# Essences and substances?



## jwright82 (Aug 16, 2012)

My personal view of essences and substances is that they are not some element within each object to be discovered somehow. This was the old view and it went through different forms. To me they are part of our conceptual framework that we use to make sense of the world. They are not a thing or substance or stuff that exists somewhere in the various things that we must discover somehow. The end result of that is Kant in my opinion. But as far as being logical or conceptions for making sense of things they are just fine. 

What happens is that you so abstract these concepts to the point of trying to find pure being and they become useless because they are not thing in the sense that my computer is a thing or my chair is a thing. They are a thing in the sense that we cannot make sense of the world without these concepts. We can’t find any other way to talk about things in the world. Its as metaphysical objects that you run into problems not metaphysical concepts.


----------



## earl40 (Aug 16, 2012)

I would try to answer your question but you are George Willing me here. Most of us old coggers will understand the reference.

So I will bump it up for you.


----------



## py3ak (Aug 16, 2012)

James, would you say that on this point you are essentially a nominalist? _Universalia post rem_ with regard to what constitutes a person a person, a human being a human being, etc.?


----------



## jwright82 (Aug 17, 2012)

py3ak said:


> James, would you say that on this point you are essentially a nominalist? _Universalia post rem_ with regard to what constitutes a person a person, a human being a human being, etc.?



No I am not a nominalist but I can certainly see how that impression can be left. I follow the view of metaphysics employed by P. F. Strawson. He said that there are two types of metaphysics descriptive and revisionary. I would say that he doesn’t capture enough of what metaphysics has been with this but I will point that out. Descriptive metaphysics looks at the broadest features of our language to examine our conceptual scheme or framework for how we make sense of the world. That is for instance since no language out there is even possible without some concept of individual objects in the world hence there must be individual objects. It is a transcendental argument. 

Since our conceptual scheme is determined by reality, we must think and talk about the same stuff, and it is through language that we reveal our conceptual scheme. So we look at how we describe the world and go from there. Revisionary metaphysics seeks to make our structure of how we describe reality better but it must always be checked against descriptive metaphysics to be proof checked. Now I find this wanting because it gives no area for previous metaphysics, like substance metaphysics, and I think that theoretical metaphysics is a better title. This captures both revisionary and the major questions of metaphysics along with various metaphysics. But theoretical metaphysics must also be proof checked by descriptive metaphysics. 

So we can therefore reject substance metaphysics in the theoretical sense but retain the idea of substance or essence in descriptive metaphysics. This allows us to abandon the problematic elements of substance metaphysics but retain the ideas so that creeds and confessions remain unaffected. Here is a web page on him. 


Peter Frederick Strawson (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)


----------



## Philip (Aug 17, 2012)

jwright82 said:


> My personal view of essences and substances is that they are not some element within each object to be discovered somehow.



Let's take an ordinary object: its essence consists in those things that make it that object or kind of object. The substance is the stuff of which it is composed at a particular point in time. If I build a chair, I am taking wood (substance) and making something out of it (essence). I think it goes without saying that this distinction is not merely conceptual or abstract.



jwright82 said:


> This allows us to abandon the problematic elements of substance metaphysics



Which problems again? I'm still unsure of where the problem lies or why it's a problem unique to substance metaphysics.


----------



## py3ak (Aug 17, 2012)

Thanks for clarifying that, James. Am I correct in thinking that on that system language is viewed as the vehicle and enabler of thought, and our portal of access to knowledge about reality?


----------



## Claudiu (Aug 18, 2012)

Philip said:


> jwright82 said:
> 
> 
> > My personal view of essences and substances is that they are not some element within each object to be discovered somehow.
> ...


----------



## John Bunyan (Aug 18, 2012)

What is the proper definition of "essence" and "substance"?


----------



## Ask Mr. Religion (Aug 19, 2012)

essence: "a thing which neither springs from, nor depends upon any thing else, but exists of and by itself alone, and is the cause of existence to every thing else."

substance: see above when discussing theology proper, as they both are used when speaking of _homoousios_


Thiessen writes, “The terms ‘essence’ and ‘substance’ are practically synonymous when used of God. 
They may be defined as that which underlies all outward manifestation; the reality itself, whether 
material or immaterial; the substratum of anything; that in which the qualities or attributes inhere.” 
Henry C. Thiessen,_ Lectures in Systematic Theology_, revised by Vernon D. Doerksen (Grand Rapids, 
Mich.: Eerdmans, 1979), p. 75. See also Charles Hodge, _Systematic Theology_, vol. 1 (London: James 
Clarke, 1960), p. 367. 

AMR


----------



## jwright82 (Aug 21, 2012)

Philip said:


> Let's take an ordinary object: its essence consists in those things that make it that object or kind of object. The substance is the stuff of which it is composed at a particular point in time. If I build a chair, I am taking wood (substance) and making something out of it (essence). I think it goes without saying that this distinction is not merely conceptual or abstract.



Right but even now you are asserting, it seems, exactly what I am that substance by itself is not a thing that subsists within the object. You mentioned a kind of substance, wood, and plastic may be another kind of substance. What you didn’t do is argue for a thing separate from all other things that is pure essence or pure substance. That idea of substance is what Aristotle argued for. The scholastics, as far as I can tell, picked it up (albeit in a modified form) and modern philosophy extended it to destruction. 




Philip said:


> Which problems again? I'm still unsure of where the problem lies or why it's a problem unique to substance metaphysics.



The idea of a pure substance becomes unknowable. It basically leads to Kant. Hence the thing in itself is unknowable. 




py3ak said:


> Thanks for clarifying that, James. Am I correct in thinking that on that system language is viewed as the vehicle and enabler of thought, and our portal of access to knowledge about reality?



Language is the portal to how we think and reality is what we must think about so analyzing our language is one vehicle through which we can investigate the nature of reality.


----------



## py3ak (Aug 21, 2012)

Thanks, James. I suspect that the definition of language has to be stretched pretty far if the assertion is that we have no other way of thinking than by language.


----------



## Philip (Aug 21, 2012)

jwright82 said:


> What you didn’t do is argue for a thing separate from all other things that is pure essence or pure substance. That idea of substance is what Aristotle argued for.



No, but I don't think I have to in order to maintain the distinction.



jwright82 said:


> The idea of a pure substance becomes unknowable. It basically leads to Kant. Hence the thing in itself is unknowable.



A pure substance wouldn't be anything, therefore it wouldn't exist at all, therefore the question is irrelevant.


----------



## jwright82 (Aug 23, 2012)

py3ak said:


> Thanks, James. I suspect that the definition of language has to be stretched pretty far if the assertion is that we have no other wya of thinking than by language.



This is just saying that we always think in a particular language. And we cannot just separate out our conceptual scheme and communicate it in a non-language, whatever that may be. Even if I describe my conceptual scheme I would be describing it in a language. 




Philip said:


> No, but I don't think I have to in order to maintain the distinction.



That’s fine. But how is your distinction different and why is it the only legitimate way to view things? 




Philip said:


> A pure substance wouldn't be anything, therefore it wouldn't exist at all, therefore the question is irrelevant.



Right and that is why I believe it was wise for post Kantian thinkers to abandon the idea.


----------



## py3ak (Aug 23, 2012)

jwright82 said:


> This is just saying that we always think in a particular language. And we cannot just separate out our conceptual scheme and communicate it in a non-language, whatever that may be. Even if I describe my conceptual scheme I would be describing it in a language.



Yes, but at this point "language" is taken to include mathematics, pictures, and indirect non-propositional ways of using words.

Philip can speak for himself, but it's not at all clear to me why believing that there is such a thing as essence of particular things necessitates belief that there is a superessential essence - an essential essence that all essences share, unless that's how you want to think of existence.


----------



## Philip (Aug 23, 2012)

jwright82 said:


> But how is your distinction different and why is it the only legitimate way to view things?



I make the same distinction, I just don't think that there are pure essences or pure substances. Such would be very odd indeed, bordering on nonsensical.



jwright82 said:


> Right and that is why I believe it was wise for post Kantian thinkers to abandon the idea.



But what was not wise was the abandonment of the distinction itself. The trouble with Kant was his assumption that essence is imposed from outside on a thing rather than inherent in the thing from its creation.



jwright82 said:


> This is just saying that we always think in a particular language. And we cannot just separate out our conceptual scheme and communicate it in a non-language, whatever that may be. Even if I describe my conceptual scheme I would be describing it in a language.



Indeed you would---but that does not preclude language being able to speak beyond itself. Kant made the fundamental error of assuming that we cannot speak about the noumenal when the noumenal/phenomenal distinction itself is, I think, an unwarranted one.


----------



## jwright82 (Aug 30, 2012)

py3ak said:


> Yes, but at this point "language" is taken to include mathematics, pictures, and indirect non-propositional ways of using words.
> 
> Philip can speak for himself, but it's not at all clear to me why believing that there is such a thing as essence of particular things necessitates belief that there is a superessential essence - an essential essence that all essences share, unless that's how you want to think of existence.



It might be more proper to say that language is one common form of a semiotic system (a system of signs with rules that govern there meaning and use) that we use. What happens is that as you abstract away the phenomenal elements of a thing. That’s all it becomes a series of phenomenal elements. So where is its essence? This is the question of universals as I understand it. 

In what way doe the particular posses or participate in its essence? I mean pick your theory but they all failed to address the problem. Nominalism is the end result, to me, of this way of thinking. But through a transcendental argument you can show that Nominalists are wrong because we cannot even speak or think about things without some concept of essence. 

Another way to put my point is that there are many contexts in which it is appropriate to use substance and essence language but not all metaphysical contexts are required by some reason to be only spoken of in this language. So I am not abandoning it only relegating its importance. 




Philip said:


> I make the same distinction, I just don't think that there are pure essences or pure substances. Such would be very odd indeed, bordering on nonsensical.



But admitting this distinction only means that although the distinction is important on some level it is not the only to think of things metaphysically.




Philip said:


> But what was not wise was the abandonment of the distinction itself. The trouble with Kant was his assumption that essence is imposed from outside on a thing rather than inherent in the thing from its creation.



But they did metaphysics without much reference to this distinction. 




Philip said:


> Indeed you would---but that does not preclude language being able to speak beyond itself. Kant made the fundamental error of assuming that we cannot speak about the noumenal when the noumenal/phenomenal distinction itself is, I think, an unwarranted one.



But isn’t that distinction the end result of essence exclusive thinking? Of course language can speak beyond itself. If we both go outside and talk about the tree in the yard we are not just referring to language but to the tree. It’s just that the language we are using is a socially constructed language through the adopted use of certain words to speak about the tree.


----------



## Philip (Aug 30, 2012)

jwright82 said:


> Nominalism is the end result, to me, of this way of thinking. But through a transcendental argument you can show that Nominalists are wrong because we cannot even speak or think about things without some concept of essence.



Unless you're Van Til, who was a nominalist.



jwright82 said:


> But they did metaphysics without much reference to this distinction.



Indeed they did---and it produced all kinds of confusion. Post-Kantian philosophy has been a giant regressive train-wreck, from Hegel and Fichte to Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre and Derrida.



jwright82 said:


> But isn’t that distinction the end result of essence exclusive thinking?



No. The real distinction is the perceived versus the actual---but it's a) an epistemological distinction b) a distinction that has nothing whatsoever to do with essence and substance.



jwright82 said:


> Of course language can speak beyond itself. If we both go outside and talk about the tree in the yard we are not just referring to language but to the tree. It’s just that the language we are using is a socially constructed language through the adopted use of certain words to speak about the tree.



Ok, so what's the problem?


----------



## jwright82 (Aug 31, 2012)

Philip said:


> Unless you're Van Til, who was a nominalist.



Good luck proving that. 




Philip said:


> Indeed they did---and it produced all kinds of confusion. Post-Kantian philosophy has been a giant regressive train-wreck, from Hegel and Fichte to Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre and Derrida.



I would say that they pointed out serious issues with previous philosophies. 

They showed how it was not Metaphysics that failed but metaphysics had failed. Analytic philosophy has recovered some traditional questions but they are now proposed in a linguistic fashion. 






Philip said:


> No. The real distinction is the perceived versus the actual---but it's a) an epistemological distinction b) a distinction that has nothing whatsoever to do with essence and substance.



How do you know what the actual is? It is not common sense to anyone but substance philosophers. 




Philip said:


> Ok, so what's the problem?



I don’t think there is one except that if we decide that we must somehow get outside of language to compare our ways of talking about things to the “way things are”.


----------



## Philip (Aug 31, 2012)

jwright82 said:


> Analytic philosophy has recovered some traditional questions but they are now proposed in a linguistic fashion.



Where they ought to be asked for real. Essences and substances are not merely features of our talk about reality, but pick out actual things. It's not just grammar and semantics.



jwright82 said:


> I would say that they pointed out serious issues with previous philosophies.
> 
> They showed how it was not Metaphysics that failed but metaphysics had failed.



All they did was to show that post-Cartesian philosophy was a mistake and then read pre-Cartesian philosophy in light of that. It's easy to write off pre-Cartesian philosophy if you read it through post-Cartesian lenses.



jwright82 said:


> How do you know what the actual is?



That's another way of asking how you know anything. You have a true belief formed by means of properly-functioning faculties. You can't "know" anything but the actual.



jwright82 said:


> I don’t think there is one except that if we decide that we must somehow get outside of language to compare our ways of talking about things to the “way things are”.



So as long as we recognize that language reflects the way things are, we're good.


----------



## Claudiu (Aug 31, 2012)

Good back and forth on this guys!


----------



## py3ak (Sep 2, 2012)

jwright82 said:


> It might be more proper to say that language is one common form of a semiotic system (a system of signs with rules that govern there meaning and use) that we use. What happens is that as you abstract away the phenomenal elements of a thing. That’s all it becomes a series of phenomenal elements. So where is its essence? This is the question of universals as I understand it.
> 
> In what way doe the particular posses or participate in its essence? I mean pick your theory but they all failed to address the problem. Nominalism is the end result, to me, of this way of thinking. But through a transcendental argument you can show that Nominalists are wrong because we cannot even speak or think about things without some concept of essence.
> 
> Another way to put my point is that there are many contexts in which it is appropriate to use substance and essence language but not all metaphysical contexts are required by some reason to be only spoken of in this language. So I am not abandoning it only relegating its importance.



Thanks for clarifying, James. The argument that thinking is by means of semiotic systems is not quite the same thing as the argument that thinking can only be done by means of language.

Can't we turn the objection around, however? Abstract away the series of phenomenal elements; there remains the intuition, and the memory from experience of ourselves, that behind all the phenomenal elements there is somewhat that provides continuity. I know some people come to lose that sense, but it seems like quite a long process of training to bring yourself to that level of dissociation - and that is ironically another indication of the fact of that continuity, that a long process of training has a cumulative impact. It is not a definition, then, but it functions as a placeholder for the meaning of "essence" if we think of it either as the element of continuity, or as that which makes continuity possible.

I'm glad you're not abandoning the position: doing so would, I think, ultimately take you away from scriptural teaching and the summaries thereof found in the ecumenical creeds and the Reformed confessions.


----------



## jwright82 (Sep 8, 2012)

Philip said:


> Where they ought to be asked for real. Essences and substances are not merely features of our talk about reality, but pick out actual things. It's not just grammar and semantics.



I am not saying that they are merely semantics. Only that our ability to distinguish between the two is theoretical in nature not metaphysical. To so separate the two leads to a dialectical impasse that will result in the problem of interaction. A theoretical distinction means that the two are essentially one but that we can theoretically consider the two separately but not separate them in reality. 




Philip said:


> All they did was to show that post-Cartesian philosophy was a mistake and then read pre-Cartesian philosophy in light of that. It's easy to write off pre-Cartesian philosophy if you read it through post-Cartesian lenses.



Well I would be interested in how you see the difference. Aristotle was guilty of the same charges so how did the medieval thinkers differ from the two?






Philip said:


> That's another way of asking how you know anything. You have a true belief formed by means of properly-functioning faculties. You can't "know" anything but the actual.



Perhaps but what function even if properly functioning can explore the metaphysical?




Philip said:


> So as long as we recognize that language reflects the way things are, we're good.



Yes! We can use any utterance that society uses to describe anything to talk about the “way things are”. Gloopy might have become the word we use for tree and that is fine because it would not affect the truth value of these two sentences:
1. the tree is green
2. the gloopy is green




py3ak said:


> Thanks for clarifying, James. The argument that thinking is by means of semiotic systems is not quite the same thing as the argument that thinking can only be done by means of language.
> 
> Can't we turn the objection around, however? Abstract away the series of phenomenal elements; there remains the intuition, and the memory from experience of ourselves, that behind all the phenomenal elements there is somewhat that provides continuity. I know some people come to lose that sense, but it seems like quite a long process of training to bring yourself to that level of dissociation - and that is ironically another indication of the fact of that continuity, that a long process of training has a cumulative impact. It is not a definition, then, but it functions as a placeholder for the meaning of "essence" if we think of it either as the element of continuity, or as that which makes continuity possible.
> 
> I'm glad you're not abandoning the position: doing so would, I think, ultimately take you away from scriptural teaching and the summaries thereof found in the ecumenical creeds and the Reformed confessions.



Yeah you could do that. Like you point out a place holder for essence would be the same. Van Til pointed out that this problem has been labeled in many different ways in western thought. The general and the particular, the one and the many, etc. But this only shows that although we cannot abandon the ideas themselves we don’t have to accept the whole philosophical house that was built upon it. 

We can continue to use the ideas but at the same time adopt newer ideas in the service of theology and Christian philosophy.


----------



## Philip (Sep 8, 2012)

jwright82 said:


> I am not saying that they are merely semantics. Only that our ability to distinguish between the two is theoretical in nature not metaphysical.



But it is metaphysical given that the dichotomy exists in reality. 



jwright82 said:


> To so separate the two leads to a dialectical impasse that will result in the problem of interaction. A theoretical distinction means that the two are essentially one but that we can theoretically consider the two separately but not separate them in reality.



But they are separate in reality. I'm not going to deny real things just to save myself theoretical headaches. 



jwright82 said:


> Well I would be interested in how you see the difference. Aristotle was guilty of the same charges so how did the medieval thinkers differ from the two?



Which charges, exactly? There's some problem that you see here, but maybe I'm just not getting what it is. Is it that substance metaphysics sounds a bit antiquated? So what? I really don't see chronological snobbery as a valid criterion. 



jwright82 said:


> Perhaps but what function even if properly functioning can explore the metaphysical?



Ordinary reason. We make ontological statements all the time. 



jwright82 said:


> Van Til pointed out that this problem has been labeled in many different ways in western thought. The general and the particular, the one and the many, etc. But this only shows that although we cannot abandon the ideas themselves we don’t have to accept the whole philosophical house that was built upon it.



The trouble, James, is that this problem shows up everywhere, not just in theoretical metaphysics. The current American political landscape could be seen in terms of this problem. It's a problem that shows up in spades when we do Trinitarian theology. It shows up everywhere and in every philosopher, including Van Til. The difference is that Van Til embraces the tension rather than absolutizing one side of it.

Here's my recommendation, then: embrace the tension between essence and substance rather than making the mistake of a) absolutizing one side of it (most solutions to date) b) reducing it to grammar (Wittgenstein and his ilk).


----------

