Introduction

Readers of ‘The China Syndrome’ might well feel inclined to complain of a glaring omission in its consideration of ‘guidance and constraint’. A moderate sceptic about the hypothesis could readily concede that the case-studies of the first chapter are effective against Sinological relativism, yet suggest that I have ignored the most massive presence in the history of philosophy: Aristotle. The contention is that his thought is permeated throughout by a variety of linguistic influences rarely recognised as such by Aristotle himself. Nowhere is this clearer than in the Categories. Although the Categories stands in the first rank of the Western philosophical tradition, its students ancient and modern are in doubt over its status. Is it (primarily) a work of dialectic; of semantics; or of ontology? The sceptic contends that this chronic perplexity is no accident. The Categories puzzles us because it, and much later philosophy in its wake, has indeed been guided and constrained by language. The moral of ‘The China Syndrome’ is that we should fight shy of formulating too specific a hypothesis concerning just how Greek (or Indo-European) leaves its mark on Aristotelian doctrines. We should nevertheless remain confident that a deep imprint is there, even without a detailed explanation of how it was made.