Abstract
Klima’s second chapter argues for an alternative interpretation of Buridan’s position, presenting it as a purely functionalist, “physicalist” theory of pure sensory awareness. To be sure, the concluding paragraph of the chapter grants that in the case of the human soul, Buridan would certainly take a dualistic position, which definitely adds some further complications to Buridan’s account of specifically human consciousness (to be addressed by later chapters in detail). However, it should be pointed out that Buridan takes this dualistic position not on account of his theory of the common sense (for which he explicitly assigns a material organ, namely, the heart, after considering and rejecting the idea that it is in the brain), but because he thinks the intellective soul is immaterial, although he argues that this is not a demonstrated philosophical conclusion, but rather an article of faith.
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- 1.
“… accidens non potest transire de subiecto in subiectum” (QDA II, q. 21; cf. QDA II. q 9, QDA II, q. 16, etc.).
- 2.
Aristotle, Metaphysica, V, 15. 1021a11-12.
- 3.
Following scholastic usage, those items are said to be “numerically the same” that would count as one in a process of counting individuals. For instance, counting Socrates’ students, we could count as follows “Phaedo—one, Alcibiades—two, Plato—three”, but we couldn’t continue “Aristocles—four”, since Plato is numerically the same individual as Aristocles, once referred to by his nickname, once by his original name.
- 4.
Actually, it is worth noting here that the recognition of this sort of similarity is clearly present in Aquinas: “Between the cognizer and the cognized thing is not required a similarity by concordance in nature, but by representation only: for it is clear that the form of the stone within the soul is of an entirely different nature than the form of the stone in the matter, but insofar as the form of the stone in the soul represents the form of the stone, the former is the principle leading to the cognition of the latter”—“… inter cognoscens et cognitum non exigitur similitudo quae est secundum convenientiam in natura, sed secundum repraesentationem tantum. Constat enim quod forma lapidis in anima est longe alterius naturae quam forma lapidis in materia; sed inquantum repraesentat eam, sic est principium ducens in cognitionem eius.” Thomas Aquinas, DEVER, q. 8 a. 11 ad 3.
- 5.
“By an even more remote similitude to the above-mentioned things, certain accidental forms that we find in sensible bodies, which are insensible and representative of sensible things, are said to be ‘spiritual’. And this is how in this question ‘spiritual being’ is understood. And because common people do not take anything that cannot be sensed to exist in this world, or indeed, unless [the belief in spiritual beings] were to be acquired from faith through preaching or through the study of philosophy, they would believe absolutely nothing that cannot be sensed to exist, the common crowd called things real only if they were sensible. And this conventional usage is the source of the distinction that some beings are real, that is, sensible, and others are spiritual, that is, insensible, so that by ‘real’ we only understand sensibles, in accordance with this common opinion. Nevertheless, this common opinion notwithstanding, when we say that the names ‘being’ and ‘thing’ are convertible with regard to their primary significations, we also know by philosophy that many insensible beings are more [intensely] beings and more perfect than sensible beings. And we should not deny either that they are things [res], absolutely speaking, although not according to this common meaning [of ‘real’].” (QDA II, q. 17)
- 6.
“And then the question arises in the first place whether the species of color in the air or in the eye ought to be called sensible. And I say that it ought not, in accordance with the proper meaning of the phrase, for it cannot be sensed. However, speaking attributively, we call it sensible because it is through it that the thing of which it is the species is sensed, just as urine is called healthy not according to the proper signification of ‘healthy’, but because it indicates the animal to be healthy.” (QDA II, q. 9)
- 7.
“In the sixth place, it follows that, for sensing an external quality, another quality has to be impressed in the sense organ whereby the external quality is sensed and that is of a dissimilar nature and species from the external quality that is sensed. For this clearly follows from the fourth and fifth assumptions stated earlier. And this quality impressed in the organ in this way is usually called the species of the external sensible quality, because it is representative of this [external quality], by which the soul is naturally capable of cognizing it. And this species is called a “similitude” of the external quality, not because it is of the same quiddity [ratio], nor of the same specific nature as that quality, but it is very dissimilar to it both in essence and in power. For the species produces sensation, whereas another quality like the external one would not produce sensation, but would rather impede it.” (QDA II, q. 17)
- 8.
See Cajetan’s detailed discussion of this issue in the last question of his Commentary on Aquinas’ De Ente et Essentia. (Cajetan 1934, q. 18: 234–237).
- 9.
Note that in this solution Buridan is not committed to the absurd claim that the accidents of the corrupted thing would have to inhere in prime matter alone, without prime matter being informed by any substantial form, as he does not think that in the process of substantial generation and corruption prime matter ever has to be without a substantial form: at any time before the new substantial form is actual, it is the old form that makes its matter substantially actual.
Bibliography
Primary
Cajetan, T. de V. (1934). In P. M.-H. Laurent (Ed.), De Ente et Essentia D. Thomae Aquinatis Commentaria. Taurini: Marietti.
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Klima, G. (2017). Buridan on Sense Perception and Sensory Awareness. In: Klima, G. (eds) Questions on the Soul by John Buridan and Others. Historical-Analytical Studies on Nature, Mind and Action, vol 3. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-51763-6_10
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