to bring the reading of philosophers somewhat more into practice. Such a purpose naturally brings with it a number of presuppositions. But it is questionable whether one can really get into presuppositions of this sort in a lecture.
1. Presupposition: that Aristotle in particular actually has something to say; that for this reason it is precisely Aristotle and not Plato, Kant, or Hegel who is selected; that to him there belongs a distinctive position not only within Greek philosophy, but within Western philosophy as a whole.
2. That we are not yet so advanced that there is not something about which we would have to admit that we are wrong in some respect.
3. That conceptuality constitutes the substance of all scientific research; that conceptuality is not a matter of intellectual acumen, but rather, that he who has chosen science has accepted responsibility for the concept (something that is missing today).
4. Science is not an occupation, not a business, not a diversion, but is rather the possibility of the existence of human beings, and not something into which one happens by chance. Rather, it carries within itself definite presuppositions that anyone who seriously moves in the circle of scientific research has to bring along with him.
5. Human life has in itself the possibility of relying on oneself alone, of managing without faith, without religion, and so on.
6. A methodological presupposition: faith in history in the sense that we presuppose that history and the historical past have the possibility, insofar as the way is made clear for it, of giving a jolt to the present or, better put, to the future.
The six presuppositions are very demanding even though we are only pursuing philology. Philosophy is better situated today insofar as it operates outside of the basic presupposition that everything is just as it should be. For the demarcation of the manner and mode in which we are treating philosophy here, I would like to call Aristotle himself as witness. We are indeed providing a treatment of philosophy, but for the purpose of implanting the instinct for what is self-evident and the instinct for what is ancient.
Aristotle makes a distinction in Metaphysics Book 4, Chapter 2 between διαλεκτική, σοφιστική, and φιλοσοφία.5 He says: “σοφιστική and διαλεκτική are concerned with the same issues as is φιλοσοφία,”6 but φιλοσοφία distinguishes itself from both of them in its way of approaching these issues, namely, in the way it deals with the same object. It differs from διαλεκτική “in the mode of the possibility”7 to which it lays claim. “Διαλεκτική makes a mere attempt”8 to ascertain that which could be meant by the λόγοι, a διαπορεύεσθαι
5. Met. Γ 2, 1004 b 17 sqq.
6. Met. Γ 2, 1004 b 2 sq. περὶ μὲν γὰρ τὸ αὐτὸ γένος στρέφεται ἡ σοφιστικὴ καὶ ἡ διαλεκτικὴ τῇ φιλοσοφίᾳ.
7. Met. Γ 2, 1004 b 24: τῷ τρόπῳ τῆς δυνάμεως.
8. Met. Γ 2, 1004 b 25: ἔστι δὲ ἡ διαλεκτικὴ πειραστική.