Vitae philosophorum

Diogenes Laertius

Diogenes Laertius. Hicks, R. D., editor. Cambridge, MA.: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann Ltd., 1925.

An imperative is something which conveys a command: e.g.

Go thou to the waters of Inachus.[*](Nauck, T.G.F.2, Adesp. 177; cf. Galen, xiii. p. 363 K.)
An adjurative utterance is something ... A vocative utterance is something the use of which implies that you are addressing some one; for instance:
Most glorious son of Atreus, Agamemnon, lord of men.[*](Iliad ix. 96.)
A quasi-proposition is that which, having the enunciation of a judgement, yet in consequence of the intensified tone or emotion of one of its parts falls outside the class of judgements proper, e.g.
    Yea, fair indeed the Parthenon!
  1. How like to Priam’s sons the cowherd is![*](Nauck, T.G.F.2, Adesp. 286.)

There is also, differing from a proposition or judgement, what may be called a timid suggestion, the expression of which leaves one at a loss, e.g.

Can it be that pain and life are in some sort akin?
Interrogations, inquiries and the like are neither true nor false, whereas judgements (or propositions) are always either true or false.

The followers of Chrysippus, Archedemus, Athenodorus, Antipater and Crinis divide propositions into simple and not simple. Simple are those that consist of one or more propositions which are not ambiguous, as It is day. Not simple are those that consist of one or more ambiguous propositions.

They

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may, that is, consist either of a single ambiguous proposition, e.g. If it is day, it is day, or of more than one proposition, e.g. If it is day, it is light.

With simple propositions are classed those of negation, denial, privation, affirmation, the definitive and the indefinitive; with those that are not simple the hypothetical, the inferential, the coupled or complex, the disjunctive, the causal, and that which indicates more or less. An example of a negative proposition is It is not day. Of the negative proposition one species is the double negative. By double negative is meant the negation of a negation, e.g. It is not not-day. Now this presupposes that it is day.

A denial contains a negative part or particle and a predication: such as this, No one is walking. A privative proposition is one that contains a privative particle reversing the effect of a judgement, as, for example, This man is unkind. An affirmative or assertory proposition is one that consists of a noun in the nominative case and a predicate, as Dion is walking. A definitive proposition is one that consists of a demonstrative in the nominative case and a predicate, as This man is walking. An indefinitive proposition is one that consists of an indefinite word or words and a predicate, e.g. Some one is walking, or There’s some one walking; He is in motion.

Of propositions that are not simple the hypothetical, according to Chrysippus in his Dialectics and Diogenes in his Art of Dialectic, is one that is formed by means of the conditional conjunction If. Now this conjunction promises that the second of two things follows consequentially upon the first, as, for instance,

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If it is day, it is light. An inferential proposition according to Crinis in his Art of Dialectic is one which is introduced by the conjunction Since and consists of an initial proposition and a conclusion; for example, Since it is day-time, it is light. This conjunction guarantees both that the second thing follows from the first and that the first is really a fact.