ἀγαθὰ καθ’ αὑτά already means that there is nothing contained in it but an Idea,69 does καθ’ αὑτά already mean καθόλου? Were it ὥστε μάταιον ἔσται τὸ εἶδος,70 “then the look would be empty.” That is, were this ἀγαθὸν καθ’ αὐτό a way of being in itself in the sense of an Idea, a γένος, a “universal,” then there would be nothing there for πρᾶξις to be concerned about, whereas the view of πρᾶξις goes right to the “outermost,” ἔσχατον, to the καιρός, to the ‘here and now’ under such and such circumstances. Πρᾶξις needs something definite. The being-character of the ἀγαθόν is oriented to the καιρός, determined by its position. The ἀγαθὸν καθ’ αὐτό as Idea would be empty if it had no εἶδος. One can see how sharply Aristotle sets apart ἰδέα and εἶδος. By εἶδος, he understands the “appearing” of a being of the world, here and now, as πρακτόν. Therefore if the ἀγαθόν is an Idea, then the sense of its being is straightforwardly πρᾶξις, which possesses it as τέλος, incommensurately. Furthermore, it is shown that these various ἀγαθά—φρόνησις is in another regard ἀγαθόν, as is ἡδονή—cannot be situated in a universal γένος.71 Indeed, language has a certain κοινόν, in the sense that it addresses various beings with one meaning-content, but the meaning-character of κοινόν is not universal, not γένος, but rather κατὰ ἀναλογίαν.72 Besides that, Aristotle left us nothing about analogy.
In the same way that he characterized the ἀγαθόν as a being-determination of the surrounding world, Aristotle, from the outset, determined the being of beings-that-are-moved with regard to their being-character. Κίνησις too is no γένος, “is not παρὰ τὰ πράγματα.”73 Κίνησις is not a way of being alongside beings-in-movement. Just as ἀγαθόν explicitly determines beings of the surrounding world in their being-there for πρᾶξις, so too κίνησις is a being-determination of the beings of the world, insofar as they always are determined as these. If, then, movements that are divided into various possible movements under the guidance of fully determinate categories refer to this possibility of division: the possibilities of being-moved are primarily determined by the characteristic being-there of the world. That is the role that categories play in the preparation for the definition of κίνησις.
I want to specify some aspects of the categories. At one point, they are designated as simply διαιρέσεις.74 Διαιρεῖν, a determination of λέγειν: a speaking of something that divides. Speaking is always speaking in the having-there of something, is always the discussing of a being that is there. The mode of discussing is characterized by διαίρεσις. Every speaking about something is initially a speaking of it as this or that, λέγειν τι κατά τινος, “addressing something
69. Eth. Nic. Α 4, 1096 b 19 sq.: οὐδ’ ἄλλο οὐδὲν πλὴν τῆς ἰδέας.
70. Eth. Nic. Α 4, 1096 b 20.
71. Eth. Nic. Α 4, 1096 b 23 sqq.: τιμῆς δὲ καὶ φρονήσεως καὶ ἡδονῆς ἕτεροι καὶ διαφέροντες οἱ λόγοι ταύτῃ ᾗ ἀγαθά.
72. Eth. Nic. Α 4, 1096 b 28.
73. Phys. Γ 1, 200 b 32 sq.: οὐκ ἔστι δὲ κίνησις παγὰ τὰ πράγματα.
74. Cf. Top. Δ 1, 120 b 36.