Predicable

Predicable (Lat. praedicabilis, that which may be

An accident is an attribute which may or may not
stated or armed, sometimes called quinque voces or
belong to a subject. The color of the human hair is
ve words) is, in scholastic logic, a term applied to a
an accident, for it belongs in no way to the essence
classication of the possible relations in which a predicate
of humanity.
may stand to its subject. It is not to be confused with
'praedicamenta', the schoolmens term for Aristotle's ten This classication, though it is of high value in the clearCategories.
ing up of our conceptions of the essential contrasted with
The list given by the schoolmen and generally adopted by the accidental, the relation of genus, dierentia and defmodern logicians is based on the original vefold classi- inition and so forth, is of more signicance in conneccation given by Aristotle (Topics, a iv. 101 b 17-25): tion with abstract sciences, especially mathematics, than
denition (horos), genus (genos), dierentia (diaphora), for the physical sciences. It is superior on the whole to
property (idion), accident (sumbebekos). The scholas- the Porphyrian scheme, which has grave defects. As has
tic classication, obtained from Bothius's Latin version been said, it classies universals as predicates of individof Porphyry's Isagoge, modied Aristotles by substitut- uals and thus involves the diculties which gave rise to
ing species (eidos) for denition. Both classications are the controversy between realism and nominalism. How
of universals, concepts or general terms, proper names are we to distinguish species from genus? Napoleon was
of course being excluded. There is, however, a radical a Frenchman, a man, an animal. In the second place how
dierence between the two systems. The standpoint of do we distinguish property and accident? Many so-called
the Aristotelian classication is the predication of one accidents are predicable necessarily of any particular peruniversal concerning another. The Porphyrian, by intro- sons. This diculty gave rise to the distinction of sepaducing species, deals with the predication of universals rable and inseparable accidents, which is one of considconcerning individuals (for species is necessarily predi- erable diculty.
cated of the individual), and thus created diculties from
which the Aristotelian is free (see below).

1 Notes

The Aristotelian classication may be briey explained:

2 References

The denition of anything is the statement of its

essence (Arist. ), i.e. that which
makes it what it is: e.g. a triangle is a three-sided
rectilineal gure.

This article incorporates text from a publication now

in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911).
"Predicables". Encyclopdia Britannica (11th ed.).
Cambridge University Press.

Genus is that part of the essence which is also predicable of other things dierent from them in kind. A
triangle is a rectilineal gure; i.e. in xing the genus
of a thing, we subsume it under a higher universal,
of which it is a species.
Dierentia is that part of the essence which distinguishes one species from another. As compared
with quadrilaterals, hexagons and so on, all of which
are rectilineal gures, a triangle is dierentiated as
having three sides.
A property is an attribute which is common to all the
members of a class, but is not part of its essence (i.e.
need not be given in its denition). The fact that the
interior angles of all triangles are equal to two right
angles is not part of the denition, but is universally
true.
1

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