Universals

The structure of Brinkley’s De universalibus is symptomatic for the tension between the methodological aim of segregating logic and metaphysics, and the philosophical necessity of considering them both. Before commenting on the five porphyrian praedicabilia (genus, species, differentia, proprium, accidens), Brinkley begins by distinguishing different senses of the word universale according to logic, physics, and metaphysics (De universalibus:299-300): the logician conceives of it as a common term predicable of several things; for the philosopher of nature, it is the indeterminate character ofthe first cause as far as its possible effects are concerned; according to the metaphysician, it is an essence (quidditas), which is “communicable” to many different individuals. Accordingly, when a logician says homo est species (= S), he is speaking of a term only, to the effect that homo (= t) in S is taken in material supposition (ibid.:306). If Brinkley’s position is compared to the ones of Burley and Ockham, we obtain the following picture: on the one hand, he disagrees with Ockham and Burley who both think that t has simple supposition in S; on the other, he agrees with Ockham that t in S is taken non-significatively (because homo was not imposed to signify a term, but human beings) and disagrees with Burley who maintains that t in S is taken significatively. Since Brinkley acknowledges a kind of metaphysical universal, he clearly is a realist. But what exactly is the ontological status of such real universals? The discussion of the personal and simple supposition (see below, point 2) provides some hints: the essence of a given thing (e. g., the humanity of a human being) is a metaphysical part present in any member of the species: ‘‘Just as the line which is in Socrates can be understood without Socrates but cannot exist without him, the humanity which is in Socrates can be understood without Socrates although it cannot exist without Socrates’’ (ibid.:303). This allows to qualify Brinkley’s position as a medieval form of immanent realism.