Allan Bäck

In his Parts of Animals, Aristotle distinguishes three modes of the necessary.However, it is not clear just what these three modes are.Nor is it clear how this passage fits with other texts where A...

Like Plato, Aristotle uses dialectic to interpret and analyze ordinary discourse as well as to ascend to the first principles of philosophy and science. At the same time he says that it is intellect ( noûs ) that apprehends the first principle. With al-Fārābī and Avicenna (Ibn Sīnā), dialectic becomes relegated to dealing with ordinary language. For them demonstration in an ideal language from principles apprehended by the intellect suffices for the philosopher