"summum genus" -- from Grice's Dictionary

summum genus. The categories. There is infimum genus, or sub-summum. Talk of categories becomes informal in Grice when he ‘echoes’ Kant in the mention of four ‘functions’ that generate for Kant twelve categories. Grice however uses the functions themselves, echoing Ariskant, rather, as ‘caegory’. We have then a category of conversational quantity (involved in a principle of maximization of conversational informativeness). We have a category of conversational quality (or a desideratum of conversational candour). We have a category of conversational relation (cf. Strawson’s principle of relevance along with Strawson’s principles of the presumption of knowledge and the presumption of ignorance). Lastly, we have a category of conversational mode. For some reason, Grice uses ‘manner’ sometimes in lieu of Meiklejohn’s apt translation of Kant’s modality into the shorter ‘mode.’ The four have Aristotelian pedigree, indeed Grecian and Graeco-Roman: The quantity is Kant’s quantitat which is Aristotle’s posotes (sic abstract) rendered in Roman as ‘quantitas.’ Of course, Aristotle derives ‘posotes,’ from ‘poson,’ the quantum. No quantity without quantum. The quality is Kant’s qualitat, which again has Grecian and Graeco-Roman pediegree. It is Aristotel’s poiotes (sic in abstract), rendered in Roman as qualitas. Again, derived from the more basic ‘poion,’ or ‘quale.’ Aristotle was unable to find a ‘-tes’ ending form for what Kant has as ‘relation.’ ‘pros it’ is used, and first translated into Roman as ‘relatio.’ We see here that we are talking of a ‘summum genus.’ For who other but a philosopher is going to lecture on the ‘pros it’? What Aristotle means is that Socrates is to the right of Plato. Finally, for Grice’s mode, there is Kant’s wrong ‘modalitat,’ since this refers to Aristotle ‘te’ and translated in Roman as ‘modus,’ which Meiklejohn, being a better classicist than Kant, renders as ‘mode,’ and not the pretentious sounding ‘modality.’ Now for Kant, 12 categories are involved here. Why? Because he subdivides each summum genus into three sub-summum or ‘inferiore’ genus. This is complex. Kant would DISAGREE with Grice’s idea that a subject can JUDGE in generic terms, say, about the quantum. The subject has THREE scenarios. It’s best to reverse the order, for surely unity comes before totality. One scenario, he utters a SINGULAR or individual utterance (Grice on ‘the’). The CATEGORY is the first category, THE UNUM or UNITAS. The one. The unity. Second scenario, he utters a PARTICULAR utterance (Grice’s “some (at least one). Here we encounter the SECOND category, that of PLURALITAS, the plurum, plurality. It’s a good thing Kant forgot that the Greeks had a dual number, and that Urquhart has fourth number, a re-dual. A third scenario: the nirvana. He utters a UNIVERSAL (totum) utterance (Grice on “all”). The category is that of TOTUM, TOTALITAS, totality. Kant does not deign to specify if he means substitutional or non-substitutional. For the quale, there are again three scenarios for Kant, and he would deny that the subject is confronted with the FUNCTION quale and be able to formulate a judgement. The first scenario involves the subject uttering a PROPOSITIO DEDICATIVA (Grice elaborates on this before introducing ‘not’ in “Indicative conditionals” – “Let’s start with some unstructured amorophous proposition.” Here the category is NOT AFFIRMATION, but the nirvana “REALITAS,” Reality, reale.Second scenario, subject utters a PROPOSITIO ABDICATIVA (Grice on ‘not’). While Kant does not consider affirmatio a category (why should he?), he does consider NEGATIO a category. Negation. See abdicatum. Third scenario, subject utters an PROPOSITIO INFINITA. Here the category is that of LIMITATION, which is quite like NEGATIO (cf. privatio, stelesis, versus habitus or hexis), but not quite. Possibly LIMITATUM. Regarding the ‘pros ti.’ The first scenario involves a categorema, PROPOSITIO CATEGORICA. Here Kant seems to think that there is ONE category called “INHERENCE AND SUBSTISTENCE or substance and accident. There seem rather two. He will go to this ‘pair’ formulation in one more case in the relation, and for the three under modus. If we count the ‘categorical pairs’ as being two categories. The total would not be 12 categories but 17, which is a rather ugly number for a list of categories, unles it is not. Kant is being VERY serious here, because if he has SUBSTISTENCE or SUBSTANCE as a category, this is SECUNDA SUBSTANTIA or ‘deutero-ousia.’ It is a no-no to count the prote ousia or PRIMA SUBSTANTIA as a category. It is defined as THE THING which cannot be predicated of anything! “SUMBEBEKOS” is a trick of Kant, for surely EVERYTHING BUT THE SUBSTANCE can be seen as an ‘accidens’ (In fact, those who deny categories, reduce them to ‘attribute’, or ‘property.’ The second scenario involves an ‘if’ Grice on ‘if’ – PROPOSITIO CONDITIONALIS – hypothetike protasis -- this involves for the first time a MOLECULAR proposition. As in the previous case, we have a ‘category pair’, which is formulated either as CAUSALITY (CAUSALITAS) and DEPENDENCE (Dependentia), or “cause’ (CAUSA) and ‘effect’ (Effectum). Kant is having in mind Strawson’s account of ‘if’ (The influence of P. F. Strawson on Kant). For since this is the hypothetical, Kant is suggeseting that in ‘if p, q’ q depends on p, or q is an effect of its cause, p. As in “If it rains, the boots are in the closet.” (J). The third scenario also involves a molectural proposition, A DISJUNCTUM. PROPOSITIO DISJUNCTIVA. Note that in Kant, ‘if’ before ‘or’! His implicature: subordination before coordination, which makes sense. Grice on ‘or.’ FOR SOME REASON, the category here for Kant is that of COMMUNITAS (community) or RECIPROCITAS, reciprocity. He seems to be suggesting that if you turn to the right or to the left, you are reciprocally forbidden to keep on going straight. For the modus, similar. Here Kant is into modality. Again, it is best to re-order the scenarios in terms of priority. Here it’s the middle which is basic. The first scenario, subject utters an ASSERTORIC. The category is a pair: EXISTENCE (how is this different from REALITY) and NON-EXISTENCE (how is this different from negation?). He has in mind: ‘the cat is in the room,’ ‘the room is empty.’ Second scenario, the subject doubts. subject utters a problematical. (“The pillar box may be red”). Here we have a category pair: POSSIBILITIAS (possibility) and, yes, IMPOSSIBILITAS – IMPOSSIBILITY. This is odd, because ‘impossibility’ goes rather with the negation of necessity. The third and last scenario, subject utters an APODEICTIC. Here again there is a category pair – yielding 17 as the final number --: NECESSITAS, necessity, and guess what, CONTINGENTIA, or contingency. Surely, possibilitas and contingentia are almost the same thing. It may be what Grice has in mind when he blames a philosopher to state that ‘what is actual is not also possible.’ Or not.