Substance is Just a Word

Art48

The philosopher Daniel Dennett introduced the term “deepity” in 2009. Here is how the RationalWiki website defines it.

Deepity . . . refers to a statement that is apparently profound but actually asserts a triviality on one level and something meaningless on another. Generally, a deepity has (at least) two meanings: one that is true but trivial, and another that sounds profound, but is essentially false or meaningless and would be "earth-shattering" if true. To the extent that it's true, it doesn't have to matter. To the extent that it has to matter, it isn't true (if it actually means anything). This second meaning has also been called "pseudo-profound bullshit.

Examples:
The Theory of Evolution is only a theory
There is no “I” in team
Age is just a number

Common sense may say that “Substance is Just a Word” is a deepity. I want to argue it is not: that in a substantial sense (pun intended), substance is just a word.

The idea of substance goes back to Aristotle and the ancient Greeks. Substance is the thing which has properties. (The word “accident” is sometimes used instead of “property.”) The thing, let’s say, an apple, is the substance. The substance has various properties: red, sweet, of a certain shape, mass, etc. If you mentally delete all the properties, what remains? There are two possibilities: substance or nothing at all.

If nothing is left, then substance is indeed just a word, a word that refers to nothing in the real world. “Substance” becomes a linguistic shorthand for a set of properties: red, sweet, of a certain shape, mass, etc. Therefore, it’s a word, no more.

Counter-argument: Consider a real apple, and an imaginary apple. There’s a difference between the two but their properties are identical. We can think of the imaginary apple as red, sweet, etc. Suppose we attribute the exact same properties to the real apple and to the imaginary apple. Then, the real apple and the imaginary apple would be identical as far as properties. But there’s a difference. The difference is substance, which is what the real apple possesses and the imaginary apple does not. Thus, in addition to existing in our mind as an idea, substance exists in reality. Thus, "substance is just a word" is wrong.

Response: The difference between the real apple and the imaginary apple is that the properties of the real apple really exist: we can see its redness, feel its mass. The properties of the imaginary apple exist only in our mind. So, the difference is in the mode of existence of both apple’s properties, not in some imaginary substance which one apple possesses and the other does not.

T Clark

Common sense may say that “Substance is Just a Word” is a deepity. I want to argue it is not: that in a substantial sense (pun intended), substance is just a word. — Art48

I disagree with your position. Saying "Substance is just a word" is as much deepity as your examples except, perhaps, with a bit more subtlety. Maybe that makes it deepitier. It's about language and metaphysics. "Substance" means something to me and to most other people. It is definitely a property that an apple has but my memory of an apple does not. I can hold an apple in my hand and take a bite.

Now, there are plenty of philosophies out there that argue that substance doesn't exist. That's fine, and I don't plan on taking up that argument here, but it's beside the point. The word "substance" means something and is useful. That's how things come to exist - We name them and use those names. And that's metaphysics.

Art48

The word "substance" means something and is useful. — T Clark

All words mean something and may be useful.
A word can refer to an objective reality (ex, water) or not (ex. unicorn).
The OP discusses if "substance" refers to an objective reality of not.

T Clark

All words mean something and may be useful.
A word can refer to an objective reality (ex, water) or not (ex. unicorn).
The OP discusses if "substance" refers to an objective reality of not. — Art48

Well there you go. "Objective reality." It's just a word. Well.. two words. I don't want to distract your thread from where you're aiming it, so I won't take that argument any further.

Fooloso4

The OP discusses if "substance" refers to an objective reality of not. — Art48

Given the definition of substance (there are others) that you cite:

Substance is the thing which has properties. — Art48

your question then is: is there a thing or are there things with properties?

You then ask:

If you mentally delete all the properties, what remains? — Art48

It is as if you take the thing and its properties to be two separate things, as if there could be things without properties and properties without things.

You go on to compound your confusion further when you say:

The difference is substance, which is what the real apple possesses and the imaginary apple does not. — Art48

The real apple does not possess substance, it is a substance. From one thing you have conjured up three: apple, properties, substance.

Janus

↪Fooloso4

You are presenting an Aristotelian understanding of substance. Spinoza argued that there cannot be more than one substance. In ordinary parlance substance just means some kind of material. In chemistry the elements are considered to be substances and so are their combinations, the compounds. So an apple would consist of several substances.

Wayfarer

This was a deeply (deepity?) confused OP, but I just wanted to add a footnote about the meaning of 'substance' in philosophy, as distinct from normal language.

In normal language, 'substance' is 'a material with uniform properties' (a waxy substance, an oily substance). In philosophy, the word 'substance' is derived from the Latin 'substantia', which was used as a translation of Aristotle's 'ousia'. Now that word is a participle of the verb 'to be', so the term 'ousia' is much nearer in meaning to either 'being' or 'subject' than it is to 'substance' in the normal sense. Most of the discussions about essence and accidents take beings (such as Socrates) as paradigmatic. Likewise in Spinoza, if the 'single substance' was actually translated as the 'single subject', I think it would convey the gist of what he means much better than the idea that he simply means 'all the material stuff of the world'.

There's a useful encyclopedia entry on this 17th Century Theories of Substance

For 17th century philosophers, the term is reserved for the ultimate constituents of reality on which everything else depends. This article discusses the most important theories of substance from the 17th century: those of Descartes, Spinoza, and Leibniz. Although these philosophers were highly original thinkers, they shared a basic conception of substance inherited from the scholastic-Aristotelian tradition from which philosophical thinking was emerging. In a general sense each of these theories is a way of working out dual commitments: a commitment to substance as an ultimate subject and a commitment to the existence of God as a substance.

Fooloso4

You are presnting an Aristotelian understanding of substance. — Janus

Right, but it is an Aristotelian understanding that was presented in the OP.

Janus

↪Fooloso4

True, but the OP also says that substance is just a word, which suggests just one non-cogent meaning. The components of the word seem to indicate an etymology meaning something like "stand under" which suggests essence or being. A quick search yielded this:

substance (n.)

c. 1300, "essential nature, real or essential part," from Old French sustance, substance "goods, possessions; nature, composition" (12c.), from Latin substantia "being, essence, material," from substans, present participle of substare "stand firm, stand or be under, be present," from sub "up to, under" (see sub-) + stare "to stand," from PIE root *sta- "to stand, make or be firm."

Latin substantia translates Greek ousia "that which is one's own, one's substance or property; the being, essence, or nature of anything." Meaning "any kind of corporeal matter" is first attested mid-14c. Sense of "the matter of a study, discourse, etc." first recorded late 14c.

Oddly enough (or perhaps not) 'understand' seems to suggest something very similar, but the etymologies don't seem to have anything much in common.

Fooloso4

but the OP also says that substance is just a word — Janus

He arrived at this by mentally deleting all the properties, and concludes that substance is just a word is wrong. He offers no other definitions.

Janus

↪Fooloso4

Common sense may say that “Substance is Just a Word” is a deepity. I want to argue it is not: that in a substantial sense (pun intended), substance is just a word. — Art48

If nothing is left, then substance is indeed just a word, a word that refers to nothing in the real world. “Substance” becomes a linguistic shorthand for a set of properties: red, sweet, of a certain shape, mass, etc. Therefore, it’s a word, no more. — Art48

The OP seems confused; the above excerpts assert that substance is just a word. Then he presents a "counter-argument", but refutes that with a "response" that concludes that substance is just a word.

So, the difference is in the mode of existence of both apple’s properties, not in some imaginary substance which one apple possesses and the other does not. — Art48

That's the way I read it anyhow.

Fooloso4

The OP seems confused — Janus

It looks that way to me.

Art48

The OP seems confused — Janus
It looks that way to me. — Fooloso4

One reason I like to post here is to see criticism of what I think. Would the OP have been clearer if I said that "substance" is like Kant's "think in itself" in that we never directly experience substance? Rather we experience properties. So, substance is a theoretical construct; it's something we assume to exist as the bearer of properties. But we don't directly experience substance.

Of course, we don't directly experience protons, quarks, etc. either so maybe the phrase "just a word" is unjustified.

Thanks everyone for the comments so far.

Janus

One reason I like to post here is to see criticism of what I think. — Art48

A worthy motive!

So, substance is a theoretical construct; it's something we assume to exist as the bearer of properties. But we don't directly experience substance.

Of course, we don't directly experience protons, quarks, etc. either so maybe the phrase "just a word" is unjustified. — Art48

I agree that substance is just an idea (or set of ideas). Our thinking is dualistic and pairs of ideas that go together are relational like substance and attributes or substance and modes, or negational like being and non-being, substantial and insubstantial and tangible and intangible.

Wayfarer

So, substance is a theoretical construct; it's something we assume to exist as the bearer of properties. But we don't directly experience substance. — Art48

I think if you'd put that to Aristotle, whose term 'substance' is at issue here - if he did understand your point he would disagree vehemently. Aristotle was, I think, trying to account for the basis of how it is that we know what we say we know. We know that things can change, but can stay the same, for instance. That is one kind of problem that I think he was addressing. Another is how we know what something really is - how we are not fooled by appearances, but can grasp the essence of what really is. In both cases, the question is one of what truly is, as distinct from what appears to be; Socrates was once young, now he's old, yet he's still the same. Why is that? And those questions are perennial questions.

The way you're approaching it reflects your cultural background - which is of course perfectly reasonable and to be expected. But I think if you're going to delve into such questions, then there are many, many starting points preferable to Daniel Dennett and 'deepity'. :yikes:

Fooloso4

↪Art48

According to Kant a substance is the subject of predicates. Since a thing in itself cannot be known nothing can be predicated of it.

Mikie

The difference between the real apple and the imaginary apple is that the properties of the real apple really exist: we can see its redness, feel its mass. The properties of the imaginary apple exist only in our mind. — Art48

This is equating “reality” with the empirical. It also seems to assume Descartes’ dualism: the apple as part of the res extensa in the first instance and res cogitans in the second.

Substance is indeed a word— but so what? Determining what it means is interesting. It’s true it goes back to the Greeks and has been an important concept in the history of thought. Substantia was the Latin translation of the Greek word, which was ousia.

Ousia is an interesting topic indeed. You should pursue that, in my view.

unenlightened

Understanding substance takes substantial understanding.

Substance is what is the basis of objects, and understanding is what is the basis of subjects. These are etymological definitions. Perhaps objects have no basis, perhaps subjects have none either. Perhaps this topic is entirely misconceived.

Baden

"Just" a word. :chin: Getting to be a word is tough. Try it and see how you get on!

boagie

Substance is energy processed through biology, or the interplay of energies producing apparent reality.

Bylaw

Common sense may say that “Substance is Just a Word” is a deepity. I want to argue it is not: that in a substantial sense (pun intended), substance is just a word. — Art48

I agree, I think, and I'll come at it a different way, by specific example. Materialism (and in one usage physicalism) is a monism where there is only one substance,matter (the physical). This substance makes up an expanding set of 'things' that include stones and water and trees, but also gravitational fields, massless particles, particles in superposition, anti-particles, particles moving backwards in time, dark matter and dark energy, often consciousness/awareness is considered material or a facet of the material and likely anything that ever becomes considered real.

We call this set of things matter/physical.

It seems to me we could view it as a spectrum of substrances or call it 'real stuff', since it seems like the set of qualities, include lacks thereof, can change over time, and need not be necessary for the label. So, either is it a committment to rule out anything that isn't some substance, but we change what is necessary to be in the category, so that doesn't seem to work. Or it is a stance against a dualism/idealism/spiritism or anything with transcendent things (but since transcendent 'things' generally could interact with physical things, this would just be a committment to not believing they are real, yet. Since if they can affect the material, they could be then considered material/real.

It just seems to have become a placeholder term, when we could just have a set of 'those things verified to exist' and not commit ourselves to a substance.

I see this use of a term indicating substance as conventional, but with specific (and perhaps confusing) metaphysical baggage.

boagie

Science has had a long tradition of trying to find the ultimate substance, the ultimate stuff all things are made of. Their findings are, things are not made of stuff or material things, things are made of energies. One should always remember; the word is not the thing, and the thing is an energy form.

Substance is Just a Word

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