Franz Brentano_The True and the Evident.pdf

48
The True and the Evident
each of us is thinking in an affirmative way. “Existent” refers to this relationship between
the thing and the speaker and person addressed. The terms “substance” and “accident”
do not refer to this relationship. (It would be advisable to make a thorough study of the
following question about the words we use to indicate the relations among the parts of a
collective: are these words logical names, or are they merely grammatical names pointing
to some logical name of the collective itself, for which they may be substituted in some
different use without change of meaning? Just as the sentence “There is redness” may be
replaced by “There is something red” without change of meaning, so, too, “This is together
with that” may be replaced by “These two are conjoined”.)]*
29. Perhaps it would be more nearly correct to say: “existent” is not even a logical name.
The most natural expression is: “there is an A” and not “an A is existent”; for in the latter
case “existent” has the appearance of being a predicate. If we are to distinguish between
“There is an A”, where “existent” does not appear as a predicate, and “An A is existent”,
then we should not take the latter to mean “A answers or corresponds to someone thinking
in an affirmative way”. It means rather “If anyone should be thinking of A in a positive
way, A corresponds to this thinking”—and if “existent” is to be taken in this way, then it is
obviously not a name in the logical sense. 17
30. The equivocal uses of “there is”, “there subsists”, “there exists” enable us to say in
truth: “There is virtue”, “There is empty space”, “There is an impossibility”, and the like.
If we had to deny ourselves these expressions, we would find our language extraordinarily
impoverished. And once we understand their modified senses, there is every justification
for continuing to use them.
31. The rejection of entia rationis obviously has important bearing upon the explication
of disjunctive and hypothetical judgements. Anyone who says “If there is an A, then there
is a B” expresses the thought that, in contemplating that A is and B is not, he holds this
combination of thoughts to be incorrect.* And anyone who says “There is an A or there is
a B or there is a C” gives expression to this thought: in contemplating that A is not and B is
not and C is not, he considers such a combination of thoughts to be incorrect.
Some would add that the statement “There is an A or there is a B or there is a C” also
indicates this: that it would be incorrect for anyone to think of there being an A, there being
a B, and there being a C, and at the same time to think that none of the three members of
this combined judgement is correct. But if one were to say, of the statement “If there is an
A, then there is a B”, that it has the meaning “There is no being of an A without the being
of a B”, either his assertion would be false, or he would be using “there is”, in the latter
statement, in an entirely improper way. Instead of throwing any light upon anything, his
translation itself would have to be clarified. 18
* Brentano dictated the paragraph in brackets as an alternative to the one preceding it
* The word “not” has been inserted here by the translators. R.M.C.