se there were different opinions about that, and also expose Abelard's perception of Plato-Aristotle controversy and whether it was really a controversy:
Boethius likewise [Porphyry], when he says that the thought collected from the likeness of many things is genus or species * , seems to have understood the same common conception. Some insist that Plato was of this opinion too, namely that he called those common ideas which he places in nous , genera and species . Boethius records that he dissented from Aristotle when he says that Plato wanted genera and species and the others not only to be understood universals, but also to be and to subsist without bodies , as if to say that he understood as universals those common conceptions which he set up separated from bodies in nous , not perhaps taking the universal as the common predication , as Aristotle does, but rather as common likeness of many things . For that latter conception seems in no wise to be predicated of many as a noun is which is adapted singly to many.
That he says Plato thinks universals subsist without sensibles, can be resolved in another manner so that there is no disagreement in the opinions of the philosophers . For what Aristotle says to the effect that universals always subsist in sensibles, he said only in regard to actuality , because obviously the nature which is animal which is designated by universal name and which according to this is called universal by a certain transference, is never found in actuality except in a sensible thing, but Plato thinks that it so subsists in itself naturally that it would retain its being when not subjected to sense, and according to this the natural being is called by the universal name . That, consequently, which Aristotle denies with respect to actuality, Plato , the investigator of physics, assigns to natural aptitude , and thus there is no disagreement between them (H & W, 183).
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It likely follows from this that Abelard (in his search of the proper definition for universals and examining the opinions of Porphyry, Boethius, and more importantly Aristotle and Plato) is trying to see the possibility of truth in each position, if it is presented in accordance to the meaning of each philosopher - truth does not contradict truth . But even so, he investigates the problem further reviewing a more recent (nominalistic) position, which he modifies, because by itself it does not look reasonable enough to him:
Moreover, now that authorities have been advanced who seem to build up by universal words common concepts which are to be called forms, reason too seems to assent . For what else is it to conceive forms by nouns than to signify by nouns? But certainly since we make forms diverse from understanding, there arises now besides thing and understanding a third thing which is the signification of nouns . Although authority does not hold this, it is nevertheless not contrary to reason.
Let us then set forth what we promised above to define, namely, whatever the community of universal words is considered to be because of a common cause of imposition or because of a common conception or because of both . There is nothing to prevent that it be because of both, but the common cause which is taken in accordance of nature of things seems to have greater force (183).
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* It feels that I have to apologize to the reader for my underlining of certain words and phrases. It may be useless and disturbing for him providing that his knowledge of Abelard is flawless, but it is important for the clarity of my own understanding of the text, and also can help the reader to understand what particularly is important to me. (A. K.)
The nature of things , and not the words only, is something that has to be of greater
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importance for Abelard in definition of universals. If we concentrate on this we could call him rather a realist. But let us wait a bit with that. Looking at how we form the conceptions of universals, Abelard likes the notion of abstraction, and this abstraction for him is not a nominalistic one:
Likewise we must define. . . that the conceptions of universals are formed by abstraction, and we must indicate how we may speak of them alone, naked and pure but not empty (183).
Here I would like to remind the reader the Aristotelian doctrine of intellect-matter. According to it, there are two types of intellect: potential and active; we have knowledge of something when we abstract the portion of that potentiality by acti...
