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Aristotle - Metaphysics
Atec Февраль 16 2008 19:57:08
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Again, how is it with the units in the 3-itself? One of them is an odd
unit. But perhaps it is for this reason that they give 1-itself the
middle place in odd numbers. (b) But if each of the two units consists
of both the great and the small, equalized, how will the 2 which is
a single thing, consist of the great and the small? Or how will it
differ from the unit? Again, the unit is prior to the 2; for when it
is destroyed the 2 is destroyed. It must, then, be the Idea of an Idea
since it is prior to an Idea, and it must have come into being
before it. From what, then? Not from the indefinite dyad, for its
function was to double.
Again, number must be either infinite or finite; for these
thinkers think of number as capable of existing separately, so that it
is not possible that neither of those alternatives should be true.
Clearly it cannot be infinite; for infinite number is neither odd
nor even, but the generation of numbers is always the generation
either of an odd or of an even number; in one way, when 1 operates
on an even number, an odd number is produced; in another way, when 2
operates, the numbers got from 1 by doubling are produced; in
another way, when the odd numbers operate, the other even numbers
are produced. Again, if every Idea is an Idea of something, and the
numbers are Ideas, infinite number itself will be an Idea of
something, either of some sensible thing or of something else
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