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Aristotle on Species Variation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 January 2009

James Franklin
James Franklin
Affiliation:
University of New South Wales
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Extract

The whole numbers and the chemical elements vary discretely: 5 is the next number to 4 and there is no number between them; silver is next to gold in the atomic table and there is no element between them. On the other hand, colours vary continuously: between red and yellow there is another colour, orange, between orange and yellow there is another colour, and so on. Between any two colours, no matter how close, there is an intermediate colour–indeed, an infinite number of intermediate colours. A surface may change gradually over time from red to yellow, assuming all the colours in between. Or again, a surface may be red at one edge and yellow at the other, changing gradually (over space) and assuming all the colours in between.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy , Volume 61 , Issue 236 , April 1986 , pp. 245 - 252
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 1986

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