The Logic of Essentialism: An Interpretation of Aristotle's Modal Syllogistic

Abstract

The Logic of Essentialism surveys the major interpretations, ancient, medieval and modern, of Aristotle's Modal Syllogistic. It presents a framework within which these competing interpretations are compared and evaluated. A new interpretation is developed, which agrees in large measure with Aristotle's text, including his theses, methods of proof, and use of examples. This interpretation reads Aristotle's modal sentences de re, and attaches considerable importance to his use of ecthesis and counter-examples. It features a formal semantic analysis that makes no reference to possible worlds, and it articulates the links, both theoretical and genetic, between the modal syllogistic and Aristotle's essentialist metaphysics.

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