more on this theme | more from this thinker
Full Idea
If being is what makes propositions true, then anything we can express in an affirmative proposition, however unreal, is said to be; so lacks and absences are, since we say that absences are opposed to presences, and blindness exists in an eye.
Gist of Idea
If affirmative propositions express being, we affirm about what is absent
Source
Thomas Aquinas (De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) [1267], p.92)
Book Ref
Aquinas,Thomas: 'Selected Philosophical Writings', ed/tr. McDermott,Timothy [OUP 1993], p.92
A Reaction
See Idea 11194 for the alternative Aristotelian approach to being, according to categories. Do absences and lacks have real essences, or causal properties? The absence of the sentry may cause the loss of the city.
Related Idea
Idea 11194 Being is either what falls in the categories, or what makes propositions true [Aristotle, by Aquinas]
| 13090 | The principle of diversity for corporeal substances is their matter [Aquinas, by Cover/O'Leary-Hawthorne] |
| 13070 | If definitions must be general, and general terms can't individuate, then Socrates can't be defined [Aquinas, by Cover/O'Leary-Hawthorne] |
| 11205 | If the form of 'human' contains 'many', Socrates isn't human; if it contains 'one', Socrates is Plato [Aquinas] |
| 11206 | The mind constructs complete attributions, based on the unified elements of the real world [Aquinas] |
| 11207 | A cause can exist without its effect, but the effect cannot exist without its cause [Aquinas] |
| 11208 | A simple substance is its own essence [Aquinas] |
| 11198 | Definition of essence makes things understandable [Aquinas] |
| 11196 | Essence is something in common between the natures which sort things into categories [Aquinas] |
| 11197 | The definitions expressing identity are used to sort things [Aquinas] |
| 11195 | If affirmative propositions express being, we affirm about what is absent [Aquinas] |
| 11201 | Properties have an incomplete essence, with definitions referring to their subject [Aquinas] |
| 11200 | The definition of a physical object must include the material as well as the form [Aquinas] |
| 11202 | It is by having essence that things exist [Aquinas] |
| 11203 | Specific individual essence is defined by material, and generic essence is defined by form [Aquinas] |