Human Person Test I

In what sense is the soul, as the principle of life, the actuality of the body for Aristotle?

(555 line 412b) - The soul is the principle of life and is the actuality of the body because the soul gives the body form because the body is only matter without form. When the human dies, the body is no longer a human being but dead matter and the body obtains a new form which is no longer a living being.

What are the main arguments that Socrates uses to justify the claim that the soul is immortal? 78b

1. Coincidence of opposites (71a): wherever we have an opposite, the opposite always seems to coincide with it. Being awake can only be understood from having been asleep earlier. Being alive can only be understood from being dead. Also the analogy of fire and cold. This leads into the transmigration of Souls: soul spends some time "dead" and then some time "alive" in a body, then "dead" again. It would not make sense for this cycle to end suddenly. 2. Theory of Recollection: all learning is not learning something new, but remembering something you already know. Already have an understanding of the Equal, he Good, the man as we can identify equal things, good things and men. Soul was before the body since only the soul can learn so it is reasonable to assume that it would exist after. 3. Prove why the soul is immortal/nature of the soul: What class does the soul belong to - (79+) note 79d: -Composites (likely to dissipate), change, particular things, Visible/Tangible so the body. -Non-composites (not likely to change), not composed of parts, unchanging, ideas/forms, Invisible/Intangible so it is the soul. If the soul is unchanging and doesn't dissipate, then it is immortal. Soul is non-composite as it is invisible and unchangeable. "When the soul investigates by itself it passes into the realm of what is pure, ever existing, immortal and unchanging, it always stays with it whenever it is by itself and can do so." (79d page 118)

What are the three basic types of philosophical anthropology distinguished at the beginning of the semester? How can we classify the two major thinkers we have studied so far (Plato and Aristotle according to these classifications?

1. Reductive Materialism - everything in existence can be explained at its most basic level by the physical sciences: WE ARE JUST OUR BODIES 2. Bipartite - Body and Soul are basic components of human beings (Plato - dualistic - soul is very different from the body) 3. Tripartite - Rational Soul (intellect/reason) + Body + Soul (Nutritive + Sensitive) Bipartite - the basic building blocks of what a human being are body and soul Tripartite - Building blocks are body, soul, and intellect

What is the difference between a special object of the sense, a common sensible, and an incidental object of the sense?

1. Special objects of the senses-perceptible or sensible by only one sense example color is something only the sight perceive. Sound can only be heard. Basically on one sense can perceive this. Remember we are using Science at the time of Aristotle. Is directly perceived. (5 senses) 2. Common Objects: Things that can be perceived by multiple senses. Example is motion, you can see and feel motion. Is directly perceived 3. Incidental Object: can only be indirectly perceived through the senses. We Sense a wall by perceiving color of the wall first and then indirectly perceive the wall t through directly perceiving the color of the wall. We hear a song being played on a piano; we directly perceive the tomes/notes and indirectly perceive the piano through hearing the song. (what the hell is this shit). Best example: What we touch are the tangible qualities of the object, incidentally we perceive the object through that touching.

What are the two grades of actuality?

1. The first grade of actuality is having capacity for life (and/or naturally organized body) 2. The second grade of actuality is exercising of the capacity. (Performance) example: having the capacity of knowledge and exercising knowledge.

What is the definitive characteristic of the soul? (Page 555)

Aristotle - Soul is the form of the body, provides the organization to the material body and the capacity for life. "Soul is substance in the sense which corresponds to the definitive formula of a thing's essence." Plato - It is the rationality. The immortal part of us that can pursue knowledge.

How, in detail, can a case be made for classifying Aristotle as a tripartite anthropologist according to both De Anima and the Nicomachean Ethics (based on our lecture only; no extra reading of N.E is required to answer this question)?

Aristotle distinguishes between the body/Non rational soul, low rational soul and a higher rational soul. Aristotle argues that a lower rational soul is the soul in us that we share in some way with the animals. Aristotle claims that the various types of souls will have their own types of virtues or at least virtues that are peculiar to them. The virtue of the lower rational soul is prudence. (Natural virtue) The virtue of the higher rational soul is wisdom. (Beyond nature) Prudence is the virtue of the composite - the virtue particular to that part of the human being, which is a composite of body and soul

What is the difference between the intellectus possibile and the intellectus agens?

Aristotle draws an analogy with sensation requires a sense organs, a medium, and an object. In the same way the intellect is going to have access to the ultimate form of the thing only through the medium produced by the imagination (image) Sense Organ Medium Object Intellect Image Form of the thing The possible intellect receives the image. The possible intellect is receptive to whatever the imagination presents to it. Next we have the agent intellect which abstracts the form from the image. The agent intellect takes on the form of the image.

Explain Aristotle's theory of cognition from beginning to end.

Aristotle's idea of cognition is of moving from data received from the senses to a sensible form and from there to an intelligible form. Aristotle allows for the materiality of the mind at the level of the senses but the purpose of the theory is to grasp a universal intelligible form, therefore, it is a search for form in the physical and immaterial mind. Function of the sensitive soul: 1. Perception of the Special object - this is what we sense. Aristotle argues that perception of the special objects is never in error. 2. Synthesis or identification of objects with incidental objects. Here error is possible. Concomitance between perception of a special object and the sensible quality of a particular object. At this level there can be falsehood. 3. Perception of universal attributes - concept of movement and magnitude is shared by many different types of incidental objects. Perception picks up on similarities. Putting 2 dogs next to each other, my perception can pick up on the similarities between the two. (Putting together the sound of barking or the tactile feel of soft fur to pick up that it's a dog) Here is the greatest possibility of error. 4. Imagination forming an image. On the basis of senses, we are able to form an image of a dog. Serves as a medium by means of which the intellect is able to understand what the thing is. Organ - medium - special object Intellect - Image - thing itself 5. Possible/Passive Intellect - Image is impressed on the passive intellect and then presented to the mind 6. Agent Intellect - abstracts form from the image 595- No one can learn or understand anything in the absence of sense, and when the mind is actively aware of anything it is necessarily aware of it along with an image; for images are like sensuous contents except in that they contain no matter.

What does Nagel mean by "reductive materialism."

By Reductive Materialism, Nagel is referring to the belief that everything in existence can be explained at its most basic level by the physical sciences. It is an attempt to reduce the existence of mind into matter, which means that a non-material mind cannot exist. Reductive Materialist's use two ways to relate mind and matter: Conceptual behaviorism and the Psycho-physical identity theory.

What does Husserl mean by the "crisis of the sciences"? In what does it consist?

By the crisis of the sciences Husserl is referring to the proposal that one cannot know anything beyond what is determined through the natural world. i.e. the natural sciences. A consequence that has occurred from this notion is that science cannot uncover the nature of the cosmos and the principles keeping it together. Additionally, there is no attempt to explain the true nature of man if the sciences only focus on the material/matter. Natural sciences cannot provide morality.

What is Cebes' objection to Socrates and how does Socrates reply? (page 125, 87+)

Cebes uses the analogy of the weaver and the cloaks he makes. (weaver=soul, cloak=body) The weaver will wear a cloak until it is worn and then will weave a new one. This process continues until the weaver weaves a final one and dies. The same goes for the soul-body. The soul is long lasting but we shouldn't draw the conclusion that it is immortal. Socrates argues that certain forms are incapable of participating in other forms. 4 is incapable to being odd and the form of 3 is incapable of being even. The soul participates form of "life." The opposite of even is odd and the opposite of death is life or the deathless. If the soul is deathless then it is incompatible with Death, thus, it is immortal. Theory of the forms - participation in the forms so a thing is what it is because it participates in such a form. We also recognize there are certain relationships and incompatibilities between certain forms. 2 is incompatible with oddness... What does the soul provide to the body? - Life Therefore, the cause of the soul is bring life to the body, therefore soul participates in form of life. In the same way as 3 can't participate in evenness, the soul participates in life and is incompatible with death. The opposite of death is deathless therefore the soul is deathless.

What is the difference between conceptual behaviorism and psycho-physical identity theory? What, according to Nagel, are the basic mistakes that both of these theories make in trying to explain the relationship between mind (consciousness) and body?

Conceptual behaviorism is the attempt to explain the mind and all mental phenomenon as being physical. It holds every mental phenomenon has an associated physical behavior. The problem with this is that physical phenomena are often very different than what someone's true mental state is. E.g. two different people in completely different states of mind could perform the same action. Also, not every mental state has a perfectly associated physical action (e.g., when someone is entirely joyful, there is a certain sense that there is no natural, physical action that can fully express how you feel) The Psycho-physical identity theory holds that mind is equal to matter and uses the analogy of water = H2O. The argument here is that H2O explains everything we need to know about water, just as matter explains everything we need to know about the psyche. Nagel's problem is that the analogy is not the same. Water is always H2O, H2O is always water: there is no material principle to show that ψ = φ. The psycho-physical identity theory tries and fails to characterize mind as matter on the level of brain events and mind event. Mind equals matter in the same way that water equals H2O. The theory claims that these nonanalytic identities are analogous because mind will be observed to be matter one day in the same way that water was finally observed to be H2O. This analogy is unsatisfactory. Matter without Mind seems to be possible, but water w/ no H2O is not. Also, the theory gives no account of who experiences the mental state in the 1st person. Like conceptual behaviorism, it fails because it refuses to rise to the level of rationality.

Why does Nagel think that consciousness poses the first major problem to the scientific worldview?

Consciousness involves someone's first-person experience in a particular situation. Science cannot observe this subjective feeling from matter or empirical observation alone because consciousness does not always manifest as a physical action. Thus consciousness poses the problem of not being able to be scientifically observable.

Intellectus Agens

Exercise of capacity. Active acting intellect. The act of thinking itself. Cognition beings with special objects or imagination.

What are some of the implications of Aristotle's theory of cognition for the possibility of the immortality of the soul?

Higher gational soul doesn't seem to be a part of the body. Therefore, after death, this is the part of the soul that lives on.

What is the role of imagination in Aristotle's theory of cognition? Of which type of soul is imagination a power.

Imagination- provides a transition point between the activities of the sensitive soul and the rational soul. Important in the process of thinking. Imagination produces an image. Page 589: Wants to distinguish imagination from perception 1. Imagination is something we can have in the absence of a particular sense or feeling. Independent of sensation 2. On the other hand, imagination is dependent on a previous experience of sensation. (can not imagine the room unless you have seen the room and people before, or seen a room and people) Imagination is a kind of movement set in motion by the senses. Meaning that the senses must come first in order to have imagination Another difference: Imagination does not have to be true while sensation has to be true at the most basic level . Example: Daydreaming can be false, having a conservation is true.

How does Aristotle define life?

Life is self-nutrition, growth, and reproduction. (page 557)

Edmund Husserl and the phenomenological method.

Phenomenology is "a return to things themselves." It is an attempt for us to do away with any assumptions we have about the world and let the world speak to us. Husserl proposes the Phenomenological method of bracketing phenomena so as to look in some way, at the essence of the thing. He proposes we suspend our thoughts on appearance and allow ourselves to study the phenomenon--how things are given to us through our experience by reflection is phenomenology and through this we discover essential truths or essences.

What does Plato mean when he claims that doing philosophy is practicing for death? (67e+)

Plato believes that knowledge is from the soul and he says that "we shall be closest to knowledge if we refrain as much as possible from association with the body and do not join with it more than we must"(67a). Philosophy is pursuit of knowledge of the highest nature. Since Philosophers desire to separate their souls from their bodies, they fear death the least of all men, for they desire the freedom of separating their soul from the body. Philosophers are seeking pure being, which is eternal not in thi world but the ideal world, which is unchanging.

What are some of the similarities and differences between Aristotle and Plato's philosophies of the person?

Plato in Phaedo believes that we cannot trust our senses. Anything the sense report to us is always false - Heraclitean Flux (appearances vs ideas). Body is evil and prevents one from understanding the forms. The whole soul is immortal for Plato. Inward reflection allows one to come close to knowledge. Plato forms are prior to the physical - existing in themselves apart from the physical Aristotle makes the opposite claim - perceptions seem to be always true but its only when we go beyond perception into imagination that falsehood has the potential to enter in. Aristotle, at least at the most basic level, believes the senses are true. Plato does not hold this belief. Aristotle - forms exist in matter; no world of forms independent of material world; organize matter Aristotle believes there are 3 parts to the soul - nutritive, sensitive, rational. Similarities - The ultimate goal of knowledge for both is knowledge of the form. Plato believes this is through recollection and Aristotle thinks that the senses allow one to abstract the form. Both believe that to attain knowledge of the form means removing matter. However, Plato believes that the body has to be rejected, and that knowledge is attained through the soul alone. For Aristotle, there have to be certain steps, imagination leads to the intellectual abstraction, once there, one must remove the senses to attain the pure form. Pure form alone is the goal of both thinkers. Both think you can't achieve perfect knowledge of the pure Forms in life. Plato believes senses are stimuli for recollection and Aristotle believes senses are stimuli for knowledge of the forms.

Why, for Plato, do only the philosophers possess true virtue?

Plato says that only philosophers possess true virtues because they seek The example of courage is that philosophers are fearless, as they know they will be rewarded in the afterlife. Philosophers are only concerned about their soul and avoid pleasures of the flesh and seek things for their essence. Example: they seek courage for its own sake, not because they fear for their family or city. Philosophers are lovers of wisdom, chief of the virtues. They know virtue as they know the forms.

Why is the body a source of deception according to Plato? What philosophers form the major influence in Plato's reasoning here? (65) 66b

Plato says that the body desires pleasure. He says that if we are to have knowledge, so truth, it can only be sought by turning away from the senses/body and toward the stability of reason and the soul. "As long as we have a body and our soul is fused with such an evil we shall never adequately attain what we desire, which we affirm to be the truth. The body keeps us busy in a thousand ways because of its need for nurture/ it fills us with wants, desires, fears, all sorts of illusions, so that, in truth and in fact no thought of any kind ever comes to us from the body./it prevents us from seeing the truth." (66b,c) The philosophers that influence him are: 1. Heraclitus who uses claims the world is in constant change just as you never step in the same river twice (because the water is being displaced downstream). 2. Parmenides who associates the stability of being to that of Forms and Ideas. True knowledge is form and is unchanging. Heraclitian Flux - material is changing so must seek the form.

What is the general sense of Simias' objection to Socrates' first set of arguments for the immortality of the soul? How does Socrates reply to these objections? (86+ page 124)

Simmias uses the analogy of an instrument and harmony to explain why he thought the soul was not eternal. Harmony is invisible but it is composite (2 or more notes). Harmony also only exists only as long as the instrument exist. This analogy is meant to show how the body is instrument and the soul is harmony meaning that the soul is composite. As soon as the body dies, these elements can no longer be harmonized, and the soul is the first to go. 1. Socrates replies by stating that while a harmony can very in composition, the soul does not vary in its composition. 2. Additionally, more notes increases harmony, however, the soul can not become "more soul like." 3. Socrates' objection: The instrument directs the harmony, while the soul is the thing that directs the body.

Why is suicide morally wrong, according to Socrates.

Socrates says that Suicide is wrong because "men are in a kind of prison (the body) and that the gods are our guardians and men are one of their possessions. So if you free yourself (soul) from your prison (body) you are committing an act of theft upon the gods (guardians).

Hearing

Special Object: Audible Medium: Air/Water Sense Organ: Inner Ear

Taste

Special Object: Flavor Medium: Water Sense Organ: Tongue

Smell

Special Object: Odor Medium: Air/Water Sense Organ: Nose

Touch

Special Object: Tangible Medium: Flesh Sense Organ: X (nervous system?)

Sight

Special Object: Color/the visible Medium: Distance, air/water, transparent/light Sense Organ: Eye

Explain Aristotle's method of approach in studying the soul through its acts and the objects towards which those acts are directed? How is studying bodily sensation the same thing as studying the soul, for Aristotle? What does Aristotle presuppose about the nature of being to justify this approach to studying the soul?

The activities an organism is capable of expressing reveal the nature of the organism's soul. By studying the powers and activities of the body, one learns about the soul because they are functions of the soul. One is able to understand the soul through its different powers. As such, because an animal is self-nutritive and eats, one knows that he contains a nutritive soul, because it is capable of touch and other sense, one knows tat it contains a sensory soul, and finally in the example of human, because he is capable of reason, one knows he has a rational soul. Therefore, the actions committed by an organism reveal characteristics of the soul. Since the soul is the form of the body, by learning about the body you learn about the soul. What Aristotle is doing is describing his method of approach in describing the nature of the soul. We study a being, not on the basis of what the being does, but on what enables it to do what it does - activities- but we must also understand activities by what objects these activities are directed toward. First and foremost we must begin by looking at the objects and which the activities of the soul are directed, then to the activities of the soul, and then to the soul itself

How might we characterize Plato's view of the relationship between body and soul?

The body is considered to be evil. It is a prison for the soul. "As long as we have a body and our soul is fused with such an evil we shall never adequately attain what we desire, which we affirm to be the truth. The body keeps us busy in a thousand ways because of its need for nurture/ it fills us with wants, desires, fears, all sorts of illusions, so that, in truth and in fact no thought of any kind ever comes to us from the body./it prevents us from seeing the truth." (66b,c) Plato believes in Bipartite Anthropology; that the soul and the body are two separate things. He also argues that the soul is the person, which is imprisoned in bodies but must strive to get rid of the bodies in order to encounter the forms (beauty, truth, goodness, Etc.).

Explain the failure, according to Nagel, of the analogy between the non-analytic identity Water = H20 and the non-analytic identity ψ = φ. What does Nagel mean by non-analytic vs. analytic identities?

The failure is that there is no material principle to connect ψ = φ while there is one (atoms) to connect water= H20. By analytic identities, Nagel is referring to identities that can be proved conceptually. Even assuming you could find a principle proving that the mind is matter, there will never be a principle proving that all matter is mind. Therefore while all water is H2O and reversibly all H2O is water, the matter=mind principle is not reversible. By non-analytical identities, Nagel is referring to two terms that are not conceptually connected but can be connected through something else. Example: Ball= red. Nothing tells us that the ball is red unless we have a first person subjective experience (seeing a red ball).

In what way does our being as person become a problem or an enigma, for Husserl after the crisis of the sciences?

The natural sciences only seek after fact and what can be explained through observation of matter. Because of this, natural sciences cannot explain the nature of the human person. The enigma of this subjectivity in this case is the nature of personhood and since science is centered around facts, it is incapable of touching on this subject. Focusing in on empirical facts vs. what is essential and meaningful. Questions of fact don't seem to focus on what's really important about being a human person. Significant aspects of human being are ignored. "Fact-minded scientists make for fact-minded people."

What is the relationship of the soul to the body for Aristotle? Is the soul separable from the body? (561)

The nutritive soul and sensitive soul give organization to the living body. The rational part is separate from the body. It is the source or origin of movement, it is the end, and it is the essence of the whole living body. (562) - Soul is the final cause of its body. 559 - "The soul cannot be without a body, while it cannot be a body; it is not a body but something relative to a body. That is why it is in a body, and a body of a definite kind" The nutritive and sensitive soul die with the body, but the rational part, independent of the body can be separable, only through death.

How does Aristotle break down substance into its composite elements, i.e. matter, form, potentiality, actuality? What are the relationships between these different concepts?

The word substance has three meanings--form, matter, and the complex of both. Of these three, matter is potentiality, what is called form is the actuality. The complex of both is the living thing, the body cannot be the actuality of the soul; it is the soul which is the actuality of a certain kind of body. Just substance is matter and form.

Explain Plato's theory of recollection. What implications does it have for Plato's theory of the soul? (76d-77, page 115)

Theory of Recollection: all learning is not learning something new, but remembering something you already know. Already have an understanding of the concepts of The Equal, The Good, and the Man as we can identify/perceive equal things, good things and men. Soul was before the body since only the soul can learn so it is reasonable to assume that it would exist after. "If the Beautiful, the Good, and others like them exist in reality, we refer all the things we perceive to that reality discovering that it existed before and is ours, and we compare these things with it, then, just as they exist, so our soul must exist before we are born. " 76d)

Intellectus Possibile

passive/possible intellect. Possible intellect capacity, first mode of actuality. Everything which is matter has possibility. There is an actuality of which we do now and a capacity to do it. The movement begins from outside. We do not need our intellect to be looking for something to process.