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From Aristotle to Cognitive Neuroscience pp 11–44Cite as

From Aristotle to Consciousness and Intentionality

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Abstract

Neo-Aristotelian accounts of the human psyche incorporate our meaningful contact with the world such that complex connectivity within the brain and between brain and world is the basis of consciousness and mental function (a “contact view”). Intelligent contact with things shapes human consciousness and cognition in ways reflecting truth-related thought and talk about the world in a context of communication, judgement, and knowledge. Human intersubjectivity thus allows us to triangulate on the objects we encounter and configure our dealings with them in communicable ways grounded in truth and falsity. Aristotle’s naturalistic view of the soul as an active, self-organising system implies that distinctively human life corresponds to a progressive integration of neural functions, enabling us to tell (in both senses) what is happening and what things really are.

I knew that seclusion and solitude were very necessary for my friend in those hours of intense mental concentration during which he weighed every particle of evidence, constructed alternative theories, balanced one against the other, and made up his mind as to which points were essential and which immaterial. (p. 205)

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Mercier and Sperber (2011).

  2. 2.

    Davidson (2001).

  3. 3.

    CPR B848ff.

  4. 4.

    This is explored in Gillett (1992, esp. Chap. 4).

  5. 5.

    Wittgenstein, On Certainty, #402.

  6. 6.

    Inquiries we have as De Anima (hereinafter DA).

  7. 7.

    DA, 430a16.

  8. 8.

    It is a key feature of embodied cognition theory (Chemero, 2009; Thompson & Varela, 2001) and the product of neural integration between practically and symbolically attuned assemblies (JHJ, e.g. 1887).

  9. 9.

    Aristotle distinguishes human from animal thought in terms of truth and falsity (DA, 427b12ff).

  10. 10.

    The space of reasons is a sustained focus of McDowell’s work (1994, 1998), and the proper role of philosophy is a preoccupation of both Frege and Wittgenstein, both of whom reject the idea that logic merely follows the dispositions of human psychology (a doctrine known as “psychologism”).

  11. 11.

    The relation is explored in relation to concepts and consciousness in Gillett (1992, 2014).

  12. 12.

    Merleau-Ponty (1962, p. 157).

  13. 13.

    Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason (CPR) “discursive” is not further defined and evokes the Greek grammaticos …

  14. 14.

    Frege (1977, p. 4).

  15. 15.

    This will be discussed in Chap. 2.

  16. 16.

    The conceptually distinct rendering is in the Hugh Lawson-Tancred translation.

  17. 17.

    Wittgenstein uses “grammatical” to reflect the origins of logic in correct use of language (PI ## 90; 111) and thereby echoes an ancient Greek usage.

  18. 18.

    The concept of sedimentation is found in Merleau-Ponty (1962, p. 164ff).

  19. 19.

    McDowell (1998, p. P185-5).

  20. 20.

    McDowell (1998, p. 188).

  21. 21.

    McDowell (1998, p. 179).

  22. 22.

    McDowell (1998, p. 183).

  23. 23.

    NE 1103a20–25.

  24. 24.

    Merleau-Ponty (1973, pp. 12, 14, 16, 17, 25, 31).

  25. 25.

    Wood (2003).

  26. 26.

    Chemero uses the term “bringing forth” to denote the fact that something actual, not just ideal, is introduced.

  27. 27.

    This term is used in Dennett (1991).

  28. 28.

    The idea of a bent rule is a problem generated if there is no categorical state that ensures that a performance will always conform to what we intuitively regard as following the rule (Kripke, 1982; Gillett, 2003).

  29. 29.

    Strawson (1974). I have discussed this link in “‘Ought’ and Well-being” (Gillett, 1993).

  30. 30.

    Nussbaum, discussed in a chapter in Love’s Knowledge (1990).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Dunedin School of Medicine, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand

    Grant Gillett

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Gillett, G. (2018). From Aristotle to Consciousness and Intentionality. In: From Aristotle to Cognitive Neuroscience. Palgrave Pivot, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-93635-2_2

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