Scots Philosophical Association

University of St. Andrews

The Law of Contradiction

Author(s): Jonathan Barnes
Source: The Philosophical Quarterly, Vol. 19, No. 77 (Oct., 1969), pp. 302-309
Published by: Oxford University Press on behalf of the Scots Philosophical Association and the
University of St. Andrews

Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2217842 .

Accessed: 22/01/2015 09:42
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of
content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms
of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Oxford University Press, Scots Philosophical Association, University of St. Andrews are collaborating with
JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Philosophical Quarterly.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 168.176.5.118 on Thu, 22 Jan 2015 09:42:17 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

302

THE LAW OF CONTRADICTION

BY JONATHAN
BARNES
Section I presents an argument for a proposition which might reasonably
be expressed by the sentence ' The Law of Contradictionis a Law of Thought'.
Section II examines a similar argument given by Aristotle in his Metaphysics. Section III sets out some propositions which the argument does
not prove.
The symbols ' aB:(P) ' and ' aD:(P) ' abbreviate ' a believes that P' and
'a disbelieves that P '; the rest of the notation is standard, except for the
relational constant 'C' and the operator ' ' which are explained as they
appear.
I
The argument has three premisses, each of which is necessarily true; in
the case of each premiss I shall offer a few considerations designed to bring
this out.
The first premiss is:
(x) ((xB:(P & Q)) - ((xB:(P)) & (xB:(Q)))).
(1)
This is a special case of:
(1.0) (x) ((xB:(P & P & . . . & Pn))-+ ((xB:(P1) )& (xB:(P2)) &
... & (xB:(Pn) ) ) ).
Informally, (1.0) states that anyone who believes a conjunction of propositions believes each of the conjoined propositions. I shall try to support the
weaker thesis (1), which is all that the argument requires; but analogous
points could plainly be advanced in support of (1.0).
To deny the necessity of (1) is to assert that a man may at one time both (a)
believe that both P and Q, and also (b) either not believe that P or not believe
that Q or both not believe that P and not believe that Q. And this is absurd:
if a man does not believe, say, that Q, how can he possibly believe that both
P and Q?
Let us try to imagine circumstances in which someone says that he
believes some conjunction and yet at the same time denies that he believes
one of the conjuncts. Suppose that a foreign student reads in a digest of
English literature the sentence ' Pepys and Evelyn wrote diaries', but does
not meet with either of the sentences 'Pepys wrote a diary' and 'Evelyn
wrote a diary'; and suppose that this leads him in an examination to assert
that he believes that Pepys and Evelyn wrote diaries and to deny that he
believes that Evelyn wrote a diary. Could we make anything of this answer ?
We might conjecture that the candidate was making a curious joke or
attempting to simulate lunacy; but if explanations of this sort were eliminated, I think we could only conclude that he did not understand the con-

This content downloaded from 168.176.5.118 on Thu, 22 Jan 2015 09:42:17 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

THE LAW OF CONTRADICTION

303

junctive sentence he wrote and hence could not believe the conjunctive
proposition he claimed to believe. (This might happen in more than one
way : he might, for example, be ignorant of the meaning of the connective
'and'; or think that Pepys and Evelyn were collaborators like Beaumont
and Fletcher; or imagine that 'wrote diaries' was a relational predicate
like 'corresponded with one another '.)
In short, if anyone asserts that he believes that P and Q, and also asserts
that he does not believe that P, one at least of his assertions is not true:
either he is lying or joking or otherwise unserious, or else he does not understand one of the sentences which express the propositions which he claims
to believe.
It is worth noting that the converse of (1):

(1.1) (x) ( ( (xB:(P) ) & (xB:(Q) ) ) -

(xB:(P & Q) )

is possible to believe a number of propositions and yet

does not hold-it
be ignorant of the operation of conjunction. It is clear too that the disjunctive and conditional analogues of (1):
)v (xB:(Q) ) ) )
(1.2) (x) ( (xB:(P v Q) (x:()
and:

(1.3) (x) ( (xB:(P - Q) )

( (xB:(P) )

(xB:() ) ) )

are not valid; and neither are the disjunctive and conditional analogues of
(1.1).

The notion of contrary predicates is deployed by Aristotle in the argument which I shall discuss in Section II; and although the notion is not
necessary to the present argument, it is convenient to introduce it here before setting down premiss (2).
Contrariety has a long, but not unambiguous, history. It is useful to
distinguish between three relations, each of which Aristotle seems to have
thought of as a type of contrariety. In the following definitions RF-the
range of F-is, roughly, the class of objects which can be called " F " without commission of a category mistake; ' Ci(F, G) ' reads 'G is contraryi to

F'.
Fx) )
(D1) C1(F,G) = (x) ( (RF = RG) & D (Gx -Fx) &
(D2) C2(F,G) = (x) ((RF= RG) & D (Gx s
->
v
D
(Fx Gx)))
((x RF)
(:D3) C3(F, G) = (x) ( (RF =RG) & D (Gx -> Fx) & ( (H) ( ( (RH =
RF) & (H # F) & (H # G) ) -> (H is between F and G))))
Contrariety, might be called incompatibility; paradigm contraries1 are red
and green, hot and cold. Contrary2predicates might be called contradictory
predicates; typical contraries2 are odd and even, guilty and innocent.
Contrariety3 might be called polar opposition; examples of contraries3 are
black and white, bald and hirsute.
These definitions are not very satisfactory: some account is needed of
what the range of a predicate is, and in (D3) the metaphor of being between
demands explanation. However, I shall not attempt to satisfy these requirements here since I do not think that anything in Aristotle's argument turns

This content downloaded from 168.176.5.118 on Thu, 22 Jan 2015 09:42:17 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

304

JONATHAN

BARNES

on the more questionable features of the definitions. In what follows I

shall not be concerned with either contrariety2 or contrariety3, and henceforth I shall omit the subscripts and use 'contraries' and 'C' to refer to
contraries1and Cl.
The second premiss of the argument is:
(x) ((xD:(P ))- ( xB:(P)) ).
(2)
This is a necessary truth if (but not only if) believing that P and disbelieving
that P are contraries. The Oxford Dictionary asserts that disbelief is the
state contrary to that of belief; and although this is not strictly true,1 it
seems to me clear that belief and disbelief-like praise and blame, love and
hate, approbation and disapprobation-do fulfil the defining conditions of
the relation C.2 In particular, it seems indisputable that anyone who disbelieves that P must thereby not believe that P: for how could a man both
believe that P and also not not believe that P ? Disbelieving is simply one
way of not believing, just as loathing a person is simply one way of not
liking him. And just as there are other ways of not liking a man-for example, feeling completely indifferent to him-so there are other ways of
not believing a proposition-for example, feeling uncertain about its truthvalue. This last point shows that the converse of (2):
(2.0) (x) ( (i xB:(P) ) ->(xD:(P)))
is not a necessary truth. Indeed, if the range of the variable ' x ' is restricted
to, say, stones, (2.0) is necessarily false.
The necessary truth of:
(x) ((xB:(-7 P) )
(xD:(P)) )
(3)
is evident. The conditional may be strengthened to a biconditional to give:
P)))
(xD:(P)))
(3.0) (x)((xB:(.
which might serve as a contextual definition of disbelief. To disbelieve a
man's testimony just is to believe that his testimony is false; and in general,
disbelieving that P just is believing that not-P.
It might be objected against (3.0) that 'a doesn't believe that P' is
compatible with 'a doesn't believe that not-P ' (a might be unsure whether
or not P), so that the sentence:
If a doesn't believe that P, then a believes that not-P
(S)
does not express a necessarily true proposition. This, of course, can only
hold as an objection against (3.0) if' a doesn't believe that P ' is synonymous
with 'a disbelieves that P'. But it does appear that 'a doesn't believe that
P' at least sometimes means the same as 'a disbelieves that P '-I can
reject a story as well by saying 'I don't believe you ' as by the more ponderous 'I disbelieve you '.
I think that this objection only shows that the everyday negative ' doesn't
believe that' is ambiguous. We can say both of the atheist and of the
agnostic that he doesn't believe that God exists, but when we say it of the
l(D1) gives no guarantee of uniqueness, and so does not warrant our talking of the
contrary of a given predicate.
2They might well fit (D3) on some satisfactory account of the relation of being
between; I suspect that Aristotle thought of them as contraries of the third type.

This content downloaded from 168.176.5.118 on Thu, 22 Jan 2015 09:42:17 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

THE LAW OF CONTRADICTION

305

former we mean that it is the case that he believes that God does not exist,
and when we say it of the latter we mean that it is not the case that he
believes that God does exist. It is plain that if we take 'a doesn't believe
that P' in the atheist sense, then 'a doesn't believe that P' is incompatible
with ' a doesn't believe that not-P '; and if we take it in the agnostic sense,
then ' a doesn't believe that P' and ' a doesn't believe that not-P ' are compatible, but their compatibility does nothing to show that (3.0) is false.
The argument from these three premisses can best be put in the form of
a reductioad absurdum. Let us assume that:
(4)
(3x) (xB:(P & m P))
and also that:
(5)
aB:(P & 7 P).
From (1), with '-i P' for 'Q ', and (5) there follows by universal instantiation and modus ponendo ponens :
(6)
(aB:(P) )& (aB:(-i P) ).
By suitable substitutions in the theorem:
(T)
(P & Q) - ( (Q - R) - (P & R) )
and two applications of modus ponens, (6) and the relevant instantiation of
(3) yield:
(7)
(aB:(P)) & (aD:(P)).
And (7) and an instantiation of (2), again by substitution in (T) and two
applications of modus ponens, give:
(8)
(aB:(P)) & (aB:(P) ).
Quantification over (8) yields:
(9)
(3x)( (xB:(P) ) & (xB:(P))
).
Since (9) follows from (1), (2), (3) and (5), and its derivation satisfies the
standard conditions for existential generalization, (9) follows from (1), (2),
(3) and (4). But the contradictory of (9):
(10) (x) - ((xB:(P)) & (-xB:(P)) )
is a variant of the theorem:
(11) (x) (Fx & Fx).
Hence (4) is incompatible with (1), (2) and (3); and so its contradictory:
i (3x) (xB:(P & -i P))
(12)
is a necessary truth.
The argument does not depend on the properties of any particular
proposition P; its scope is quite general. Thus its conclusion, (12), can be
put informally as follows : no-one can believe the conjunction of any proposition and its negation. A slightly more dramatic way of expressing this
is to say that the Law of Contradiction is a Law of Thought.
II
The traditional doctrine of the Laws of Thought can be traced back to
a passage in Aristotle. It should be stressed, however, that Aristotle does
not recognise four Laws, but only one; and that he does not put forward
psychological points or use the vague phrase 'a Law of Thought', but gives

This content downloaded from 168.176.5.118 on Thu, 22 Jan 2015 09:42:17 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

306

JONATHAN

BARNES

a short and rigorous argument for a precisely formulated conclusion. Aristotle's argument is similar to the one given in Section I; since it is difficult
to follow as it stands in the text, and since its ingenuity has not been
appreciated by the commentators, I shall set out the passage in translation
and then offer a few explanatory remarks.3
(A) A principle firmest4 of all is one concerning which it is impossible
to be mistaken. . . . What this is let us now say: It is impossible
for the same thing at the same time both to belong and not to
belong to the same thing and in the same respect (and let us suppose
added all the other qualifications which we should add to guard
against the dialectical difficulties).5 This, then, is firmest of all the
principles, (107T) for it answers to the definition given above.
(106T) For it is impossible for anyone to believe that the same
thing is and is not, as some think Heraclitus says. For it is not
necessary that a man believes what he says. But if (102T) it is
not possible for contraries to belong at the same time to the same
thing (let us suppose the usual qualifications added to this proposition too), and if (103T) the opinion contrary to an opinion is
the opinion of the contradictory, (105T) it is evident that it is impossible for the same man at the same time to believe that the
same thing is and is not; (104T) for the man who was mistaken
about this would have contrary opinions at the same time. (Metaphysics, F 3, 1005bll-12;
18-32)
This passage can be supplemented by an extract from a later chapter of the
book:
(B) Since (100T) it is impossible for contradictories to be true at the
same time of the same thing, it is evident that (102T) it is not possible
for contraries to belong at the same time to the same thing either.
(101T) For of contraries one is no less a privation, and a privation
is a denial of being to some determinate subject-matter.6 (ib. 6,
1011b15-20)
These passages demand close reading; it may help if the steps of the
argument are re-arranged somewhat and the proof set out more formally.
The proof is conducted, Aristotle says (ib. 4, 1006a4), by means of the
Law of Contradiction; the Law appears in the form of:
(F) (x)
(Fx & Fx).
(100)
From (100) and:
3The numerals inserted in the translation key sentences of the text-hence the
adscript ' T '-with formulae in the explanatory remarks. The other adscripts I use
are self-explanatory.
4The superlative implies that Aristotle thought only one logical law could be a Law
of Thought.
5For these see also : de Interpretatione, 6, 17a35-37; Topics, I 5, 166b37-167a35;
and compare Eudemian Ethics, B 3, 1221b4-7. The dialectical difficulties can safely be
ignored in a modern presentation of Aristotle's argument.
6The Greek is uncertain here. I have translated the reading of MSS E and J; the
text offered by Ab is hardly possible. Most editors, including Ross and Jaeger, follow
Alexander's hybrid version of the passage.

This content downloaded from 168.176.5.118 on Thu, 22 Jan 2015 09:42:17 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

THE LAW OF CONTRADICTION

307

(101)7 (F) (G) (x) ( (C(F, G) ) - (Gx -m

Fx))
Aristotle infers (" .7.t ", 1011b15 ; " yap ", 1011b18):

(102) (F) (G) (x) ((C(F, G) ) (Fx & Gx)).

This is the argument of (B). Aristotle seems to find its validity patent; it
could readily be set out in an amplified version of any standard treatment
of the predicate calculus.
Next let us take:
(103) C(B:(P), B:( P)).
Aristotle does not argue for (103) in the Metaphysics; some commentators
have thought that he tries to prove it in chapter 14 of the de Interpretatione,
but the chapter is extremely obscure. However, my comments in Section I
on (2) and (3) ought together to be enough to establish the truth of (103).
Aristotle's argument might have been clearer had he interpolated:
(103a) C(B:(P), D:(P) ).
From (102) there follows:
(104) (x) ( (C(B:(P), B:(Q)
) & (xB:(Q) ) ) ).
(
The inference is a case of universal instantiation. Next, (103) and (104)
yield (" s' ", 1005b26;

"

yap ", 1005b31) :

(105) (x) ((xB:(P)) & (xB:( P)))

by substitution of '-i P ' for ' Q ' in (104) and modusponens.8
Finally, Aristotle passes from (105) to:
(106) (x)- (xB:(P & - P) )
which is logically equivalent to (12). It is not clear from the text what
Aristotle thought the relation was between (105) and (106); indeed, it is
not even clear that he saw any difference between the two propositions.
However, (106) is the most natural reading of the Greek of (106T); and at
the same time it is hard to suppose that Aristotle thought of (106) as an
immediate inference from (103) and (104), so that it seems reasonable to
introduce (105) into the argument as a representation of (105T). To get
from (105) to (106) Aristotle of course needs something like my premiss (1).
III
of
Aristotle's
My account
argument misrepresents the text on at least
both
the
modal qualification of propositions.
two counts;
concern
the
some
the
of
in
First,
argument are prefixed in the Greek text,
steps
but not in my account of it, by modal operators. For example, a stricter
interpretation of (105T) would be:
((xB:(P)) & (xB:( P)) ),
(105M) (x) -i
7(101) is not an adequate representation of (101T) on any reading of the Greek there
(see note 6). However, I think that (101) must be entailed by whatever proposition
Aristotle means to express by (101T). I take my version to be expressing something
like:
(101') (F) (G) (x) ((C(F, G)) -> (Gx -> (- Fx & (x RF) ) ) ).
Aristotle has almost certainly said this before, at r 2, 1004a10-16; but there too the
text is corrupt.
8Strictly, we need an intermediate application of modus ponens to a suitable substi.
tution-instance of:
--> (x) (Fx ) ).
Fx) - (P
(T') ( (x) (P

This content downloaded from 168.176.5.118 on Thu, 22 Jan 2015 09:42:17 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

308

JONATHAN

BARNES

The same applies to (100T), (102T) and (106T); but not to (101T), (103T)
or (104T). However, this is probably trivial: I suspect that the function
of these operators is simply to indicate that the steps in the argument are
necessary truths; the indications are admittedly casual and sporadic, but
that is in line with the carefree attitude towards modal operators which
Aristotle displays in the rest of Metaphysics F and elsewhere. At all events,
I shall not pursue the point any further.
The second point is more serious. Aristotle claims to have proved not
merely (106) but (107T), or more fully:
(107T') It is impossible to be mistaken concerning the principle that it is
impossible for the same thing at the same time both to belong and
not to belong to the same thing.
If we read 'be mistaken concerning the principle that' as ' (wrongly) believe that it is not the case that ', this becomes:
(107M) (x) O (xB:(O (3F) (3x) (Fx & Fx) ) ).
Let us simplify this to:
(107)
(x) (xB:(O (P & P) ) ).
It is quite clear that (107) is neither equivalent to nor entailed by (106): in
general, no-one's believing that actually P is compatible with there being
men who believe that possibly P.
Moreover, no argument analogous to Aristotle's or to that of Section I
could prove (107), for although the modal analogue of (1):
(1M') (x) ( (xB:(O (P & Q) ) ) - ( (xB:(O P) ) & (xB:(O Q) )) )
seems to hold, the requisite modal analogue of (3):
(3M') (x) ( (xB:(O -m P) ) - (xD:(O P) ) )
is plainly false.
Aristotle's deduction of (107) is thus invalid. A similar fallacy would be
committed if we tried to infer a quantified version of (107):
(107Q) (x) (xB:( (3P) (P & P) ) ).
The fallacy turns on the fact that the quantifier ' (3P) ' in (107Q) falls
within the intensional context 'xB: . . .'. If we quantify over ' P ' in (106)

to get:
(106Q) (P) (x)- (xB:(P & P))
we can see that in the passage from this to (107Q) the initial quantifier is
captured by the epistemic context 'xB: . . .'. An analogous point holds of

the move from (106M) to (107) ; and it is possible that Aristotle's willingness
to make the move was due to his ignorance of the snares of intensionality.
A further proposition which the argument does not prove is:
(106U)
(x) (xB:( (P & P) ))
Nor does it prove the propositions similarly analogous to (107) and (107Q):
(x) (xB:( -i
(P & P) ) )
(107U)
and:
(107QU) (x) (xB:( -7(3P) (P & -7 P) ) ).
Moreover, if, as I claimed, (1.1) is invalid, (106) does not even yield:
(106&) (x) -7 ((xB:(P) ) & (xB:(-7 P) )).

This content downloaded from 168.176.5.118 on Thu, 22 Jan 2015 09:42:17 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

THE LAW OF CONTRADICTION

309

Finally, there is an interesting proposition which is all but stated by

Aristotle at F 3, 1005b13-17, a sentence which I omitted in my translation
of passage (A). It is:
(x) ( ( (3P) (xB :(P) )-(xB:(
(108)
(P) (P & P) )) ).
Neither (108) nor any modalized version of it follows from (106).
Any of the propositions mentioned in the last three paragraphs might
not unreasonably be glossed as the proposition that the Law of Contradiction is a Law of Thought; and there are certainly many more analogous
propositions equally open to such a gloss. Furthermore, there are normative
propositions about how all men ought to think and psychological propositions
about how all men do think which might also claim the right to the gloss.
Some of these propositions may well be true. My claim that the Law of
Contradiction is a Law of Thought is meant as nothing more than the claim
that (12) or (106) is a necessary truth.
Oriel College,Oxford.

This content downloaded from 168.176.5.118 on Thu, 22 Jan 2015 09:42:17 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions