Blackwell Reference Online

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M etaphysics, ancient G reek philosophy We can apply one predicate to many different things. How can they be related in this way? According to Plato , a common description suggests that there is a common intrinsic feature or nature shared by these different things that determines their real existence. This common nature is one and the same and stands over many particular things. This is Plato's “one over many principle.” He called the one common nature Form or Idea and declared that Ideas are objects independent of our minds and that each of the many particulars imitates or participates in their Idea. Ideas are objects of knowledge , while particulars are objects of opinion. The central aim of Plato's Theory of Ideas is to argue for this principle and to deal with various difficulties arising from it. These difficulties have become the problem of the relation between universals and particulars. The discussion of this problem forms one of the chief issues in Western metaphysics, although it is closely linked to logical questions about meaning and predication. The one over many problem is also called the one-many problem, but this latter expression is also used to ask whether the substance of the world is one or many in the debate between monism and pluralism. “Those who say that the Forms exist, in one respect are right, in giving the Forms separate ... log in or subscribe to read full text