Aristotle on Perception 9780191519055, 9780198236290

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ARISTOTLE ON PERCEPTION

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ARISTOTLE ON PERCEPTION STEPHEN EVERSON

CLARENDON PRESS • OXFORD

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OXFORD U N I V E R S I T Y PRESS

Great Clarendon Street, Oxford OX2 6DP Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University's objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide in Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offices in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan South Korea Poland Portugal Singapore Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam

Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries Published in the United States by Oxford University Press Inc., New York © Stephen Eversonl997 The moral rights of the author have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) Reprinted 2007 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization, inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this book in any other binding or cover And you must impose this same condition on any acquirer ISBN 978-0-19-823863-8

For my father and to the memory of my mother

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PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This book has taken an embarrassingly long time to finish. Actually, this book was written reasonably efficiently; the trouble was that it is the last, in the series of three different manuscripts, each devoted to the task of elucidating what Aristotle has to say about the capacity of perception, and that series has taken a long time to complete. Had I mastered the art of revising rather than fallen into the habit of rewriting, then there would have been a book much sooner, I suspect, however—and certainly hope—that it would have been a worse book. My earlier attempts to give an account of Aristotle's theory of perception were rather longer and made considerably greater reference to modern views about perception and intentionality. That the present book is shorter is an obvious boon for the reader: that it makes less frequent reference to contemporary theorists may appear to have produced a less interesting result. Indeed, it may be that the degree of such reference I now make is such as to satisfy no one. The purist who thinks that one should treat ancient texts only in their own terms, and that trying to read them in the light of contemporary theories can only distort what they say, may find there to be too many comparisons made to what is a rather different tradition in philosophical psychology, Alternatively, those who want to know what relevance Aristotle's treatment of perception has for those interested in the nature of perception and the mind may feel that not enough work is done to extricate Aristotelian and possibly Aristotelian answers to the questions which are now posed by philosophers of mind. Whilst I do think that there is much of interest to be gained from comparing what Aristotle has to say about the activities of the psuche with modern attempts to understand the operations of the mind, and their relation to the workings of the body, this seems to me something best done once one has indeed tried to understand Aristotle in his own terms—in terms, that is, of the questions he takes himself to be answering and of the background theories he presupposes. If one is to grasp the nature of Aristotle's psychological theory, then the Physics and the Metaphysics are considerably more helpful guides than recent work in the philosophy of mind.

viii

Preface and Acknowledgements

That said, it is still a mistake to make it a principle that one should eschew reference to contemporary philosophical discussion. One reason for reading old texts is that they can provide us with possible ways of thinking about an issue and so broaden our own understanding of it. One reason why we can fail to read a text correctly is that our view of how its subject-matter should be approached blocks us from recognizing that the author is not approaching it in that way. Debates about whether contemporary labels can properly be applied to earlier philosophers—Is Aristotle a 'functionalist'?; Is the Republic utilitarian?—are usually pretty desultory affairs, but this should not blind us to the fact that developments in contemporary philosophical discussion can lead the historian of philosophy to see new, and helpful, ways of construing the arguments he or she is examining. Often, it seems to me, the refusal to place the work of an historical philosopher within a critical understanding of non-historical writing leads to the wrong kind of philosophical innocence—one which is actually unhelpful for pursuing the historian's task. The text itself does not assume any knowledge of Greek on the part of the reader, although it does, I'm afraid, rely on a certain willingness to accept transliterations of some of Aristotle's terminology. In case this is confusing, I have added a glossary of these, which refers to the place in the book where each receives most elucidation. For those with Greek, I have provided the text of cited passages in the footnotes. Especially when an author is citing passages from a wide range of texts, it is annoying if one cannot check the originals without carrying a whole series of books around with one, I have not, however, generally indicated textual problems—for these the reader will have to go to critical editions of the texts. Also, since English is not an inflected language, it is often easier to provide short excerpts in translation than it is in the original, and because of this, the cited Greek passage will sometimes be fuller than that given in translation in the body of the text. Parts of Chapters i and 4 are closely related to my piece, 'Proper sensibles and xaff and causes', which appeared in Phronesis for 1995.1 am grateful to the editor of that journal for permission to reproduce this material. The writing of the first two versions of this book was done, intermittently, whilst teaching full-time in Oxford—at St Hugh's, Balliol, and then Lincoln. My time at both St Hugh's and Balliol was highly

Preface and Acknowledgements

ix

enjoyable. Unlike in American universities, the college system has yet to develop a proper way to employ non-tenured academics, and colleges still rely on posts which were designed to be suitable for promising graduate students but are much less suitable for anyone more advanced. Since those who now hold such posts are generally considerably more advanced than this, their position is often very unsatisfactory. Fortunately, I was for the most part very lucky in my affiliations. Both St Hugh's and Balliol were unusually supportive and generous: certainly not all educational institutions show as much concern for their young academics. The final draft of the book was written in Trinity College, Cambridge and then here in Ann Arbor, at the University of Michigan. Members of both institutions did, and have done, much to make a stranger feel at home, One consequence of the length of time it has taken to produce this book is the large number of people who have given up their time to comment on earlier material. Hugh Johnstone has been willing to criticize anything put in front of him and has saved me from many errors of scholarship, philosophy, and style. Richard Sorabji gave helpful comments on the first draft when he was supervising my Ph.D. thesis at King's College London. Julia Annas and Jonathan Barnes both read through the next version and provided a wealth of useful objections, thus considerably delaying the process of publication. Myles Burnyeat read the penultimate draft and helped me both to focus my worries about his reading of the De Anima and to develop some new ones about my own. Both David Charles and Malcolm Schofield were generous enough to read and comment on more than one draft, which strikes me as well beyond the call of duty. I also had detailed and valuable criticisms from two anonymous readers for the press. Kristina Milnor kindly helped me to proof-read the Greek citations for the final version. Ian Rumfitt and David Velleman gave advice on how to make the Introduction seem more appealing. With all this help, there must be a good chance that at least some of the errors in the book are someone else's. In a first book, one can, I hope, be allowed to note some more generalized and long-standing debts. There can be no better training for undergraduate philosophy than is provided within the tutorial system and I was particularly lucky in my tutors at Corpus. Both Jennifer Hornsby and Christopher Taylor were unfailingly gener-

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ous with their time and this was a principal reason why philosophy seemed something exciting to pursue. Again, and even further back, my schoolmasters Neil Cooper, David Jones, and David Keysall went out of their way to provide intellectual encouragement for an arrogant pupil who had just discovered that one of the pleasures of philosophy is in irritating other people with arguments for counter-intuitive conclusions. Finally, well beyond the time when they could reasonably have expected not to be still subsidizing their offspring, my parents have been willing to provide support of all kinds. I am still amazed by how gracious and uncomplaining they were in doing this, and so am very pleased at last to be able to dedicate this book to my father and to the memory of my mother,

S,E. Ann Arbor, December 1995

CONTENTS

Introduction

1

1 Perception and its Proper Objects

13

2 Perceptual Change and Material Change

56

3 Proper Sensibles and Secondary Qualities

103

4 The Perceptual System

139

5 Perceptual Content

187

6 Perception and Material Explanation

229

Glossary

289

Bibliography

291

Index Locorum

297

General Index

305

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Introduction Aristotle's account of perception might well seem an unpromising subject for the historian of philosophy as opposed, perhaps, to the historian of ideas. Much of his discussion of the senses in the De Anima and the Parva Naturalia consists of empirical claims which are now quite obviously false. Whilst there might be some antiquarian interest in knowing that Aristotle believed that light 'is the presence of fire or something resembling fire in what is transparent' (DA II. 7,4i8bi6-i7),1 that 'the sense-organs are composed of only two of the simple elements, air and water' (DA III. i, 425a3~4),2 or that when menstruating women look into very clean mirrors, 'the surface of the mirror becomes a sort of bloodshot cloud' (Ins. 459b3),3 one might reasonably wonder whether any theory of perception which seeks to make explanatory use of such claims could be of interest to anyone other than an antiquarian. Even if the historian of philosophy does not always expect the texts he studies to be candidates for truth, it looks at first sight as if at least much of what Aristotle has to say about perception is not only false but fairly boringly so. It will not take any great reflection to see where he goes wrong, just a quick consultation of an introduction to anatomy. It would be a very honest monograph indeed which explicitly revealed at the start that its subject-matter was of no real interest, and so it will come as no great surprise that I think that these appearances should be resisted. Certainly for the student of Aristotle, his account of perception is of quite considerable interest, and even some importance, since it provides by far his most sustained attempt to provide an explanation of the behaviour of natural substances. What we find in the relevant chapters of the De Anima and the treatises of the Parva Naturalia is an application of the explanatory method set out in the Physics for the study of

i 3

2

Introduction

natural substances. For Aristotle, living creatures are primary examples of natural bodies; he does not provide a physical theory for the behaviour of inanimate substances and then look to see how this might be extended to cover living things. Rather, that theory is intended from the start to be applied to animate and inanimate substances alike. Indeed, since Aristotle includes plants within the class of animate beings, there will be few, if any, complex natural substances which are not alive. The psychology of the De Anima is thus not a different kind of science from that whose principles are set out in the Physics but is, or at least should be, an example of that science. Anyone who is interested in Aristotle's theory of natural science must study the psychological (and also the biological) works—and, since Aristotle devotes considerably more time to explicating the operations of the perceptual capacity (together with those of the related capacity for phantasiaf than he does to the other capacities of the psuche,5 his account of that capacity provides perhaps our best evidence for the nature of his physical science. Undoubtedly, that account must be central to our understanding of his psychology and, in particular, our understanding of the nature of the psuche. It is easy to be misled by his characterization of the psuche in DA II. i as the 'form of a living body' into thinking that Aristotle believes that we can get a prior understanding of what it is to have a psuche—to be a living thing—before we have an understanding of the various capacities which are characteristic of living things. Accepting this, one could then take it that the psuche had been defined in DA II. i, and that the ensuing discussions of the particular psychic capacities are intended to contribute only to the second, and not to the first, part of the project specified in DA 1.1 as "to grasp and understand, first the nature and essence 4 I shall not offer a translation of 'phantasm'. The standard translation is "imagination", but this is misleading since, as I shall argue in Ch. 4, the range of activity of phantasia is much wider than that of imagination, and it is as well not to suggest unwanted restrictions on the capacity from the start. 5 Again, although 'psuchi' will be in very frequent use in the book, I shall not attempt to translate it, since there is, I think, no term of English which is not misleading. 'Mind* will not do, since plants do not grow in virtue of having a mtad, whereas they do grow in virtue of having a psuche. 'Soul', apart from being archaic, is too suggestive of a separate individual substance distinct from the body. For further comments on the relation between the study of the mind and the study of psuche, see the beginning of my (iQ95b).

Introduction

3

[of the psuchb35-!Qiia2)28

There are difficulties in this passage, to which I shall return later, but its usefulness for our present purpose does not turn on resolving these.29 What is important for the moment is the reason Aristotle gives to support his claim that the sensible hupokeimena are prior to perception. The claim is that the objects of perception are prior to the capacity for perception, since what brings about change is prior to what is changed. Aristotle thus identifies them as the agents of perception and hence prior to perception itself. This is true even if they are picked out using the relational term aistheton. What this allows for is that whilst one cannot understand what it is for something to be an aistheton without thinking of it as suitably related to the capacity for perception, nevertheless, one will be able to pick out actual aistheta without describing them as such. That the objects of perception are aistheta is indeed a definitional claim, and one which does not advance our understanding of the perceptual capacity. Having made this claim, however, one can proceed to discover a posteriori what things in fact do stand in a suitable relation to the capacity— that is, what things are such as to bring about the activity of the relevant capacity. This is exactly how Aristotle does proceed in this discussion of sight, for instance: The object of sight is the visible, and what is visible is colour and a certain kind of object which can be described in words but which has no single name; what we mean by the second will be abundantly clear as we proceed. 28

29

In particular, it needs to be decided what ta hup&keimena are.

Perception and its Proper Objects

25

Whatever is visible is colour and colour is what lies upon what is kath' hauto visible; kath' hauto visible not by definition but because it has in itself the cause (to aitiori) of its own visibility. Every colour is such as to change what is actually transparent; and that is its nature, (DA II. 6,4i8a26-b2)30

Aristotle begins with a trivial definitional claim, specifying the related predicates—the objects of vision are what are visible—and then immediately sets out what sorts of thing are in fact visible. These are colours and another class of objects which Aristotle says here have no name, but later identifies as things "which appear fiery or shining' and which, whilst invisible in the light, do produce perception in the dark (II, 7,41932-8). Aristotle thus does make an informative claim about the objects of sight, and one which provides an escape from the threat of deSnitional circularity. So long as one can understand what it is to be coloured or shiny independently of any understanding of vision, then in specifying the objects of vision as coloured and shiny objects, Aristotle has indeed provided the beginnings of a theory of vision,31 The objects of vision are those things which are such as to act on the animal so as to produce vision. That Aristotle should seek to define the perceptual capacities by reference to their objects because these are the agents of the activity of those capacities is what we should expect both in light of his remark in DA II. 2, that 'it is not enough for a definitional account to reveal as most now do the mere fact; it must include and exhibit the cause also' (4i3ai3-i6),32 and precisely because what he is seeking to define are capacities. In Met, 0. i, Aristotle- gives as the primary sense of 'capacity' 'a source of change in another thing or in the thing itself in virtue of being other' (104639-11).33 The point 30

31 That one can understand what it is to be coloured independently of knowing that it is such as to produce vision is, however, contested by some scholars—see Ch.3. 32

3J

The point to this is that even when the agent oC a change and what is changed happen to be the same (as when, for instance, a doctor cures himself, Met.

26

Perception and its Proper Objects

to this last qualification is that even when the same individual happens to bring about some change in itself (as when a doctor heals himself), it will not be affected in virtue of having that capacity in virtue of which it brings about the change. In any case of change, both the agent and the patient need to possess relevant capacities for changing and being changed. So, just as the agent possesses the capacity to bring about change in something eke or in itself 'in virtue of being other', so there is also a 'capacity of being affected, in the patient itself, which is a source of being affected either by something or by itself in virtue of being other' (104631 i-is),34 Change requires the interaction of an agent and a patient which possess suitable capacities for action and passion. Not just anything can act on anything else—any substance is only able to act or be acted on in determinate ways:35 It should first be accepted that in nature nothing acts on, or is acted on by, any other thing at random, nor may just anything come from anything else, unless we mean that it does so accidentally, (Phys. T. 5, i88a3i-4)36

Change occurs when substances with complementary capacities for acting and being acted upon come into contact.37 Thus, to be whitened, for instance, a substance must have the capacity to become white and then come into contact with something which has the capacity to change it so that it becomes white—and the explanation of the change will make reference to these capacities. Explanatory triviality is avoided because a substance's capacities, it seems, are determined by its non-dispositional properties:38 A. 12, 1019317-18), the change does not take place in virtue of that identity. The doctor's skill could just as well be exercised oa someone else and the cure could equally be effected by a different doctor. 34 35 36

37 38

Where non-accidental change is concerned.

See Met. 0.1,104835-7 (cited below, p. 28). I take a non-dispositional property to be one whose definition does not require reference to its being such as to produce some effect—this allows that by possessing a non-dispositional property a substance may still be necessarily such as to produce effects in suitable patients.

27

Perception and its Proper Objects

For how could white come from musical, unless musical happened to be an attribute of the not-white or the black? No, white comes from notwhite—and not from any not-white, but from black or some intermediate. Similarly, musical conies to be from non-musical, but not from any thing other than musical, but from unmusical or any intermediate state there may be, (Phys. 1.5,i88a3j-b3)» Not just anything can become white: for a substance to be able to become white it must already be either black or a colour which lies within the range of colours delimited by black and white, In this way, Aristotle avoids making vacuous his claim that in order for a substance to change in a particular way it must have the capacity to change in that way. Of course, if something becomes white, it will not have been white before the change, but not anything which is not white is such as to become white: only substances which are already coloured can become any particular colour.40 The point is generalized a little later on: Everything that comes to be or passes away comes from, or passes into, its contrary or an intermediate state. But the intermediates are derived from the contraries—colours, for instance, from black and white. Everything, therefore, that comes to be by a natural process is either a contrary or a product of contraries, (iS8b2i-6)41 Every change, then, is the product of two complementary capacities. The substance affected must be such as to be changed in that way and there must be an agent which is such as to produce such change. Given these conditions, however, the change occurs necessarily: .»

40

41

Taking transparency to count as a colour for the present purpose.

3235.28 f.

Cp, GC I. 7,

28

Perception and its Proper Objects

As regards non-rational capacities, when the agent and patient meet in the way appropriate to the capacity in question, the one must act and the other be acted on, (Met 0.5, M48a5-7)42

If something hot comes into contact with something cold, the latter cannot avoid being heated (and, presumably, if something which can perceive comes across something perceptible, the former cannot avoid perceiving—at least without somehow blocking the effect of the perceptible object). For perception to occur, then, there must be a suitable agent and a suitable patient; substances which possess, respectively, the capacities to produce perception and to perceive.43 In possessing a perceptual capacity, such as sight or vision, an animal is such as to be affected by a determinate range of objects, and in order to understand the capacity in question, one needs to determine what that range of objects is. By distinguishing the proper objects of each sense from other types of sensible objects, Aristotle is in each case able to isolate that range of objects which are such as to activate the capacity, and by which the capacity, or rather whatever possesses the capacity, is in its nature such as to be affected. The senses 42

In the case of rational capacities, these are exercised when there is a suitable object and when their possessor desires to exercise them. In these circumstances, their exercise is also necessary (ct 1048911 ft). 4J Freeland claims in her (1986) that the capacity to see is not a "power", i.e. a source of change (80), but is rather a capacity for activity (energeia). Now, that perception is a capacity for energeia is indeed of great importance for Aristotle's theory of perception and Freeland is certainly right that Met. 9,6 encourages us to treat such capacities as being distinct from 'powers'. However, the consequences of denying that to possess the perceptual capacity is to possess a power to be affected can be seen from Freeland*s claim that 'in actualising her ability to see, the woman brings it about that a power of her eye to perceive colour is activated* (87 n, u), The trouble with this, of course, is that animals do not bring it about that their sense organs are activated (at least they cannot do so directly). The fact is that the capacity for perception is both a capacity for activity and a power to be affected— something which, when Aristotle attends to it in the course of concentrating on perception in the DA, leads him to extend his understanding of alteration and affection to include cases where a capacity for activity is actualized by an external agent. This is emphasized towards the start of DA II. 5, where Aristotle compares the capacity for perception with that of combustibility: something which is combustible does not set fire to itself kath* huuto but requires something which has the capacity to ignite it (41737-8). Similarly, then, what has the capacity to perceive requires the activity of something else which has the capacity to bring about perception—and something which has the power to produce change will require a patient which has the power to be changed in the relevant way.

Perception and its Proper Objects

29

are naturally related to their proper objects because in possessing a particular sense modality, the organ is such as to be affected by those objects. So, in the case of touch, whose purpose is to enable the animal to act on food, the organ must be such as to be affected by what is dry, moist, hot, and cold and so to have the capacity for touch, the organ of touch must be such as to be affected by these so that perception occurs. Like the other modalities, touch is essentially related to those objects which activate it, and so is to be defined by reference to these. Since the object and the organ must be such as, respectively, to produce change and to be changed, this places constraints on what non-dispositional properties they can have. In specifying, for instance, the proper objects of sight as what has colour, Aristotle is stating the non-dispositional property something has to have if it is to be an agent of change in the eye: it is an object's colour which grounds its capacity to affect the organ. Similarly, the eye must be such as to be affected by colours — and this means that it needs to be transparent. So, in De Sensu 2, Aristotle says that although the eye is made of water, it sees not because it is water but because it is transparent (438312), This is clearly a causal requirement: the transparent is what is such as to be affected by colour (cf. II. 7, transparent Similar constraints are applied to the other organs as well,44 In each case, the natural constitution of the sense organ is determined by its needing to be able to be affected by the relevant object so as to 'become like' it—to 'receive its form'.4i It should be clear from this why the proper sensibles are perceptible kath' hauta, For, given that the sense organs are precisely constituted to be able to be affected by their proper objects, the proper sensibles will bring about perception in virtue of being what they are: they are intrinsically such as to produce the relevant changes in the organs. If the proper sensibles are the agents of perceptual change, this will explain both why they are 'strictly' the objects of perception and why they are perceived kath' hauta. For if the 'primary* senses (i.e. the five senses as opposed to the 'common sense') are such as to be affected by their proper objects, and perception cannot occur without change in the primary sense organs, then it will require the 44 45

For details of this, see Ch. 2, pp. 80-2, Again, I turn to the question of how to understand these notions in the next chapter.

30

Perception and its Proper Objects

agency of the proper sensibles on the sense organs for perception to occur at all. The perception of the accidental and common sensibles will be consequences of this sort of change.4* Moreover, since the five senses are naturally related to their proper objects, those objects will affect the senses in virtue of being what they are: they wiE be kath' hauta sources of change.The senses will be essentially related to their proper objects rather than other perceptible things because they are essentially such as to be affected by their proper objects and not by other things. 3. DEFINING THE SENSES Whilst there is general agreement amongst Aristotelian commentators that Aristotle defines the senses by reference to their proper objects, it has not been generally accepted that that definitional relation is secured upon the fact that the proper sensibles are the kath' hauta agents of perceptual change. There is obviously a temptation for philosophers brought up within a Cartesian tradition to think that an account of perception should centre on perceptual experience—and, at least for this reason, it is instructive to see the difficulties which result from trying to read Aristotle's account of the relation between the senses and their proper objects without paying due attention to the causal relation in which they stand. Hamlyn, in his commentary on the De Anitna, writes that Aristotle means by this [that the proper and common objects are perceived kath' hauta] that the relation between the sense aod its object is an essential one ... That is to say that if we use the sense we must perceive the kind of object in question, since the sense is defined by reference to the kind of object.47

Similarly, Richard Sorabji claims that when Aristotle says that 'the sensible qualities are related to the senses as kath' hauta', he is saying, in other words, that 'one is defined by reference to the other'.48 Both Sorabji and Hamlyn thus accept that the senses are 46

I will deal later with the question of how these are perceived,To forestall immediate worries, however, it is worth noting that whilst it is certainly true that the common sensibles are, like the proper sensibles, perceptible kath' hauta, they are only so perceived by the "common sense*. The individual senses merely perceive them accidentally (cf. DA III. i, 425314-15). See Ch. 4, Sect, 2. 47 w Hamlyn (1968), 105. Sorabji (19798), 76.

Perception and its Proper Objects

31

defined by Aristotle by reference to their objects but seem to take the essential relation between a sense and its objects to be a conceptually or logically necessary one.49 To support his reading, Maralyn even risks a comparison between Aristotle and Berkeley, Commenting on 418311, where Aristotle says that the proper sensibles of one sense cannot be perceived by any other sense, he writes; If a [proper sensible] is essential to a given sense it cannot be perceived by another sense, except incidentally [sc, accidentally]. Here Aristotle states the case badly. He has in mind the sort of thing that, e.g., Berkeley referred to as 'proper objects' of a sense—-objects which are, so to speak, internal to the sense.50

For Berkeley, however, all that is involved in perception is the conscious mind and the sensation present to it—Aristotle's view, as we have seen, is quite different from this. His 'proper objects', unlike Berkeley's, are external and solidly material entities. Whereas Berkeley can claim that without the presence of an idea there can be no perception-—since to have an idea present to the mind just is perceiving—and that perceptions will therefore be identified by reference to these objects which are intrinsically and phenomenologically distinct, it would hardly be plausible for Aristotle to claim that there can be no perceptual experience unless it is experience of coloured (etc.) material objects. The adoption of a Berkeleian account of the status of the proper objects of perception without any commitment to internal, that is mental, objects of perception would seem to lead to problems. Both Hamlyn and Sorabji appeal to Posterior Analytics I. 4, 733341! to support their definitional understanding of the kath' hauto relation: kath' hauto ... if it belongs to it in what it is—e.g. line to triangle and point to line, for their reality depends on these and they belong in the account which says what they are. (73a34"7)51 49 So, Hamiyn talks of the objects being 'internal* to the senses (1968,105) and Sorabji talks of 'logically necessary troth' (19793, 81). Perhaps a Wittgenstinian would be led into talking of the 'grammar' of our talk about perception. 30 Hamlyn (1968), 105. It is this which leads Hamlyn to his claims about what sort of incorrigibility is enjoyed by the perception of the proper sensibles, cited in n. 19, 51

32

Perception and its Proper Objects

On examination, however, this passage provides a very dubious parallel for the relation between a sense and its objects. For what Aristotle is talking about here are things which inhere in the same substaneea The senses and their objects, in contrast, are distinct substances. It would be very odd indeed for Aristotle to claim that the two are related kath' hauta because the one subsists in the other. Fortunately, as we have seen, Aristotle himself elucidates the relation between the senses and their objects in a quite different way. The proper objects of sight are said to be visible kath'hauta because they are able to bring about changes in the eye: 'the visible, then, is colour, i.e., that which lies upon what is kath' hauto visible—kath' hauto visible not by definition but because it has in itself the cause of its own visibility' (418329-31). The proper objects of sight are not just colours but coloured surfaces. In the De Caelo, in a passage cited earlier, Aristotle says that 'everything that is perceptible subsists, as we know, in matter' (278311): the perceived colour will be a property possessed by some material substance. In Metaphysics E. 18, we are told that surfaces are kath' hauta coloured (1022330-1), and in De Sensu 3 that colour is 'at the limit of body, but is not the limit of body; but the same natural substance which is coloured outside must be thought to be so inside too' (439a3i-bi).52 The point Aristotle is making in DA II. 7, then, is that surfaces are kath' hauta visible not in virtue of being surfaces but in virtue of being coloured, since it is colour which is such as to affect what is transparent. Kath' hauto visibility obtains in virtue of something's being a kath' hauto agent of perceptual change.53 52

53 Both Hartmann and Sorabji point to De Sensu 5,444b? ff. to show that Aristotle regards the causal process involved in perception as irrelevant to the definition of the senses: It is not a matter of straightforward empirical fact that we do not see odour or smeSi colour* (Hartmann 1977, 183). This is true-—but not because Aristotle defines the senses by reference to their objects. It is rather because each of the senses is able only to be affected by its proper objects kath' hauta. In the De Sensu passage, Aristotle allows that an animal can be said to smell even if it does not breathe. If this implied that the same quality could be perceived by means of two or more different causal processes, it would indeed cause problems for the account which I. want to offer: but it does not imply this. The change undergone by the organ of smell is the same for both breathing and non-breathing animals. The difference lies only in the mechanisms leading up to that change. For creatures which breathe, 'the breath removes something which is like a lid on the organ proper ... while in creatures which do not breathe, this is always off'

Perception and its Proper Objects

33

By ignoring this causal relation between the senses and their proper objects, Hamlyn and Sorabji have trouble in showing why the proper objects of a sense should form a unified set— and are led to Maine Aristotle for this difficulty. So, whilst Hamlyn, for instance, is happy to allow that 'if one hears one must hear a sound,' he asks whether it is 'necessary that if one sees one must see a colour' and concludes that this would be true 'only ... on some very broad interpretation of "colour" *.54 Alternatively, in the case of touch, both commentators are concerned that the proper objects of this sense are too various to be able to provide an adequate grounding for defining the sense itself. Hamlyn, again, puts the point succinctly: Touch also brings with it problems. Aristotle says that it has many special objects (cf. 422525 f£), e.g. hot, cold, dry, wet, rough, smooth; but the plurality of objects makes it impossible for any one of them to be such that if we feel something by touch it must be that object, and there is nothing they have in common except that they are tangible.55

444b22~4),The point here is not that there is any relevant causal difference between the two cases but rather that the difference is precisely causally irrelevant. This is confirmed by Aristotle's parallel with animals which have eyelids and those which do not. There can be no temptation to claim that the presence or absence of eyelids is an essential feature in the process of seeing. In view of this, it is difficult to agree with Sorabji. (19793, 77) that there are 'considerable differences* in the mechanism employed in the perception of smells between animals and fish. M Hamlyn (1968), 105. Sorabji too is worried that Aristotle's class of kath' hauta visibles is too restrictive: 'In addition to these two (colours and the brightness of things which shine in the dark) one can also see other kinds of brightness. One can see size and shape, motion or rest, texture, depth or the location of things* (19793), 80, However, Sorabji properly saves Aristotle from the objection that he excludes shape and motion by saying that the 'objects of sight like size and shape . . . are not at all like colour', but 'are perceived by perceiving colour'. He continues, 'the idea that one cannot see shape and so forth without perceiving colour, brightness or darkness is put forward as applying at least to any cases that Aristotle was likely to encounter in his zoological enquiries. Whether it is a logically necessary truth is something that the reader may decide for himself (ibid. 80-1). Sorabji remains concerned, however, that, even so, the proper objects of sight are too few: 'Why does he not mention other kinds of brightness? . . . One possible answer is that he includes the brightness of things that shine in the light under the heading of colour and therefore does not need to mention it separately. . . . [I)t is just possible that under the heading of colour Aristotle means to include certain kinds of brightness' (ibid. 81). 55 Hamlyn (1968), 105-6. Sorabji: 'It would be unsatisfactory to rely heavily on the objects of touch in deining the sense. For one thing, the objects of touch are extremely varied' (19793), 85, See also Brentano (1977), 57.

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In making this objection, however, Hamlyn precisely cites the means with which Aristotle will meet it: what gives unity to the proper objects of touch is just that they are tangible, where this is saved from triviality by the fact that to be tangible something needs to be such as to affect the organ of touch.56 The need to show how the proper objects of touch form a unified set does not escape Aristotle, since he raises the question himself in DA II. n: It is a problem whether touch Is a single sense or a group of senses . . . Every sense seems to be concerned with a single pair of contraries, white and black for sight, sharp aod flat for hearing, bitter and sweet for taste; but in the field of what is tangible we find many contraries, hot-cold, dry-moist, hard-soft, etc, (422bi9-2t>,23-7) Aristotle's immediate move is to claim that touch is not the only sense which is sensitive to more than one set of contraries (422b27~32). Although this removes the apparent anomaly of the objects of touch, however, it does not show what the objects of touch have in common. This is done at 423b27ff,, where Aristotle says that what are tangible are 'the distinctive qualities of body as body' (423b27)S7 and that the organ of touch is 'the part which is potentially such as its object is' (423530-1). The organ of touch, in being such as to be affected by one pair of contraries, will be such as to be affected by them all—for it will be affected as a body and by a body as a body, in being properties of body as body, the proper objects of touch are all such as to affect the organ of touch and, in sharing this property, they constitute a unified set.58 In the same way, the eye, in being transparent, is such as to be affected by both colour and those things which shine in the dark—and these, in being such as to affect the eye, constitute a distinct and proper class of things. What leads Hamlyn and Sorabji astray, I think, is an assumption that a theory of perception will begin from some phenomenologi56 Note that for the threat of explanatory triviality to be averted, the change must be characterizable other than as a perceiving something by touch. 57

58 It must be said that Aristotle is sensible, if not perhaps entirely honest, not to list lightness and heaviness amongst the proper objects of touch in the DA—since the perception of these will not readily be explained in terms of the organ's becoming like its object.They are, however, listed in GCII. 2 and Sens. 6 as tangible objects.

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cal starting-point so that the proper objects of any sense will be identified by reference to distinct sensational properties. Thus, Sorabji refers to 'the importance of the kind of experience that is involved in sight,' and claims that 'part of the reason why it is helpful to mention the sense objects in a definition of sight is that reference to the sense objects implies in turn a reference to the kind of experience to which the sense objects give rise.'59 Now, whether phenomenology is a useful foundation for a theory of perception, it is not treated as such by Aristotle. Although he certainly does not ignore the fact that perception involves awareness, he shows no interest in the subjective experience enjoyed in perception in his discussion of the senses and their objects in the DA. What interests him are the conditions which are necessary for perception to occur: what the sense organs must be like if they are to be affected by certain kinds of material object. What unifies the proper objects of any sense is not any phenomenological similarity, but a common causal power. Understanding this helps to deal with a further difficulty which Sorabji raises for Aristotle's defining the senses by reference to their objects—that one might non-accidentally perceive the proper objects of one sense by means of another sense. If this were possible, he points out, the hope of defining each sense in terms of a supposedly unique ability to perceive a certain range of properties would be dashed. To show that this is conceivable, he gives the following example: A case that excited some interest recently was that of Rosa Kuleshova, reported in Time (25 January 1963, p, 58), She allegedly distinguished colours and read ordinary print with her fingertips, without relying on the texture of the paper... May not cases such as this supply counterexamples to the claim that the non-incidental [sc. non-accidental] perception of colour is always an exercise of sight?*0

In this sort of case, we are to imagine someone who distinguishes the proper objects of one sense by means of the organ of another— and here it would seem problematic to determine whether this is a case of, in the example cited, seeing or feeling. Now this is indeed problematic if all that we can judge the question by is what 'we would be inclined to say*61—our intuitions would indeed be pretty 59 61

Sorabji (19793), 84. * Ibid, 82. Ibid, 83 n. 30. Note that Sorabji again makes an appeal to perceptual experi-

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inadequate in a case such as this. As far as our intuitions take us, either answer would seem arbitrary, Aristotle, however, need not be forced to attempt an intuitive response to the puzzle-—for the woman would indeed be seeing if she were being affected by the colour in virtue of its being the colour. Given his theory of alteration, however, this would only be possible if her fingertips contained a transparent organ able to be affected kath' hauto by colour, It would simply not be possible for her to perceive colours by means of the organ of touch, however—and the impossibility here is a causal one, Conceivability is simply irrelevant to the issue. Sight is 'the power to perceive colour' and one has that capacity by possessing an organ which is such as to be affected by objects in virtue of their colours. Each sense is essentially related to its proper objects because it is a distinct capacity—a capacity to change in a particular way when acted on by a determinate kind of external agent. The external agent determines not only that a change will occur but what the nature of that change will be: the organ, in which the capacity resides, changes so as to become like the object, to receive its form. To define the senses—to understand their natures—requires scientific investigation of how one is affected in perception. A class of objects, the proper sensibles, is identified whose members are such as to act on the organs in virtue both of their being what they are and of the organs having the nature they do. Underlying the notion of kath' hauto perceptibility is that of kath' hauto agency. The proper sensibles are the kath' hauta causes of perceptual change. To claim that the proper sensibles are perceptible kath' hauta is not itself to make a definitional claim—it is rather what secures the definitions which the psychologist will proceed to give. 4, ACCIDENTAL AND KATH' HAUTA CAUSES Aristotle's distinction between the proper sensibles, which are perceived kath' hauta by their respective senses, and those perceptual ence here: 'Particularly important would be the question of what kind of experience she had. If the experience were too like that involved in seeing, we should be inclined to say she was seeing. If the experience were too like that involved in, say, feeling warmth, we might be inclined to say she was feeling, but that the perception of colour was merely incidental' (ibid,). It is not clear to me how we should judge whether a distinct kind of experience was more 'like* that of seeing or feeling— fortunately Aristotle's causal criterion would enable him to avoid needing to make such tricky judgements.

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objects which are merely perceived accidentally by any individual sense can now be seen to rest upon the more general distinction between kath' hauto and accidental causation which Aristotle draws in Physics II. 3. Although many things can be said to be causes, only some things are causes kath' hauta—in virtue of being what they are. Other things are merely accidental causes of change. Determining what it is for something to be a kath' hauto cause of change—and what sorts of thing can be causes of change at all— is thus of great importance for understanding Aristotle's account of perception and perceptual change. Matters are complicated here because it can appear difficult to disentangle his theory of causation from its role in providing causal explanation. This has led to the view that Aristotle's notion of a cause is itself an episteniic one. If this were a correct reading of Aristotle, then it would not be obvious that the argument of the previous section would be secure—since what would count as a kath' hauto agent of perceptual change, and hence as a proper sensible, would be determined by what would be most informative to cite as the cause of any perception. The danger would then be that the account of change would not have the independence needed to provide a nonarbitrary means of distinguishing those sensibles which are perceived kath' hauto from those which are not. Aristotle introduces his discussion of efficient causation in Physics II. 3 by placing it within the context of the physicist's explanatory requirements: Now that we have established these distinctions, we must proceed to consider aitia, their character and number. For, since our enquiry is for the sake of knowledge, and we do not think that we know something before we have grasped the why of it (which is to grasp its primary cause), it is clear that we must do this in respect of generation and destruction and all natural change; so that, knowing their principles, we can try to apply them to each of our objects of enquiry. (i94t»i6-23)62

Right from the start of the discussion, then, Aristotle is linking aitia with explanation: to know the aition of something is to grasp the 62

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'why' of it. This, it turns out, can be grasped in four different ways: its form, its matter, what it is for the sake of, and what brings it about. Given this variety, one certainly cannot take aitia to be causes: the bronze is not the cause of the statue, the ratio 2: i is not the cause of an octave, and health is the effect rather than the cause of walking.63 As Julia Annas says, 'these cannot all be causes without absurdity'.64 It is tempting, then, to follow Annas in taking aitia to be not causes but explanations. Whilst this is indeed 'a great improvement*,65 in that it shows what unifies the four types of aition, it needs to be treated with care. For, strictly, explanations are linguistic items rather than such things as sculptors and bits of bronze.66 It is thus better to take aitia to be what are cited in explanations rather than as explanations themselves. If something is an efficient cause of a change, then it can be cited in the explanation of that change. The question which needs to be addressed is what constraints, if any, the explanatory role of aitia places on the relations whose relata can be cited in the explanation of change, It would seem that Aristotle accepts the following biconditional: DVxVy (y is a change and x can be cited in an efficient-causal explanation of y 3 Part of Aristotle's concern in III, 3 is thus to demonstrate that phantasia is definitionally independent, i.e. a capacity which cannot be described in terms of other, more basic, capacities and he does this by showing that it differs from all the other critical capacities, concluding at 428bg that it 'is neither one of these nor compounded out of them'.64 The possibility that it might be identical with either knowledge (episteme) or thought (nous) is quickly dismissed on, the grounds that whilst these latter states always grasp the truth, phantasia can be false (428316-18). The treatment of the relation between phantasia and belief is more sustained and important, and I shall consider it slightly later. What is of most relevance at this stage, M Cf. 428br2-i3 and 26f. Michael Wedin, in his (1988), points out that 428612-13 does not actually say that the objects of the two capacities are the same: Aristotle 'is not even talking about objects of the imagination but only about its occurrence relative to objects of perception' (26). Wedin goes on to argue that, in fact, there are no objects of phantasia and thus denies it the status of a full psychological capacity (ibid. 59!.). He allows that there are objects of memory (mnemaneuta) at Mem. 449b9 and 450324, but since he regards memory as a distinct capacity subserved by phantasia, this is consistent with his argument. However, if, as I shall argue, memory is an exercise of phantasia, then objects of memory will be among the objects of phantasia. Certainly, the objects of phantasia are not the agents of its activity, as the objects of nutrition and the proper objects of perception are of their activities, but the common sensibles are not agents either, 82 This is discussed in Ch. i, Sect. 3, 63

(26434-6). Since, for Plato,aisthesls does not have prepositional content, it seems better to translate it here as 'sensation' rather than as 'perception*. 64

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however, is his contrast between phantasia and perception. He distinguishes the two as follows: That phantasia is not perception is clear from the following consideratioos: perception is either a capacity or ao activity, e.g. sight or seeing; phantasia takes place in the absence of both, as e.g. in dreams. Again, perception is always present, phantasia not. If they were the same in activity, phantasia would be found in all the brutes: this is held not to be the case; e.g. it is not found in ants or bees or grubs,65 Again, perceptions are always true; phantasiai are for the most part false. And so we do not, when we exercise [our senses] precisely with regard to the sense-object, say that this seems (phainetai) to be a man—but rather when we do not perceive distinctly.*6 And, as we were saying before, visions appear to us even when our eyes are shut, (428a5~-i6)67

This is a crucial passage for understanding the nature of phantasia and indeed establishes its non-identity with perception. Most importantly, the activity of perception is not that of phantasia since there are times when things appear to a subject and it would not be true to say that he is perceiving—as when he is asleep. The capacity for perception is not the same as that for phantasia because there are some animals which, whilst possessing the former, do not have phantasia. Once Aristotle has succeeded in establishing the negative point that phantasia is not the same as, or a combination of, other psychological capacities, he can then move to provide a positive account of it: But since when one thing has been changed, something else may be changed by it, phantasia is held to be a type of change and to be impossible without perception but only to occur in beings that are percipient and to be of what perception is of also. The change may be brought about by the perceptual activity and this change must be similar to the perception. 65

I have retained Ross's text here—but see n. 86 below. * Excising 6?

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This change would not occur without perception or to those who do not, perceive and its possessor may in virtue of it act and he acted upon in many ways and it is true and false,

(428bn-i7)w Aristotle here distinguishes a set of changes to what is in effect the aisthetikon. Although they are changes which involve the perceptual system, they are not themselves perceptions but are rather the result of perceptions. Having distinguished these changes, Aristotle can then identify them with phantasiai and so achieve what the account requires. In keeping with the method set out in An. Post. II, 2, phantasia is shown to be definable by reference to its cause— thus establishing its definitional independence of the other activities of the psuche—whilst allowing sense to be made of the later identification of the aisthetikon and the phantastikon.69 This, of course, shows the need for the causal component of the definition of perception, since what distinguishes phantasiai from perceptions is precisely the different causal histories of the two activities with their underlying physiological changes. Perceptions are brought about by the proper sen.sibl.es and in their turn are the causes of phantasiai. Aristotle's definition of phantasia can thus be found at 4281130; 'If then phantasia presents no other features than have been stated and is what we have described, then phantasia must be a change resulting from the activity of perception.' 68

69 In his (1988), Wedin argues that 'the phantastikon and the aisthetikon are distinguished only in the functional specifications for phantasia and aisthesis' and, combining this with Aristotle's daim that phantasia is the movement that comes about because of actual perception, postdates that Aristotle's point might be that occurrences of phantasia 'come about by way of subserving exercises of perception' (52). This fits in with Wedin 's daim that phantasia is not itself a capacity but rather serves to provide psychic capacities with mental images. If, against this, we do take the work of phantasia to be not the presentation of images in perception but rather nonperceptual sensory activities (such as dreaming, hallucinating, and imagining) this allows us to provide a proper distinction between the activities of perception and phantasia (and hence between the aisthetikon and the phantastikon) without having to make phantasia play a role in perception, (For the difficulties in doing that, see n. 86 below.) It also explains why, as Wedin points out, Aristotle should seem hesitant as to whether or not phantasia is a genuine capacity of the psuche: for whilst it is indeed functionally distinct from perception, it does not have objects in the way that perception does.

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Before considering Aristotle's account in more detail, it is worth contrasting this causal understanding of phantasia with that offered by Malcolm Schofield in his essay, 'Aristotle on the imagination*. On Schofield's account, Aristotle is engaged in a rather different kind of psychological enterprise than he is if we take the core of his treatment to be the causal analysis offered at 428buff, For Schofield, the causal placing of phantasia is subsidiary to the linguistic and behavioural analysis offered in the first part of III. 3: For in attempting to say what makes [phantasia] different from sense perception or belief Aristotle steers clear of two opposite but equally fruitless modes of differentiation, with which he was none the less familiar. He does not make the distinction between [phantasia] and perception in physical or physiological terms; he employs these in his causal analysis, at 428bioff., but only after he has sought to clarify in quite different terms what the two phenomena are that he wants to relate in causal connexion. N o r . . , does [he] adopt the procedure associated with Hurne, of reflecting on the presence of sensory features in imagining, and then attempting to give an account, based on introspection, of the difference in sensory quality between imagining and perception... Instead he opts firmly for behavioural criteria. Thus at 42jb 16-24 he asks: is believing a voluntary activity like imagining? Are the emotional consequences of imagining the same as belief? And he divines that linguistic behaviour is of fundamental importance.70 The difference between Schofield's construal of the argument of DA III. 3 and mine is thus not only of interest for phantasia itself but also for how one understands the nature of Aristotle's general psychological method. On Schofield's account, Aristotle is concerned to provide a general characterization of a variety of psychological activities which cannot be accounted for in terms of perception. His rendering of Aristotle's argument in behaviourist terms is misguided, however. For one thing, even if Aristotle does not give introspection the fundamental position accorded to it by Hume, he certainly adduces facts about one's mental life which the subject will know by introspection—that phantasia is in our power whereas belief is not, for instance, or that belief has an effect on our emotions which phantasia need not—and there is no sign that he requires such facts 70

Schofield (1979), 123; I have changed Schofield's 'imagination* to 'phantasia'.

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to be cashed out by reference to behaviour. Certainly, perception, phantasia, and belief will have effects on behaviour, as well as on other mental states, and these effects will differ between them, but to maintain this is very far from 'opting for behavioural criteria' for their analysis. Secondly, it is far from obvious that, in what precedes the causal account, Aristotle is in fact offering any sort of analysis—behavioural, mental, or otherwise—of phantasia at all, Aristotle's concern here is to show that phantasia is a distinct capacity and not to be identified with any other capacities, either individually or in combination. In order to do this, he cites a great many facts about phantasia and other mental states and claims that these are inconsistent with taking phantasia to be anything other than a distinct capacity, Schofield is thus misleading when hs says that Aristotle asks whether 'believing is a voluntary activity like imagining' or 'the emotional consequences of imagining are the same as those of belief,1 Certainly Aristotle tells us that belief and phantasia differ in these respects but his motivation here is only to show that the two things are thereby distinct. There is not systematic investigation of phantasia at this point. At the most, what we are given in the passages leading up to the causal claims at 428!)ioft is a series of phainomena about phantasia, Schofield indeed acknowledges this, allowing that the text 'provides a particularly clear and arresting testimony' to Aristotle's 'enthusiasm for philosophising on the basis of the endoxa",11 The moral which he wishes to draw from this for reading the text rests, I think, on a mistaken view of how Aristotle's method works. Citing the phainomena, or the endoxa, and resolving any problems they pose, is a preparation to scientific explanation, not its substance. Exploration of what we say about a psychological capacity needs to be underwritten by scientific investigation of its workings.72 Aristotle is certainly epistemologically respectful of our concepts and beliefs but, as a psychological realist, he does not think that the nature of mental capacities and states is determined by our concepts of them. The phainomena and endoxa are a useful and important guide to the truth: they do not constitute it. Concerned as he is in III. 3 to show that phantasia is indeed a 71 72

ibid.

i.e. the provision of the 'para-mechanical' explanations which Ryle so despised—see his (1949), 213. On this, see Fodor (1968), 16!

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unitary capacity, Aristotle would not have rested content with showing merely that, as Sehofield would have it, phantasia 'is a loose-knit, family concept",73 Fortunately, he had no need to be content with such a claim. The causal analysis at 428bio£ provides the necessary unifying criterion; what phantasiai have in common is that they are changes brought about by perceptions and sharing their content. In any case, it is surely too hopeful to regard what precedes the causal definition in DA III. 3 as providing 'a particularly clear and arresting testimony' to Aristotle's 'enthusiasm for philosophising on the basis of the endoxa', Aristotle certainly cites facts about the workings of phantasia but he does not do this in the systematic way which he employs, for instance, in the discussion of akrasia in EN VII.14 Aristotle does not appeal to common beliefs, or earlier theories, to cast light on the capacity or to raise difficulties which must be solved. Rather he cites facts about its operation—facts which will generally be known on the basis of one's knowledge of one's own psychological activity—and these are cited just to demonstrate that it is not identical with any other capacity. There is no attempt at a positive account until we reach the causal claims at 428bio. Moreover, not only is a causal understanding of phantasia what we should expect given Aristotle's general psychological method, it also fills an important gap left open by his discussion of perception. For, as we have seen, he does not begin that discussion by considering perceptual experience, but instead identifies perception by reference to its causes, the proper sensibles. Perception occurs 73 74

Schofield (1979), no.

Note that even there, Aristotle leans finally towards a physical rather than a dialectical explanation of akrasia. Certainly he sets out the endoxa and sorts out the problems these occasion, but his account does not float free of physiology and causation. Thus, he compares akrasia to other states in which one has knowledge but does not use it—-sleep, madness, and drunkenness: "But now this is just how men are when in the affections; for feelings of anger and sexual desires and other such affections clearly alter the body, and some even produce fits of madness. It is plain, then, that akratic people must be said to be in a similar condition to these,* (dAld /ftjv omta dwa&favtcu oiye ev toif x&Beatv Svref ffvftol yog Ktu Imffv/tfai atpgoAiaituv xal tvia T&V rotofaatv emdiJMac; xal m ato/ia ttsOunaatv, cviotf 6e aalfiavuzf xoiovmv. SfjAov ovv OT< /touag ixetv hetaicrv rovg axga-efif fot'rotf • 1147814—18), What is common to all these states is that the person is affected in such a way that his knowledge is no longer operative—and in all there is a physiological cause for this. The final part of the discussion is indeed taken up with a causal explanation of what happens in akrasia—an explanation which is x is an accidental cause of s's perceiving some proper sensible). What is not clear is whether Aristotle would strengthen this into a biconditional, so that something's being an accidental cause of a perception is not merely necessary but also sufficient for its being accidentally perceived. The discussion in II. 6 suggests that he might well accept this stronger claim, since the only reason which Aristotle gives there for the accidental perception of Diares' son is that he forms an accidental unity with the perceived white thing. If some additional condition had to be met—such as, for instance, that the subject should recognize Diares* son—then the discussion here would be misleading at best.3 It has, however, seemed counter-intuitive to some commentators 1

2

4, 3

For the distinction between kath' hauta and accidental causes, see Ch. i, Sect.

Note that Aristotle does not say that Diares' son is accidentally perceptible because he forms an accidental unity with a proper sensible but that he is accidentally perceived because of this.

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that Aristotle should allow that for an accidental sensible to be perceived it is sufficient merely that it should form an accidental unity with some perceived proper sensible. Thus Stanford Cashdollar claims that accidental perception always involves the recognition of an accidental sensible.4 If this is correct, then perceptual statements will not be extensional, since it will not be sufficient for the recognition that a proper sensible stands in an accidental unity with something that it in fact does so. We should have to look to other facts about the perceiver to determine why any perception has the accidental objects it does.This is accepted by Modrak, for instance, who asserts that 'the perception of an [accidental] object arises spontaneously in the percipient whose past and present experiences are conducive to the apprehension of the [accidental] object in question'.5 Whilst Modrak seems merely to assume that for a subject to perceive an object he must recognize it as such, Cashdollar acknowledges the possibility of allowing that such recognition is not necessary for accidental perception but dismisses it both on textual grounds and because it would, he thinks, trivialize the account of accidental perception; The exemplary cases, however, make it apparent that awareness 'that x is y (rightly or wrongly) is always involved in accidental perception.6 Moreover that view {that such awareness is not required] would have made accidental perception trivial. Every white thing happens to be some particular 'this' or other, so that it is the case that every proper sensation is of something accidentally.7

Cashdollar's reliance on what he calls the 'exemplary cases' in the DA (i.e. II. 6, 4i8a8ff.; III. i, 425314ft; III. 3, 428bi8ff.) is somewhat optimistic, as he provides no detailed argument for his claim that they 'make it apparent' that accidental perception always involves recognition of what is accidentally perceived. In fact, neither II. 6 nor III. i provides any support at all for this claim. As we have just seen, the only reason cited at 41838 ft for taking Diares' son to be accidentally perceived is that he is accidentally 4

Cashdollar (1973). 'Recognition' here does not imply successful recognition. Modrak (1987), 70. 6 Cashdollar traiislates as 'incidental* rather than 'accidental'. To make this conflict between his terminology and mine less confusing, I have taken the liberty of changing his. 7 Cashdollar (1973), 157-8. 5

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the same thing as the white object which Is the proper sensible, Since Aristotle apparently sees no need to give any further reason, the passage, if anything, counts against Cashdollars' thesis. 425314 ff., which comes as part of Aristotle's argument in III. i that there cannot be a sense dedicated to the common sensibles, is no more help to him, but simply repeats the point that the accidental sensibles are not perceived in virtue of being what they are but because they are accidents of proper sensibles.8 If these exemplary cases do not exemplify what Cashdollar wants, his third case seems at first sight to give him exactly what he needs: Perception of the proper sensibles is never in error—or admits the least possible amount of falsehood. Secondly there is perception that what is accidental to the objects of perception is accidental to them: in this case certainly it is possible to be deceived; for the perception that there is something white cannot be false, bat it can be wrong about whether the white object is this or something else. (428bi8-22)*

Here Aristotle is concerned with perceptual error and seems to talk in just the terms which Cashdollar requires of him. When the subject perceives that the white object is, say, Diares' son, his perception can be false. For error to occur, there must be a perceptual state with false representational content and this will indeed, within Aristotle's scheme, require the perception to represent the proper sensible as being accidentally identical with something when it is not. The trouble for Cashdollar is that Aristotle is not talking here simply of the subject's perceiving some accidental sensible: the perceptual verbs employed are not those which take objects but those which are followed by that-clauses. All the passage shows is that Aristotle accepts that one can have perceptions which represent accidental sensibles. He can certainly allow this whilst still denying 8 'If it were not like this our perception of the common sensibles would always be accidental, i.e. as is the perception of Qeon's son, where we perceive him not because (on) he is Qeon's son but because he is white, and the white thing happens to be Qeon's son'

425024-7). 9

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that for a subject to perceive an accidental sensible, he must have a perception in which that sensible is represented. Indeed, that he does deny this is shown by the explanation of error at Ins. 458b3i—3, where Aristotle says that 'to see or hear incorrectly can only happen to one who sees or hears something real, although not what he supposes'.10 Here, the subject does not perceive what he takes himself to perceive. What he does actually perceive he does not recognize—and so recognition cannot be a condition for it to be true that someone perceives an accidental sensible. To allow that being an accidental cause of a perception is sufficient for something to be accidentally perceived is not, as Cashdollar claims, to trivialize accidental perception. Even if it turns out that it will always be true that if a subject perceives at all he will perceive some accidental sensible, this will not diminish the need for an account of how a perceiver can come to recognize accidental sensibles—that is, to be able to have perceptions of accidental sensibles as what they are. Indeed, it is not clear what it would be for accidental perception itself to be trivial: certainly the claim that one accidentally perceives the accidents of a perceived proper sensible is not a trivial one. Nor, in fact, is it an implausible one. It is quite natural, for instance, to declare uncertainty concerning the objects of one's perceptions—it would not be odd, for instance, to say to someone 'You saw me yesterday but you didn't recognize me', whereas it would be odd to say 'You saw that I was there yesterday but you didn't recognize me.' The first would be true simply because of a causal link between the perception and its object whereas the second would not.11 What is important is to maintain the distinction between two rather different enterprises. The first is that of specifying the truthconditions of such statements as 's perceives a* when a can stand for a sensible object of any type. It is not at all trivial to be told that recognition of x is not required for it to be true that x is perceived by s. The second enterprise is that of explaining how it is that we do recognize the objects of perception and form judge10

' Many further examples of cases where we would not naturally take the truth of'S perceives a' or'S perceives an P to require 5 to perceive the object as a or as an F can be found in Ch. i of Dretske (1969), which defends the notion of what he calls 'non-epistetnic' perception.

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meats about them. If these two projects are confused, then claims made in the course of the first might well seem unsatisfying when taken in the context of the second. As long as it is seen that one can maintain the extensionality of non-intentional perceptual statements (i.e. those of the form 's perceives *') without thereby being committed to treating the prepositional contents of perceptual statements as being extensional, the extensionality of the first need seem neither worrying nor indeed counter-intuitive. If we do accept that Aristotle would maintain the biconditional, Vx Vs (x is perceived accidentally by s < ? ) & Up)' entails

111 Note that this would be satisfied by a world in which there was merely one person whose psychology was quite undetermined by his material condition, 112 For this line of attack, see Miller (1990). Miller includes relational and dispositional properties among physical properties, which makes his claim that no two physical substances are physically indiscernible more plausible, if perhaps more vulnerable.

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individual sense organs must possess in order to enjoy their defining capacities. Is it true, then, that Aristotle does accept that perceptual properties supervene on material alterations? In fact, Phys. VII. 3 by itself does not support such supervenience. The formula which Aristotle employs there to express the relation between the changes which might wrongly be thought to be alterations and those changes which are genuine alterations is just that whenever one of the former occurs, there will have been some alteration (or, perhaps, set of alterations) which necessitated it. There is no sign there of the generality of material determination which the supervenience theorist is trying to capture, and certainly no commitment to the claim that two substances which are materially indiscernible will be indiscernible with respect to the properties which are determined in each by its material properties. To find evidence for this sort of indiscernibility, one has to bring in the discussion of anger and fear in DA I. i, since there we do find the claim that whenever one is in a certain material condition this will determine a particular psychological affection. If we do take that discussion to be exemplary of the general relation between psychic affections and material alterations, then there is after all reason to accept the supervenience of perceptual properties on material properties. The problem, of course, is that DA 1. 1 provides evidence not merely for the claim that two substances which are materially indiscernible must be psychologically indiscernible but that those which have the same psychological properties must have the same material properties.113 Thus, we get not merely the claim that but the biconditional Now, this is not inconsistent with the supervenience claim, since it follows from

113 Remember lhat each range of psychological properties will be related to a restricted range of material properties.

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that It is also consistent with this that and hence What this demonstrates is that supervenienee is, at least as I have so far formulated it, a less interesting relation than it might have seemed. What the physical ist requires is an argument to show that perceptual states and events are in some way dependent on material states and events. Showing that perceptual events supervene on material events is not sufficient for this, however, since, whilst dependency (in some respect) must be asymmetric, supervenience need not be. Of course, one could, define the supervenience relation so as to stipulate that if -properties supervene on W-properties, then ^-properties do not supervene on ^-properties, but this will not help the attribution to Aristotle of the claim that perceptual properties supervene on the material properties of the aisthetikon, unless one can exclude his acceptance of (i) and (4)-ns Now, our texts do not, I think, determine an answer to whether Aristotle does accept these propositions—and there are reasons both for and against attributing them to him. The fact that he allows for the possibility of physical definitions of psychic affections does suggest quite strongly that he would accept them: it is difficult to see how one can make reference to a type of material change—an alteration—in a satisfactory definition of an affection if not all instances of that affection have the same type of alteration as their material base. On the other hand, the plausibility of accepting that tokens of some particular types of perceptual state are always correlated with tokens of some material state diminishes quickly when one starts to distinguish perceptual states by reference to their content. The visual aisthemata which are produced by Diares' son 1M Given that sleep is an affection of the aisthetikon, and hence a perceptual state, (3) is in fact plausibly an Aristotelian claim, even when ^-properties include perceptual properties, (If sleep were not a perceptual state, then there would be at least one material state of the organ which would not correlate with a perceptual state.) 115 Such a restriction is suggested, for instance, in Heil (1992), 99-100.

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affecting the eye will differ depending upon whether one sees him in the morning sunlight or at dusk, or from above or below, but in each case one can perceive that Diares' son is in front of one. It is difficult to know whether Aristotle would regard this as a problem for his account of the relation between the perceptual and the material, or whether he would readily accept that tokens of the same perceptual state can have different material bases, Unfortunately, this is not a question which he addresses explicitly and we cannot answer It for him without undue incaution. Even if this is unsatisfying, it does not, I think, leave his account of the relation between the body's material alterations and the affections of the psuche simply obscure. The problem for taking supervenience to be the crucial relation between perceptual and material events was that, as formulated, it did not manage to capture the fact that the former are determined by the latter.116 This can be true whether perceptual events and material events are mutually supervening or supervene only in one direction. Here it is helpful to return to what we find in Phys. VII. 3: that for any generation or acquisition of a hexis there will have been an alteration which necessitates it. Generalizing this, as the discussion of the psychic affections in DA I. i licenses us to, we can say that whenever there is a psychological change, this will have been necessitated by some material alteration (or set of alterations). What this gives us—and indeed what is required—is a relation which is analogous to causal necessitation, i.e. one in which the relata are individuals and one is necessitated by the other. That Aristotle does think of the relation as one which holds between individuals is shown by the end of Phys. II. 3, where he says that 'genera are causes of genera and particulars of particulars' (I95b25-6).m Employing this notion of material necessitation allows us to escape from the problems which beset the account of supervenience. By taking the relation in question to be one of a certain 116 Commentators differ in whether they regard this as a problem for supervenience or for the standard formulations of supervenience: for the first response, see Charles (1402), 278-9; for the second, see Heil (1002). 100-2, 117 Although the example he uses for this is the difference between sculptors as the cause of statues and this sculptor as the cause of this statue, there is no sign that this claim is restricted to the ease of efficient causation: rather, it comes as part of a discussion in which Aristotle has been discussing aitia generally.

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type of necessitation which holds between particulars, we do not have to define it in terms simply of modality, implication, and conjunction. Moreover, whilst it is consistent with taking it to be a relation between particulars that one should not be able to generalize about the kinds of properties which stand in that relation, obviously it is not a consequence of this. If this set of material alterations to a substance with these particular material properties necessitates the occurrence of this perception with that content, then it would be at best odd if an exactly similar set of alterations to another substance with an exactly similar material constitution necessitated a perception with a different content.118 We know from DA 1.1 that Aristotle does think that bodily conditions of the same kind will determine the same psychological affection—so the question of whether he will accept biconditional claims linking particular types of psychological affection with particular types of material alteration need amount to no more than the (possibly empirical) question of whether there is more than one type of material alteration which will necessitate that psychological affection. This need not be something on which Aristotle commits himself in advance of thorough physiological investigation. What is important is just that whenever there is a formal change, there will be a material change (or material changes) which determines it. 6. THE EXPLANATION OF PERCEPTION Aristotle does not neglect the requirement that he should show why the form of a bodily organ should determine a particular sort of material constitution. We can see this, for instance, in the De Sensu, when he explains why the eye is composed of water: Whilst it is true that the organ of sight is made of water, it is not the case, however, that seeing comes about in virtue of its being water but rather in virtue of its being transparent—something which is common to air as well. But water is more easily confined and condensed than air and it is because of this that the kore, that is the eye, is made of water. (Sens, 2,438ai2-i6)"9 118 Although, if the content were in part constitutively determined by the causal history of the perception, then this could happen—but in that case there would be an explanation for the difference in content. 119

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We know from DA II, 6 that the essence of each sense is relative to its (proper) objects. The proper objects of sight are colours (and shiny things) because these are the kath' hauta causes of sight. Colours are such as to affect what is transparent and so, if the organ of sight is to be affected by colours, it must be transparent and so have as its matter either air or water. Since water is the more easily condensed and confined, and thus more suitable for its position in the eye, the organ of sight is made of water. The form of the organ determines its matter. Unless it is composed of a transparent stuff—of which water is the most suitable-—it would not be aflectable by colour, and so would not be able to take on the forms of the objects of its capacity,120 If the perceiving and the material alteration were merely accidentally related, however, there would be no reason why the kore should be made of something transparent. It must be transparent so that it can be altered by coloured objects, but this will only be necessary for it to have the capacity for sight if such alteration plays a role in seeing. If such alteration is a necessary member of a set of alterations which determines the occurrence of a perceiving, then the explanation of the organ's constitution is a satisfying one. The kore needs to be transparent because colours are such as to bring about change in what is transparent. This change is a change which, in respect of the kore, is a material change. Because the transparent stuff in question is part of a suitable complex physiological system, the colour is able not only to produce this material change but also to bring about the activity of vision. That second change is a psychological and hence formal change. The organ has the constitution it does because if it were not capable of undergoing the material change, it would not be such as to undergo the formal change—the change which, according to DA II. 5, is the change to actuality and nature. The realization of the form, the first actuality, requires the existence of a particular material structure, and the actualization of the capacity which constitutes the form, the second actuality, requires that structure to undergo material change.

120

Again, the organ of hearing must consist of confined air because air which can dissipate is not affected by sound. It must contain air because what produces sounds is such as to affect air, and the air must be confined if it is not to dissipate and become soundless (cf. DA II. 8,42002-14).

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We can now also make good sense of the claim that perception is an affection which is common to the psuche and the body. This was initially puzzling because it seemed to require one to make sense both of the body and the psuche being affected—and, unlike the body, the psuche is not the sort of thing to change or be affected. This apparent difficulty is resolved by appealing to the distinction between a substance's formal nature and its material nature: an affection of the psuche will be an affection which the living substance undergoes in virtue of having the form, the psuche, it does. To have that psuche is just to be a material body so constituted as to possess its denning capacity. The claim that perception is a joint affection is the claim that the aisthetikon cannot merely exercise its capacity for perception, but must also undergo material alteration—alteration of which it is capable in virtue of its material nature. When someone perceives—which is an affection of the psuche (although an 'affection' in the sense of an alteration2, that is a change from the mere possession of a capacity to its exercise)121—there must be a material affection of the aisthetikon such that the occurrence of the latter necessitates the perceiving. That the material alterations of the aisthetikon determine its perceptual changes allows a proper role for the material explanation of those changes. Just as explanation in terms of the efficient cause of a change is explanation which shows what necessitates that change, so is material explanation. Where the change in question is not a genuine alteration, the agency of the kath' hauto efficient cause will be mediated by the material changes which determine that change. The proper sensibles, for instance, are the kath' hauta efficient causes of perception, but no proper sensible will produce perception unless there is a material alteration in the organ which is brought about by the property which is kath' hauto perceptible. Thus, the changes which something brings about in virtue of being visible and those which it brings about in virtue of being coloured are distinct,122 Even so, objects are visible in virtue of being coloured, which is why colours are the kath' hauta objects of vision: they are visible in virtue of being what they are. Importantly, Aristotle's account of the relation between percepi2j por jjje Distinction between alteration] and alteration^, see Ch. 2, Sect. 5. 122 For the point that what It is to be visible is distinct from what it is to be coloured, see Ch. 3, Sect. 2.

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tual and material changes also allows him to explain perceptual occurrences which cannot be explained Ideologically in terms of the proper functioning of the perceptual system. Thus, in Ins, 2, Aristotle explains that it can appear to someone on a boat that (he land is moving because the sense organ is affected in the same way as it would be were the subject still and the land moving. Again, when asleep, subjects can mistakenly take themselves to be perceiving because of the coherence of their dreams: 'when in sanguineous animals the blood is calm and separated, the change from the aisthemata in each of the sense organs is preserved and makes the dreams coherent' (461325-7).m The nature of the dream depends upon the material properties of the phantasmata—if these preserve the properties of the aisthemata, then the dream will be coherent, whilst if they have been altered by turbulence in the blood, the dreams will be disordered. Thus, differences in the subject's psychological activities are to be explained by reference to differences in the material changes undergone by the phantastikon. In this case, the material explanation is not merely a part of the account of the psychic affection, but all the explanation which there is to be given. Elsewhere, Aristotle cites the effects of deviant material constitutions on psychological activity. So, towards the end of the Mem. we find an explanation of why some people should have difficulty in remembering things: Those whose upper parts are abnormally large, as is the case with dwarves, have abnormally weak memories, as compared with their opposites, because of the great weight they have resting on the aisthetikon, so that neither from the start are the movements able to persist but are rather dispersed, nor in recollection are they able easily to take a straight course. (Mem, 2,453ap-b4)124 In memory, as in the other non-perceptual activities of phantasia, the subject must be aware of phantasmata, and so it requires that the aisthemata should persist in the perceptual system.125 When the 123 124

125

See Ch. 4, Sect. 4.

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head and neck bear down upon the aisthetikon, however, this is blocked and so the subject is less able either to retain or to make use of the imprints of the aisthemata.m Similarly, in the Ins., Aristotle explains the inability of some people to dream as the result of their having a natural constitution which is such that 'copious exhalation is borne upwards, which, when borne back downwards, causes a large quantity of motion' (Ins. 3, 462b5-8),127 The fact that abnormalities such as these are sufficient to block or impair the ability to dream or to remember shows again that having a perceptual system which is physiologically normal is necessary for the operation of the various capacities of that system. What secures this is the need for the system to be able to be materially affected in a way which determines its proper functioning. It is the ability to provide material explanations which allows Aristotle to discharge the obligation on him as a student of natural substances to show how the form determines the matter of the living body in question. For that an organ always has a particular kind of material constitution is not sufficient to show that its form determines that constitution. Of course, that that form is always found in that matter (at least within a particular species of animal) is a sign that the form requires that matter if it is to be realized— and Aristotle's general doctrine as to the necessitation of a composite's matter by its form shows, if true, that this would in fact be a sure sign. It is one thing to know, simply in virtue of accepting a general thesis, that an organ's form determines its matter, and quite another to show why that form determines that material constitution. If, however, the various activities of perception and phantasm require particular types of material change to determine them, then this will show why the various organs need to have their material constitutions. Only an organ which is capable of being changed in the relevant material way will be capable of the activity which defines it. These considerations provide compelling reason to resist the spiritualist's account of Aristotle, according to which the only change which a proper object of perception will bring about in its corresponding organ is the perceptual awareness of it. For one 126 127

* See also Mem. i, 450332-^11,

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thing, the spiritualist will need to give some account of how perception can be a joint affection of the psuche and the body, and this will be at best difficult if he allows the occurrence only of a formal psychological change. Secondly, if there are no material changes involved in perception, then it is left mysterious why the particular perceptual capacities should require the material bases they do.128 Further, if one denies that there are material changes which are sufficient for psychological changes, then some account will have to be given of the relevance of material explanation in the discussion of memory, sleep, and dreams. In contrast, if we accept not only that the perceptual organs undergo material changes when their formal capacities are actualized, but also that those material changes are both necessary and sufficient for the activity of the psychic capacity, then each of these problems has, as we have seen, a ready solution. Thus, whilst Aristotle is neither a materialist nor an ontological physicaltst, he does, at least in the case of perception, accept explanatory physicalism—the claim that all perceptual events can be explained by reference to material alterations which determine 128 So, Burnyeat allows (1992,22) that 'from the fact that [sc, the proper sensibies act on their corresponding faculties to bring about an awareness of themselves] we can derive certain conclusions about the kind of physical organs we must have (in two senses of "must"): the eye must be made of something transparent, the organ of touch must have an intermediate temperature and hardness'. But, he claims, 'these are merely necessary conditions for perception to take place, TTiey are not part of a more elaborate story which would work up in material terms to a set of sufficient conditions for the perception of colours and temperature. In Aristotle's view there is no such story to be told (DA 1. i).' What is missing here is any suggestion as to why, if there is no material change to the organ in perception, there should be any necessary material conditions for possessing a capacity to perceive, or how the conclusion about the organ's material constitution is to be derived from its ability to be affected by the proper sensibies. Also puzzling is his citing DA 1.1 to support the claim that there are no material sufficient conditions for perception, since it is in that chapter that Aristotle presents the argument just considered for the claim that the bodily condition can determine the affections of the psuche. It has been suggested to me that the spiritualist might attempt to evade the consequence of this in the case of perception by noting that Aristotle opens by asking at 403910—11 whether any of the erga or pathemata of the psuche are specific to it and that in 403316-25 he mentions only emotions. It would be possible, then, to take 'pathe' in 403325 to refer to emotions rather than affections generally, so restricting the claim that these are logoi enhuloi in such a way that it does not include perception. If we accepted this, however, then it would leave Aristotle without any proper response to the question of whether there are any affections which are specific to the psuche. 403216-25 would then contain some interesting claims about the emotions but would not bear directly on the general questions as to the relation between the psuche and the body which surrounds it.

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those events. To provide such explanations, however, will form merely a part of psychological science. Physicists and psychologists such as his predecessors whose concern was only to chart material alterations could not acquire a proper understanding of their subject-matter, since, by ignoring form and formal changes, they could neither provide correct descriptions of what they were studying nor show why there are substances with the material constitutions there are. Aristotle's ambition to provide a unified psychology, containing all the necessary modes of explanation, requires the supplementation of material explanation by the other modes, but not its abandonment. He is able to take seriously both the fact that living things are necessarily enmattered and that neither they nor their behaviour is fully comprehensible in merely material terms. Aristotle is not impelled by his dissatisfaction with the material explanations of his predecessors into positing a merely contingent link between the psychological and the material. As we have seen, he complains that Plato did just that. By allowing that at least perceptual events are determined by material alterations to the sense organs, he is able to do what none of his predecessors were able to—and that is to show why organs which possess the capacities they do need to have the material constitutions they do. If there are at least a limited set of material alterations which are such as to determine some psychological change, then if an organ is to be capable of undergoing that change, it must have a material constitution which is capable of being altered in a way which will determine the formal change. Aristotle's physiology and his substantive physics are, of course, no longer credible. This does not infect his psychological theory, however, which, far from being incredible, provides, at least in its explanatory structure, a powerful model for the study of mental events. In its proper resistance to the reduction or elimination of psychological descriptions together with an equally proper desire to show how the material explanation of psychic events can be integrated into the science of the psuche, it manifests a better sense of what is required of that science, and its contemporary successors, than many who are still engaged in it.

GLOSSARY The large number of transliterated terms in the text may well give rise to confusion. In order to minimize this, I have given a brief account of the significance of some of the more frequently used terms. Note that these accounts are not intended to be uncontroversial: they characterize how these are understood in the book and not how they are generally understood by Aristotle's critics. At the end of each entry, I refer to the principal discussion of the term in the book where some defence of the account is offered. aisthema (plural aisthemata) An aisthema is the affection produced by the agency of a proper sensible on its respective sense organ. An aisthema will be describable both materially (it is an affection of some material base) and representationally. See Chapter 5, Section 2. aisthetikon The term means literally 'that which has the capacity to perceive'. Aristotle uses it to pick out the whole material system which has the individual sense organs and the controlling organ, the heart, as its parts (together with the connecting blood vessels). See Chapter 4, Section i. aition (plural aitia) An aition is something which is cited in the explanation of a change. Aristotle distinguishes four types of aition. See Chapter i, Section 4. empeiria (plural empeiriai) An empeiria is an acquired perceptual concept—that is, a concept which is exercised in perception (and phantasia). It is in virtue of the acquisition of an empeiria that the subject gains the recognitional capacity for an accidental object of perception. Thus, one will not be able to perceive that something is a cigarette unless one has acquired the empeiria of a cigarette. Simply in virtue of possessing that empeiria, however, one will not be able to provide a definition of a cigarette, but only (generally) to recognize one when one sees one. See Chapter 5, Section 5.

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phantasia (plural phantasiai) This term, can pick out both a particular psychic capacity and an episode of its activity, Aristotle seems to use it in its former sense in two different, if related, ways. The capacity is responsible for the subject's having appearances, so when it appears to someone that p, this will be in virtue ofphantaxia and he will have a phantasia that p. Sometimes Aristotle uses the term strictly, so that a perceptual appearance would not be an exercise of phantasia; at other times he uses it so that perceptual appearances are included within the class of phantasiai. See Chapter 4, Sections 3-5, phantasma (plural phantasmata) Phantasmata play a similar role to aisthemata: they are material affections of the aisthetikon which can be described both materially and in terms of what they represent. They differ from aisthemata in that they do not result directly from sensible objects acting on the sense organs but are derived from the aisthemata which do. See Chapter 5, Section 2, psuchs (plural psuchai) The psuche is the form of a living body. To give the form of a body is to specify what kind of thing it is. To be a living body is to possess some capacity for activity, and so the psuche will be the capacity for the activity whose possession defines the body in question. Although Aristotle does think that the bodies of animals have defining psuchai, it is argued in this book that it is a derivative use and that the primary examples of living bodies are organs rather than the complex animal bodies which have those organs as parts. See Chapter 2, Section 2.

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INDEX LOCORUM

Aristotle

Categories (Cat,)

1

7

8

6336-7 6b28 6534-6 6bs6 7331-4 7335-9 7b 10-14 7bi3-i4 7bi5~i6 7bi6-i8 7bi9 7b23~5 7b24~7 7b3i— 2 7b33~5 7b35~8 834-6 8a6-9

De Interpretation

I,

i6a6-S

Posterior Analytics (An, Post.)

1-5, 117 118

II. i,

121

H.2

121

II.2,

1 2O

120 12O

H-3

22

11-3.

23

I94b21-2

23 II7-I8

118 118 118 n6 23 274 200 2O I

193, 222

31-2

II.2 11.2,

9Oa3I-2

42 47 54 43 n. 78 222-3 n- 74 267 223 223 n. 74, 267 223 268 226, 268

169

IOOa3--6

iooa6-g looaioff. 100312-13 Topics

1.7

11.5, II.8 II.9 HI.i

1-2,4,5,51, 137

I94b23~9 19536 195332-bi 195834 !95a35-bi i95b6-8 I95b2i~s '95b25~7 I95b25~€ I96b24-s i96ba6-9

III.i, 201327-34 2Oib3-5 V.2, 226824-7 VII VII.2

VII.2, 243332-5

VII.3

44

Physics (Phys.)

194812-15 194326-7

23,117

73834-7

10082-3

193328-31

i 93^32 i94bi6-23 J94bl7-22

23,117

1.4,

II.ii, 94a37~b2 94b4~5 94^27 11.19, 99^36-9 99b36-7

H.I-2

121

188331-4 i88a35~b3 i«8b2i~6

244b2-245aii 244b3 244bis

VII.3, 245b3-5 245b6-9

26 27 27 241 241 52

242 242 n, 104, 249, 262 52 37 241 54 240 48 39 48 "45 51 41 40 n. 73 281 44 45 242 272 117, 1 20, 125, 126, 274 n. 103 114 1.14 560.5 1360. 67,271 99, 100 n. "3,134, 136 n. 66, 136 n. 67, 137, 139. 143 271 134-5 136 160 n, 41 274, 275, 276, 279, 281 269 269

298

Index Locorum

Aristotle, Physics (cant.)1 245blO-!2

245613-14 24626-7 24634-9 24664-6 246610-14 246614-17 246614-15 247ai6~i7 247816-18 247917-18 247819 247611 24832-4 VIII.3, 254329-30 VIH.4, 25567 De Caelo

l.g, 27831 1 On Generation and Corruption (GC)

L5

1-5,

321619-22

1-7,

1. 10,

323625-9 323628!!. 323629-33 32432-4 32439-14 324834-61 324611!. 32467-9 328319-22

II.3,

33063-5

1.7

II.2

II-4,

II.9 Il.g,

33iai2-l4 331332-6

335«33 335618-24

269 269

271,272 269-70

270 270 270 272

270-1

IV.I2, 394314-24

DeAnima(DA) Li

403327-8 403330-61 40361-9 403610—12 403611-12 403614-15

2140.56 20,32 92,94 8n, 15

72

82,95

95

27 n. 41

1-3

1.3, 1.4,

II

H.i,

412827-8 4I2b5-6 41266 4I2blO-II 4I2bl2-I3

88

4I2bl7-l8

88 n. 94 880.94 500.94

4I2bl8-2O 412620-2 4I2b22-3 4I2b23-5 412627-4133! 413813-16

4i3azi-5 414314-25

77

77 n. 62

II.3 II.3,

2-3 232 232

232, 287 n.

128 232

287 n. 128

232 253

263-4 244-5 234-6, 287 n.

128 245 245 248 52 248

52, 247-8

240 237 68

163, 182 2,61,65,67, 71, 72 n. 51,

233

60, 61

60 60 60 64 64 64 65 61 65 66 66 69 66 66 66

ion. 113, 240

II.2 0.2,

128

4i2a6-9 412811-13 412315-16 412319-21 4 1 2320- 1

50 n. 94 Son. 94 840.83 Son. 94 34 n. 58

56, 60, 63, 232, 233, 256, 271,279,281, 282, 287 n.

407615-17 408617-18

II. i

83 83 83

50 49

40237-8 40383-5 40335-7 403310-11 403312-16 403316-25 403816-19 4033 i 9ft 403919-25 403324-7 403325

271 272 271 271 271 214

Meteorologica

IV

Li,

41467-9 414611-13 414632-3 414620-2 414625-8 415312-13

25 4 236

42, 43, 63

164

14 n. 5

67 3 4

4

299

Index Locorum

H-4 II.4,

U.5

H*

II.6

II.6,

II,7 II.7,

41536-7 41501.2-13

14 6?

415318-20 415320-2 415524

21, 167

416532-41732 416533-4 4i6b34 41737-8 41789!!', 417313-14 4i7a2iff. 417822-8 41752-9 417515-16 4i7bi6-J9 417521-8 4i7b23-4 41883-6 41833-4 41885-6 41887—17 4i8a8-i i 41 SsStt 4i8a8~9 4i8aio-i2 418311 418812 418015-16 418017-25 418820-4 418324-5 4i8a2(>-b2 418321 418024-5 418327 418829-31 4i8a3i-b2 4i8b4~6 4i8bi6~i7 4i8b2(>~4i9ai 4i8b26-§

4i8b26-7 41932-8 41932-6 41939-11

13 n. 2

21, 113

56 n, 4 7, 130.2, 17, 89-90, 93-4, 95, 125, 130 n, 55, 136 n. 67, 137, 274 n. 103, 283 83 «7, 56, 94 90 28 n, 43 90

11.8,

42084-5

42Ob29ff.

42ob3iff. II, 10

II. 10, 42238 422334 42zb2~3 422b3-s H.n II.II, 422bl9-2O

422b23-7 422bi5

90 238 90 91 91-2 91

422b27-32

423bi7-26 423bi7-i9 423527-42497 423b27ff.

423b27 423530-1 42491 4240.2-5 42432-3 42437-9

20 92

57,8 124 2OI 283 I? 148 189 21 21

11.12 11.12, 424017-25 424817-21

424ai7-t9 424321 424322-4 424322-3 424324 424324-5 424a25-8 424332^1 424bl-3 424b3-2i 424b3-5 424b4-i i 424b5~8 424bs 424b8 424bi2 424bi8 424bao

31 1 8, 21 2O

18

1 88

T

53

20, 32, 152 24-5

20 21

97 32

So n, 70, 1150.25

116 i 80 29

42082-14 42082ft

IH.I-2

III.I, 42533-34 42534-5

8i n. 79 25 115 115 281 n. 120 Si 81

165 n- 55 178 100 n, 113 130

81 81

81 136 34 34 33 34 75 100 B. IJ3 8l-2

34 102 n. 119 34 56 98

272 n, 99 97 96, 163 99, 161 58, toon. 115 85, 123 160 155, 1 60 151 96 58, 151 !OO

86 58,8? 127-8 no 156 n, 28 no

129 129

130

131

130 n. 55 163 i 880.93

300

Index Locorum

Aristotle, De Anima (cont) 425314-27 149 425314% 154, 189, 190 425ai4~24 1560, 28 425314-15 30 n, 46 425316-19 151 425324-7 190 n. 8 425327-9 150 425327-8 147 425»30-b3 14? 425b6-ii 155-6 111.2 no, 113, 124, 125, 143, 14411, 8 IH.2, 425bi2-i6 142-3 425bis-i7 143 n. 7 425bis 143 n. 7 173 425b24-s 425bas 123 n.. 40 426315-19 in 426320-5 in 426323-4 1190,31 426b8-i i «3 426bi7~22 146 163, 170, 171, UI-3 172,176, 181, 182-5, 197, III.3, 427bn-i6 427bu-i4 427bn-i2 427bl6-24 427^7-20 427bi7-i8 427b27-8 427b2? 42831-2 42833-4 42835-16 428a8~i i 42838-9 428310-11 428311-12 428312-15 4288! 3

4289 1 3ff. 428816-18 4288.19-22 428322-4 428824-1*9 428816

212

166 i6z 19,200.. 18 170 214 173 166 180 1 66, 177,

194 n, 14

166 168, 184 176 185 164, 177 n. 86 162 n. 47 161, 179, 182 n. 99, 185 183 161 n. 44 167 221 n. 70 221

159 n- 38 i?3

428bz~4 428b4 428b9 428bioff. 428bio 428bu-i7 428bnff. 428bi2-i3 428bi4 4a8bi8~3o 428br8-22 428bi8ff. 428bi8-i9 428b24~5 428b26ff. 428^0-42932

IH.4 III.4, 429313-18 429315-16 429bi4 HI.9, 43233 i-b2 III, 10, 433b28~9 III. n, 43435-8 434310-11 434319-21

19, 212

179 «. 89 167 170, 171, 172 1.72 168-9 170 1 60, 1670,61 194 159 n, 38 190 189

190. 16 226 n. 81 160, 167 n, 61 169 IOI

162 200 IO2 I58n.35

1 60 n, 39 184 n, 103 221

III.I2, 434330-^4 434b3~7 434bl6-i8 43535-« HI.I3, 435»»-b3 435aziff, 435azo-b3

21411.54 130.2 13-14 15 n. 7 16 n, 10 152 82 n. 78 89 n. 95 87

Parva Naturalia

1,5,62,193

De Sensu (Sens.) i 1 43616-10 436bi~4 436b6-7 436bio-t2 436bi6-i7 436bi8-22 43781-3 438812 438312-16 438312-14 438b20 438b24-5 438b25-7 438b3O 439a3I-5 3

232 232 231 231 231

111.12-13

13 n. i

15 15 15 29 282 80 81 81 81 82 116

301

Index Locorum

5,

6 7,

439931-bi 439b6~7 444b7ff, 444b22-4 44998—10 449310-20 449310-12

De Memoria (Mem.) i i, 449b9 45O8 10-11

450,122-3

450324

2,

450326-32 45083 2-b n 45obl 1-15 450b2o~7 45 "5-8 45138-11 453331^4

De Somno (Sotnn. ) 2, 455314-15 455315-20 455815^17 455816-17 455317 455820-2

455833-bi 455b8-iz 455^34 De Insomniis (Ins.) i,

458a33~b3 458b2~4 4581*7—9 45§b9 458bio-25 458bl4-i5 45^15—16 45§b25 458b2§ 458b29~459a5 45§b3i-3 45939-10 459314-22

2 2,

459828-33

459bi-5

459b3« 46032-3 4&oa4ff. 460028-32 460332-%

32 1 16 32 n. 53 33 n. 53 34 n- 58 »44 145 157

196, 197, 208 207 167 n. 6 1 175 173 167 n. 61 193 286 n. 126 194 195 196 n. 21 195 285

46obiff. 46ob2~3 46ob3-27 46ob3-8 4&ob6 46ob7-8 46obn-i3 46obi8 46ob20-3 46ob23f£ 46ob23~5

3 3,

154 141-2 154 124 n. 44 143 n. 7 144 142 142 6S 173,196,211, 214 173 209 174 157 174 221 221 n.?!

46ob28—31 46ob28 46ob29-30 461325-7 46ia3-bi 46ib3 46ib5-7 46ib4~5 46ib22^-6 46lb22ff.

46ibz3—4 46ib3O~462a8 46282-8 462915-16 462319-28 4fi2b5-8 De Divinations per Somnutn (Div.) 2, 463bi8-i9 464320-7 464327-8 464330-2 464bs-l5

i loo n. 1 13 98 132 175 n. 82, 215 2170.59 175, »77 15911.38 215 216 217 218 179 n. 89 212 179

174 n. 79, 17911. 89, 181 214-15 178 n. 88 212 175 285 175-6 213

214 214 n. 55 196 197 200 207-8 213 178 n. 88 157 286 226 2190. 65 2190.67 219 219 219-20

221 n,7I

159 "• 38

i?4

191, 209, 217 n. 60 174 n, 81 157-8

285 214 98

De Juventute (Juv.) (Juv, 7-28 = De Respirations (Resp.) 1-21)

i, 3, 4,

10,

467b28-32 467b28 469312 469b6- 261-2, 283, 286 mean 81-2, 87 medium 20, 97, 129, 131, 132, 136 memory 68, 166, 167 n, 61, 173, 178 n. 88, 184, 193-5, 222, 225, 231, 267-8,

285

menstruation i, 98 Meyer, S. S. 274 n. 102 Miller, R. 2780. 112 mind 108 mirrors i Modrak, D, 93 n. 104, 143 n. 7, 144 n, 8, 146 n. 14, 1.54 n, 22, 155 n. 26, 1590.36,189 moist 14,34 motion 13, 15, 141 nature 46, 242 necessity 43 nous 4, 51 n. 94, 181 n. 97, 200-1, 228 number 148, 153 Nussbaum, M. C. 9 n. 18, 10 n. 20, 159-65, 166, 178-9 nutrition 9, 141 objects of perception (aistheta) j, 9, 10, 17, 24-5, 28-30, 57, 104, 133, 175, 197 accidental 18, 20, 30, 149, 158-65, 163, 1 86, 1.87-93, 20I i 2O2> 2O4> 20^> 221, 226, 228 common 18, 20, 30, 147, 148-57, 161 n. 46, 163, 190, 192, 225

308

General Index

objects of perception (aatheta) {coat,): proper 18-21,24-5,31,36,82,84,96, 99, 110-17, 123. 138, 148, 149. 150, ••51 '53. 155> 160-2, 166, 169, 175, 1 88, 190, 192-201, 214, 225, 228, 229, 269, 283 organs 11,29,60-9,70,76,233,249, 282, 286, 288 controlling (master) organ 142, 144, 156, 175, 176, 177, 178 n. 88, 199, 213,228,266 sense organs i, 6, 7, 9, 10, 29, 35, 36, 56, 58-9, 68, 78-88, 93-4, 96-102, 113, 123, 129, 132, 133, 136, 138, 139-40, 141, 149, 150, 151, 153-5,

175, 177, 1 88, 214, 229, 230, 266,

279, 285; see also aisthetikon.

pain 231,270 paschein 90, 91 Peacocke C 20 n. 18, 1 08 n, 9, 200, 212 perception of perception 124 n. 44, 141-4, 154, 163, 175-6, 195 perceptual verbs 189 phantasm 2, 51 n. 94, 157-86, 193, 197, 2O4-5, 2II> 212-221, 222, 225, 212i 256, 285-4

phantasmata 166, 173, 177-8, 194-7, 220, 285

phantastikon 157-8, 169, 175, 194, 228, 285 physical 103 physicalism 8-9, 10, 56-7, 250-1, 259-60, 261-2, 280, 287 physics 2, 52-3, 243, 248 pictures 195-7, 198, 203-10 pity 232 plants 2, 3, 13, 14, 58, 78, 86-9 Plato 49-50, 146-7, 167, 212, 237, 288 pleasure 231,270 pneuma 78 practical syllogism 181 n. 97 primary qualities 108-9, 126-7, 132, 137 process (kinesis) 95, 255, 258 proper sensibles, see under 'object of perception' psuche 2-4, 6, 60-79, 86, 102, 104, 141, 231-6, 236-7, 244-5, 249. 251, 253. 281,284,288 psychology 2-4, 9, 230, 243 Putnam, H. 9 n, 18, 10 n. 20

ratios 96-7, 99, 100 real distinction 108 reason 166 recognition 189, 191-2, 200, 203, 219 recognitional abilities 224-8 reduction 259, 261, 273 reflection 152 relations 22-3, 1 17-20 representational content 200 resemblance 97, 200-3, 219-20 rest 148, 152-3 respiration 8, 62, 238-9 Ross, W. D, 123, 128-9, 144 n, 8, 1590. 38, 1 80 n. 95, 221 n. 70, 235 Russell, B. 19 Ryle, G. 171 n, 72 savour 97, in Schofietd, M. 165, 170-2, 179-80, 182 n. 99, 185 n. 104 secondary qualities 105-9, 126-7, 137, 2250.81 self-control 275 semen 74 sensations 18-19, 1 08, 137, 167 sense-data 18, 20 n. 19 separability 232 Sextus Empiricus 133 n, 59 sexual desire 172 n. 74 shape 62, 150, 151, 152, 156, 225 n, 81 sharp 34 sight 15, 16, 17, 18, 66, 99, in, 123, .142, 146, 148, 154, 156, 174, 283 objects of sight 17, 24-5, in, 115-16, 123, 126, 129 organ of sight, see eye, kore Silverman, A, 96-7 similarity 201-2, 204, 206-7, 215-17 sinews 73 size 150, 151, 156 Slakey, T. 10 n, 21, 10 n. 22, 94 n. 105, 231 slaves 22, 117, 118-19 sleep 62, 142, 172 n. 74, 173-4, 207-8, 28011, 114, 285 smell 7, 15, 91, no, 127-32, 135 object of smell 81, no, 129 organ of smell 32 n. 53, 81 soft 34,81 Sorabji.R, ion. 21, ion. 22, 30-6, 39-42, 44 n. 79, 48, 89 n. 95, 94 n. 105, 203 n. 37

General Index sound 17, 165 n. 55. we object!, of hearing spiritualism 10, 58-60, 84, 93-4, 103, 139-40, 229, 286-7 Strawson, P. F. 38 n. 66 subjectivity 8 n. 17 substance (ousia) 60-1, 78, 233, 236, 241-3, 245-6 supervenience n, 258-65, 275-

80

sweet 34,97, 116, 121, 123, 145 taste 17, in, 123, 130, 135, 146 objects of taste 17, 123 organ of taste 75, 81 temperance 275 temperatures 84 Themistius 89 thought 3, 162, 163, 1 66, 173, 195 touch 14, 1 8, 29, 33-4, 101, 130, 164,

183

objects of touch 33 -4, 129, 131, 132 organ of touch 29, 75, 81-2, 86, 87, 99, 245 transparent 1 , 29, 34, So, 97-8, 1 15-16,

152

309

understanding 223 unity 148 vices 270-1 vision, see sight virtues 270-1, 274-5 vital heat 76-8 voice 16511. 55, 178 Ward, J. K, 97 n. 109 Wardy, R. 136 n. 67, 271-3 water r, 78, 80, 84, 139, 155, 229, 282-3 Waterlow, S. 55 n. 103, 56 n, 3 wax 58 Wedin, M, 167 n. 61, 169 n, 69, 176 n. 86, 177 n. 87, 178 n. 88, 181 n. 97, 183 n. 100, 220 n. 69, 266 n. 76, 273 n. too, 273 n. 101, 277 n. 106 well-being 16 wet 77 white 34, in, 123, 145 White,~A. R. 1810.96 Whiting, J. 73, 77 n. 62 Wiggins, D. 65 n, 29 zoology 63,77