Philosophy 102 Flashcards
Change or motion
The going from potentiality to actuality
End
The actuality that is the perfection and completion of a thing
Rest
The state or action of being in the actuality that is the end
Nature
The principal or cause of being moved and of being at rest in that to which it belongs primarily
Substance
The ultimate subject of predication and the ultimate subject of existence; it exists in or through itself
Accident
What exists in another as in a subject
Substantial change
A change wherein a new substance comes to be, with a new substantial form
Accidental change
A change wherein the same substance still exists, but with some new accidental form
Substantial form
A form that makes a thing be fundamentally what it is; it makes it be a substance
Accidental form
A form that makes a substance be in a certain qualified way
First definition of soul:
The form of a natural body having life potentially within it
Second definition of soul:
The first actuality of a natural, organized body
Nutritive power
Power of the soul whereby the body is preserved in being and quantity.
Augmentative power
Power of the soul whereby the body acquires its due quantity
Generative power
Power of the soul whereby a new body comes into being
Apprehension
The act of a cognitive being wherein it has and becomes another, by having a likeness of that thing
Natural immutation
A change in which the form of the thing causing the change is received according to its natural mode of being
Spiritual immutation
A change in which the form of the thing causing the change is received according to a kind of spiritual mode, i.e. as a likeness or image
Sense apprehension
The act of the living organ of an animal that has received a spiritual immutation and thereby possesses a likeness of the sensible object
Matter
A principle of potentiality
Form
A principle of actuality
Antiphon’s argument that the nature of a thing is its matter
If a bed was planted, wood would grow.
You can tell the nature of a thing by what it generates.
Therefore the nature of a bed is wood.
Aristotle’s argument that the nature of a thing is its form
Like generates like.
Generation is only said to be complete when a form like the original exists.
Therefore, form must be most of all what a thing is.
Appetite
Inclination toward or desire for things
Sense appetite (sensuality)
The power of inclining to what is apprehended by the senses
Natural appetite
An appetite or inclination that follows upon the nature of a thing
Fuller sense of appetite
Inclination following upon an apprehension IN the thing itself
Imaginative power
The interior sense power of retaining and recalling sense images received from the exterior senses
Estimative power
The interior sense power of apprehending sense objects as advantageous or harmful for the individual or species, when the external senses do not perceive them as pleasing or displeasing
Memorative power
The interior sense power of retaining “estimations,” i.e. what the estimative power apprehends, and of retaining the aspect of “pastness” that can be associated with images
Common sense
The interior sense power which unites the sensations of all the exterior senses, and apprehends that one is sensing
Passion
A movement in the sense appetite, composed of a disposition in the sense appetite itself, the ‘formal’ part of the passion, and a natural immutation in an organ, the ‘material’ part of the passion
Fear
An inclination away from future evil, with some internal bodily movement
Desire
An inclination toward possessing something pleasant, with some internal bodily movement
Why the intellect must return to the phantasms
The ‘proper object’ of the human intellect is a corporeal nature existing in an individual instance.
The phantasm is an image of an indvidual.
Therefore, in order to understand its proper object, the human intellect must return to a phantasm and perceive the nature existing in the individual.
Proper object
That which is connatural to an intellect or commensurate with its way of knowing and that through which the knower comes to know other things
Incorporeal
An actuality which is neither a body, nor simply the act of a body; not having a material nature
Argument that the human soul is incorporeal
The human intellect can know any body.
Now whatever knows certain things cannot have any of them in its own nature, because that which is in it naturally would impede the knowledge of anything else in that genus.
Thus the intellectual principle (i.e. the human soul) cannot have a material nature.
Agent intellect
The power of the intellect that abstracts the intelligible species from the phantasm
Phantasm
A sense image, which is an image of a thing in its individuality
Abstraction
A process of mental separation, whereby intelligible aspects are grasped, while other aspects are left behind (namely, individuating aspects)
Intelligible species
An immaterial likeness of the nature of the known thing without individuating aspects
Possible intellect
The power of the intellect in potency to receiving the intelligible species, which once it receives the intelligible species is said to be the ‘subject’ of knowledge
Concept
An immaterial likeness of the object known, which the possible intellect forms or expresses, once it possesses the intelligible species
Senses
Perceive what is singular/particular
Intellect
Perceives what is universal in the thing
Argument that the human soul is subsistent
A thing operates as it is, or action follows upon being.
Thus, only what exists through itself can operate through itself.
The human soul operates through itself in intellection.
Therefore, the human soul exists through itself, which is to subsist.
Averroes’ Argument
The intellectual principle is immaterial and incorruptible.
Any form that informs or actualizes corruptible matter must itself be corruptible; for when the matter corrupts, the thing itself corrupts, and of course thereby the form too.
Therefore a rational soul is a contradiction/oxymoron.
Argument that the soul is not man
- What performs the action of a man is a man (i.e. action follows upon being).
- The body and soul composite perform the operations of man, as is clear in sensation.
2a. Sensation is an operation of man.
2b. The body-soul composite forms the operation of man. - Therefore, the body and soul composite is man.
Argument that the human soul is incorruptible
The rational soul is subsistent. Thus, when the composite corrupts, the human soul survives because it has had its own act of existence all along.
Natural sign
The sign points to something because of a natural connection between it and the thing signified
