Aristotle on unscientific definitions.

Aristotle distinguishes three kinds of definition which are unscientific because founded on
what is not prior (μὴ ἐκ προτέρων). The first is a definition of a thing by means of its opposite, e.g.
of "good" by means of "bad"; this is wrong because opposites are naturally evolved together, and
the knowledge of opposites is not uncommonly regarded as one and the same, so that one of the two
opposites cannot be better known than the other. It is true that, in some cases of opposites, it would
appear that no other sort of definition is possible: e.g. it would seem impossible to define double
apart from the half and, generally, this would be the case with things which in their very nature
(καθ' αὑτά) are relative terms (πρός τι λέγεται), since one cannot be known without the other, so that
in the notion of either the other must be comprised as well 1. The second kind of definition which is
based on what is not prior is that in which there is a complete circle through the unconscious use in
the definition itself of the notion to be defined though not of the name 2. Trendelenburg illustrates
this by two current definitions, (1) that of magnitude as that which can be increased or diminished,
which is bad because the positive and negative comparatives "more" and "less" presuppose the
notion of the positive "great," (2) the famous Euclidean definition of a straight line as that which
"lies evenly with the points on itself" (ἐξ ἴσου τοîς ἐφ' έαυτῆς σημείοις κεîται), where "lies evenly"
can only be understood with the aid of the very notion of a straight line which is to be defined 3. The
third kind of vicious definition from that which is not prior is the definition of one of two
coordinate species by means of its coordinate (ἀντιδιηρημένον), e.g. a definition of "odd" as that
which exceeds the even by a unit (the second alternative in Eucl. VII. Def. 7); for "odd" and "even"
are coordinates, being differentiae of number4. This third kind is similar to the first. Thus, says
Trendelenburg, it would be wrong to define a square as "a rectangle with equal sides."

1 Topics VI. 4, 142 a 2.2—31.

2 ibid. 145 a 34—b 6.
3 Trendelenburg, Erläuterungen, p. 115.
4 Topics VI. 4, 142 b 7—10.