PHI 2323 Lecture 11

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More Syllabus Changes

• Socratic Circles 2019-09-27
• no quiz over nature of soul

On The Soul

• Inner view consists of self, logic, wisdom, knowledge, and feelings
  • We can convey and experience these in literature and poetry
• The soul is immaterial, but the study of it is certain and worthwhile
  • The best kind of knowledge.
• Outline of De Anima
  • general → specific
  • Define the soul
  • The "vegetative" soul (by which things grow and reproduce)
  • The "sensitive" soul (by which things sense and react with their environments ^{is this correct?})
  • The "rational" soul (by which we humans can reason about things)
• Aristotle gives difficulties associated with this... lots of them
  • "Therefore, let's just start over, shall we?"

Aquinas on Existence

Handout

AAH!! WHAT'S GOING ON‽‽‽

After further clarification during office hours:

• If something exists right now in the present, it exists in act

  Example: The oatmeal I am eating right now as I am typing this exists in act

• If something does not exist, but could possibly exist in the future, it is in potency

  Example: The packets of instant oatmeal on the shelf are delicious, creamy bowls of apple cinnamon oatmeal in potency

• substantial existence is anything that exists in itself

  Example: The oats, apple pieces, and cinnamon specks in a bowl of oatmeal

• accidental existence is anything that is "a property of" or "attached to" something else

  Example: The hotness and creaminess of a bowl of oatmeal

  • Categories of accidents according to Aristotle:
    1. quantity (e.g., 2 cubits long)
    2. quality (e.g., white, grammatical)
    3. relation (e.g., double, half, greater, lesser, slave, master, husband, wife)
    4. where? (e.g., in the marketplace, in the Lyceum)
    5. when? (e.g., yesterday, last year)
    6. position/posture (e.g., lying, sitting)
    7. wearing clothes (e.g., armed, shod)
    8. action (e.g., lancing, cauterizing)
    9. passion/being-acted-upon (e.g., being lanced, being cauterized)
• For each existence, there is something in potency. This something is matter

  Example: The instant oatmeal packets and water are matter for this bowl of oatmeal, and this bowl of oatmeal is matter for its hotness

• The "what-it-is" (essence) of a thing in act is called form (not Plato's version of a form!)

  Example: the instant oatmeal packet and water matter (i.e., a bowl of oatmeal in potency) actually become a bowl of oatmeal through its "oatmeal-ness" (substantial form)

  Example: the bowl of oatmeal is hot in potency and becomes actually hot through its "hotness" (accidental form)