PREDICATION (from

See also:

• LAT

Lat. praedicare, to

See also:

• STATE
• STATE, GREAT OFFICERS OF

state, assert)  , in logic, the term which denotes the joining of a predicate to a subject in a judgment or proposition . The statement " all men are mortal " is to predicate mortality of all men . In other words a judgment is made up of a subject and a predicate joined by a copula . Since the true unit of thought is the judgment, since all concepts or universals exist only in continuous thinking (judging), the theory of predication is a fundamental part of logic . The true relation of subject and predicate has not been deter-mined with unanimity, various logicians emphasizing different aspects of the process (see LOGIC) . The logical use of " predicate " is to be distinguished from the grammatical, which includes the verb, whether it be the verb " to be " in its various forms, or another verb . The simple grammatical sentence " he strokes the dog " the first word is the subject, while "strokes the dog " is the predicate, including verb and object . In logic every proposition is reducible to the form " A is B," " B " being the predicate . Thus the logical form of " he strokes the dog " would be " he is stroking the dog " or some other periphrasis which liberates and determines the logical predicate . The true significance of the logical copula is difficult . It cannot be described simply as a third (i.e. separate part) of the judgment, because until two terms are enjoined by it they are not subject and predicate . Much discussion has raged round the question whether the use of the verb " to be " as the copula implies that existence is predicated by the subject .

It may be taken as generally agreed that this is not the

case (see further LOGIC, and the textbooks) . PRE-EXISTENCE, DOCTRINE OF, in theology, the doctrine that Jesus Christ had a human soul which existed before the creation of the world—the first and most perfect of created things —and subsisted, prior to His human birth, in union with the Second Person of the Godhead . It was this human soul which suffered the pain and sorrow described in the Gospels . The chief exposition of this doctrine is that of Dr Watts (Works, v . 274, &c.); it has received little support . In a wider form the doctrine has been applied to men in general—namely, that in the beginning of Creation God created the souls of all men, which were subsequently as a punishment for ill-doing incarnated in physical bodies till discipline should render them fit for spiritual existence . Supporters of this doctrine, the Pre-existants or Pre-existiani, are found as early as the 2nd century, among them being Justin Martyr and Origen (q.v.), and the idea not only belongs to metempsychosis and mysticism generally, but is widely prevalent in Oriental thought . It was condemned by the Council of Constantinople in 540, but has frequently reappeared in modern thought (cf . Wordsworth's Intimations of Immortality) being in fact the natural correlative of a belief in immortality .