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The history of mathematics might not seem a promising field for conspiracy
theories. Yet such a theory was rampant in the seventeenth century. No less a thinker than
mathematicians, among them Isaac Barrow, John Wallis and Edmund Halley. (Huxley
has even been argued by Netz that analysis was in fact for ancient Greek geometers a
method of presenting their results (see Netz 2000). But in a deeper sense Descartes
perceived something interesting in the historical record. We are looking in vain in the
writings of Greek mathematicians for a full explanation of what this famous method was.
And I will argue for an answer to the question why this lacuna is there: Not because
Greek geometers wanted to hide this method, but because they did not fully understand it.
It is instructive to note the ambivalent attitude of the most rigorous mathematician of the
period, Isaac Newton, to the method of analysis. He used it himself in his own
mathematical work and in the expositions of that work. Yet when the mathematical push
mathematicians indulge far too much in speculations about analysis. He was not only
critical of its uses by Descartes and others, but suspicious of the method itself.
It will in fact turn out that, if I am right, ancient Greek mathematicians were in
their practice more keenly attuned to what is involved in the method of analysis
conceptually and logically than their recent interpreters, even though they did not have a
framework to describe the method in general logical terms. (This lack is not surprising, if
I am right in arguing that certain crucial elements of this framework were recognized
only a few years ago.) By saying this, I am placing an onus on myself of giving a better
Before tackling this task, a number of preliminary remarks are in order. First, in a
birds-eye historical perspective, the method of analysis (or perhaps of analysis and
synthesis) has two aspects, if not two meanings. Sometimes analysis seems to mean
backwards until a bridge to already known results is established. I will call this the
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consequents what were formerly antecedents and linking them one with
another, we finally arrive at the construction of what was sought; and this
we call synthesis. Now analysis is of two kinds, one, whose object is to
seek the truth, being called theoretical, and the other, whose object is to
find something set for finding, being called problematical. In the
problematical kind we suppose that which is set as already known,
\
(γνωσθ ε ν), and then pass through its concomitants in order, as though
they were true, up to something admitted; then, if what is admitted be
possible and can be done, (ποριστον) that is, if it be what the
mathematicians call given, what was originally set will also be possible,
and the proof will again be the reverse of the analysis (Hultsch 634, 3-
636.30, Thomas 1941, vol. 2, pp.596-599.)
For earlier interpretations of this passage, see Tannery (1903), Cornford (1932),
On the other hand, analysis seems to mean (or at least emphasize) something else,
viz. a study of the interrelations of different geometrical objects in certain figures, that is,
in certain geometrical configurations. (Cf. Hintikka and Remes 1974.) This sense might
notions of analysis are related to each other (if they are) is examined below. This
interrelation is one of the most interesting features of the saga of the analytic method.
Another matter that can be disposed of is the question of the direction of analysis.
inquire into what the conclusion comes from. Hence, in them the direction is
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geometrical objects, for instance relations expressed by algebraic equations. Such
equations can usually be solved for either term. In that sense, the direction usually does
not matter.
It is also relevant to note that understanding the ancient method of analysis is not
an isolated problem in the history of mathematics and in the history of thought even more
porismoi. Euclid wrote an entire book on each of these topics, although only the Data has
survived. It is far from obvious even what their subject matter is, let alone what they were
needed for. They have no obvious counterparts in modern mathematical practice. Why
not? In later periods, the history of the method of analysis is connected with the
development of algebra and with its uses in analytic geometry. Some scholars have even
seen in the idea of “an analytical experiment” the methodological Leitmotif of early
mathematical practice makes little difference to the framework that should be used in
analyzing it. Whether it was a method of proof, a heuristic method of finding proofs and
identified. For instance, in so far as heuristic techniques can be rationally discussed, they
can be construed as strategic methods. But if so, they can in principle be examined,
formulated and theorized about in as explicit “fully formal” terms as rules of proof.
(Needless to say, it may and should be asked which in principle formalizable strategies
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are heuristically better or worse than others.) Hence analytic argumentation will be
For similar reasons, it does not make much difference if an interpreter tries to
evoke the famous holy cow called mathematical practice. If such practice is not
haphazard, it must be governed by some tacit rules which must be discussed on a par with
The fact that the structural analysis of the ancient Greek method is largely
independent of its pragmatic uses has not always been recognized. For instance, some
misunderstanding. Precisely the same rules as govern steps of deduction ipso facto
govern the search for premises. We merely have to apply the same rules in the opposite
direction. For another example, Netz thinks that the direction makes a difference whether
strategic rules of deduction or of other kinds of reasoning can only be heuristic rules of
With these methodological precepts in mind, one can suggest that there is an
in fact been available for more than half a century. It is the technique of argumentation in
our usual basic logic, first-order logic, known as the tableau method of E. W. Beth. In his
very first presentation of this method (Beth 1955, p. 319) the historically perceptive Beth
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approach realizes to a considerable extent the conception of a purely analytical
method, which has played such an important role in the history of logic and
philosophy.
Interpreters have not paid enough attention to Beth’s suggestion. But what precisely is
Beth’s approach and what is the extent to which it realizes the old Greek idea of
analytical method in geometry? Let’s deal with the first question first. The tableau
method is a procedure for looking for a proof that a certain first-order proposition G is a
which you can think of as saying “someone in envied by everybody”. Likewise, let G be
in words, “everyone envies somebody”. The tableau could then look as follows
(3) (∀y) Nyα from (1) (4) (∃u) Nβu from (2)
What happens here is almost self-explanatory, and so is its connection with the
synthesis and analysis. On the left side we take the premise F and see what the world
must be like if it is true. On the right side we take the conclusion and see what the world
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might be like if it were to make the conclusion G true. For instance, if (1) is true, there
must exist some individual or other, call it α, to make it true. Hence the step to (3). (Of
course, we need not know who α is otherwise.) By symmetry, if (4) is true for any
arbitrary individual β of whom we need not know anything else, then (2) is true. (This
necessitates considering some instantiating terms like β in (2) playing the role of a
variable bound to a universal quantifier.) Thus on the right side we reason backwards
from the desired conclusion to the conditions that would make it true. The steps (5) and
(6) are merely applications of general truths to particular instances. Once we have the
same proposition on both sides, we have built a bridge and run up the right side in order
to reach the conclusion G = (2) from the premise F = (1). The right side thus exemplifies
analytic reasoning in the directional sense while the left side can be thought of as
Similar examples are easily found in geometrical reasoning. They would be more
geometrical theorem in Euclid (or elsewhere in the classical tradition). This division is
explained e.g. in Heath 1926, vol.1, pp. 129-131. Thus in this traditional terminology,
steps (3) and (4) would be cases of ekthesis while (5) and 6) would be parts of apodeixis.
reconstruction of the analytic method viz. the fact that both sides of a tableau can be
both sides, we are reasoning about certain given or postulated individuals. In the sample
tableau, we considered the configuration formed by the individual α who was assumed to
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be envied by everyone and by the postulated individual β who was hoped to envy
argument was a routine part of ancient mathematicians’ practice. This was what the
more complicated arguments, the reasoning might have to branch into two or more
disjunctive lines of thought. Furthermore, individuals other than those instantiating the
premise and the conclusion might have to be introduced. (As an example, you might for
instance construct a tableau for the inference from “someone is envied by all unmarried
persons” to “every unmarried person envies somebody”.) Such further introductions are
constructions”.
Moreover, in steps (5) and (6) we are in an obvious sense analyzing the
configuration formed by α and β. We are asking what envying relations there might
expressible by algebraic equations. There are plenty of perfectly valid rules of logical
inference that do not lead themselves to such an interpretation for instance, adding a
disjunction of the form (S v ~S) as an extra premise (for instance to the left side of a
tableau) preserves truth and hence constitutes a valid inference. Such additions might
even help an argument significantly. However, they cannot be interpreted as dealing with
several different ways. The idea of analysis as an analysis of configurations requires that
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each step of an analytic argument can be interpreted as saying something about some
ingredients and sometimes adding a new geometrical object to it. This is of course what
Greek geometers routinely did, not only in what are technically known as their analyses.
Even though this practice has prompted little comment, the possibility of doing so
consistently is not at all obvious from a logical point of view. The possibility of viewing
of geometrical objects is virtually tantamount to the requirement that the logically explicit
argument satisfies what is called the subformula property. What this principle requires is
how the subformula requirement makes it possible to consider a geometrical (or any other
inference needed, universal instantiation with respect to names already present in the
configuration in question by introducing a new “arbitrary” sample object into one’s line
of reasoning.
Now the subformula principle is the most important logical feature characterizing
the tableau method. The possibility of transforming any first-order proof into a form in
which the subformula principle is satisfied is the first and foremost result of modern
proof theory. Its first version is known as Gentzen’s first Hauptsatz. (See Szabo 1969.)
Since in the usual Gentzen – type formulations of first-order logic the rules that do not
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satisfy the subformula principle are condemned into what is known as the cut rule, this
fundamental result is also known as the cut elimination theorem. Greek geometers’
This vantage point offers also an insight into the relation of the two ingredients of
the method of analysis. It is not hard to see that we can maintain the subformula principle
in all proofs from premises only if some of the argumentation proceeds from the hoped-
for consequences backwards toward the premises. For instance, suppose that the right
side of a tableau is in effect a deductive argument proceeding from bottom up, if so, that
deductive argument could not satisfy the subformula principle. For instance, in our
sample tableau a step from (6) to (4) would be valid, but it would not satisfy the
implies the directional sense. This insight in turn enhances the interest and value of the
entire tableau method and the Greek geometrical practice. This practice involved
geometrical configurations illustrated by figures. Now it is far from obvious and indeed
false that any proof in elementary geometry can be so considered. For instance,
(1983).
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In order to be interpretable as dealing with a specific figure, deductive reasoning
must satisfy what is known as the subformula principle. The name of this principle
describes it. What it says is that each step in explicit formal reasoning must be a
principle is satisfied can each step of reasoning be construed either as a statement about
certain definite relation to the earlier ones. Without the subformula property, a deductive
argument in geometry cannot always be interpreted as being about a certain figure. And
this is how Greek geometers looked upon their proofs. Hence they were in effect
Now the subformula property can be considered as the characteristic mark of the
tableau method. This method naturally results as soon as we assume the two-column
format (premises in the left or “true” column and the conclusion in the right or “false”
column) and then require that the subformula property holds in each column. What this
means for the interpretation of the method of analysis is that the analysis-of-figures sense
But if so, the analysis-of-figures sense also leads to the directional sense of
analysis. For from logical theory we know that in a tableau proof we typically have to
consider on each side more individuals mentioned in the initial premise or in the
usually have to be a large number of steps also on the right-hand side, which manifests
the directional sense of analysis. Hence the interpretation of the method of analysis and
synthesis as a tableau procedure shows that there is an actual connection between the two
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apparently unrelated senses of analysis. As a synthesizing slogan, it can be said that
sense.
Since the tableau approach and the method of analysis and synthesis are closely
related, these considerations strongly suggested that the method of analysis and synthesis
Moreover, the idea of “arguing about figures” has an obvious connection with the
heuristic usefulness of analysis. Geometrical invention does not mean that one
configurations need not even be geometric in a narrow sense, but can be discrete figures
Among other things, this rational reconstruction shows the subtlety of the relation
between analysis and synthesis. What was pointed out above is that the deduction that
inverts the analytic reasoning as it were on the right side of a tableau cannot itself satisfy
the subformula principle, that is, be “analytic”. We might express that by saying that
sense. But the converse also holds. One cannot conduct the entire argument analytically
in the directional sense. If by analysis one means looking for premises from which the
conclusion can be derived deductively, this search cannot satisfy the subformula
principle, that is, be analytic in the analysis-of-figures sense. For on the left hand side we
cannot proceed upwards without violating the subformula principle. What follows is that
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if a geometrical argument from a premise to a conclusion is to be interpretable as an
argument about certain figures (i.e. certain kinds of geometrical configuration), it must
Hence analysis and synthesis are structurally not just movements in opposite
and a synthetic component. Analysis was not practiced by Greek mathematicians merely
geometrical figures.
This would be like switching from the tableau method of deductive proof to the well-
known tree method which was discovered at the same time as the tableau method.
to describe – one can even say, construct an isomorphic picture of – the world as it would
have to be if the premise(s) were true but the conclusion false. This interpretation would
enable us to view the entire argument as being a kind of picture construction and hence as
dealing with figures. Thus, such an interpretation seems to have been foreign to the
Greeks. It seems that we can see traces of the complementary relation of analysis and
synthesis in the texts. It may for instance be significant that Pappus never says that
analysis should always be carried back to the first principles. Rather, he says that analysis
ends when the analyst has reached “things already known or having the status of a first
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to earlier theorems. Rather, a phrase like “what is admitted” is relative to a stage of an
ongoing argument and cannot naturally refer to its potential ultimate premises. This is
The tableau reconstruction also throws some light on the problem concerning the
and then proceed “through the things that follow [or accompany, akolouthein] in order.”
strictest logical sense possible, the tableau interpretation yields the interesting answer:
None of the above. For even on the left side of a tableau, the successive lines (which may
be disjunctive, the disjuncts being left hand sides of a subtableau) are not logical
consequences of the premise. Only their existential closures are such consequences. In
our sample analysis above, (3) is not a deductive consequence of (1). Rather, it illustrates
it through the “arbitrary object” α. But what this means is that the existential closure of
(3) is (1).
the case of a sample configuration of individuals, some of which may be what has been
called “arbitrary individuals”. Similar comments pertain to what is going on on the right
In view of such subtle distinctions, it perhaps is not surprising if Pappus did not
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Pappus’s words promises any real illumination. (It may none the less be relevant to note
that the key word akolouthein elsewhere in the Greek philosophical texts sometimes
means accompanying (“going together”) rather than consequence. See Hintikka 1962.)
proofs thus throws important light on the method. Nevertheless, the most interesting and
constructive feature of the tableau reconstruction is that it fails – or more specifically the
ways in which it fails in the form in which it has just been presented. The principal
shortcomings of the tableau reconstruction can be given labels. These labels are problem
and construction. It is no accident that these two notions have been central in recent
To take the notion of construction first, where should we place it in the tableau
objects into the argument. In the tableau technique of logical proof, such new individuals
are introduced on the left side by existential instantiation and on the right side by a mirror
image rule of universal instantiation. But such instantiations are not constructions. What
are introduced are not objects constructed out of the familiar ones, but John Doe-like
the tentative conclusion that there exist individuals of a certain kind. The arguer then in
effect says (to himself and/or to others), “Let us consider one case in point and call it α.”
A judge in a court of law might likewise say of an unknown perpetrator, “Call him John
Doe.” In fact in the early modern period, Wallis (1683, p. 66, quoted by Klein 1968, p.
321) claimed that the use of symbols for unknowns in algebra was inspired by such a
legal usage. This comment, whether or not it is historically accurate, is suggestive in that
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it shows that an early modern algebraist thought of the introductions of new individuals
into an argument, not just as constructions in a geometrical sense, but more generally as
In any case, the use of such arbitrary individuals presupposes that we do not know
or assume anything about them except which existential proposition they instantiate, for
instance know how they are related to objects already known or postulated, for instance
how they are constructed out of the known ones. Hence in this sense constructions yield
too much information. They also yield too little information, in that geometrical objects
can be known to exist that cannot be introduced by any obvious construction. Moreover,
as Wilbur Knorr among others has argued, Greek mathematicians were familiar with
stand for an arbitrary sample object, as if another Jane Doe or Richard Roe. It makes no
prima facie sense to think of the new objects to be actually constructed, for the
construction would have to start from merely notional and possibly impossible entities.
Hence the tableau interpretation cannot explain or even accommodate the crucial
role of constructions in analysis or, for that matter, in other kinds of mathematical
reasoning. Nor does it have anything to say about what problems were and how they
differed from theorems, in spite of the fact that it is generally agreed that the main use of
geometrical problems were in effect existence theorems. Recently, his view has been
trenchantly criticized by Knorr (1986, especially pp. 74-80, 360) and others. However, a
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convincing positive answer to the question as to what problems were is not found in the
literature.
The reason for this absence of a recorded answer is perhaps that the answer is too
obvious. Problems are questions, and their logic is the logic of questions and answers.
And since questions are requests of information, the logic of questions and answers is a
part of epistemic logic. The logic of ancient Greek mathematicians is not the usual first-
order logic. It is epistemic logic (or equivalent). The question whether the tableau
question whether the logical techniques of epistemic logic can yield a logic of problem
solving.
The main difficulty is obvious. In order to practice the tableau method, an analyst
must know the desired conclusion to be established. It is what is put on the top of the
right side. But in problem solving this conclusion is precisely what it is sought for. This is
This seemingly makes the tableau procedure completely useless in discussing the
analytical method in its directional sense, for the method was supposed to consist in
analyzing the desired conclusion. In the case of a problem, the configuration instantiating
the conclusion should include the hoped-for construction. But how can one possibly
The systematic logical problem we are facing here has recently been solved. The
framework for looking for an answer to a question in the same sense as it can be used as a
framework for looking for a proof of a logical consequence relation. This can be done by
17
introducing the epistemic element into the reasoning. In mathematical practice, this
element is often tacit. It can be made explicit by adding to the usual first-order logic an
“it is known that” operator K. In the tableau method it can always remain sentence-
initial. Furthermore, a distinction must be made between known and (possibly) unknown
individuals. I will spare you the technical details and indicate only their manifestation. It
turns out that quantifiers ranging over known individuals are those that are independent
of the K operator. This is indicated by writing them as (∃x/K) or (∀y/K). Such quantifiers
by
Given a question, we can now always form its desideratum, which expresses the
epistemic state which the questioner aims at. For instance, if the question is “Who
murdered Roger Ackroyd?”, the desideratum is “it is known who murdered Roger
Ackroyd”; in symbols,
If the question is, “How does the area of a square depend on the length of its sides?” the
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Now the tableau method can be applied to problem-solving simply using the
premises must be thought of as being preceded by the K operator.) This procedure bears
and as true” and more than mere similarity with what Pappus refers to as supposing “that
which is set as already known”. The desideratum is that crucial hypothesis. The
possibility of being so is the genuine secret of the method of analysis. Beth was on the
right track in seeing a connection between the idea of a purely analytic method and
tableau proofs. However, the right interpretation can be reached only by means of the
familiar first-order tableau arguments, especially when the sentence-initial K’s are left
tacit. The main difference is that we now have to keep track of which individuals are
known and which quantifiers range over known individuals. The following is an example
of such a tableau argument. The question in question is of the form, “Given an individual
x, what individual y is related to it as in D(x,y)?” For instance, the question might be,
“How is distance covered by a freely falling body related to time?” The argument shows
function.
19
(1) K (∀y)D(x,g(x)) (assumption) (3) K (∀x)(∃y/K)D(x,y) (desideratum)
Here the desideratum says that it is known what individual y is related to any given x by
Again, similar geometrical arguments are easy to find. In Euclidspeak, step (4) of
our argument is an ekthesis and step (7) a kataskeue. Assumption (2) says that the
fraction g(x) is given. This guarantees that g(α) in (6) is given. Moreover, (8) says that β
is given, which enables it to be substituted for the variable y in (4) so as to obtain (10),
This small sample argument illustrates the nature of the epistemic tableau
method. If the epistemic operators K are omitted, the tableau looks very much like an
ordinary nonepistemic tableau. The only exception are the slashes indicating which
20
quantifiers range over known individuals. There is no similar syntactical indicator for
names and/or dummy names like α and β. If you look at the tableau, you can see that α is
known. Hence it cannot be substituted for a variable bound to a slashed quantifier. It can
be substituted for the x in (3) or for the y in (1). However, it could not be substituted for
the y in (4).
Modest though this little example is, it illustrates an important feature of the
conceptual situation. The premise (1) says that it is known that, for each x, g(x) satisfies
which is a mere set-theoretical entity, the class of ordered pairs <x,g(x)>. From the
argument it is seen that this assumption (1) does not alone entail (3), that is, entail that it
is known how g(x) depends on x. Formally, since g(α) is not assumed to be known, it
cannot be substituted for the slashed variable y in (4). The desideratum follows only with
the help of the assumption (2), that is, only because g(x) is assumed to be a known
function.
that some of the instantiations will have to be with respect to known individuals. These
instantiations cannot be with respect to “arbitrary” John Doe individuals. Wallis may
have been right about the parentage of algebraic instantialization, but a similar idea does
21
Hence, clearly constructions were not the only way of proving the existence of a
geometrical object in Greek mathematics. What matters is not so much that the object in
It is now my main thesis that the epistemic tableau method is logically speaking
the analytic method of Greek geometers. What is my evidence for saying so? The main
characteristic of the epistemic tableau method is the need of keeping track of known
individuals in arguments. Now not only can we find a methodology for doing so in Greek
mathematics. Realizing the logical function of this methodology solves one of the main
open problems concerning the interpretation of Greek mathematics in general. For this
methodology is precisely the business of that important part of the Greek mathematical
corpus that dealt with what were known as data. Euclid’s so-called book is only the best
known example of this preoccupation with “the given”, as the usual literal translation.
But the intended meaning is obviously what for the purposes of some particular argument
“the known” instead of “the given”, and assumed that this is what their Greek
predecessors meant. (See Berggren and van Brummelen 2000.) Whatever qualifications
argument where something else is “given” (known). This is the purpose of the entire
“data” literature. The rules concerning what is “given” are logically speaking rules
authorizing instantiations. And such rules are needed as soon as we have to deal with an
22
the interpretation of the method of analysis as the epistemic tableau technique also solves
another outstanding general problem concerning Greek geometrical theory. We can first
of all see how Zeuthen went wrong. The true conclusion in a problematic analysis is not
an existence theorem, but the desideratum of the problem in question. But this does not
mean that existential propositions do not play a role in solving geometrical problems
analytically.
Problems are naturally construed as questions. But before one can legitimately ask
a question, one has to establish the presupposition, as we know from the logic of
questions and answers. And the presupposition of a question is the proposition obtained
from its desideratum by omitting all slashes. In the case of general wh-questions, which is
what we are dealing with here, such presuppositions are existential propositions. Such
solution. Hence it must be expected, if I am right, that Greek geometers should have paid
Like data, porismoi attracted a great deal of attention on the part of Greek geometers. For
instance, not only did Euclid write a book called literally Data (See Ito, 1980, Simson
1806), he also wrote a book on the porismoi, which unfortunately has been almost
In spite of this apparent importance of porismoi, their nature and their role in
geometrical argumentation has not been previously understood adequately. This may
23
many geometers understand them (sc. porisms) only in a partial way and are
ignorant of the essential textures of their contents.
The epistemic tableau procedure now helps us to understand what is implied. First, what
is a porismos supposed to be like? Pappus tells us that the aim of a porism is not a
the thing proposed.” But what is a production that is not a construction? The natural
interpretation is that what is meant is the finding of the object sought. And to show that
something can be found is tantamount to showing that it exists. Hence porisms are
naturally taken to be existence theorems, in other words, the existential statements that
is explicitly asked, its presupposition is normally presented as an earlier result that serves
porisms were not necessarily proved independently of the analytic arguments by means
of which problems were solved. A successful analysis proves the existence of the
solution, but an analysis may also end up showing the impossibility of a solution, that is,
the falsity of the presupposition. It is in this role that the very word ποριστóν occurs in
Proclus also explains the notion of porism by using the notion of finding in so
porism is the name given to things that are sought but need some finding and are
neither pure bringing into existence nor simple theoretical argument.
24
Indeed, as Heath (1926, vol. 1, p. 13) puts it,
the usual form of a porism was “to prove that it is possible to find a point with
such and such a property”
express existence.
knowable he writes:
The essence of the knowable notions does not require that one perceives them or
that they are actually produced. Rather, if the proof of the possibility of the notion
has been provided, the notion is sound, whether one has actually produced it or
not (Hogendijk, p. 96, quoted by Berggren and Van Brummelen, 2000, p. 26).
problem by the epistemic tableau method what is established is the existence of a known
individual, whereas in the corresponding existence theorem it is only shown that there
notwithstanding, the content and meaning of any one porism “lends itself to unambiguous
porismoi in the overall process of problem-solving. Yet this role was in practice
These insights into the nature of the Greek method of analysis help to confirm the
interpretation of this method as being in effect an epistemic tableau technique. But what
about the idea of construction? In a loose sense all introductions of new objects
(including John Doe-like “arbitrary objects”) into an argument can sometimes be called
“auxiliary construction” in the sense of Euclidian kataskeue. But in a more specific sense,
25
the construction of a from b and c is what serves to make sure that when b and c are
given, a is also given. Hence constructions in this specific sense, while not being needed
in the proof of a theorem, are vital in a solution of a problem in the same sense as
of analysis in terms of epistemic tableaux. However, at a closer look there lurks a scary
skeleton in the closet of Greek analysis. Once again the tableau framework serves well in
spelling out the situation. The notion of construction fits well in what happens on the left
side of a problem-solving tableau. However, the same does not hold of the right side.
There new individuals, including known ones, are introduced by universal instantiation.
But what universally quantified variables represent intuitively speaking are hypothesized
individuals, not in any natural sense given or known ones. Such merely notional
individuals cannot serve as inputs into a construction in any clear sense. What is
supposed to happen on the right side is a coexistence and cooperation of the two aspects
of the analytic method, the analysis-of-figures sense and the directional (backwards-
This conundrum is reflected in the confusions and paradoxes that actually beset
discussions about data in antiquity. Typically, the source of puzzles in them is in effect
the idea that in the right side the looked-for solution is already known. But this is not a
difficulty for an interpreter like myself. It was a problem for the Greek geometers
themselves. They were looking at the method of analysis in a wrong way. Theirs is not a
coherent model-theoretical interpretation of the tableau method. The correct one is that
26
model(scenario, situation or “possible world”) in which the premise is true but the
conclusion false. If the attempt is frustrated, the consequence is valid. In the epistemic
case, an analyst is likewise trying to describe a situation in which the premise is known
but the conclusion is not. The individuals hypothesized on the right side are therefore no
the individuals that would make the conclusion known, but the ones that would make it
unknown, in the jargon of modern mathematics, they are the unknowns, not the data, of
interpretation of the tableau method. On this interpretation a search for a tableau proof is
relation, that is to say, to construct a model in which the premise is true but the
directions, the conclusion is seen to be valid and the tableau which shows this serves as
the proof of the conclusion. But in such a proof, steps on the right side cannot be
above. In the first one, the term β does not refer to any particular object in the kind of
serve as a starting point of a construction in any natural sense. As was noted above, it
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Somewhat similar things can be said of the term α of the second (epistemic)
sample analysis. It, too, can only be thought of as standing for an “arbitrary object”. It
cannot serve as the basis of a construction, as is witnessed by the fact that it cannot be
conclusions from a merely postulated theorem. But one cannot carry out constructions
the way in which new objects are introduced into a geometrical arguments, they could not
fully understand what happens in the backwards-moving part of the procedure of analysis
and synthesis.
In sum, the Greeks could not accommodate what happens on the right hand side
with the idea that geometrical arguments and geometrical analyses should be thought of
I believe that this failure of Greek mathematicians to understand fully the logic of
the analytic method is what made them reluctant to explain it. Thus Descartes and his
The method of analysis is understood and used correctly only when the unknowns
are treated on a par with known entities. In formal terms, this means allowing universal
instantiation on the right side to operate just like existential instantiation on the left side.
This presupposes that the links between individuals, for instance between geometrical
objects, that make them “given” or “known” in the sense manifesting itself in their being
28
acceptable substitution-values of slashed variables, need not be constructions creating
new known objects from previously known ones. They can be merely relations of
dependence. Such relations can of course obtain between unknown and known entities.
Such relations can be known even when their terms are unknown.
This insight was never reached by the Greeks. In this sense, they never reached a
full-fledged notion of an unknown. And it was only when this idea was realized that the
analytic method could give rise to algebra, to analytic geometry and to infinitesimal
analysis.
characteristics of ancient Greek thought. It may in any case be noted that the idea (and
practice) of unknown entities could not have found a slot in an Aristotelian science. On
the contrary, each such science deals with a genus of entities of which it is at the outset
assumed that they are and what they are. (See here Hintikka 1972.)
These insights put the very notion o construction and its history to a new light. As
was seen, the introduction of a anew individual on the right side should not, and cannot,
introduction of a John Doe arbitrary individual after all, except that the arbitrariness is
not complete. For the new individual must depend on the given ones in a specific way. In
formal logic, the functions that embody that dependence are known as Skolem functions.
In mathematics, the same dependencies are expressed by equations that relate the
The constructive character of this process will then lie in its very possibility. And,
as was pointed out above, this possibility means representability of the logical reasoning
29
in question in a cut-free form. This insight gives the entire notion of construction and
What has been found here also throws light on the use of definitions as premises
in Greek mathematics. What we have seen is that the logic they were using is in effect
from definitory identities whose function is to identify the bearer of a name (or
whose logical force is different from (a=b) (or from K(a=b)) and which can be used to
At this point, we seem to have left with a serious problem. Mathematicians of the
early modern period were problem-solvers quite as much as the Greeks. If it was the
elements, including the need of considering “data” and proving porisms, why didn’t the
new analysts have to do the same? How could they avoid the problems of what is
“given”?
The main part of an answer is that the use of algebraic methods, especially the
the difficulties of the Greeks. In a nutshell, it may be impossible to use unknown (merely
analysis. (How do you draw a circle around an arbitrary point?) Or at least it was
30
difficult to understand what the Realgeholt of such ideas was. But there is nothing
element apparently was not needed at all, solving precisely the difficulty that was found
This answers the historical question. However, it leaves a logician still puzzled.
What precisely is the logic of algebraic problem-solving that can dispense with the
epistemic element? But this question belongs to studies of the logic of the analytic-
31
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