Predication and Inherence in Aristotle's Categories

Abstract

In Categories and De Interpretatione (Oxford, 1963), J. L. Ackrill has performed the notable task of clearly delineating a number of questions and alternative answers to these questions involved in the interpretation of Aristotle's discussions about predication and inherence in the Categories. As a result of Ackrill's excellent translation and penetrating analysis of the text of the Categories, we have arrived at a point at which Aristotle's early distinction between predication and inherence may be discussed with some degree of exactness and clarity. Although I do not agree with everything that Ackrill has said about predication and inherence, my disagreement is grounded in an account of the text which his translation and analysis have helped to make possible. In recent papers G. E. L. Owen (Inherence, Phronesis, 1965) and J. M. E. Moravcsik (Predication in Aristotle, Philosophical Review, 1967) have attempted to improve upon Ackrill's account of Aristotle's distinction between predication and inherence. I shall use Ackrill's commentary and translation as a base from which to launch an investigation of predication and inherence in the Categories, but I shall find it convenient at times to refer to the comments of Owen and Moravcsik. I shall begin with a very rough summary of what I have to say about predication and inherence, and then discuss them in more exact terms.