Edward N. Lee, Plato On Negation and Not-Being in The Sophist

Philosophical Review
Plato on Negation and Not-Being in the Sophist

Author(s): Edward N. Lee
Source: The Philosophical Review, Vol. 81, No. 3 (Jul., 1972), pp. 267-304
Published by: Duke University Press on behalf of Philosophical Review
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PLATO ON NEGATION AND NOT-BEING

IN THE SOPHIST'
N PAGES 257c-258cof the Sophist,Plato introducesa

notionwhichhe calls the "Parts of the natureof Otherness." He thenwritesexplicitly-infact,he writesit twice-that
that Part of Otherness,and not merelyOthernessby itself,
definesthe genuine non-Beingthat is needed to conclude his
inquiryand to trap the Sophist.2But whydoes he say so? Just
what difference
is there betweenthe not-Beingexplicatedby
means of the Parts of Othernessand the not-Beingexplicated
throughOthernessby itself?I am convincedthat none of the
existinginterpretations
of the Partsdoctrineadequatelyanswer
that questionor accuratelyanalyze Plato's own meaning.My
aim will be to do both.To begin (I), we will workthroughthe
detailsofthedifficult
passagein whichPlatospellsouthisdoctrine
of the Partsof Otherness;thenwe shall tryto clarifythe philosophicalrolethatthedoctrineplays-first(II) in Plato'sanalysis
of negation (particularlyhis account of the sense of negative
predicationstatements),and then (III), thoughmore briefly,
in connectionwithone ofthewidermetaphysical
issuesraisedin
the Sophist.
I
Our passagecan be dividedintothreemain closelyconnected
phases. (A) First (in 257c5-dIi) Plato introduces and explains

his notion of a "Part of the nature of Otherness" by means of an
1 Parts I and II were read, in much shortenedform,beforethe American

PhilosophicalAssociation,EasternDivision,in December, I969 (abstractin
JournalofPhilosophy,
LXVI [i969], 784). For helpfulcriticism
at severalstages
of the paper's preparationI am gratefulto the many audienceswho gave it
both a hearingand a "workingover," but I owe mostspecial thanksto Alex
Mourelatosand to David Blankenship.
2 Theaetetus says it first,at 258b6-7,then the Strangerdoes so in his
summing-upat 258e2-3.What the Strangersays, however,seems not to be
exactlythe same as Theaetetus'point; see Sec. I (B) and n. 2i below.
267

EDWARD N. LEE
analogy with the parts or branchesof knowledge.(B) Then

(in 257di2-258aio) he arguesthateverysuch"PartofOtherness"
is, in its own way, fully as definite as, and no less real than,
any otherForm. (C) And finally(in 258aIi-c5), since at least

some such Part of Othernesscan be identifiedwith the real
natureof non-Being,he concludesthat non-Beingis also, in its
own way, fullyas definiteas, and no less real than,any other
Form. Thus the doctrineof Partsof Othernessservesto define
o'v,
the nature which genuinelyis not-Being(ErTtv OVTWs/S TO
258e3),and so to traptheelusiveSophist.We shalltakeup each
one of thesephasesof the passage in turn.Beforesettingout on
that,however,I shouldemphasizethathalfthe battlein interjust wherewe shall begin:
pretingour passagelies in beginning
thismeansisolatingthe
at 257c5 and no earlier.Most important,
doctrineofthePartsfromdetailsoftheexamplethatimmediately
precedesit in the text (the generalremarksabout negationvia
large,small,and mediumsizesat 257bi-c4). It will be quite clear
a littlelateron just what conceptualgroundsthereare forthis
thoughthatmaybe fornow,I must
separationand, bothersome
postponethefulldefenseofthisdecisivemovetillthen.3But even
now we may note certaintextualgroundsfor the procedure
of
followedhere.I shall be treating257bI-c4 as a generalization
the pointabout negation-or the particularcases of negationjust before (especially in 255e8-257aI 2).
thatPlato had presented
The lines formulatea sortof semantic corollaryto that preceding
passage, their dependency upon it being marked by the linking
introductoryparticle 8 in line 257b i, as well as by the Stranger's
parentheticalremark cs E'OLKEV in line 257b3 (a remark appealing
not to anythingintrinsicallyevident in this murkyfield, but to
what had been carefullyestablished in the preceding context).
But when, in line 257c5, the Strangermoves on to his next theme,
the Partitioning of Otherness, he uses the more abrupt,
demarcatingparticle se, not the linkingparticle 3y. Dramatically,
then,he is being shown as gentlyprodding the expositiononward
to its next and novel phase, rather than invitingTheaetetus to
3 See Sec. I (C) below,on thedistinction
betweentworolesofOthernessin
the Sophist.I returnto 257bi-c4at the veryend of thatsection.
268

PLATO ON NEGATION
notice a point which is, in all essentials, already established.4

with this,the Stranger'swordsuot. .. .palverat in
Consistently
his next line (257c7) suggest that his new point-one that he
grasps already and is here just about to unfold to Theaetetusis still, so to speak, his to impart and not quite yet available to
Theaetetus; for it will be introduced to him, not on the basis
(or not solelyon the basis) of informationalready at hand (from
255e-257a) and so shared by them both, but by way of the new
analogy to the partitioningof knowledge. (His words not ...
9XaLverat
ofthenewpoint,but
thusserveto softenhisintroduction
they of course do not qualify the forceof his commitmentto the

point's validity.) All these features of the subtle stylisticand
dramatic "break" between our passage and its preceding context
will receive full conceptual clarificationin due course. To arrive
at that, we must turn now to the details of each phase of our
passage-starting whereit starts,at 257c5.
(A) Phase One-the Basic Analogy.In order to introduce and to
explain his notion, Parts of Otherness, Plato uses as an example
the partitioningof knowledge(Jmor4r1't) intoits several branches.
Most commentatorshave been content merely to mention and
skim over the analogy; some ignore it entirely,regarding it, no
doubt, as a merely"literary" embellishment.None, I think,have
attentiveto its structureand its force. It proves
been sufficiently
4 The difference
betweenlines 257bi and C5 lies not only in the particles
word order: 2Cwop6VS Ka' -rae
employedbut even in theirsubtlydifferent
both assumesand buildsupon (83) an initialpositionsharedby speakerand
signals the speaker's departurefromthat
hearer, while ro'& 8E 8tavoq7o16Ev
contextand his introductionof some novelty.The differenceis like that
point about the
betweena guide's invitinghis chargesto noticeone further
them
place where theyare already standing,and his inviting-cum-directing
to move along a ways to some otherplace-one knownin advance to him,
but not to the personsguided: "And let's notice,too, thisfeatureofthe ruins
visiblefromhere" vs. "This way now,please, and watchyourfooting."Once
we can also easily appreciatethe reasonsand the
attunedto thisdifference,
subtle courtesybehind the Stranger'sadded remarkin c5-part concessive,
part admonishing-c Kali aol. aVV8OK6Z. Such nuancesofverbal courtesyappear
oftenin the dialogues,and indeed provide a subject of studyin theirown
undihrerAuswirkung
Urbanitit
right.(Cf. Kurt Lammermann,Vonderattischen
in derSprache[Gbttingen,1935].) Our interesthere,of course,is not to notice
Plato'sdepictingofthenuanceforitsownsake,butas a markeroftheintended
ofhis subjectmatter.
stepsin his exposition:hissegmentation
269

ED WARD NC.LEE
fundamentalfor the present account and so I give it the most

detailed scrutiny.5
The various areas or branches of knowledge get partitioned
off from the undifferentiatedgeneral notion, knowledge, and
so come to have theirvarious specificnames, depending upon the
special field with which, in each instance, the knowledge is
concerned. Knowledge concerned with harmonies and rhythm
is (let us say) what we call "music"; knowledgeabout lettersand
syntax (say) is "grammar"; knowledge about numbers,
"arithmetic"; knowledge about woodworking, "carpentry";
and so forth. Knowledge is itselfone general and unspecified
notion, but each branch of it is marked offas a specificbranch,
and gets its specific name, according as it is directed to some
specificsubject matter(257cI o-d2).
Now, according to Plato, the one general notion of Otherness
gets "parceled out" or "apportioned" in just the same way as
does knowledge.6 That is to say, then, Otherness too is "partitioned" as itis directedto various otherspecificbeings.The notion
5 Obvious as thisstrategy
may appear, I shouldwarn the readerthatit is
almostneverto be foundin the extensiveliteratureon the Sophist.Even in
Prof.Owen's denselyargued,magisterialessay,thereis scarcelya word on
the topic ("Plato on Not-Being,"in G. Vlastos [ed.], PlatoI: Metaphysics
and
Epistemology
[Garden City, 1971], pp. 223-267). He does writeat length(esp.
pp. 231-241)
about "the carefully-worked
analogy of 257B-59B" (p. 238),
but he alwaysmeans Plato's parallel betweenthe negatingofsuch predicates
as "large" and the negatingof the verb "being," neverthe presentanalogy
with "partitioning"Knowledge. As we shall soon see, Owen's thesisthat
Plato's argument(about the negatingof the verb) is "one fromanalogy"
(p. 232) thusturnsout to be on the righttrack,but to be too weak to fitthe
textexactly.Owen writes(p. 239), "it is theanalogybetweennegating'being'
and negatingsuch termsas 'large' and 'beautiful' that governsthe next
stretchof the argument(257C5-58C5)." More to the point to say that the
governinganalogy, that betweenpartitioningKnowledge and partitioning
Otherness,here yieldsPlato an expressanalysis-the sameanalysis-forboth
ofthesenegatings.
6 257C8 KaOadTep
w74tar7
'p-q,
257d5 -raiov
TE'AToV0ETomUo.
There is no ground for
Campbell's odd idea that the analogymeans that Othernesshas just as many
branches as has knowledge-as if 257c8 read &Ja7rep (L. Campbell, The
and"Politicus"ofPlato [Oxford,i867], pp. lxxx and I59). Jowett's
"Sophistes"
old marginalcommentseems to reflecta related confusion.Other textsin
Plato use thisexample about knowledgein generaland its severalbranches,
but none in quite theway itis usedhere(cf.Rep.IV, 438c-e,Charm.i 65c-I 72C).
270

PLATO ON NEGATION
of a "Part of Otherness,"just like that of a branch of knowledge,

must thus be the notion of Otherness directed-tosome specific
being other than itself.It must be a determinationof the notion
of Otherness,via the specifyingof that item otherness-than-which,
which is, in that particular case, to be at issue.
A somewhat closer look will help us see precisely how this
analogy works.Furthermore,painfullysimple as the analogy may
seem, the most crucial move in Plato's analysis is in fact surreptitiouslyeffectedjust by means ofit, and to secure our hold upon
the whole text we must have that move clearly in view. The
followingschemas will help us to examine and to press Plato's
analogy between the parts or branches of knowledge and the
"Parts of Otherness."7
Schema D
Schema I
concerned
with
|Knowledge
Sond
directed
to
Otherness - -o
c" |t|o
11musi
not X"|
7 In these "definitional"schemas the lower framecontainsthe 6ovop.aor
firwvvpiato be
defined;the upper level represents

the definitionof the termi.e., the formulaof that essence (here a constructedor molecularessence)
whichthetermsignifies.
These schemashelpto showthattheimplicitstructure
of Plato's analogyhere in 257c-dis the same as thatmade explicitat Laws X
895d-896a(cf. also Soph.2i8b-c and Ep. VII 342a-343b).
271

ED WARD N. LEE
The firstschema illustratesa "Part ofKnowledge," theparticular

part that we call "music." According to this schema, the term
"music," an example of theparticularE'rrvv/Utat mentionedby
Plato at 257CII, is to be defined as "knowledge concerned with
sounds" (or knowledge directed to sounds, or about sounds, or
the like-however we are to renderEid i-p yLyV4LEvovin 257CIO
I).
That formulastates the essence of music. Notice that one might
also say-although more loosely-that "musicis concerned with
(or directed to) sounds." What would be "loose" about that is
that the statement does not include any specification of the
essence of music (namely, as a branch of,or type of,knowledge);
therefore,it fails to articulate the fact that music is "about"
anything,not, so to speak, "on its own," but preciselyin virtue
of the fact that it is a "knowledge": music is knowledge-concernedwith-sounds,and that is how it comes to be "about sounds."8
Returning now to our schematic diagrams, let us press the
analogy between the parts or branches of knowledge and the
Parts of Otherness. According to the second schema, the term
"not-X" is to be defined as "Otherness directed-to X" (or:
"othernessthanX"); that formulastates the essence of the not-X.
Here again, it would be possible to say that "not-X" is "directed
to (or opposed to) X." But, once again, this statementwould be
misleadinglyloose. What would be loose about it is thatit does not
include any specificationof the essence of "not-X" (namely,as a
branch of,or part of,Otherness); thereforeit failsto make explicit
the fact that the not-X is "opposed to" anything,not in virtueof
any internal propertyall its own, but preciselyin virtue of the
fact that it is an "Otherness." The not-X is otherness-than-X,
and
that is how it comes to stand in oppositionto X.
8 NoticeAristotle's
observationin Chapter8 ofthe Categories:"Knowledge,
a genus,is spokenofas just whatit is, of (or about) somethingelse (it is called
knowledgeof something);but none of the particularcases is calledjust what
it is, ofsomethingelse. For example,grammaris not called grammarof something,nor musicmusicof something.But if theyare thusspokenof at all, it
is in virtueof the genus that thesetoo are spokenof as in relationto something:grammaris called knowledgeofsomething(notgrammarofsomething)
and music knowledge of something (not music of something)" (i ia24-31,
afterAckrill).As Ackrillrightlynotes,however,the relationof knowledge

and its branchesis not properlya genus-speciesrelation.
272

PLATO ON NEGATION
I said a short while ago that the most crucial point in Plato's
analysis might be clarifiedby means of these schemas. The point
is the one that he repeatedlyurges: that the relation of the not-X
to the X must always be understoodin termsof Otherness,not of
contrariety.9The relation of the not-X to the X does not hold,
so to say, directlybetween the not-X and the X (as though those
two stood on quite the same level). The not-Xis rathera construct,
derived from the X. And just as in the case of music, its
"aboutness" (directedness,or relatedness) does not inhere in its
own nature, but derives fromits genus: music is "about" sounds
in that it is a formof knowledge (whichis about them); so is not-X
"about" X (connected with X, directed to it, or opposed to it)
only in that it is a branch of Otherness (thebranch which is
In this way, Plato's analogy serves
otherness-precisely-than-X).
to eliminate any notion of contrarietyfrom his analysis and to
operate instead with Otherness alone. By means of the analogy,
he is avoiding the followingsortof schema-one where the not-X
would stand in direct contrarietyto the X (or, rather, av3To'To
, Xto a ' To
a.L71
X).
ro TO
TO L7 X
stands in
(or: cw6I r6 As x -,relation of
to
EV /O/)contrariety
CWTO
LVTo To X
X"4
"not X""
In place of such analysis of negatives in terms of direct contrariety,he presentsan oppositionmediated by Otherness; or-to
put it moreprecisely-he presentsa reductionofthe oppositionto a
9 Plato had made thispointjust beforeour section,in lines 257b I -c4 (the
lines we have partitionedofffromour passage) and he reiteratesit at its
conclusion(258b2-3). I discussthe connection,and the difference,
between
thesetwo passages at the end of I (C) below.
273

EDWARD N. LEE
focusingof Otherness. Instead of its being the case that "not-X"

signifiessome logically simple entity that stands in logically
primitiverelations of incompatibilityor contrarietyor whatever
to the X itself,"not-X" signifiesthe logically complex or constructednotion, Otherness-than-X.
One furtheraspect of this firstphase of the passage merits
special notice beforewe move on. In these lines Plato's exposition
has moved (however transiently,as we shall see) into the formal
mode and has taken on an explicitlysemantical air of concern
with the sense of various linguistic expressions-expressions
explicitlyquoted and referredto as such, as linguisticitems. This
shiftwas to some extentprepared in 257cI-3, with its point about
the negation sign and its explicit distinctionbetweencvota-ra and
the -apacypa-rathey signify.10In our first phase, he similarly
distinguishesthe various branches of knowledge and the specific
title or JrTwvvdcta which each branch will "have" (257cIo-di);
developing the analogy, the term "not beautiful" is also referred
to as an "expression"(257d9 ErTCwvvpia).The immediatelyfollowing,
and otherwise parallel, examples in 257e-258a, however,will be
dealt with in the material mode, and by the time the crucial case
of ro',5 6'vis reached, Plato's gripon the formalmode faltersto the
point of his committinga catachresis: thoughhe draws at 258b2-3
the same semantic moral he had drawn at 257b3-c3(namely,that
the analysis-although a different
analysis this time-is all done
in termsof Othernessand not of contrariety),he therefails to say
that the expression
Tor 7 oVis what "signifies"an othernessrather
than a contrariety,and says instead that the antithesisitself-the
very one that that expression names-is what thus signifies
10 So littlehad therebeen of this semanticfocusthroughthe entirepreofthekinds(25 id ff.)thattheStranger
cedingsectionon theintercommunion
firstmisstateshis semanticgeneralizationin 257b9-cI-giving it, so to speak,
as an overlysimpleverbal point-and then,correctinghimself,proceedsto
stateitmoreadequately(cI -3). No doubtPlato putsin thisbitofself-correction
expositionof the
(much too quicklyrightedto shake trustin the sure-footed
and
de nomine
Stranger)to accentuatethe distinctionbetweenconsiderations
de re. (Cf. R. B. Levinson'spoint in Anton and Kustas [eds.],
considerations
[Albany, 1971], pp. 275-276.) It thushelps
GreekPhilosophy
Essaysin Ancient
in thisfirst
effecta transitionto the more explicitlysemanticconsiderations
phase of our passage.
274

PLA TO ONJNEGATION
(.
...avn'aemg...
arjLaivovaa [258aI i-b3]).11 That slip, however,
lies well ahead of us at the presentpoint. Within this firstphase
of the passage, Plato keeps very carefully to his definitional
schemas and to the formalmode. His care and explicitnessin this
regard attest to the fact that his basic analogy with the parts or
branches of knowledge was quite specificallydesigned to analyze
the sense of certain E'wovvpat-to wit, of negative expressions.
is "the not(His only explicit example of a negative J7rwvvtuaa
beautiful"-that is, no pL) KaAov-but the example is easily generalized: the Part of Otherness which is opposed to any item X
will have as the general form of its name "not-X"-that is, ro
71 X.) His analogy establishesnot only howsuch negative expressions have theirsense, but also, and more basically still,that they
do have a sense, a fullydeterminatesense that can be definedand
thus can be validly thoughtand said. That negative expressions
do have fully determinate sense Plato brings out here by the
remark that that Part of Otherness called the "not-beautiful"
is "the other of nothingelse but that nature of the beautiful"
(di o- i i); for the OVK aAO I-t formula which he uses to state this
point in di i is a fairlycommon formulafordefinitenessof sensefor example, in the very statingof definitions.'2Recent work on
Parmenides has helped to show just how appropriate and crucial
this semantic move is to the removingof Parmenides' roadblocks
from the way of not-being.'3 Thinking backward (so to say)
11 The slip, to be sure, is slightenough, and easily set right.(For a resemblingcase in Aristotle,see Cat. 3bIO-12 and Ackrill'scommentsad loc.)
12 See, e.g., the references
in M. Frede, "Prddikation
undExistenzaussage,"
xviii (i967), 88, n. i. For thisand relatedpointsabout deterHypomnemata,
minacy of sense,see also my paper, "On Plato's Timaeus49D4-E7," American
LXXXVIII (I967), 22-25.
JournalofPhilosophy,
13 On the (seemingly)
indeterminate
senseof negativeexpressionsas a key
to Parmenides'rejectionofthe "Way ofWhat-Is-Not,"see especiallyA. P. D.
(New Haven, 1970), Ch. 3, "The Vagueness
Mourelatos,TheRouteofParmenides
Parmenidesof courseshapes a great
of What-Is-Not."Plato's aim of refuting
but it will returnto centerstagejust at the climax of our
deal of the Sophist,
presentpassage (258c6 ff.) and in view of the increasinglypointed antiParmenideanthrustofPlato's argument,as he movestowardthatdenouement,
I findit temptingto hear in the Stranger'ssomewhatroundaboutquestionat
257dg an allusion to Parmenides'word aveivv1tov(in B8.I7). The lines that
Plato will be quotingin fullat 258d2-3(linesB7.I -2) directtheyouthto hold
back his vo',ua fromthe Way of non-Being,and B8.I7 verysimilarlydirects
275

ED WARD N. LEE
about Plato's writingofthe Sophist,it seemslikelythat the doctrine

of the Parts of Othernesswas devised as a tool of semanticanalysis
to give Plato's answer to part of the problem about the sense of
negative expressions.Certainly,the fact that the "names" of the
Parts are negated expressionsis no more a coincidence than is the
"turning up" of justice in the Republic.But we need to finish
tracing Plato's thought in our passage before turning to its
philosophical significance.
(B) Phase Two-the BeingoftheParts.In 257c5-dIi (our "Phase
One") the Strangerhad introducedhis notion,Parts of Otherness.
At 257dI2 he rallies Theaetetus to observe the next point about
them,and begins to negotiatea shiftfromthe formalmode of that
phase to the material mode of this: from his semantic remarks
about the sense of certain rwevvatcua
to a point about the "being"
of the Parts-the fact that they no less fully"are" than are such
Forms as the Beautiful,the Large, and the rest.I shall be speaking
of "the being of the Parts" so as to follow Plato here, but that
somewhat odd idiom must not give rise to any notions that he is
here out to establish the kind of existence
Parts may have: "what
sortsof thingsthey are"; whetherthey float with othersin some
platonic heaven, subsist-or do not subsist-in our minds or a
Cosmic Mind, or whatever. All talk of their being (Etvat) here
in 257e-258a comes to nothing more than saying that they are
every bit as determinatein content,preciselyas well defined,as
the simple positive natures which they are "opposed to." To say
the Parts are is just to say that they have such definitenatures;
forto talk about theirbeing is to talk about theirnature-that, is,
about the nature that they are: it is not to talk about the nature
of their being.14So much by way of caveat.I proceed to Plato's
as well. Plato followsthe
that that Way be "left" as aVo7yTov, adding avdwvv~uov
injunctionin so faras he "says goodbye"to any contraryofwhat-is(258e7-8),
ovcan be definedand thoughtwithbut in our passage he willshowthatTo',uX
out involvingany contrariety-thusthat it is not aVo'yTov, unknowableand
unthinkable(cf. also B2.7-8); and he will show that preciselyby using the
analogywithParts of Knowledgeto explain the sense of the name by which
we call it (258b5-7),showingthus that it is not-and need not be "left"avovvwov.
14 It may perhapsappear to someperverse

on Plato's part (or else on mine
in thusinterpreting
him) to speak about the "being of the Parts" if "all that
276

PLATO ON NVEGATION
statementsas to just what the being of a Part of Othernessconsists

in.
His conclusion is stated in oblique and summary terms in
257e6: it is that the being of the "not-beautiful" (as, indeed, of
any Part of Otherness) consistsin "a sort of opposition of entity
to entity";in an opposition(Jvi-i0Eats-)holdingbetweenone being
and another being. But what sort of "antithesis," and between

whichbeings? For an answer to that we are forced back to the
preceding, much-contested sentence, 257e2-4. Although the
translators and commentators have differed widely in their
of theirnature.The feelingmay persist

that means" is the determinateness
that somethingmoreis needed for talk to concern"the being of a thing":
some sortof
such talkmustalso treatitssubjectas an entity-as a something,
thingor individual. ("If the being of a Form is just its nature,what's the
natureof the being that that natureis the natureof?") This is no place for
chasingdown thisvague but importantassumptionabout what an ontology
"mustbe." (The assumptionis, I suspect,thereal forcebehindall thoseinterpretationsof the SophistwithwhichOwen wrestlesin the essaycited above.)
Sufficeit to say that Plato, as I understandhim,rejectsit. The view that"a
being" is at bottomsomesortofthingor individual-whethera physicalthing
likean ox, a mentalthinglike a pain, an "abstractentity"(an ideal "Thing"
like an Eternal Idea) or whatever-all such views about the ultimacyof
thinghoodare rejectedby him, in the crypticbut fundamentalpassage at
Tim. 52b3-dI,as so manyformsof "dreaming."They projectthe referential
habits fromour pointingat and talkingabout perceptiblethings,onto our
conceptionof thinkingabout and talkingabout everysubjectmatter(so that
even the mind is thoughtof as a spectatorof ideal items"situated" in some
"place" thatwe can, so to say,mentallypointat or attendto). But theassumptiononlyembodiesa pervasivehuman tendency-a kindofprejudicelearned
of Plato is reallyto
fromthe senses.And to pressit upon the interpretation
saddle him with the very viewpointhe is tryingto reduce away. (Cf. my
in The Monist,50 [I966], 363.)
remarksabout his use of the image-metaphor
To be sure, the "Platonism" or "Platonic Realism" that everyschoolboy
knowsconsistspreciselyin maintainingthat thereexistideal or nonphysical
things(as well as the physicalthingsaround us); but Plato's own "Realism"
ratherconsistsin rejectingthe primacyof thinghood(in a sense: of existence
"being" or "reality"with"determinacyofnature"
questions)and identifying
kinds of "things"). Anything
kinds of determinacyfor different
(different
and stablenature,just so long as
whatsoeverthathas or showsa determinate
and in that it does so, "genuinelyis" (n.b. Laws X 894a5-8). I wrotein the
textabove thatPlato's talkofbeingcomesto "nothingmore" thantalkabout
determinatenatures.But the idea that anything"more" mustbe said is just
the old prejudice; more correctto say it comes to nothingless: forhim the
centralfact-or wonder-in realityis preciselysuch determinacyof nature,
which,rightlyunderstood,encompassesall that thereis to say and know.
277

ED WARD N. LEE
reading of those lines, I feel the sense can be established beyond

any reasonable doubt.What Plato says in those lines-but says
terriblystarklyand abstractly-is the following:
Isn't it as markedofffromone specifickind among beingsand, on
the other hand, opposed to a particularbeing-isn't that how it
comes about that the not-beautiful
is?15
But which is the first"specific kind among beings" here, and
which is the second "particular being"? And what is the relation
between the "marking off" and the "being opposed to"? (Are
they two separate, perhaps successive, "constitutingacts," or
are they two distinctaspects of one and the same?)
To make shortworkofa long argument:the precedingexample
about knowledge surely lets us settle these questions.Just as he
15 Taking ciAWo
-t as nonne.Owen favorsa different
construction(op. cit.,
p. 239, n. 32) but his seemsto me untenable.(a) Plato is herejust beginning
to establishthatthe not-Beautiful
no lessfully"is" than is the Beautifulitself
(eg ff.). He could scarcelybeginthismove by simplytakingforgrantedwhat
he is about to show:werehe able to startoff(as on Owen's view he does) by
referringto the not-Beautiful as cAo rTtrv OVTWv,he would have no need then
to explain (as he does in e2-4) how it comesto be such,so as thento be able
to say (in e6-7) thatit is such. Most of e2-7 would be purelysuperfluous:he
would already be where he is going. Further(b), the phrase &Ao rT (some
other,one ofsometwo) seemsmuch too indefinite
a reference
here,when that
Part has just been clearlyspecifiedin d7-1i. Nor can it be taken as made
definitein the context of "the antithesis . . . DAo rtTOrvO'VTv-7Tpos0 t -r-6v

Ovi-orv";
for taking it so presupposesthe succeedingcontext (e6-7) that is not yet
available here in e2, and thus cannot serve to make the referentialforce
of DAAo
Tt sufficiently
determinate.(It would be a different
storywere the
aAAoTt not initial,but made specificin relationto othertermsprecedingitAnTr6v 0v-rwvat Phaedo 74ei-2-but that is not true here.) And finally
cf. JaAo
(c), Owen's versionsurelylosesall theforceofe3 o'VIM.
The Stranger'squestion
in e2-4 essentiallyre-describesthe processof partitioning
just introducedin
c7-dII, and concernsprimarilythe way it comes about that the not-Beautiful
is; its focus is thus the conjunct,two-waydependencyfirstdescribedby
a; wa'AtvavTr&EOv, and then
Kacp' evog -rcv oivcov> a'popwaOEvKa& Tpos iT Trcvovmrov
to by ovrrco.
referred
But Owen (ibid., 11.3-6), by projectingdirectlyback from
the next lines (e6-7) theirantithesisbetween two 0v-ra,quite eclipsesPlato's
own co-ordinationof these two directionsof the not-Beautiful's
dependency
otherthanitself;thushe losesboththecomplementing,
upon WvMra
co-ordinating
forceof a; wdkAtv
and the proper,complexantecedentforoi-rw.In fact,Owen's
own translation(ibid., 11. 11-13) seems to call forsomethinglike "-ovi-roo-ro"
or "c-oi -t -rocolo-rov~v,"
ratherthan ovil-co,in e3.
278

PLATO O N NEGATION
earliersaid thatthevariousbranchesofknowledgeare "marked

'aioptr0e'v) fromtheone generalnotionofknowledge
(by theirbeing directedat various particularfields),here he
must be sayingthat the Parts of Othernessare "markedoff"
(257e2
d'poptawev) fromthe one generalnotionof Otherness:that
is, the first"specifickind among beings"to whichhe refersin
257e2-4 mustbe thenatureofOtherness.16
If thefirst
ofthebeingsherereferred
tois Otherness,
thesecond,
obviouslyenough, is the Beautiful.But what is the relation
betweenthetwoconstituting
momentsof"markingoff"fromthe
one and "beingopposed"totheother?I. M. Crombiehasrecently
suggestedthat the "relativelyemphatic phrase 'then again'
(au palin) suggeststhat two points are made in this sentence
and not the same pointtwiceover."17But Plato's own example
about knowledgeagain enables us to see that the truthfalls
the same point (thatabout
betweenCrombie'stwo alternatives:
the not-beautiful)
is made here"twiceover,"but it
constituting
is made fromtwo distinctand complementary
pointsof view:
is
that "Part of Otherness"which we call the "not-beautiful"
indeed"markedoff"fromone being-fromtheunitarynatureof
Otherness-butit is thus "markedoff" preciselyby its being
"opposed to" anotherbeing-the natureof the beautiful.The
off" (257c1 I
16
Dies has the sense right,and with the rightreasons (Platon:le Sophiste
[Paris, I955], p. 372, n. 2). Cornfordunaccountably assumed that the Beautiful
is meant (Plato's Theory

of Knowledge
[London, 1935], p. 29I, n. i); he does
not justifythat reading, however,and Frede (op. cit., pp. 86-87) rightly
rejectsit, his own readingagreeingwithDies and withmine.Despite Owen's
on the construction
of the line (see precedingnote), he
otherdisagreements
of the firstye'vos,
agrees in thisidentification
concerned(his n. 32, 11.6-15).
I cannotshareOwen's view thatboththe different
and itspartsmustherebe
understoodas classes,however,(ibid.,11.9, 12, 15-2i). That appears to me to
run agroundon the basic analogywithparceling-upKnowledge,whereclassconceptionsdo not seem to apply. Neitherdo his cited parallelsestablishhis
case at 229c) about thesubdivision
view:ourpassageis not (liketheinteresting
of a genuswhereone itemis picked out fromothersat its own level by "opposingit" to all ofthem
collectively;noris it (like23ib and 268d) one stepin a
definition
by a seriesofdivisions;I ofcourseagree that257c1 I is a parallelbut not thatit supportsOwen's view. (On the extensionalist
premisesof this
Sec. II below,)
class-interpretation
see further
17 J. M. Crombie,An Examination
of Plato's Doctrines,
2 (London, I963),
409,
11.1-3.
279

EDWARD N. LEE
two clauses thus do not representsuccessive or even separable

"moments" in this constitution.It is preciselyin and throughits
being focused specificallyon (or, in Plato's term, "opposed to")
the Beautiful that that "Part of Otherness" which we call the
"not-beautiful" comes to be "marked off" from the unfocused
nature of Othernessitself.
With lines 257e2-4 securely under control, we can better
understand Plato's next, summary remark (257e6-7) that the
being of the not-beautifulconsistsin a "sort of opposition of one
being toward another being." Taken strictly,if a bit woodenly,
with the lines just before, this might seem to imply that the
opposition holds between Otherness itself,as the firstof the ov a
just referredto as ov'i-aback in e2-3,and the Beautifulas the second.
But that would in fact be very odd. Plato's usual way of talking
all throughthispassage is to say that the Part of Otherness,never
Otherness itself,is what "stands opposed" to the other specified
being.18 Nor could he here be making one exception, saying
Othernessitself,Othernessrather than its Part, is a base termof
the antithesis.He could not,formereOtherness-unfocused, undirected, non-determined Otherness-is precisely that: unfocused
and undetermined. Just as such, it cannot properly be what
stands in antithesis to anything; for were it standing thus, it
would not be unfocusedbut would, by that very fact,already be
"partitioned": it would be a Part ofOthernessinstead ofOtherness
itself.19
The rightview is ratherthat lines e6-7 startoffby invokingthe
point just made in e2-4 about the being of the not-beautiful:
having explained there howit comes about that the not-beautiful
"is," Plato now can take it (e6 &4and os !'OCKEV) thatit is; thusthe
referentof his first,emphatically placed word ovi-osg
must be the
not-beautifulitself,that whose status as an o'v had just been
established. (The subsequent item in e6-apos o'v av-rW0Ecs'18 Thus at 257d7, and immediately before our passage, in 257e2-4 itself.
And consistentlythereafter,at 258ai i-bi and 258e2.
19 Furthermore, on the "mechanical" reading of v5roghere under attack,
e6-7 would not follow at all from e2-4: for e2-4 says (both on Owen's reading
and on mine) that what is marked offfrom Otherness, not Otherness itself,
stands in opposition to the Beautiful.
280

PLATO ON NEGATION
reiteratesthe second moment frome3; what is novel here is that

the "bearer" ofthisantithesisis itselfan o5v: Vros .5..
acv~-rWEaCS.)
But then, to catch the sense of e6-7 right,its full pleonastic force
must be retained. It does not say (as a too-simplereading might
take it) that the not-beautifulis one item consistingin an antithesis
between two items other than itself.The initial genitiveis, so to
say, "subjective" or explicative: that antithesisto the beautiful
which is preciselywhat the not-beautifulis, has itselfthe statusof
an o', and thereforecan be referredto as "the antithesisof an owv
toward the beautiful." Such, I submit, is the sense of 257e6-7:
V~ ~
or)
ovrosI
Tp6s7
&o
As
a5VT10EMS,
usEO
K,
En
Elval
fts-
I
E
aWvEt
To Ad
20
'V.
KaAov.0
Thus far, we have been dealing only with Plato's very first
remarksabout the antithesisthat constitutesa Part of Otherness,
the remarksin 257e2-6. His two later referencesto thisopposition
each raise complex problems of theirown, but we shall deal with
these two briefly,so as to testout our presentview of the components in that opposition. At 258ai I-b3, Plato bringshis resultsto
20 Owen, arguingforhis reading of 257e2-4 (on which see n.
I5 above),
saysthatany otherreadingofit "does not thenlead directlyto theconclusion
in 257E6-7,that'not-beautiful'
a contrastbetweentwo things-thatrepresents
are" (his n. 32, 11.3-6). But on the presentreadingof the two, e6-7 follows
more "directly"than on Owen's own. On his view, e2-4 beginsby referring
as AAoTt -cv OTvwv,addingthenthatit is markedofffrom
to the not-beautiful
one class and contrastedwithanotherbeing (cf. his 11.III-I 3). But e6-7 then
locatesthe beingofthe not-beautiful
just in thatlattermomentof"contrast.'"
Owen's sequence thusrunslike this:
(i) One thing-that-is
(A), marked-off
(B) froma given class (C) and
moreovercontrasted(D) withone thing-that-is
(E)-isn't that (i.e.,
A, fleshedout withB-E) what the n-b turnsout to be?
(ii) So the n-b turnsto be a contrast(D!) of one thing-that-is
(A) and
another(E).
While on the presentreadingit would run like this:
(i) Isn't thisthe way it goes: by beingmarkedoff(A) fromone specific
thing-that-is
(B) and on the otherhand opposed (C) to a particular
thing-that-is
(D)-isn't that how it comes about that n-b (E) is?
(ii) So (since n-b is [by (i)], and since, roughlyspeaking,A = C) the
n-b (E) turnsout to be the contrast(C) betweena being (E) and
anotherbeing (D).
If thisstillseemspuzzling,that will prove to be because it is elusiveto say
what the beingofa truenon-being
does consistin (moreon thisin section[C]
below): the not-beautiful
provesto be a beingwhosenaturetotallyconsistsin
antithesis-to-another-being.
28i

ED)WARD N. LEE
bear upon that specific Part of Otherness which stands opposed

to nothingless than the nature of Being Itself(aV'T'- To OV 258b2).21
This specificcase of oppositionis the one thatTheaetetus proceeds
to identifyand to welcome as the not-beingwhich theyhave been
seekingin order to capture the sophist.The language with which
Plato specifies this opposition is extremelyelliptical, however,
and has been veryvariouslyconstrued.Some idea of the syntactic
problem may be conveyed just by a sketch of the alternatives:
Plato refershere to an opposition (antithesis):22
i
(a)
of the Nature of a Part of Otherness (Fowler,

Deuschle, Muller, Wiehl);
The specificForm Being Itselfmust be meant here: 258b2 av' roD Too
is specificallythat Form,just as back in 257aI TO OV aV'TO. Indeed, the
patternof the argumentis the same in both passages: (i) the Strangerfirst
deals with straightforward,
cases (256ci-e3/257e9-258a5),
non-inflammatory
then (ii) providesa generalizationof his point (256e5-6/258a7-9),
and then
(iii), arguingby simplespecification,
concludesthatthatpointmustapply to
the instanceof Being Itself(257ai-6/258aio-b3). At any rate,that is how his
argumentappears.
But even ifthespecificForm"Being Itself"is meantin (iii),
thatofcourseprovesnothingabout whatit meansto mean thatForm. It could
be argued that,althoughthe move from(ii) to (iii) is, so to speak,rhetorically
the "mere" instantiation
of a generalprinciple(applyingit to thatparticular
ofthemoveis ratherthat (iii) is anotherway of
Form), thephilosophicalforce
statingthat same generalprinciple:the principleis firstestablished(ii) for
any values of X in "a is not-X,"and thenis restated(iii) in termsof"a not-is
(sc., not-isX, forthatsame range ofvalues of X)." (Cf. Owen's case forthe
argumentby "analogy," refs.in n. 5 above.) These twowaysoftaking(iii)and withit themovefrom(ii) to (iii)-seem even to showup in thedialogue:
at 258b6-7,Theaetetusseemsto take it in the first,restricted
sense-i.e., to
feel that what theyhave been seekingis an antithesisspecificallyto Being
Itself(as ifthatweresomesingleitemon a par withothers).And theStranger's
rhetoric,at least, has certainlyencouraged that impression(cf. his summarizing "build-up" fromnon-inflammatory
cases to not-Being-omitting
step [ii] entirely-in258b8-c3).Yet, as we shall see, the Stranger'sown final
summary(at 258d5-e3)is fullygeneral in scope, taking (iii) in the second,
fullygeneral sense. And the latter is surelyPlato's intention:Theaetetus'
treatingBeing Itselfas a specificitemamong othersperhapsgoes along with
his "stillbeingat a distancefromrealities"(234e); it involvesthesame sortof
to in n. I4 above.
ontologicalerrorwe referred
22 Here I deliberately
retainthe construction-anawkwardone in English
- "an oppositionof x and ofy" (instead of the more lucid "an opposition
betweenx andy") in orderbetterto conveytheambiguitiesof thegenitivesin
Plato's Greek.We shall returnto the otherconstruction
shortly.
21
ovros
282

PLATO ON NEGATION
or (b) of a Part of the Nature of Otherness(Cornford,

Dies, Taylor,Campbell,Apelt,Robin,Frede);
and 2 (a) <ofa Part>ofBeing(Taylor,Apelt);
or (b) <ofthenature>ofBeing (Fowler,Deuschle,Muller,
Stallbaum,Heindorf,Wiehl);
or (c) <of a Part of the Nature> of Being (Cornford,
Dies, Campbell,Robin,Frede).
Amid this scatterof alternatives,it is difficultto feel great
confidence;whatis more,even thosewho have agreedwithone
oftheGreekhavewidelydisagreed
anotherabouttheconstruction
as to just whatit means.23For myown part,however,I believe
the rightreadingsmustbe i (b) and 2(b); thusthe sensewould
back now to the clearerEnglishidiom
run as follows(switching
of "oppositionbetweenx and y"): "the reciprocalopposition
obtainingbetweena Part of the Nature of Othernessand the
NatureofBeing." And on thisconstruction
(as perhapson some
of the others) 258ai i-bi quite agrees with our reading of
257e2-4.
I cannotherearguein detailforthiswayofreading258ai i-bi,

but one fundamentalpoint needs mentioning:although2 (c)
is certainlysyntactically
possible,it seemsto me impossible,in
viewofthecontentofthispassage,thatPlato shouldbe referring
to thesecondtermof the antithesis
as a "Part ofBeing" or as a
"Part of the Nature of Being." For althoughhe has carefully
introduceda meaningfor the notion,Parts of Otherness,no
meaningat all has herebeen establishedforthe notion,Partsof
Being;neitheris it clear how any couldbe establishedalong the
lines of Plato's own analogy to branchesof knowledge,the
analogy governingour passage. Thus, while many interpreters
appear to assume that any single Form may be referredto
easilyenoughas a "Part of Being"-say, as one chessman is a
part of a set, or one man a part of a crowd-that simply is not
23 Thus Cornford
and Dies agree on (ii) c, but Dies takesit as Plato's way
of referring
to the specificForm of Being (op. cit., p. 373, n. i), whereas
Cornfordthinksthatany specificForm-beingmay be meant (op. cit.,p. 292,
n. i). As suggestedin n. 2 I above, such differences
may not be unresolvable.
283

ED WARD N. LEE
justified by Plato's carefullycontrolled use of the term "Part"

in thispassage.24
In the Stranger's concluding summary (258d5-e3), Plato refers
for the last time in the dialogue to his doctrine of antithesis:
"we have dared to say about the Part of it [sc., of the nature of
Otherness,cf.d7] which stands opposed to any specificbeing, that
preciselythat <Part> really is what-is-not(io- ,) ov)." Again, the
Greek has been very variously construed, but, to be brief,my
view is this: it is a generalizingphrase, sayingthistime that every
case of a Part of Otherness-that is to say, every case in which
Otherness is focused upon some specific Form-being (apok TO' &V
/K cLTOV
...
v-(0GE1LEvov)-is
a case of that antithesiswhich
constitutes the being of (any) non-Being. This is not, then,

the same restrictedpoint which (at least seemingly) he made in
258a1i-b3, one concerned specifically with opposition to the
nature of Being Itself (a-ro' TO- 0v b2), but a more general point
encompassing every possible case of non-being.Just as each and
every branch of knowledge gets its distinctivename according
as it is directed to some specific field (notice icKauirov back in
branchis determinate(each is an "each"-E'Kauiov)
257CI i )-each
according as it is directed to some determinate field-so each
and every Part of Othernessis determinateas it stands in oppositionto some determinateForm (wpOS TO' ov E'KauTov. . ..avTrt0LEEvov) .25
in 258b (op. cit., p.

Owen also holds that we should not supply,uoptov
n. 33). Frede has a curiousargument(op. cit., pp. 91-92) that EKaarov
in the Stranger'ssummaryat 258e2 showsthat poptOvmustbe suppliedback
at 258bi, else the EKaarovwouldhave no basis in the earlierargument.To me
it seemsclear that the cases surveyedin 257d7-258a5,along withthe explicit
generalizationin 258a7, provide ample basis for that generalizingEKaarov.
Frede takes no pains to show what the idiom "a
Like othercommentators,
Part of Being" would mean here (especiallywith the sense of "Parts" here
carefullyintroducedby Plato), but merelycasuallyasserts"dass Verschiedenvon einemTeil des Seienden
heit vom Seienden immernur Verschiedenheit
ist."
to sayingthatit is
25 Saying that a Form is OKaaiov is actuallytantamount
an eAos Ev (258c3)-a definite,single Form: cf. Plato's formulationof the
24
239,
Here at Soph. 258e2,

(and cf. Parm. 132ai-5).
sense of EKaaTov at Parm. i58ai-3
I feel that the force of EKaarov goes, in a way, with both6v and o6ptov:it goes
grammaticallywith the former,but derivativelywith the latter,since each

determinatePart of Othernessis opposed to some determinateForm and
reallyis thatofthe Formto whichit is directed,
since,indeed,itsdeterminacy
284

PLATO ON NEGATION
(C) PhaseThree-the
Beingof TrueNot-Being.
I turnnow to the
lastphaseofthepassagedefining
thatroleofOthernessbywhich
it constitutes
genuinenon-being.We have seen that a Part of
Otherness,thoughit is in one sense groundedin the being of
Othernessitself,really receivesits determination(as thePart
which it preciselyis) fromthat being (Form) to which it is
opposed. It is not merelya segmentation
of Otherness-a kind
of piece of Otherness(cf.the sail in the Parmenides):
thatwould
put the case too weaklyand too one-sidedly.26
It is ratherconstituted
bythefocusing
ofOthernessuponsomeotherdeterminate
x. Thus its nature-its being-consistsin the two together:in
otherness-than-some-x.
Butnotetheconsequence:otherness-thansome-xis preciselynot-being-that-x.
The nature of a Part of
Othernessthusconsistsin: not-beingsome otherspecifiedbeing.
The PartofOthernessis thusa beingwhosebeing(thatis,whose
nature)consists
in itsnot-being;and thatis whyit can be
precisely
said to be ove-wsTo'1uq ov (258e2-3):thenot-beingwhich
properly
reallyis NOT-being.
We can best make clear the forceof Plato's point here by
his doctrinein our passage withhis earlierremarks
contrasting
about theroleofOtherness.In thepagesjust beforeour passage
on the Parts of Otherness(that is, 25id-257a) Plato had held
thatthereis intercommunion
amongForms,and thatOtherness
so pervadestheworldof FormsthateveryFormwhichis is also
(besidesbeing itself)otherthan everyotherForm. Since each
Formis "otherthan" everyotherForm,it "is not" everyother
one ofthoseForms.Therewas thusalreadya perfectly
clearsense
fortheterm"not-Being"or "thatwhichis not" (no,) tv): indeed,
shapingitself,so to say, as the complementofjust thatdeterminatecontent
and thus derivativelydeterminatethroughits specific,constitutive
otherness
thanthat(cf.257di i). Owen's readingofovCKdaaov ("the beingofany subject,"
op. cit.,n. 33) seemsunnecessary.
26 258a7-9 is no exceptionto this point, thoughit mightlook like one.
Plato theresays that,given that Othernessis an ov, its Parts are necessarily
ovTa no less than it itselfis. But he is merelygeneralizingfor all Parts of
Othernessthe pointhe has just made about threeinstances(in 257e2-258a5).
This line is not expressingthe conditionsnecessaryfortherebeingany Parts;
it presupposesthe partitioningof Otherness'and is not explaininghow that
happens. That will stillrequiretheir"constitution"via focusingupon some
otheritemand antithesisto that.
285

ED WARD N. LEE
each and everyForm will be an example of "what is not" in this

sense,foreach one is not (that is, is otherthan) each and all of the
others. (Plato makes all these conclusions quite explicit at
256d8-e6.)
This analysis was clearly very limited, however. The sense of
"what is not" which it establishesis ofcourse a perfectlylegitimate
one, as faras it goes,27yet "what is not," in thissense,is something
which also fullyis, in itself.Its being a (case of) non-Beingsupervenes,as I shall put it, upon its already, and independently,being.
Let us suppose that two Forms A and B both are. Each then is
what it is in the fullnessand individual specificityofits own being.
Presumably,were it not for the nature of otherness,they could
not even be other-than-each-other;each would simply be.
The nature of othernessdoes, however, pervade the being of all
form-naturesand thus constitutestwo "non-Beings" from the
individual being of A and B: to wit, A's non-being (that is, its
not-being-B; its being-other-than-B)and B's non-being (that is,
its not being A). Clearly, in such a case our calling A and B
"non-Beings" does not compromiseat all theirbeing beingsin the
fullestpossible sense. Indeed, it presupposesit. Only because each
being is, by itself,what it is, can the two be cases of not-being-theother. Here (as I put it before) their non-Being supervenes
upon
their prior, independent being. It obtains, so to say, across the
intervalor logical distance between two individually established,
distinctbeings.
Such was Plato's point about non-Being earlier. So limited is
it that it seems clear enough why he would not leave that his
final word on the subject, as a fully adequate account of nonBeing. With the doctrineof the Parts of Otherness,he introduces
a distinctand strongernotion of not-Being.Although non-Being
here must still be analyzed in termsof otherness,that otherness
role. It no longerpresupposestwo separately
now plays a different
27 Hence at 256d8 Motion was already called OcV-rSSOVK c5v in that it is a
Form genuinelyother than the Form Being. Althoughthat sense of EvewsW
OVK 3v was tied exclusively
to OthernessthanBeing,the immediately
following
generalization(256e5-257a5)showsthateach Form'sothernessthananyother
Form makesit equally genuinelya case ofa ye ov. (Thus in 257ai-6 it can be
deduced thateven Being Itselfmustin thissensebe a not-being.)
286

PLATO ON NEGATION
given,separatelydistinctdeterminaciesas relata (as in its "supervenient" role). Instead, it plays what I shall dub a constitutive
role: Otherness itself,in conjunction with some one other term,
now serves (as explained before)to constitutethe being of a novel
nature, the nature of a "Part of Otherness." Through this
constitutiverole, each Part of Othernesswill be somethingwhose
whole nature consists in this: in otherness-thansome other
specifiednature. It will thereforebe somethingwhose "nature"
(thus, whose being) consists in its not-being-something-else.
In
its earlier, "supervenient" role, Otherness served to define nonbeings which were also somethingin and of themselves,of their
own proper nature. But its constitutiverole-that is, the doctrine
of the Parts of Otherness-defines a non-Being which is notalso
something in and of itself: a non-Being which has no proper
nature "all its own," but whose being consists precisely and
exclusivelyin its notbeing somethingelse. And that fact,I submit,
explains at last the factwith which thispaper began: the factthat
Plato twice remarksthat it is the Part of Otherness,not Otherness
just in itself,that answers his quest for an account of the real
nature of non-being. Only in its constitutiverole does Otherness
define a notion which is, as Plato puts it (at 258e2-3), ovens n-o -r
ov: somethingwhich really and fullyis not;a not-beingthat really
does consist specifically and entirely in its NOT-being. (N.b.
254di, settingit as a goal to showTOImqov ... as Ec(TsV
OVT0S' A) ov.)28
Having in hand this distinctionbetween two roles that Otherness plays, we can at last redeem the promissorynote we started
with and justifyour isolatingthe Parts of Othernesspassage from
Plato's generalizations on negation in 257bi-c4. Those lines, it
should be clear by now, drew the semantic lessons fromhis long
account of Otherness in its "Supervenient" role.29The function
28 See the "Addendum" to thispaper, where I argue that Plotinusread
thispassage of the Sophistin preciselythe sense expoundedhere.
29 Interpreters
have soughtpersistently
to findimplicitin Plato's example
here (forit is scarcelyto be foundexpresses
verbis)a doctrineofnegationbased
on incompatibility
relationsthatobtainwithina rangeor familyofpredicates,
and theyhave then projectedsuch a doctrineonto the account of Parts of
Otherness.But Owen quite rightlyinsists(oP' cit.,p. 232, n. i9) thatno such
analysisis to be smuggledin there.The analogyestablishesonlythe negative
point (no pun intended)thatnegationdoes notimporta contrary(in Owen's
287

ED WARDN. LEE
of the "not" (that lesson teaches) in any statementsaying that
an item A "is not" some other,B. does not consistin turningour
attentionto B's contrary,but merelyto some item other than B.
In brief,the lesson is that negation must be analyzed in termsof
Othernessand not of contrariety.When stated all that briefly,to
be sure, the principle could just as well apply to the Partitioning
of Otherness. The main resultof our analysis,however,has been
in these
to show that the principle is satisfiedquite differently
in
contrariety
257bI-c4
The
that
Otherness
replaces
cases.
way
two
is by its "Supervenient" role; but the way it does so in the second
case is by its "Constitutive" role. Thus when at 258b2-3 Plato
ov signifiesan othernessbut not a
echoes the principle that i-z PAd)
contrary,he is not merelyrepeatinghis earlierpoint, but showing
that his new doctrineofthe Parts ofOthernessalso falls-although
in a differentway-under that general rule.30This difference
in the doctrinal semantic point of 257bi-c4 and of 258b2-3
should give us finaljustification(if any more be needed) fornot
foistingon the doctrine of the Parts any implications from the
example in the earlier passage about large, small, and middling
sizes.
II
We have been a long time tracing Plato's meaning in the
passage at hand and must turn next to some exploration of its
philosophical significance.Assumingthat we have now seen what
Plato's doctrine of the Parts of Otherness is, we have still to ask
what it comesto. What is the force or point of the doctrine?
What mightPlato have thoughtthat he could dowithit?
words,"that 'small' has no more claim to be what 'not large' means than
'middling'has"). It does not tryto smugglein a positivetheory,and to say
or hintthatsome limitedrangeof "others"is what is signified(imported)by
the "not." (See also n. 37 below.)
30 It is an odd lacuna in Owen's essay that he seems never to referto
258b2-3.Althoughhe delineatesso well (esp. pp. 231-236) Plato's general
he does not make clear that
strategyof divorcingnegationfromcontrariety,
ways. (Cf., e.g.,
this"divorce" is managed twiceand in two sharplydifferent
his remarkat p. 23i, n. i8, lines6-7: "both appeals to a 'contraryofwhat is'
are met by the replyin 257B3-C4,258E6-259Ai.")
288

PLA TO ON NEGATION
As a firststep in answering that question, it may help if we

articulate the logical power of the doctrine-its contribution
toward analyzing the sense of negative statementsand, in particis not, of
ular, of negative predication statements.Plato's Sophist
course, a piece of modern logical analysis, and it would be willful
to conceive his aims as narrowly
"logical" or "analytic" there.3'
Nonetheless,that is equally clearly a partof his aim. He is out to
refuteFather Parmenides and to show that we can both think
and say "what is not." His task, to that extent,is to articulatethe
sense of negative expressions, showing that they do have a
determinatesense and, therefore,"can be thought." The Sophist
is, in good part, the resultof Plato's effortsto solve that problem.
it is the
Every bit as much as certain parts of the Tractatus,
resultof his wrestlingwith what Wittgensteincalled "the mystery
of negation: This is not how thingsare, and yet we can say how
thingsare not."32 Unhappily, it is widely agreed that Plato failed
in this attempt-failed despite certain partial successes; for his
analysis of not-beingin termsof Othernesscan deal with negative
identity statements but-so most of the commentators have
agreed-it cannot handle negative predication statements.33
What I shall tryto show here is that his doctrineof the Parts of
Otherness-when understood along the lines we have set forth31 Notice, e.g., that what I have been treatingas the distinction
between
mightintwo "roles" of Otherness,the Supervenientand the Constitutive,
in sensebetween
stead be thoughtofmerelyas an explicationofthedifference
negationof the "is" of identityand negationof the "is" ofpredication.That
since,as is now generallyagreed,the distincview would have its attractions,
tion between identitystatementsand predicationsis oftenofprimeimportance in the dialogue. But it would totallyfail to explainwhat I have made
a focal question here: why it is that only the latteris identifiedwith the
authenticnon-Beingtheyneed to catch the Sophist. Hence I believe that
talkofthetwo "rolesofOtherness"mustbe retained:it permitsus to elucidate
conceptual and ontologicalthesesof the dialogue which the otherway of
puttingthe issuewould mask.
32 Ludwig Wittgenstein,
I9I4-I9i6
(Oxford,i96i), p. 30.
Notebooks
33 See A. E. Taylor, Plato: theSophist
and theStatesman
(London, i96i),
op.cit.,p. 296. AlsoJ. Malcolm,Phronesis,
pp. 64-65 and 8i-82, and Cornford,
at n. 30. Owen seemsto disagreewiththis
i2 (i967), 145, withhis references
view,but his essayleaves it ratherunclearjust wherehe thinkstheproblemof
predicationis takenup; his remarkson p. 237 (bottom)and on p. 260 suggest
offalsehoodat 263b-d.
thatit is not untilthe treatment
289

ED_)WARD N. LEE
can fillpreciselythat function:it articulatesthe sense of negative

predications.
In order to show that, it will be helpfulfirstto make clear the
differencebetween the present interpretationand the kind of
interpretationwhich has usually been given to our passage.
It can be brieflystated. On my reading, a "Part of Otherness"
is an intentionaldeterminationof Otherness: it is a specification
of the determinablenotion (nature) of mere othernessas the more
But the
determinate notion, otherness-than-some-specific-x.
current interpretationsof Plato's doctrine are all thoroughgoingly extensionalist.F. M. Cornford,for instance, holds that
'The not-beautiful'is the collectivename for all the Forms there
are, other than the single Form, 'Beautiful.''The not-beautiful'
is
a special name forthis 'part' of the Different.34
And Harold Cherniss holds a similar, though slightlydifferent,
view:
"not x" as a [partofthe natureofotherness]is simplyall the entities
notbeingany or all ofthese
which are notthe entityx, just as x itself,
otherentities,is also a [partof the natureof otherness].:5
Still others have held a variation of this view: that the Part of
Othernessis not all other entitiesthan x, but only some selected
group of them: on one view, that group of entitieswhich stand in
relations of incompatibilitywith x (Hamlyn, Kamlah, J. A.
Philip) or, on another view, those that stand in yet some other
relation of "semantic contrast," "qualitative difference," or
"contrastin signification"to x (Moravcsik). I thinkthesereadings
all must be said to fail forwant of any adequate basis in the text.
What is more, they all have the resultthat Plato cannot account
for negative predication statements.They have strained to find
a reading such that "x is not F" would say that F is otherthan all
$4 Cornford,
op. cit.,p. 290; cf.p. 293.
35 Harold Cherniss,Aristotle's
Criticism
of Plato and theAcademy(Baltimore,
1944), I, 263-264.So faras I have noticed,thislast idea-that a singleForm
fromany
can itselfcountas a "Part of the Other" (by virtueofitsdifference
or all others)-is propoundedonly by Cherniss.
290

TION
PLA TO ON JVEGA
Forms ofwhich x does in factpartake,36or that x partakesofsome

Form Z which is other than F in the sense of belonging to the
group of Forms opposed or contrastedto F in such a way as to
exclude it.37 But whatever the virtues of these as theories of
negation, I can see no good ground for thinkingthey are Plato's
theory,and thus no ground forthinkinghecould use them to deal
with negative predications-an extremelygrave shortcomingin
his effortto rebut Parmenides. On our own account, however,
Plato's doctrine of the Parts of Otherness would serve precisely
that purpose.
Plato seems to have shared Parmenides' convictionthat thought
must always have some determinate being as its "object" ;38
that is, to put it less extremely,that thought must always have
some determinatelyexpressible,assertable content. In order to
refuteParmenides, then, Plato saw it as his task to vindicate the
sense of negative expressionsby showing that the understanding
of any negative statement involves the apprehension only of
"existent," positive,determinatecontents.It is clear enough how
his account of negative identity statementswould meet these
requirements.He analyzes them in termsof what we called the
"supervenient" role of Otherness: "A is not B" (in the sense,
Cf. Frede, op.cit.,pp. 94-95,and Owen, op.cit.,pp. 237-238and 260.
Cf. J. M. E. Moravcsik,"Being and Meaning in the Sophist,"Acta
Fennica,I4 (i962), 68-75. This and the previous reading are
Philosophica
or classdiscussedin what is surelythe subtlestversionof the extensionalist
interpretationof Plato's treatmentof negation to date, David Wiggins'
"Sentence Meaning, Negation,and Plato's Problem of Non-Being,"in G.
and Epistemology
(Garden City, I97I), pp.
Vlastos (ed.), Plato I: Metaphysics
theoryappears on pp. 294 and 299, and thisone on
268-303 (the pre-vious
Subtle as it is, however,Wiggins'accountis largelyirrelevant
29i and 301).
underminesitselfby conto Plato's treatmentof negation:it systematically
flatingthe Partitioningof Othernesswith the earlier example about "not
big" in 257b1-c4 (cf. pp. 291-294, 297, and 299 forkeyinstancesof the conspoilsthewholepaper,just because theextensionalist
flation).That conflating
readingis appropriateat 257b1-c4 (in view of the two-placecharacterof the
Supervenientrole there),but does not carryover at all to the Partitioning
passage and so obscureswhat is actuallyhappeningthere.Having misread
surprisedby "Plato's extraPlato's argument,Wigginsis, unsurprisingly,
ordinaryconfidence"(p. 293) in what he is sayingand can evensupposehim
utterlyunclear as to just what it is thathe is saying(p. 301; cf.pp. 292-293
and 297).
36
37
38
Cf. esp. Rep. V 476e-477a and Parm. 132b-c.

291

ED WARD N. LEE
"A is not the same as B") says that A (which is) partakes of
Otherness (which is) in referenceto B (which is).39 But we can
now see clearly how the "constitutive"role of Otherness (that is,
the doctrine of the Parts of Otherness) will deal with negative
predication statements within these same requirements. What
"x is not brown" says is that x (which is) partakes of a certain
Part of Otherness (a Part which fully and securely is, as Plato
takes such great pains to make clear at 257e2-258c3); it says that
x partakes of that Part of Otherness whose "name" (257dg
cinovvjda) is "(the) not-brown" and whose determinate nature
consistsin Otherness-precisely-than-brown.
What this analysis amounts to we can best bring out by noting
an importantlimitationin its force.What "x is not brown" says,
on thisview, is that x (which is) partakesof that Part of Otherness
(a Part which is) which is preciselyOtherness-than-brown.
That
is, the negating statementsays that the subject's partaking lies
outside the predicate negated-outside of brown: in othernessprecisely-than-that.But that is all that it says. The statement
does not specifyat all what it is that the subject does instead
partake in. Plato's line of analysis thus yields a fullydeterminate
sense, but a wholly negativesense, for negative predications.
Hence (and this is the limitation mentioned above) his theory
does not serve to capture or to explicate the full semantic force
of everydayuses of negations.When, in ordinaryspeech, I assert
a negative predication,I will no doubt have my reasonsfordoing
so. If and when I ever say, "x is not brown," it will probably be
because I see (or believe) that x is in fact instead white or green
or yet some other color other than brown.40But such features
of negation do not enterinto Plato's analysis. And it would seem
that they can reasonably be disregarded in an analysis of "x is
not brown." For when I say, "x is not brown," all that I am
sayingis that x is not brown. Whatever else may be true, or
89
Cf. Soph. 255e-256e:this is the essentialresult of the entiresection,
254b-257b.
We can ignore, for present purposes, the involvement of the
"vowel Form" Being, and-to usp John Malcolm's symbolism-can take
"XpOrr"as shortfor"XpB(O)rr."
40 See esp. P. F. Strawson'sdiscussionof negation in An Introduction

to
LogicalTheory(London, 1952), pp. 5-8 and Ii2-i 3.
292

PLATO ON NEGA TION
whatever else I may believe, I do not at all say how-things-areinstead, but only how-they-are-not.As Wittgensteinremarksin
the Tractatus,"The negating proposition determines a logical
fromthatof thenegated proposition."4lBut thatis all
place different
that it does. It does not specifywhat does obtain in lieu of the
negated proposition.
It will be especially evident at this point how the present
reading of Plato's doctrinediffersin forcefromthe extensionalist
readings mentioned earlier. On this account, it is no part at all
of the sense of the negatingpropositionthat it should referto any
(much less to all) particular entitiesor predicates other than the
negated predicate. The negating statementsimply says that the
subject partakes in the specific negative intention, Othernessthan-the-predicate-negated.That is, it says that the subject's
partaking lies outside the predicate negated; it does not say
(on this account of it) that it lies in some other particular place
outside that predicate (although that will no doubt be true),
but just that it lies outside-that-predicate:anywhere-at-allbut
there. By borrowing the shaded diagrams from Wittgenstein's
we mightrepresentas follows(clumsily,no doubt, but
Notebooks42
accurately enough) the way that Plato analyzes the sense of a
predicative statement and of its negation. Take the statement,
"Socrates is tall." The subject term is understood to name the
41 4.0641
(2). Max Black has suggested that this remark may not quite
cohere with Wittgenstein's other remarks on negation, and that it may come
Tractatus
from a different time than they (A Companionto Wittgenstein's
[Ithaca, I964], p. 184). The remark is perhaps ambiguous (amusingly, the
various possible readings for it parallel various suggestions about the sense of
Plato's doctrine), but it seems to have been coined along with others that are
not (cf. Notebooksi9I4-i9i6,
pp. 25-26) and, as my exposition here will show,
I believe it was intended to express a view of negation strikinglysimilar to
Plato's. So far as I have found, Wittgensteindoes not elsewhere rely thus on
the notion Otheror Different
(andere)to express his view of negation, but here
at 4.064I there is a strong verbal (and, I argue, philosophical) parallel with
Plato.
42 I borrow the diagrams from the Notebooks,
p. 30, although I use them in
a way somewhat differentfrom Wittgenstein's point there. My use of them
goes more closely with his remarks on p. 28: " p' and 'a p' are like a picture
and the infinite plane outside this picture. (Logical Place.)/I can construct
the infinitespace outside only by using the picture to bound that space."
293

ED WARD N. LEE
theFormor
the square above it represents
actual particular,43
them
arrow
between
and
the
character,Tallness (the Tall),
indicatesthe subject'spartakingin the attributeit points to
(suchpartakingto be thoughtofas directedto,or "anchoredin,"
What "Socratesis
the shaded portionof the predicate-picture).
this:
is
then,
tall" says,
(Tallness)
(Socrates)
What "Socratesis not tall" saysis this(theupperlevelrepresentinghere that Part of Othernessopposed preciselyto the
Tall):
(Socrates)
to par43Here I shall ignorecomplicationsin the problemof referring
ticulars,and takeit simplythatthesubjecttermdenotesa subjectentity,one
whosestatusneed not here concernus. (For detailsand evidenceconcerning
the "complications,"cf.my articlein The Monist,50 [X966],353-366.)
294

PLA TO ON NEGATION
The determinatesense of "x is not tall" thuslies precisely,but lies

entirely,in its saying that tall is what x is not. What thestatement
will signify-and all that it signifies,on Plato's analysis-is that
the subject does not participatein thatpredicate.
What is more, our presentaccount enables us to follow Plato's
thought as to how the negating statement signifies that, his
thought about what might be called the dynamics of negation,
or the structureofone of thosejudgmental motionsof the complex
"circles" of the soul about which he speaks at Timaeus37a-c.44
As we saw earlier, when scrutinizing Plato's account of the
constitutionof the Parts of Otherness,each Part gets "parceled
off" fromOthernesspreciselyby being opposed to some specified
being. But, for present purposes, we can read the constitution
of the Parts of Othernessas Plato's account of the constitutionof
the senseof negative predications.And in this account, the determinate sense of the negative predicating statement comes (the
specificationof the subjectremainingconstant)froma specification
of the predicate which is to be negated. Thus, to return to a
comparison with the early Wittgenstein,the thought behind
Plato's account of the dynamics of negative predication can be
seen to be very much the same as the thoughtsin these entries
fromthe Notebooks
i914-19. 6:
...,
If a picture presentswhat-is-not-the-case
this only happens
throughits presentingthatwhich is not the case.
For the picturesays,as it were: "This is how it is not,"and to the

question"How is it not?" just the positivepropositionis the answer.
The negatingpropositionuses the logical place of the negatedpropositionto determineits own logical place. By describingthe latteras
the place that is outside the former.45
So in Plato's account, the negating predicative statement uses
the specificationof the negated predicate to constituteits own
44 Some connections
betweenthe Sophistand thisimportantpassage of the
Timaeusare discussedby J. A. Philip, "The MegistaGeneof the Sophistes,"
Phoenix,
23 (i969),
89-103 at 101-102-but much more remains to be done.
45 Pp.
25-26.
295

EDWARD N. LEE
determinatesense: it specifiesthat sense preciselyas the subject's

relationto what-is-outsidethe designated predicate, its partaking
in otherness-precisely-than-that.
So to speak, the negating
statement asks, "How is it with the subject?" and it answers,
"Not like this!" or (in Plato's terminology)"Other than this!"
How far the comparison with Wittgensteinwill carry is, of
course,no part of my argument.But it holds farenough,I believe,
to show us that Plato's doctrineofthe Parts of Othernessis the key
to his analysis of the sense of negative predicative statements,
and thus a crucial factor in his refutationof Parmenides. Very
much like Wittgenstein,Plato is saying that we are able to think
what is notthe case preciselyby thinkingwhat it is that is not the
case. We are able to think -d p) ov-what is not-precisely
by thinkingwhatit is that is-not. But more important, Plato's
doctrine of the Parts tries to explain how we do that,and the
comparisonwithWittgensteinhere helps bringinto reliefanother,
so far unsuspected,feature of the theory at the very core of his
of the sense
"dynamics of negation." For of course the negativeness
on
of a negating statementcomes,
Plato's analysis, not fromthe
specifyingof the predicate negated but instead fromthe "Partitioning" of Otherness achieved when Otherness is focused on
that predicate. A firmgrasp of this fact enables us to see that
is really not to reduce the sense of a
Plato's aim in the Sophist
negation to an affirmationthat the subject participates in some
negative property.That would be one way of putting his view,
but it masks the most fundamentalfeatureof his theory.46He is
holding instead-again very much like Wittgenstein-that
negation is essentiallyan operation:it is the operation of Parti46 The two ways of puttingPlato's theorythat I have in view here closely
correspondto Owen's two ways of expressingnegativestatements(op. cit.,
p. 234): i.e., "x is not-y"and "x not-isy."The firstway "masks" thepointof
interesthere,in that,ifwe take "Socrates is not tall" in the sense "Not-tall
of Othernessis simplypresupposed
is what Socratesis," thenthe partitioning
-taken as an unremarked
that gives the definitesense for its
fait accompli
predicate,not-Tall. But if we take it in the sense "Socrates not-istall," we
bringthat operationto the fore:it can be seen or feltnow as (so to speak)
bendingthe arrowof our earlierpictureaway fromthe Tall and towardits
In eithercase, the partitioning
shaded surroundings.
shapes the sense of the
makes its role-and the
resultingstatement.But the latter representation
philosophicalpoint-more perspicuous.
296

PLATO ON NEGATION
tioningOtherness. For that is the operation which constructsthe

sense of the negatingstatementfromthat of the veryone negated
-and so bringsit about that the negating statementdoes negate
precisely that. Plato's analysis of negation as the operation of
partitioning Otherness thus serves to elucidate just why the
sense of the negating statementdoes excludethat of the statement
it negates, and why a statementand its negation cannot both of
them be true (at the same time and in the same respects,and so
forth).It explains these fundamentalfeaturesof negation in that
the very sense of the negation is seen to consist precisely in its
exclusion of the sense negated; in its sayingthat thatis what-is-not
(or, equivalently,that what is is preciselyotherness-than-that).4
When understoodin thisway, it seems to me plain that Otherness-at least in the formof the partitioningof Otherness-is not
only not some misdirectedaberration of Plato's, but is indispensable to any analysis of negation. David Wiggins has recently
expressed his doubts "that Plato's notion of the . .. Otheris of
fundamental importance in solving it [the problem of negation]."48 But these largely spring from his misunderstandingof
what Plato's notion is, and Wiggins' own suggestionthat affirmation and denial may be "equally primitive concepts"49
mustbe a mistakenone, at least in so far as any treatmentof these
two mustprovide some account of the factthat a denial is denying
just the affirmationof which it is a denial. Since that essential,
internal link between the two is preciselywhat Plato's device of
partitioning Otherness explains, there seems little hope for
47Just how and why this "exclusion" obtains is the nub of the entire
problem. "Incompatibility"analyses (see n. 37 above) do make this issue
focal, but theymerelypush the philosophicalproblemback one step, since
"X incompatiblewith r" at best repeats
that X's presenceexcludesr's and
does not at all explainwhy it does so. (Cf. Wiggins,op. cit.,p. 29i, n. I5a,
and p. 30I on predicate"ranges.") The firsttask of analysisin the case of
negationbecomesthatof explicatingthe relevantX and r in just such a way
of)
that the specificexclusionof each is essentialto (internalto, constitutive
the other:so that thisexclusivenessis, so to say, built into the relata and is
not invokedfor themfromany unexplicatedsource "outside." And that is
preciselywhat Plato does do, on the presentreading, in constructinghis
notion,Parts of Otherness.
48 Wiggins,op. cit.,p. 302. (I have correctedan evidentmisprint.)
49 Ibid.,p. 300.
297
3

EDWARD N. LEE
Wiggins' idea that denial, once accorded a "primitive place,"

might "completely displace Differenceand the Other from the
theoryof negation."50This is not to say, of course, that denial is
reducible
to affirmation
;51 only thatit is inseparablefromaffirmation
and somehowpresupposesthat.Neitherwould I hold thatPlato has
in any sense "dissolved away" negation or "reduced it to" a
(mere) partitioning of Otherness. He has merely explicatedit
thus. No doubt negation is in some sense irreducible. Even
Plato's own analysis can be seen to rest in the end upon the
contrarietyof Same and Other (when theseare suitablyqualified),
since that contrarietyis what ultimately"explains" why Otherness-than-Xmust exclude Sameness-with-X(in the same respects,
and so forth).But Plato's theorycan quite consistently"rest on"
that contrarietyat a fundamentallevel, so long as it avoids (as
it expresslydoes) introducing any more particular contrarieties
in the course of analyzing particular cases of negation (for this
would-among other things-reintroduce the discredited notion
of a contrary to Being). He never claims to have reduced
contrarietyto Otherness, nor even to have eliminated entirely
any trace of a role for contrarietyin the account of negation:
only to have shown that negation does not specificallyintroduce
the contrary of the termnegated (whetherthat term be verb or
predicate). His account, then, will still involve a fundamental,
irreducible contrariety.And since contrarietybetween X and Y
means (at the least) NOT-BOTH X and r (in the same respects,
and so forth), he has clearly not "reduced" away negation.52
But where did he say he would?
50 Ibid.,p. 302. (Wigginshimself,

at pp. 282-284, notesthepresentadequacy
requirementfor a theoryof negationand makes use of it thereto reject a
"displaytheory"of sententialmeaning.Since he uses the criterionhimself,I
and denial
maywell be mistakenhereabout theforceofhis takingaffirmation
as "equally primitiveconcepts";ifI am so, thenI wouldsuspectthatforPlato
mustbe "equally primitiveconcepts"in thesame
and partitioning
affirmation
internallyrelatedto one another.)
sense-yet stillessentially,
51 Cf. ibid.,p. 300, 1. II.
52 Cf.EricToms'sarguments
againstanyreductionofnegationto Otherness,
in Being,NegationandLogic(Oxford,i962), pp. 82, 87, 9i; but his own disof it.
missalsof Plato's theorythere(pp. 87, 96-97) reston misinterpretation
298

PLATO ON NEGATION
III
If the account in Sections I and II above is sound, then the
logical force of Plato's theoriesin the Sophistproves to be much
greater than the commentatorshave appreciated. Not only can
he analyze the sense of negative identitystatements,but he can
analyze the sense of negative predication statements as well.
To an extentmuch greaterthan had earlierbeen recognized,he did
succeed in dealing with the problem of negation. Yet we have
noted that his aims in the Sophistwere not narrowlylogical or
"analytical" in nature, and we need also to ask what other
substantiveissues he may have hoped to illuminate by means of
these analytic achievements.
I take that as a question which we have to answer,but providing
such an answer necessarily implies an approach toward interpreting the Sophistthat is very much more speculative than we
have attempted yet.54What must be done now is to utilize the
positive resultsreached in the passage we have analyzed, so as to
shed lighton topicsand problemswhich Plato introduceselsewhere
in the dialogue. When we do apply our passage in that way, then
(I believe) some of the larger significance of the doctrine of
Parts of Otherness at once begins to come into view. A single
instance will have to sufficehere as a sample of this program.
Close to the beginning of the dialogue (at 2i9b) and then
again a few pages after our section (at 265b) Plato explicitly
introduces the notion of "production" (ioljcrts) and both times
53 Cf. n. 3 I above. One particularly
enigmaticaspectofthedialogue ought
to be mentionedhere:it is thatthiscarefullyconstructed
doctrineofthe Parts
of Otherness-its entireapparatus of determinations
and antitheses-is left
totallyunused in Plato's subsequentaccount of falsity(263b-d): one of his
major "analytic" achievementsis thusnotapplied to one of his major "analytic"problems!And perhapsmorecuriousstill:Plato seemsto omittheentire
Parts of Othernesssectionfromthe longishreview of his argumentwhich
immediatelyfollowsthatsection(258e6-259b6).Cornfordattemptedto import
some allusion to it there(op. cit.,p. 295, n. 4), but in factthe reviewcovers
25id-257c,and stopsjust shortof our section.
54 I would stillsubscribeto the principlesof such a speculativeinterpretation that I suggestedin an earlierreviewof Kamlah's "Platons Selbstkritik
im Sophistes,"
33 (I 963): see American
ofPhilosophy,
LXXXVIII
Zetemata,
Journal
(i967), 232-236 (esp. 234-235).
299

EDWARD N. LEE
explicitly defines it as "bringing something into being from a
previous non-being."55Cornford'sfootnoteat the latter passage
hastens to assure us that Plato's "definitionis not intended to
out of absolute non-being.
suggest creation out of nothing,"56
That is no doubt true,since Plato carefullyrejectsany such notion
in the Sopilistitself,but then what sort of non-being is it that
"production" involves? I believe we are now in a position to see
that Plato's doctrineof the Parts of Othernessprovideshis answer
to thisveryquestion.
Consider the following example-the production of a ripe
apple from a previously unripe one (a simple instance of the
agricultural production mentioned at 2 iga, and of the natural
or "divine" processes of production at 265c-e). Here an apple,
from previously not being red, comes to be red. Here, clearly
enough, the not-being which is involved in the production is
the apple's prior not-being-red.But what is it not-to-be-red?It
should be amply clear by now that Plato's doctrineof the Parts of
Otherness provides his answer to just this question: the apple's
not-being-redis (so that doctrine teaches) its partaking in that
special Part of Otherness which is opposed precisely to red-its
partaking in Otherness-than-red.On Plato's analysis, therefore,
the natural "producing" of a red, ripe apple will have the
followingformal structure:the apple firstpartakes of that Part
of Otherness which we call the "not-red" and then (throughthe
agency of some causal process or other) comes to partake of the
red. (Indeed, what it is for something to "come to partake of
the red" is for there to be such a succession of its partaking
in that Part of Othernessand then its partakingin red; what it is
forthere to be a causal agency "at work" here is forthat agency
to establishjust this succession.) Elementary as this result may
seem, two final comments may help indicate its surprisingly
far-reachingsignificanceforinterpretingthe dialogue as a whole.
55 In additionto thesetwo specificdefiningreferences,
the notionof productiongetsconsiderablefurtheremphasisin the dialogue: see especiallythe
of Rep. X 598blengthyexample at 233d-235b(withits many reminiscences
599b) and the curiouslydeliberateand explicitremarksat 265b-266e (more
than a thirdof the entirefinaldefinition).
56 op. cit.,p. 325, n. i (most probably directedagainst a suggestionby
A. E. Taylor).
300

PLATO ON NEGATION
(A) The case of rotqats'showsthat we can apply certain analytic

(I meanpages241-264)
resultsofthe long end-sectionofthe Sophist
to at least one of the substantiveissues elsewhere raised in the
dialogue. And even thismuch reflexiveapplication helpsto illuminate Plato's design of this complex work. It shows that, even if
Plato's inquiry does at timesin the Sophisttake a narrowly(and explicitly)"analytical" turn,thedialogue is not merelyan "analytic"
inquiry into the sense of negative expressions,but is rather a
"transcendental"inquiry,exploringand definingtheformalconditions of the possibilityof various problematic notions-in partic-
as a fundamentalfeatureof phenomenalbeing.
ular, of -7rJcr-lts'
Our result thus helps illuminate the philosophical strategythat

underlies the major literary conceit of the entire dialogue; for
the dialogue is posed as a "hunt" for the elusive Sophist, and
turns aside into a lengthyattempt to show it possible
to capture
that prey: that is, since he is to be defined as a producer of
images, to show at least that it is possible to understand"production" (and, perhaps, to understandthe being-and non-being-of
images as well).
(B) What is more, when Plato's enterprisein the Sophistis
approached in this way, it at once becomes clear that it is closely
related to Aristotle'senterprisein Book I of the Physics.It will no
doubt have struckthe reader, in the course of my example of the
ripening apple, that participation in some Part of Otherness
there plays precisely the role that is played by the concept of
privation of form in Aristotle's analysis of becoming and the
"principles of nature." It needs to be noted that Plato's doctrine
of the "Part of Otherness" does not coincide with Aristotle's
usual analysis of "privation" (afrpr crts).As Aristotleusually deals
with that notion, it might rather be called "deprivation," for it
is understoodto signify,not the mere absence of some quality, but
the more specificnotion of its absence fromsome subject in which
it might naturally be present. (Hence, blindnessis a "privation"
of sight for a man, or for any animal that can normally see;
but we would not say that a stone is "deprived of sight," since it
never has it, nor can a stone be blind-though, to be sure, it
cannot see.) In PhysicsI these refinementsof the notion are
absent, however, and privation functions, as one of the
301

EDWARD N. LEE
"principles" of nature, merelyas the lackor absenceof a character

or form.Indeed, at one point (I 7, igia5-7) Aristotlegoes so far
as to suggestthat we mightnot reallyneed all threeofhis "principles" (substratum,form,and privation of form),since becoming
and change may be understoodin termsof the successiveabsence
and presence of form; to get Plato's doctrine, we need only
substitutethe successive participation in x and in the Part of
Otherness which is opposed to x. For the doctrineof the Parts of
Otherness is formallyadequate, as we have seen, to play the
role played by the concept of privationof formin Aristotle'sown
analysis of phenomenal becoming. The conclusion lies ready to
hand that the Parts of Otherness define for Plato that same
negativityin natural being which, in Aristotle's account of it,
emerges as privation of form. And since privation, even on
Aristotle's view, is "in its own nature not-being" (OV'K OV ...
we can the more clearly see how Plato's
KcaG' LvT'v, I92a4-5),
correlatein the Sophist-the Parts of Othernessopposed to things
that are-serves
to explicate ro &
6'v'urw fq' 5v.
If the Sophistdoes bear this much link to the conceptual

concernsof PhysicsI, and if it yields us a specificanalogue to the
principle of privation, it is tempting to wonder whether, after
all, we may not findthere a Platonic analogue to the principle of
matter as well. Plotinus thought we could.57 Many modern
interpretershave thoughtso, too, but all of their attemptshave
foundered on misguided effortsto bring the Form of Otherness
itselfinto connection with the xcopa of the Timaeus.Armed now
with the present,novel interpretationof Plato's Parts of Otherness, we will be able to avoid that pitfall and may have some
hope of succeeding where these others have failed.58But in any
case, that hunt will have to be leftforanotheroccasion.
For references,
see "Addendum" to thispaper.
To citejust one, widelyknowninstance,Jean-PaulSartre,in the"Metamakes a famousequation
physicalAppendix" to his Beingand Nothingness,
and the Othernessofthe Sophist.
Though thatequation
betweenhis "pour-soi"
is clearlyindefensibleas it stands,a fairlyslightcorrectionmay resuscitate
cannot be Othernessitself,it is quite a bit like
his thesis:thoughthepour-soi
the Part of Otherness-thatwhose being consistsin its not-beingsome other
than itself.
57
58
302

PLA TO ON NEGATION
ADDENDUM:PLOTINUSANDSOPHIST 257-258
In recent years, Plato's treatmentof not-Being in the Sophist
has been subjected to extremelycareful scrutiny.So intense has
the discussion been that it may well appear to count against the
novel reading I have here put forth,preciselythat it is so novel.
How-if thisreading of the textis even possible-can it have been
so widely missed? To allay that criticismsomewhat, it may be
helpful to observe that Sophist257c-258e was construed in the
way for which I argue here at least as early as Plotinus. (That
fact does not prove this reading correct,to be sure, but it should
at least show that it is a possible constructionof the Greek, if it
seemed right even to the ancients.) Plotinus' reading of these
pages of the Sophistemergesin the course of his account of matter
as not-Being. (EnneadsII.4[I2], II.5[25], and III.6[26] are the
basic texts.) I shall not be concerned here with that difficult
doctrine of matter, but shall cite only the texts which indicate
that Plotinus shared the presentview of Sophist257-258.
In brief,my view has been that Plato here definestwo distinct
what "is not" is some item which
typesof "not-Being." In the first,
has a determinatebeing of its own, but which is other than some
other (or than all other) beings, and thus "is not" those others.
Such cases illustratethe "supervenient" role of Otherness. The
second type of not-Beingis one which has no determinatebeing
ofits own, but one whose whole being consistsin its otherness-than
some other specified item: in its not-being-that-specified-item.
It is this notion, I argued, that Plato means by a "Part of Otherness," and it exemplifiesthe "constitutive" role of Otherness.
But Plotinus draws precisely this distinction,and he draws it in
explaining that matteras not-Beingis identical, not with Otherness simpliciter(that option he explicitlyrejects), but with "the
part of othernesswhich is opposed to the thingswhich in the full
and proper sense exist" (II.4.i6,I-2). Hence, abstractingfornow
fromthe factthat his whole doctrineis a doctrineabout matter,
we
may take his remarks as an explanation of the way he read
Plato's account of the Parts of Otherness in Sophist257-258.
Matter, Plotinus says repeatedly,is not-Being,but not in the
same way that Motion or Rest is not-Being:
303

ED WARD N. LEE
it would appropriatelybe called non-being,not in the sensein which

motionis not being or rest not being but trulynot-being[III.6.7,
I I-I3; cf. also II.5.5, 9-IO and I.8.3, 6-9].
The differenceis that in these other cases what "is not" also is
something,on its own: each "is non-existentbecause it is not
being, but some other existing thing differentfrom being"
(41.4.I4, 22-23: oiV3K05V, O&Tt Ad TO' ov, dAA'(Mo ov TDE'9r). In these
other cases, then, the not-beings"are not onlyother but each of
them is something as form" (II.4.I3, 29-30: o' 1tuvov-AGa,&AA
TL EiKacrov US E8og) . But in the case of matter-that is, of the
Kay
"Part of Otherness" opposed to all true being (cf. II.4.i6 ad
init.)-what "is not" is not"something else besides" (11.4.I5, 36
and I3, 26-27). Rather, its nature wholly consistsin its being
other than the beings cited: "consists in its relationshipto other
things,its being other than they" (11.4.I3, 28: gvYXEEE '72)
Ta('4Aa, off 2A(o avt'rc-ov.
Cf. also II-5-5, 25-27). Thus for Plotinus,
just as for Plato, the "Part of Otherness" is understood to be
"what really is not-Being" (Sophist258e2-3; cf. Enn. 11.5.5, 24
and 111.6.7, I I-I3); and the meaning of thisdoctrineis expressed
in termsof a "constitutive"otherness.
EDWARD
University
ofCalifornia,San Diego
304

N.
LEE

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Philosophical Review

Plato on Negation and Not-Being in the Sophist

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PLATO ON NEGATION AND NOT-BEING

N PAGES 257c-258cof the Sophist,Plato introducesa

phases. (A) First (in 257c5-dIi) Plato introduces and explains

1 Parts I and II were read, in much shortenedform,beforethe American

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analogy with the parts or branchesof knowledge.(B) Then

any otherForm. (C) And finally(in 258aIi-c5), since at least

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notice a point which is, in all essentials, already established.4

they of course do not qualify the forceof his commitmentto the

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fundamentalfor the present account and so I give it the most

There is no ground for

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of a "Part of Otherness,"just like that of a branch of knowledge,

7 In these "definitional"schemas the lower framecontainsthe 6ovop.aor

defined;the upper level represents

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The firstschema illustratesa "Part ofKnowledge," theparticular

afterAckrill).As Ackrillrightlynotes,however,the relationof knowledge

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focusingof Otherness. Instead of its being the case that "not-X"

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about Plato's writingofthe Sophist,it seemslikelythat the doctrine

14 It may perhapsappear to someperverse

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statementsas to just what the being of a Part of Othernessconsists

to entity";in an opposition(Jvi-i0Eats-)holdingbetweenone being

and another being. But what sort of "antithesis," and between

of theirnature.The feelingmay persist

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reading of those lines, I feel the sense can be established beyond

definitein the context of "the antithesis . . . DAo rtTOrvO'VTv-7Tpos0 t -r-6v

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earliersaid thatthevariousbranchesofknowledgeare "marked

[Paris, I955], p. 372, n. 2). Cornfordunaccountably assumed that the Beautiful

is meant (Plato's Theory

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two clauses thus do not representsuccessive or even separable

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reiteratesthe second moment frome3; what is novel here is that

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bear upon that specific Part of Otherness which stands opposed

of the Nature of a Part of Otherness (Fowler,

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or (b) of a Part of the Nature of Otherness(Cornford,

I cannotherearguein detailforthiswayofreading258ai i-bi,

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justified by Plato's carefullycontrolled use of the term "Part"

a case of that antithesiswhich

constitutes the being of (any) non-Being. This is not, then,

in 258b (op. cit., p.

Here at Soph. 258e2,

grammaticallywith the former,but derivativelywith the latter,since each

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each and everyForm will be an example of "what is not" in this