Traditionally, in Catholic philosophy, a person is understood to be a substance possessing intellect and will. Intellect and will, in turn, are understood to be immaterial. Hence, to be a person is ipso facto to be incorporeal – wholly so in the case of an angel, partially so in the case of a human being. And qua partially incorporeal, human beings are partially independent of the forces that govern the rest of the material world.
Individuality,
meanwhile, is in the case of physical substances a consequence precisely of
their corporeality rather than their
incorporeality. For matter, as Aquinas
holds, is the principle of individuation with respect to the members of species
of corporeal things. Hence it is
precisely insofar as human beings are corporeal that they are subject to the
forces that govern the rest of the material world.
With a wholly corporeal living thing like a
plant or a non-human animal, its good is subordinate to that of the species to
which it belongs, as any part is subordinate to the whole of which it is a part. Such a living thing is fulfilled insofar as
it contributes to the good and continuance of that whole, the species kind of
which it is an instance. By contrast, a
person, qua incorporeal, is a complete whole in itself. And its
highest good, in which alone it can find its fulfilment, is God, the ultimate
object of the intellect’s knowledge and the will’s desire.
Insofar as
we think of human beings as persons,
then, we will tend to conceive of what is good for them in terms of what
fulfills their intellects and wills, and thus (when the implications of that
are properly understood) in theological terms.
But insofar as we think of them as individuals,
we will tend to conceive of what is good for them in terms of what is
essentially bodily – material goods, pleasure and the avoidance of pain,
emotional wellbeing, and the like.
However, we will also be more prone to see their good as something that
might be sacrificed for the whole of which they are parts.
Maritain
puts special emphasis on the implications of all this for political
philosophy. The common good is more than
merely the aggregate of the goods enjoyed by individuals. But because human beings are persons, and not
merely individuals, the common good is also not to be conceived of merely as
the good of society as a whole and not of its parts. Rather, “it is, so to speak, a good common to the whole and the parts”
(p. 23).
On the one
hand, the political order is in one respect more perfect than the individual
human being, for it is complete in a way the individual is not. On the other hand, in another respect the
individual human being is more perfect than the political order, because qua person he is a complete order in his
own right, and one that has a destiny beyond the temporal political realm. Hence, a just political order must reflect
both of these facts. In particular, it
must recognize that the common good to which the individual is ordered includes
facilitating, for each member of the community, the realization of his
ultimate, eternal end in the hereafter. Thus,
concludes Maritain, “the human city fails in justice and sins against itself
and its members if, when the truth is sufficiently proposed to it, it refuses
to recognize Him Who is the Way of beatitude” (p. 24).
This refusal
is, needless to say, characteristic of modern societies, both liberal and
collectivist. And unsurprisingly, they have
at the same time put greater emphasis on human individuality than on human personhood. Both do so insofar as they conceive of the
good primarily in economic and other material terms rather than in spiritual
terms. Liberal societies, in addition,
do so insofar as they conceive of these bodily goods along the lines of the
satisfaction of idiosyncratic individual preferences and emotional wellbeing. Collectivist societies, meanwhile, do so
insofar as they regard human beings, qua individuals, as apt to be sacrificed
to the good of the species of which they are mere instances. (It should be no surprise, then, that Burke
would famously condemn “the dust and powder of individuality” even as he
condemned at the same time the totalitarianism of the French Revolution. For individualism and collectivism are rooted
in precisely the same metaphysical error.)
Maritain
cites a passage from Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange that summarizes the moral and
spiritual implications of the distinction between individuality and personhood:
To develop one’s individuality is to live the egoistical life of the passions, to make oneself the
centre of everything, and end finally by being the slave of a thousand passing
goods which bring us a wretched momentary joy.
Personality, on the contrary,
increases as the soul rises above the sensible world and by intelligence and
will binds itself more closely to what makes the life of the spirit. The philosophers have caught sight of it, but
the saints especially have understood, that the full development of our poor
personality consists in losing it in some way in that of God. (pp. 24-25,
quoted from Garrigou-Lagrange’s Le Sens
Commun)
Among the pagan philosophers, perhaps none is as clear on this theme as Plotinus, who in the Fifth Ennead contrasts individuality with orientation toward God: “How is it, then, that souls forget the divinity that begot them?... This evil that has befallen them has its source in self-will… in becoming different, in desiring to be independent… They use their freedom to go in a direction that leads away from their origin.” And among the saints, none states this contrast more eloquently than Augustine, who distinguishes “two cities [that] have been formed by two loves: the earthly by the love of self, even to the contempt of God; the heavenly by the love of God, even to the contempt of self” (City of God, Book XIV, Chapter 28). This earthly city, in its modern guise, has been built above all by individualism.
Related posts:
So, individualism and collectivism act as opposite extremes that impinge on person-hood, especially by focusing on the material aspect of human life or lives.
ReplyDeleteHello Prof Feser
ReplyDeleteWell written post !
I was wondering though if you are familiar with criticisms of this line of thinking from figures like Pater Edmund Waldstein. Criticisms of it usually take the approach of "Primacy of the Common Good".
For me personally some problems that I see are that it sort of entails that God cannot permit the evil or suffering of individual people without taking into account every individual's greater good. I think this is false.
I think in certain respects that he can. For example God may permit or allow some suffering to occur to you for the sake of some good but this good need not be some personal good in which you benefit personally but may be a common good in which everyone takes part. Obviously you may take part in that good as well but not in away that's different from anyone else. God may have some reason for picking you to undergo the suffering but that reason as well need not have anything to do with your personal good.
Also God may permit two people to undergo the same exact suffering, both may be very virtuous or pious. They may configure their suffering to Christ to the same degree, but ultimately God may choose to bring out a good from one of the person's suffering that is greater then the good he chooses to bring from the other persons suffering.
Even if someone has suffered less then you, God may still bestow them with a greater good then he does for you.
All this is predicated upon the fact that God does not owe us any compensation for our suffering ( Fr Brian Davies also makes this clear in his book on the problem of evil, pg 157-159), he permits it for some good but not necessarily our individual personal good.
I think Aquinas affirms as much in ST I-II, q. 79, a. 4, ad 1.
"Every evil that God does, or permits to be done, is directed to some good; yet not always to the good of those in whom the evil is, but sometimes to the good of others, or of the whole universe"
I'd like to know Dr Feser's thoughts on this or anyone else's as well
Cheers!
Karol Wojtyla addresses this problem in his work Person and Act under the heading of 'participation.' He argues that participation (both social-role oriented and universally 'communal') is an essential aspect of the proper being of the human person, so that the sacrifice of the individual person (in the sense of both the subjective and objective genitive) is not inconsistent with but a fulfillment of his properly human personhood, which is fundamentally grounded in his freely willing the good in truth.
DeleteHi David
DeleteInteresting.
Aren't there instances though where God may use an individual's suffering for some common or universal good despite the fact that the particular individual may not be willing to participate in it or accept it. I also pointed to a particular situation in a comment below. Just type "Norm" using your find text option.
I think in general that it would be wise for us to accept that even our worst sufferings may be in service of some common good even if God doesn't draw any personal individual good from it.
I agree that in a way it does constitute a fulfilment of our personhood in so far as we as persons exist for the sake of the common good. (God's manifestation of his goodness through creation )
But I don't understand what you mean when you say it is grounded in the person freely willing the good in truth.
Regardless of whether the individual wills it or not,God can use the individual for the common good.
"Aren't there instances though where God may use an individual's suffering for some common or universal good despite the fact that the particular individual may not be willing to participate in it or accept it."
DeleteUndoubtedly. Deterrence, for example. But I'm not sure what your point is. You think that Ed wrote something that denies this?
(Willing participation in the common good is personally fulfilling. Unwilling participation is certainly not impossible, but not (intrinsically at least) a personal fulfillment of the individual human person.)
I think there will be many Christian philosophers who are very surprised when they get to heaven and find animals there. They will see and even feel the joy, sadness and pain that they experienced in their lives on earth. The wolf with the lamb, the leopard with the goat, the lion with the calf, not just symbolic but there in *person*, no longer in competition due to their appetites present during creation.
ReplyDeleteSome who have treated animals cruelly, beyond the natural ways of the wolf, leopard and lion, may recoil from heaven itself. “But Lord, you told us that animals don’t have souls?”. Then they will remember the words of scripture; “ I know all the birds of the air, and all that moves in the field is mine”.
Brother it ain't much of a heaven though, if you can feel pain and sadness there : ).
DeleteWe are still on Earth buddy.
That's not what St. Thomas teaches in The Summa: Supplement, question 91, article 5.
DeleteOn the contrary, If plants and animals are to remain, either all of them will, or some of them. If all of them, then dumb animals, which had previously died, will have to rise again just as men will rise again. But this cannot be asserted for since their form comes to nothing, they cannot resume the same identical form. On the other hand if not all but some of them remain, since there is no more reason for one of them remaining for ever rather than another, it would seem that none of them will. But whatever remains after the world has been renewed will remain for ever, generation and corruption being done away. Therefore plants and animals will altogether cease after the renewal of the world.
Further, according to the Philosopher (De Generat. ii) the species of animals, plants and such like corruptible things, are not perpetuated except by the continuance of the heavenly movement. Now this will cease then. Therefore it will be impossible for those species to be perpetuated.
Further, if the end cease, those things which are directed to the end should cease. Now animals and plants were made for the upkeep of human life; wherefore it is written (Gn. 9:3): "Even as the green herbs have I delivered all flesh to you [*Vulg.: 'have I delivered them all to you']." Therefore when man's animal life ceases, animals and plants should cease. But after this renewal animal life will cease in man. Therefore neither plants nor animals ought to remain.
I answer that, Since the renewal of the world will be for man's sake it follows that it should be conformed to the renewal of man. Now by being renewed man will pass from the state of corruption to incorruptibility and to a state of everlasting rest, wherefore it is written (1 Cor. 15:53): "This corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality"; and consequently the world will be renewed in such a way as to throw off all corruption and remain for ever at rest. Therefore it will be impossible for anything to be the subject of that renewal, unless it be a subject of incorruption. Now such are the heavenly bodies, the elements, and man. For the heavenly bodies are by their very nature incorruptible both as to their whole and as to their part: the elements are corruptible as to their parts but incorruptible as a whole: while men are corruptible both in whole and in part, but this is on the part of their matter not on the part of their form, the rational soul to wit, which will remain incorrupt after the corruption of man. on the other hand, dumb animals, plants, and minerals, and all mixed bodies, are corruptible both in their whole and in their parts, both on the part of their matter which loses its form, and on the part of their form which does not remain actually; and thus they are in no way subjects of incorruption. Hence they will not remain in this renewal, but those things alone which we have mentioned above.
Norm: “Brother it ain't much of a heaven though, if you can feel pain and sadness there : ).”
DeleteThere is both weeping and joy in the heaven of this creation. Weeping such as when God’s own Son, light from light, was beaten, spat on, and put to death by the world. Joy when a man or women turns instead in humility towards that same Son of Man, and finds life.
Tim the White: St Thomas was both a genius and a holy man. However it would be wrong to treat his writings as scripture. Since the fall we as humans changed from being part of primal nature, after that “knowing good and bad” and consciously choosing between the two. This is why we need to wear ‘the robes washed in the blood of the lamb’ in heaven. Animals did not fall in this sense, except maybe as an extension of man, say when a a cruel man makes an animal cruel. When a wild animal simply follows it’s nature, even kills for food or to protect it’s young, this is still part of God’s creation: it is good.
DeleteRemember that Aquinas burnt his books as “so much straw” after he experienced a vision of heaven. Because he was one of the greatest philosophers before the new-Babel fall of nominalism, it’s right that Christians hold a special place for him. But to treat his conclusions as revelation is not something Thomas himself would want you to do.
It is my belief that this argument by Thomas is presented as a probable argument, rather than from necessary principles, and he may be in error. Certainly he can be in error about some of his premises, to wit
Delete(1) the heavenly bodies are by their very nature incorruptible both as to their whole and as to their part, and
(2) the elements are corruptible as to their parts but incorruptible as a whole
appear to be not wholly sound. Clearly the
heavenly bodies are indeed corruptible. And even if we take "elements" not in the modern sense like hydrogen, helium, etc, and instead consider the elements to be, say, protons, neutrons and electrons, it is clear that they are corruptible as a whole. And given quantum dynamics, with the very existence of atoms (and smaller structures) depending essentially on motion and vibration and forces acting, it is improbable that there is ANY way of rewriting all of this as "at rest" in an absolute sense.
Hence this calls into question the validity of the essential premise of the argument, and consequently the world will be renewed in such a way as to throw off all corruption and remain for ever at rest. If Thomas incorrectly derived this from Scripture by a mistake in the sense of "incorruptible" meant for non-human beings, his argument might be wrong. If incorruptible was meant (in reference to beings other than humans) in a sense that allowed for the actions that are implied by quantum physics, possibly that requires a different model of "incorruptible" than what he assumes would apply.
@Tony
DeleteAnother dificult with the saint argument seems that he treats the lower animals final cause of serving man as their only end, when they also exist to give glory to God in participating un His being, beauty and goodness in imperfect ways, so their existence would never be with no cause.
But while i don't find his argument for there not being animals at all in Heaven a strong one, his argument against particular animals ressurrecting seems quite plausible(see the start of Tim quote). This combined with the lack of a clear affirmation of animals ressurrecting either in Scripture or Tradition seems to me good enough to doubt that any animal that lived, lives or will live in this valley of tears will be alive again.
Yall just going to wave off St. Thomas like that? At least Tony read the text first. Is it just me, or are there no other theologians of his stature that proclaim a continued existence of plants and animals in eternity?
DeleteIt hardly seems worth the effort of God bothering to create a new Heaven & Earth if there's not going to be any plants or animals in it. Even if you presumably live in a palace as lushly furnished as you like (doing so without the luxury of even a single pot plant). It's hard to imagine humans living in an otherwise entirely lifeless universe. The New Earth in the Summa's supplement account seems to only exist to provide somewhere for resurrected human bodies to go. It doesn't seem like much of an advantage over living simply as incorporeal spirits without any material world at all.
DeleteTim, the Scriptures speak of "new heavens and a new Earth" (Isaiah) We don't know what that means in detail, but the prophet hints by saying that the calf will lie with the lion, etc. Now, these are likely metaphors, but the ambiguity that inherently rests in how far the metaphor applies, given that (as St. Paul says) "Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor has it entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him”, means that we simply cannot be entirely confident on what the limits are to what truth the metaphor is pointing us toward. The mere fact that there will be a "new Earth" means that there will be some sort of material universe, and that implies also some sort of elemental stuff serving the same functions that now are filled by quarks, electrons, protons, along with the resident forces and activities, means that SOMETHING that is like the now-corruptibles will exist. We don't know what.
DeleteSo for me, I take St. Thomas's argument against the resurrection of the old individual animals like Fido and Secretariat to be sound, showing definitively that they cannot be resurrected because metaphysically it is nonsensical. I take his arguments against God creating NEW plants and animals like to the old ones as at best arguments of a probable type, and in this case weakened by their reliance on seemingly faulty physics.
he treats the lower animals final cause of serving man as their only end, when they also exist to give glory to God in participating un His being, beauty and goodness in imperfect ways, so their existence would never be with no cause.
@Talmid: I agree with this as an additional problem, though I would pose it slightly differently: Although humans are the highest beings in the physical order, and therefore they sit (in some sense) at the top of the hierarchy that orders such creation, there are 2 points that limit what that means toward the animals. (1) In actuality, "the physical order" is only part of the created order, which includes angels as well, and angels sit higher than man as to our natures alone. (2) Animals are lower than man in the hierarchy and (to an extent) serve toward the good of man, nevertheless it is the good of the whole order in toto that is God's primary object, and not just man's good specifically. He wills the good of the whole order when he wills that birds eat seeds (and thus kills them) and then wills that cats prey on birds (and thus kills them), i.e. the good of the whole order is greater than the good of parts of the order separately. And so (as you say) the beauty and goodness of plants and animals are good not solely in the utilitarian sense of serving the good of man. This (presumably) is part of what drives there being a NEW Earth being made at the end.
The question, then, is, what would be the point of these animals? They aren't persons, but individuals. So they don't have a personal end. And the end of mere individuals is the good of the species, which is to say the perpetuation of the species, which properly (ecologically) speaking means taking part in the circle of life (hakuna matata!). So if the lion lies down with the lamb, the lion and lamb have lost their proper ecological roles. So what are they then? Just decorations? Pets? Will they still copulate, breed like rabbits, to infinity?
DeleteBTW, when Aquinas talks about the incorruptibility of the elements as a whole, this claim is wholly defensible. The point is about the overall physico-chemical and bio-ecological set-up, which we indeed have no reason to think of as anything but (naturally!) incorruptible.
David McPike: “They aren't persons, but individuals. So they don't have a personal end. And the end of mere individuals is the good of the species.”
DeleteThose with an assumed materialism could say the same about humans, but lets take the Christian acceptance of revelation as our assumption.
The common distinctions between a person and a non person contain many assumptions about telos and about what is good. Yes humans are unique in being made in the image of God, and in being lifted up above the angels, but I would take ‘good’ to be how closely the individual reflects the divine ideal that created them at the end of their full creation. As God is spirit, this too refers to their spiritual state, not to the state of the body. “Be perfect, as your father in heaven is perfect” as an example of this point. Having Alzheimers can entirely corrupt the body and the mind, but not the spirit. When the person with such an affliction dies, they are also freed from the limitations of the disease.
Unlike fallen humans, animals tend to naturally reflect the divine ideal upon which they are created. This makes them naturally good, even naturally “perfect”. For humans the divine ideal is exampled by Jesus, and even the best of us are not naturally good or perfect in all ways. Heaven is where God’s will is done automatically, in other words where things are perfect, as the Lords Prayer tells us. Spiritually, things that are perfect are attracted to heaven, things that are not perfect recoil from heaven. God doesn’t NEED to do any active judgement, the “darkness hides from the light”. So animals in spirit will naturally be drawn to heaven, hence ‘I know the birds of the air, and all that moves in the field is mine”.
I would add a caveat that this does not refer to all that we place scientifically as “animals”. For some “animals”, the ideal of them represents darkness, they are indeed just a necessary part of creation, which requires disease, poison and decay in a way in which heaven does not. Examples of this used in revelation are spiders, scorpions, locusts and snakes, but clearly it’s a wide group that appear to be significantly different in terms of why they were created. There are limits on us understanding anything at all about the new creation, of which this creation is a necessary precursor, which makes it difficult to really understand any of this. Nonetheless, it seems strange to think that the lamb that gives up it’s life just so that we can eat, or the donkey that spends it’s life in service to carrying the heavy loads, will not be spiritually drawn towards the lamb that gave up his life, who carried the heaviest load on his back, so that we may eat the bread of heaven. Anyone who uses philosophy to say that animals do not have spirit has not spent much time in the wild, or perhaps not even had a pet.
"it seems strange to think that the lamb that gives up it’s life just so that we can eat, or the donkey that spends it’s life in service to carrying the heavy loads, will not be spiritually drawn towards the lamb that gave up his life"
DeleteA thoroughly gratuitous claim. I currently own and daily interact with some 80(?) animals: sheep, cows, chickens, rabbits, dogs, cats (and it's spring so that number is going up). Anyhoo, they're not spiritually drawn towards Jesus. They're just not. Trust me.
As for spiders, sorry you don't like them, but you should spend some more time with them. Maybe get a pet one. They're actually very charming creatures.
DMP: I’m curious what you think it means for God to “know you”? As in the parable where someone dies, and God says “I do not know you, go away”.
DeleteI ask as you seem to have a different reading of scripture from me. I didn’t pick spiders out of personal preference, although it’s true that I’ve never been tempted to keep one as a pet.
It’s of course possible I’m wrong about this (especially with regards snakes where scripture is not clear either way - perhaps they are “lifted up”). As others have said, scripture is not 100% clear on this. However my reading of scripture and my view of both God and of animals is clearly different from yours - and I do live in farming country. Even a sparrow doesn’t fall to the ground “apart from God”.
I’ve spent a lot of time in the African bush. One thing elephants often do when they follow their migration paths is to stop at the ‘grave’ of a family/herd member that died in past years. They can spend much of the day there, often taking it in turns to rest their trunks on the skull. I’ve seen young adults starting to fight, and another young adult come between them to break it up. These are wild creatures whose inner life we can quite easily recognise once you know them well enough, unlike many animals where we can only recognise aspects; the bravery of the horse, the playfulness of young mammals etc. If you accept that God created these creatures to reflect aspects of Himself that are also aspects of us, that unlike us these creatures are innocent, and that the symbolism of Jesus words will never pass away, I personally find it more likely than not that God sustains animals beyond this life.
Another reason to consider Aquinas's argument to be probable rather than necessary is this:
DeleteI answer that, Since the renewal of the world will be for man's sake it follows that it should be conformed to the renewal of man.
It is not at all clear that the renewal of the world will be "for man's sake" in any sense we can grasp here and now. Even when you consider this world in this current condition is "for man's sake" - which is true in some sense but is not manifestly true in an absolute sense - it is manifestly NOT true in the very same way after the final judgment. That is, part of the purpose of "the world" in this stage of the Providential Order is to give man the fitting environment in which to live out the knowing and loving he is called to as his principal purpose. This stage of creation must give man a field in which to operate where his acts and his choices have real-world consequences, and (just for example) where his acts to love his spouse assist with God in creating brand new persons meant for love in all eternity. However, the next stage, i.e. after the final judgment, positively won't have these as conditions for our act of love: there will be no marrying, no procreating, no chance for sin to produce constraining conditions on further choice, etc. Hence it is not clear in what way a new world will be in service to man. Man's resurrected bodies will not need food or drink, nor sleep, nor respond to gravity if we don't want it, nor be limited by walls, etc. So, it seems difficult if not impossible to state in what way "the world" beyond our own bodies will be USED by us in any significance sense.
And if there is any answer to that question, it seems probable that "so too animals and plants" will fit in along with whatever purpose "the world" has in that stage of the Providential Order.
Wow. Add another item to the tally of situations where modern secular society is not just wrong, but has completely eroded our ability to make the necessary distinctions to even talk about the issue clearly.
ReplyDeleteOrwell was more right than he knew.
Is this post reflective of the Personalism of JP2 or is that something different?
ReplyDeleteEd,
ReplyDeleteWhy did you turn to Three Reformers, instead of The Person and the Common Good, which represents Maritain’s mature thought? Of course you’re aware of the “personalism” controversy in which Maritain figured (albeit indirectly); the former book takes account of the issue and clarifies his thought.
Great work as ever!
"Every evil that God does, or permits to be done, is directed to some good; yet not always to the good of those in whom the evil is, but sometimes to the good of others, or of the whole universe"
ReplyDeleteI would agree with this, but not with this:
"God does not owe us any compensation for our suffering"
God owes (or should provide) compensation for some sufferings, and it could still be true that the sufferings in question were for the sake of the goodness of other beings. The sufferings in case were not for the sake of the victim, but the victim still deserves compensation.
Hi Anon
DeleteI think there a lot problems with the notion of God owes us compensation for any suffering.
One can imagine scenarios where there are people who may have suffered terribly in this life but ultimately might end up in hell, thus uncompensated.
Think of perhaps a child who undergoes some trauma inducing situation.(holocaust etc). Now at the time this suffering was experienced, lets assume the child was old enough to remember but had not yet reached the age of reason. So this suffering can't be punishment for some personal sin.
Suppose that because of this suffering, this child grows up to deny God or blaspheme his name. Maybe he is angry that God didn't show up to rescue him or what have you
Ultimately, he dies in this state, God judges that his blasphemy is mortally sinful and he ends up in hell.
It's clear that in such cases, the suffering is not compensated for.
Obviously in real life we would say that we don't know God's final judgement on the soul but that underscores the fact that it's a possibility at the very least.
God is not a part of the moral order, nor is he subject to the Paulin principle where h'd be obligated to prevent or compensate for sufferings. He is not morally responsible for your suffering.
God can bring about greater goods even without that suffering and there may be times where he bestows even greater goods upon those who suffered less.
The parable of the workers in the vineyard comes to mind.
I believe that it can be rather risky to assume we can delve deeply into, and be definitive, about this and other versions of "the problem of evil". The problem of evil is a true mystery that we will not wholly solve in this life, as we cannot possibly comprehend The Plan in which God allows evils for the sake of other goods.
DeleteThat said: it might be plausible to suggest that God owes it not to the individual who suffers, but to Himself, to compensate for evils suffered. This is sort of implied by His justice, which is whole and comprehensive. But it remains true that God doesn't "owe" to anyone that He create them to begin with, so all other, consequent owings (in whatever sense) are based on a prior pure outright gift of existence. And recall also that God's gift of giving us existence is not a "once-and-done" act, He continues to will our existence throughout all time forward, i.e. we would be annihilated into nothingness if He stopped willing our existence. So, I suspect that all instances in which we can refer to God owing us anything specifically must be understood as CONDITIONAL owing: assuming first that God owed Himself justice (so to speak), and assuming second that He wills to create me as a rational being, then He ought to deal justly with me by rewarding my merits and punishing my demerits.
And the last point (merits and demerits) raises the other big distinction: in the moral order, because we are born in a state of original sin, we cannot act meritoriously without the grace-based (gift-given) merits of Christ's redemptive sacrifice. So none of us born of Eve can claim merits that require rewards separate from the prior gift of grace: it's ALL gift.
I also seem to recall various saints saying that even of those in Hell, God has had mercy on them by reducing their suffering to less than their sins would deserve.
The situation you described is just morally abhorrent to me. God allowing someone to end up in hell because of such a tight causal nexus with some horrible unjust suffering that God allowed *for the sake of other people* is just an abominable idea, I find.
Delete"God is not a part of the moral order"
I strongly disagree with that, and explicitly affirm that God is a moral agent as the ultimate source of the formal perfections of Intellect, Will and Goodness. God absolutely is part of the moral order by being its very foundation, which should make us expect him to always act in a way that is far more virtuous, loving and perfect than any of us could. As such, to not compensate people for horrible sufferings they undergo would be inconsistent with this perfection.
"nor is he subject to the Paulin principle where h'd be obligated to prevent or compensate for sufferings. He is not morally responsible for your suffering."
He isn't obligated to prevent every single instance of suffering because some sufferings can bring about a greater good for the victim or others. He is, however, obligated by his own nature to prevent horrible suffering that is truly gratuitous. And likewise he should compensate victims of horrible sufferings.
God is morally responsible for people's suffering insofar as he is our sustaining source of all being at every moment, and is able to influence almost every event at all times without effort, and is perfectly wise. He is morally responsible for us, and will not fail to compensate victims, justly punish evil (except perhaps when mercy is adequate) and so on.
Again, what you wanted to argue for "God sometimes allow people to suffer for the sake of others" is fine, and Aquinas himself said that. The ideas that "...therefore God does not owe any compensation to victims, and is not part of the moral order" are entirely additional and do not logically follow from it. And are wrong, metaphysically.
Anonymous
DeleteThat God is not a part of the moral order and as such not bound by the Pauline principle is age old Thomistic teaching.
It was reiterated by Dr Feser himself in his response to Sterba. You can check it out.
Also gratuitous suffering is suffering "without any reason",
In this case I specifically mentioned the reason, the Common Good which expresses the good of God.
Hi Tony
Good to hear from you.
You make some interesting points.
I don't see how God's justice applies to suffering per se.
Recall that suffering and death just follow from the essence of being natural creatures. To be preserved from suffering and death is not owed to us but was offered to us as Grace in the garden of Eden to our first parents. So there are many instances of evil suffered are not per se unjust, natural calamities, sickness, disease etc. They are just instances of the natural order working as it should.
God also uses suffering as punishment for personal sin. Humans do so as well.
There's nothing unjust about this suffering.
The most obvious case of unjust suffering I think, is the case of children when some adult sinfully brings suffering on them.
But even this case, the injustice is in the act of the offender acting against his own nature and the victim having to deal with some physical or psychological loss.
Sin in human beings is caused by factors like unruly desires of the senses, lack of knowledge.
Being defectible is just one of the natural possible consequences of being a rational creature.
So on this analysis, it's hard to see where God owing us anything comes into the picture.
Ofcourse whatever we lost during the suffering will be restored in Heaven whether the ailment is physiological or psychological, psycho-somatic unity etc. Is that what you mean by compensation? Then yes I would agree. What was wrongfully taken from us will be given back.
But that's not what people mean when they think "compensate". What they usually have in mind is some "personal good or reward that God meant for YOU to have, that is GREATER than your suffering but he requires your suffering to bring about this good". That's the notion I find problematic.
God could have presumably given you a more greater good even without any relevant suffering.
Norm,
Delete"That God is not a part of the moral order and as such not bound by the Pauline principle is age old Thomistic teaching."
That doesn't make it true, does it? You pretty much ignored my argument for why God can be part of the moral order (by being its very source and the paradigmatic Good itself in which all things participate) and just asserted your view again.
And to be honest, it is not clear to me that it is "age old Thomistic teaching" as in, it could be found in Aquinas himself. It could be. But it's not cear to me. It seems contradictory with Aquinas's own views of God as the source of all perfections and the propriety of analogical attributions of wisdom, goodness, freedom, etc. to God, which gives us real knowledge of his nature. The fact that God's moral agency is not identical or of the very same kind to ours does not mean that it does not exist or is a mere metaphor. The fact that Aquinas agrees that God never allows gratuitous evils itself shows that God is a moral agent of some sort.
So I do not buy that oft-repeated view of yours; I am aware it has its defenders, but I find it completely wrong for the reasons I've mentioned.
"Also gratuitous suffering is suffering "without any reason",
In this case I specifically mentioned the reason, the Common Good which expresses the good of God."
Of course. But I mentioned it because you had said that "he is not subject to the Pauline principle where he'd be obligated to prevent evil etc." and I pointed out to you that God IS, indeed, obligated (by his own nature, I would say) to prevent some evils, such as horrible gratuitous suffering. Aquinas himself says that every evil that God permits is only for the sake of some good, and you yourself agreed that God would not allow pointless suffering. I am trying to make you see that God is not at all outside of the moral order; his acts are part of it and are intelligible through it.
God could never murder or torture someone for no reason. These would be wicked acts and if he did them, it would be evil. And evil is impossible for God, who is Goodness itself. So it is impossible for God to murder and torture people for no reason.
In the same way, it is impossible for God to allow some horrendous evils with no compensation.
God can allow someone to suffer horribly for the sake of some good beyond them, but he shouldn't fail to provide appropriate compensation for that victim.
The reason why God never allows any gratuitous evils is because evil itself is a "lack", it doesn't have any positive metaphysical existence. This coupled with the fact that the voluntarist conception of the intellect-will dynamic is wrong.
DeleteThe intellectualist conception is correct. On this conception whatever is willed always willed for some good. This applies to human beings as well. Even human beings always act for the sake of some apparent good (emphasis on apparent since what is willed may appear to be in good in some ways but evil overall).
So if it's the case that human's always act with some good in mind it also follows that whatever God wills is always for the sake of some good. It does not entail that God is part of the moral order.
You mention that whatever we attribute to God is always analogical, yet you insist on judging God by some human standard of "owing compensation".
First of all the very fact that you have to reach heaven in order to be compensated for your gratuitous suffering is evidence that God doesn't owe that compensation. It doesnt make sense that the compensation be conditional upon reaching heaven and yet be owed at the same time.
If by compensation you mean, restore your psycho-physiological unity or whatever was lost during your suffering then yes, God "compensates" in heaven.
But if what you mean by compensation is some "personal good or reward" that God means for only YOU to have, that is GREATER than your suffering but he required your suffering to bring about this good . That's the notion I find problematic.
Shouldn't the fact that your suffering plays a role in bringing about the common good be satisfying in and of itself ? And you may even participate in this common good should you be saved. The common good itself exists in order to express th goodness of God which is the point of all creation.
There will always be a reason for your suffering, but that reason may not benefit you personally, it may benefit you in a common way and whatever you lost shall be restored.
Anything else beyond that is not owed.
Thanks for engaging on the issue though. I know it's tedious.
DeleteSometimes I wish Prof would weigh in on this stuff. Would be nice to have a guiding hand.
But I understand that there are more pressing issues like the crisis in the church etc.
Maybe Prof should do some annual Christmas or Easter reddit style Ask me Anything :)
With a wholly corporeal living thing like a plant or a non-human animal, its good is subordinate to that of the species to which it belongs, as any part is subordinate to the whole of which it is a part. Such a living thing is fulfilled insofar as it contributes to the good and continuance of that whole, the species kind of which it is an instance.
ReplyDeleteIt is not clear to me that for an animal, "its good is subordinate to that of the species to which it belongs, as any part is subordinate to the whole of which it is a part. " Suppose that God directly creates (without using the reproductive powers of other animals) some individual animal of species X, in order to accomplish in His plan some events that such an animal can cause, but that God does not have any other purpose in the whole order of creation for that species than those specific acts of that one individual of the species. And for this reason, God makes only one member of the species, and makes it male: with no females of the species, it cannot reproduce, and when it dies, the species will die. It is not clear to me that it is proper to say that "its good is subordinate to the species" in any sense that is worthwhile. Its good is to live its life in such a way as to engage in the activities proper to its nature, insofar as possible, including eating, drinking, sensing, moving, catching prey, etc. It's good would entail participating in reproducing, if a female of the species were around, so that aspect of its nature cannot be fulfilled. But there is no way in which its carrying out its activities according to its nature are more properly "for" the species than they are "for" itself as its own individual good.
Moreover, the individual animal is the one fully real instance of the species, whereas at all other times "the species" only "exists" in the imperfect sense that the form of species X is (and remains) conceivable and a possibility as to having real individuals exist. It is the individual substance that fully and properly has an end in reality, the species considered formally only has an end in ratio, i.e. as a "being of reason".
To support this, St. Thomas points out that the death of individual animals is a kind of "an evil", but is good for the entire created order which is "the good" which God properly intends. Well, so also, species go extinct as part of the good of the entire order. So even entire species are subordinate to the good of the whole order, but a species is not related to the whole order in the way that the individual is related to the species - there is no formal unity that unites all existing being into a super-genus.
Hence I suspect that the idea of the subordination of an individual animal to the "good of the species" needs a better explanation than simply the continuation of the species.
This is never a problem in practice because God can send an Angel to accomplish the unique mission in animal form, as He did with Don Bosco.
DeleteI agree that God can do so, and apparently has done so for a limited period of time. But nothing requires that He must accomplish it that way, when He can also just directly create the individual animal one-off. And in the case of Don Bosco, apparently God's whole intention included that Bosco eventually find out that it was an angel. If God overall intended that the needed actions be done by a REAL ANIMAL, then an angel wouldn't serve the purpose.
DeleteI don't think of this as "a problem", I am simply trying to point out an explanatory gap that is not entirely filled by saying that the good of an individual animal is "subordinate to the good of the species".
Tony, it isn't clear to me that this scenario doesn't just contain a contradiction. Formal and final causes are not completely independent, so I'm
Deletenot sure that you can stipulate that it is metaphysically possible for there to be a creature for which its good is independent of its nature.
My suspicion is that the scenario you have outlined is akin to starting from the premise that God could create an unmarried bachelor and then "proving" something false. (To be clear, I don't think you are doing this intentionally or in bad faith).
Anon, I was not trying to imply that formal and final causes are independent, and I don't see why what I supposed implies that the creature's good is independent of its nature. Rather the opposite: what is its good is specified by its nature. All I was trying to point out is that as the sole actual (really existing) member of its species within the divine plan, it's good as an individual does not sit subordinate to "the good of the species" as if the good of the species were some higher-order good that could and would call for it to suffer curtailment of its individual good "for the species". The significant distinction isn't between formal and final ends, it's between an actual (fully real) entity and the notional being of "the species" considered formally alone. Only the former can enjoy a good. If "the species" as in actual existence only EVER will consist of 1 individual, all actual goods of "the species" will ever only be actual goods of this one individual.
DeleteMy suspicion is that the scenario you have outlined is akin to starting from the premise that God could create an unmarried bachelor and then "proving" something false.
Did you mean "married bachelor" ? I agree that by starting with that oxymoron, you could "derive" false results, and doing so wouldn't actually mean anything. If you think God making, directly and miraculously, a sole member of an animal species, which will accomplish certain results (ordinate with its nature) and then be eaten by some predator before it could have a chance to reproduce, is oxymoronic, you would have to show that such a scenario is oxymoronic, or at least provide some reason, not just "suspect" it. I suspect that such a scenario is utterly possible, just improbable.
"And qua partially incorporeal, human beings are partially independent of the forces that govern the rest of the material world."
ReplyDeleteNot according to any scientific evidence, or any evidence of any kind. How would this even work? The non-material part would have to be independant of the material part but also dependant on it (material to non-material and non-material to material) in order to be able to perceive or influence anything material, and in order to avoid going more and more out of sync with it. The whole idea doesn't work and is redundant.
Age. Illnesses. Alcohol. Drugs. Tiredness. Sleep. Genetics. Our environment. Nutrition. All of these common, material factors influence our minds on a daily basis, and nothing indicates anything to the contrary.
Congratulations, you’ve noticed the same thing Aristotle did, over two thousand years ago.
Delete"Age. Illnesses. Alcohol. Drugs. Tiredness. Sleep. Genetics." All universal immaterial abstractions. Thank you for making Feser's point.
DeleteIt's like hardware and software. The hardware supplies the data and executes outputs for the program. Corruption of the hardware supplies poor data and poor function, but the program can function either with it, or without it, in cyberspace, in the cloud.
DeleteTim,
DeleteThat looks like a poor analogy to me. A program cannot function without the hardware even in 'the cloud'. The cloud is simply distant hardware that one can link to with the hardware they have at home. And cyberspace relies on the hardware that it consists of.
The glass of wine I have in my hand at the moment is not a "universal material abstraction."
Delete@ Anonymous,
Delete"Age [...] Genetics." All universal immaterial abstractions. Thank you for making Feser's point."
None of these things are immaterial abstractions.
@ Tim the White,
"It's like hardware and software."
As Hal Friederichs has pointed out, software can't run without hardware, so if anything, your analogy supports my position. In any case, why use analogies?
@ Hal Friederichs,
"A program cannot function without the hardware even in 'the cloud'."
Correct.
"Not according to any scientific evidence, or any evidence of any kind. How would this even work? The non-material part would have to be independant of the material part but also dependant on it" -- anonymous.
DeleteThere is nothing wrong with the analogy. It answers your question "how would this even work?" and shows your prior assertion is shallow and broken.
Ignoring its formal arrangement, a computer system's hardware is nothing but some quantities of silica, copper, arsenic, plastic, and whatever else goes into a computer these days. It not only cannot function, it has no function.
Even when those material components are formally arranged as a computer, that hardware also cannot do anything without software.
But Turing already proved some part of the operations of a functioning computer system is substrate independent, i.e. it does not matter what the components of your computer are made of, nor the specific architecture of those components.
Two computer systems may run the *exact same programme* on this hardware or that hardware. But notwithstanding the material dependency there is a not-material identity in the systems: the software.
Zoe,
Delete"...it does not matter what the components of your computer are made of, nor the specific architecture of those components."
I don't believe that to be true. Software designed for a MAC computer cannot run on a Windows computer. Nor Windows software on a Mac. In fact, when Apple recently replaced its older processors with the M-series, new software had to be written for it.
And, as pointed out earlier, computer software is uselss without a computer. It can't run without a computer.
I think that is analogous with our mental capacities. When a human being dies so do his mental capacities. Those capacities cannot survive independently of the human body.
I believe the computer/software analogy can be useful when pointing out the dependence of the software on the computer but I don't think Tim the White was using it for that purpose.
I don't believe that to be true. Software designed for a MAC computer cannot run on a Windows computer. Nor Windows software on a Mac.
DeleteAny computer program consists essentially of an algorithm, and that algorithm could be done with paper and pencil if you wanted (and had lots of time). Indeed, the pencil and paper are only aids, you could carry out the whole in your head if you are capable of keeping track of the details. So the fact that one program version is designed to run on a Mac, and a you need a different version to run on Windows, is an irrelevancy: both versions can be run on the human mind, which is capable of understanding both.
(I believe that Turing proved also that any program (at least, any deterministic program?) could also be reduced to a simple one comparable to a Turing machine, but that's many years in my past and I won't swear to it.)
I think that is analogous with our mental capacities. When a human being dies so do his mental capacities. Those capacities cannot survive independently of the human body.
That's your guess, but what evidence do you have to back it up?
People have come back from the dead, and in some cases they have describable experiences from when they were dead, and in some cases not within sensory range of their (dead) body, and checkable from independent sources as to validity.
If the human soul survives death, then it is implausible that all intellectual faculties are gone at death. This post more or less assumes the Christian point, as a premise, that the human soul is the sort of thing that can survive death:
Traditionally, in Catholic philosophy, a person is understood to be a substance possessing intellect and will. Intellect and will, in turn, are understood to be immaterial.
If you are merely assuming that either there is no such thing as an immaterial soul, or that it cannot survive death, then your position is at odds with the premises of Feser's OP. It's OK to disagree on those, but it means your points don't really address these issues.
Hal,
DeleteIt is an analogy, not an identity. The quoted part of my comment is certainly true: Turing proved it with what we now call "Turing machines".
Perhaps you wish to narrow the extension of the term "software" to the code itself rather than including the algorithms or functions encoded? I see no principled reason why we should.
And, if we're going to be that strict, note that the incompatibility that you are talking about in your examples is all software and often used to be fixed by software via emulation, now virtualization. Re-writing OS software so that existing programmes can work on machines with completely novel chipsets does nothing at all to refute substrate independence.
I grant that computer software is useless without computer hardware but my point is that computer hardware is equally as useless without computer software. This responds to anonymous's objection: "How would this even work? The non-material part would have to be independant of the material part but also dependant on it"
Computer systems are "evidence of any kind" that such mutual dependency between material and non-material parts of a whole is quite logical and can in fact work. I understood this to be Tim the White's point.
Apologies: the previous anonymous reply to Hal was mine. I didn't see 'Comment as:' had defaulted.
DeleteZoe,
Delete"It is an analogy, not an identity."
Sorry for being dense, but I don't understand what you mean by that. Could you explain?
" So the fact that one program version is designed to run on a Mac, and a you need a different version to run on Windows, is an irrelevancy."
We may be talking past each other. The software for MAC and the software for Windows is not the same. So even though we can consider the program to be the same - it accomplishes the same tasks on both systems, the actual software coding has been modified to work with the different hardware systems.
Sure, we could use a pencil and paper to accomplish some of the same tasks that a computer program can accomplish, but then we are talking about the task itself and not the computer software that has to be written to work on a particular hardware system.
First, I'm not a computer guy, but fwiw: There is no principled (only a conventional/ architectural) distinction between software and hardware. Both must be physically instantiated and hardware is just machine-standard software.
DeleteSecond, this:
"Not according to ... any evidence of any kind": Okay, gratuitously asserted. So what is 'evidence' and what are the its 'kinds' in your opinion?
"How would this even work? The non-material part would have to be independant of the material part but also dependant on it (material to non-material and non-material to material) in order to be able to perceive or influence anything material, and in order to avoid going more and more out of sync with it."
Yes, that's right. IOW, the material and the immaterial would have to causally interact. But what was the problem supposed to be?
Zoe,
Delete"That's your guess, but what evidence do you have to back it up? "
It's not a guess nor is it an empirical matter. It is a conceptual one.
There are many different concepts regarding the mind and the soul. I come from a Wittgensteinian perspective: we attribute a mind to a being who can reason and act for reasons. Likewise, we attribute a soul to one who can differentiate between good and evil and act upon that kowledge.
The words "mind" and "soul" are façons de parler. They are ways of talking about our intellectual and moral powers. They don't refer to actual entities, let alone immaterial entities. After all these powers are like abilities. Abilities are not entities.
A person is one who can be said to have a mind and a soul, i.e. one who has those powers of the intellect and the moral.
When we die, those abilities and powers die with us. Of course, this is a very brief summary.
P.M.S. Hacker has written a tetralogy concerning human nature that gives a very detailed explanation of this.
Hal,
DeleteI wasn't that anonymous though I will happily have his smarts mistaken for mine!
In the perennial tradition:
A person is an individual substance with a rational nature. A power is a principle of action stemming from a thing's nature and the immediate formal source of an activity or operation. An act or actuality is any activity or other feature that characterizes the being in question: e.g. man's operation of the power of intellect.
So we are talking of actualities.
The soul–for Aristotelians–is the first or fundamental act of a living body, specifically the substantial form of such a body by which matter is organized to be an individual of a given type with its characteristic powers. There are vegetative souls (plants), sensitive souls (animals), and rational souls (persons).
Our host has argued for why the intellect must be immaterial and it then follows that the rational soul survives the death of its body.
"There is nothing wrong with the analogy. It answers your question "how would this even work?" and shows your prior assertion is shallow and broken."
DeleteNope. The analogy itself is "shallow and broken", as it lacks the main feature which my question addresses. Software always exists as something material, like an SSD, CD-ROM (for my generation!) or EEPROM as firmware. So the analogy only answers the question 'how does a material list of software instructions control a material computer?'. (To which the answer is: pretty easily, actually) This has nothing to do with the actual problem, which is 'how does a non-material soul influence (and be influenced by) a material brain?'
"Even when those material components are formally arranged as a computer, that hardware also cannot do anything without software."
Nor can software do anything without the hardware.
"Two computer systems may run the *exact same programme* on this hardware or that hardware. But notwithstanding the material dependency there is a not-material identity in the systems: the software."
The fact that the same software (algorithm seems more accurate) can be run on two different computers does nothing at all to prove that the software is not-material.
@ David McPike,
Delete"There is no principled (only a conventional/ architectural) distinction between software and hardware. Both must be physically instantiated and hardware is just machine-standard software."
Agreed.
"So what is 'evidence' and what are the its 'kinds' in your opinion?"
Evidence consists of facts. A fact is evidence for theory X rather than theory Y if that fact is more likely on theory X than theory Y. All the facts we have are far more likely on theory X that the mind is simply a physical process carried out by the brain, rather than theory Y that it is partly (or wholely?) carried out by an 'immaterial soul'. By 'kind', I was referring to everything from simple everyday observations such as the fact we are more likely to make mistakes when we are tired (why would an immaterial soul get tired or need sleep?); scientific observations like brain scans linking particular areas of the brain to particular functions such as facial recognition (why would these functions be localised if they are carried out by an immaterial soul? Why would the brain even be necessary at all?); and I think I was referencing philosophical arguments as well. (I can't remember clearly because my mind is an imperfect physical mechanism declining with age!)
"IOW, the material and the immaterial would have to causally interact. But what was the problem supposed to be?"
The problem of how can something immaterial causally interact with something material. Software interacts with hardware by being physical, the same as the hardware.
Hey Zoe, are you a lady Thomist?
DeleteObjecting Anon,
Delete"This has nothing to do with the actual problem, which is 'how does a non-material soul influence (and be influenced by) a material brain?'"
The immaterial causally interacts with the material in a whole as the form which organizes or determines its matter in such a way that the thing does its intended function.
Notwithstanding McPike's point about the distinction between software and hardware, I maintain that the analogy was fine for illustrating how a whole must rely on two co-principles for its operation, just as a 2-D drawing can give the impression of perspective without actually showing you a third dimension.
But if instead you want to analyse a computer system remember that the whole includes the system's architect and its user. And it will be a heavy lift for you to explain how the physical instantiations of hardware and software alone provide an objective fact of the matter as to the computer system's function.
Zoe,
Delete"The immaterial causally interacts with the material in a whole as the form which organizes or determines its matter in such a way that the thing does its intended function."
I'm sorry but this is too abstract for me.
What do you mean by "the form"?
From my perspective it is the human being who has the capacity to reason that creates the software & hardware that enables it to performs specific functions.
I don't see any need to posit an immaterial cause.
And to clarify, I'm not a reductionist materialist.
I'm having trouble understanding why one would need to posit an immaterial substance (or entity) to expain the cognitive & cogitative powers of a human being.
@anonymous:
DeleteLet's consider your example of an allegedly evidential fact: We make mistakes when tired.
Seems to me perfectly obvious that you have zero case for how that is an evidential fact that shows the mind is purely material rather than immaterial. You've just leapt to a conclusion while ignoring the entire theoretical framework that would be required to constitute your simple fact as having any evidential ramifications for the question about immateriality.
You just assume (again) that material and immaterial causal interaction is a problem. But again, you entirely omit to spell out any theoretical elaboration of the nature of material and immaterial causality such that it would be intelligible why such causal interaction would (or would not!) be problematic.
Hal,
Delete"What do you mean by "the form"?"
Form is one half of the compound that ALL material entities are composed of. See hylemorphism. Humans aren't just composed of matter because matter without form doesn't exist as a separate entity in a physical world and neither does form without matter. Both co-exist together in one entity (a substance). All matter has a form, and the human form is a special instance that includes an immaterial intellect. There is no interaction problem because there isn't 2 different entities, rather there are 2 principles (form and matter) that co-exist in 1 entity.
Great post. Also pertinent: Augustine, De Trinitate, Book 12, Chapter 9.
ReplyDeleteThe moral outlook of liberal individualism is simply 'nihil ultra ego' - nothing beyond self.
ReplyDeleteWCB
DeleteNo. There are other persons. And the environment. And the culture or subculture one creates.
WCB
WCB
Prof. Feser, you would do well to familiarize yourself with Maritain's error here well done by the 20th century Argentine priest, Julio Meinvielle, in his work: Critique of Maritain's Understanding of the Human Person
ReplyDeleteCritique of Maritain's Understanding of the Human Person. It can be purchased here: https://ivepress.org/critique-of-maritains-understanding-of-the-human-person/
WCB
ReplyDeleteEzekiel 11
18 And they shall come thither, and they shall take away all the
detestable things thereof and all the abominations thereof from thence.
19 And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within
you; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give
them an heart of flesh:
20 That they may walk in my statutes, and keep mine ordinances, and
do them: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God.
See also:
Ezekiel 11:18-20, Ezekiel 36:25-7,Jeremiah 24:7,Jeremiah 32L38-41,
Hebrews 8:10-12, Hebrews 10:15-17
With the "Great Commission" of Mark 16, this applies to all humanity, not just Israelites.
Now the question is, why does not God fulfill his promises made in these verses? This would banish mush moral evil and attendant horrific suffering.
If God is the fount of all goodness, God would want to banish moral evil and it is in his power if we claim the Bible is the word of God. and if God is indeed good God would strongly want to banish moral evil as far as possible.
Nor are claims God is incomprehensible, et al a counter argument. Or that God is not part of the Universe's moral order. Such claims are simply gaps to stuff a theoretical God into that allows moral evil to flourish.
WCB
Lol. Knew you couldn't resist. Bravo.
DeleteWith the "Great Commission" of Mark 16, this applies to all humanity, not just Israelites.
DeleteThe first Gentile Peter was sent to was Cornelius in Acts 10, and he initially resisted the instruction to go to him. Paul is the apostle sent to the Gentiles, beginning in Acts 13, but even Paul was instructed to go to Israel first. And Paul makes it clear in his writings that the Old Testament promises have nothing to do with the church which is the body of Christ. Who do you think Hebrews are? Who was Ezekiel sent to?
But even ignoring that, God also says when he will do those things in the verses you quoted. Do you know when that time is? If you do, that's why God hasn't done it yet, because God doesn't break his promises. If you don't, then you probably shouldn't comment on subjects you know nothing about.
Cool story bro. What's it got to do with this post?
DeleteNothing, bro. But it was cool.
DeleteWCB
Delete@Kevin
"With the "Great Commission" of Mark 16, this applies to all humanity, not just Israelites.
"
John 3
16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
See my post above, Ezekeiel 11 et al.
WCB
Zoe,
ReplyDeleteThanks for clarifying the 'anonymous' issue. :-)
Also, thanks for presenting such a clear presentation of the Thomistic position of Aristotle's philosophy. The Wittgensteinian view that Hacker presents also draws from that Aristotelian tradition. So I do agree that a person is an individual substance with rational powers. But those rational powers can only sensibly be attributed to the person, not to a person's mind (or his brain, as the materialist would have it). Aristotle makes the same point:
"Aristotle states in his De Anima that ‘To say that the psuche is angry is as if one were to say that the psuche weaves or builds. For it is surely better not to say that the psuche pities, learns, or thinks, but that the man does these things with his psuche.’ Here Aristotle is emphasizing that pitying, learning and thinking can be sensibly attributed only to human beings, not to some principle of life that informs their body, namely the psuche (sometimes incorrectly translated as ‘soul’).” From p. 20 of Hacker’s “Philosophical Foundations of Neuroscience”.
I read the blog post you linked to and the article that Dr. Feser wrote:” Kripke, Ross, and the Immaterial Aspects of Thought” several years ago. I can’t recall the details of my disagreement with the blog post (and article) and I made no comment when it was posted because I didn’t learn about it till much later. However, I think they mainly stem from having differing views on the nature of word meaning.
It’s unfortunate that James Ross chose Kripke’s interpretation of Wittgenstein’s position on following rules to support his argument. Most Wittgensteinians find it to be mistaken. Hacker and Baker wrote a detailed paper critiquing Kripke’s view:
On Misunderstanding Wittgenstein
I believe we might also have a disagreement regarding what a power is. As I understand it a power is the existence of a possiblility. For example, if I know how to drive a car and I live near San Francisco it is possible for me to visit that city. I can have that power even though I never actualize it. Having a power does not imply it will ever be used.
Also, as I’m sure you realize, it can be quite difficult to understand Aristotlle’s views. There is often disagreement over it. And even fellow Catholics did not agree with Aquinas’ use of Aristotle during and after his writing of the Summa. One of the sticking points was whether or not Aristotle could effectively support the Christian view that individual sould survived a person’s death. I base this on Stephen Gaukroger’s book :
The Emergence of a Scientific Culture: Science and the Shaping of Modernity 1210-1685
I don’t know if all of this will fit in one post. Anyways, I hope it helps to give you a little better understading of my views on this. Even with these differences it seems to me that we do agree on much regarding the nature of a human being. Especially in comparison with the materialist veiw that is unfortunately so common these days.
"Here Aristotle is emphasizing that pitying, learning and thinking can be sensibly attributed only to human beings, not to some principle of life that informs their body, namely the psuche”
DeleteIt is indeed correct that when the form "human" informs a body so as to make a man, it is "the man" that thinks, feels, senses, etc. Apart from being a real, individuated being, the form "human" can do none of these, and when you have a form/body union making the man, it is the man who acts. However: if you shove the man off a roof, he falls not in virtue of his human form being "human", but in virtue of his body being subject to physical laws. And if he thinks "triangle" as a universal, he may require the assistance of the imagination and an individual phantasm, but the conceived thought as act is primarily in virtue of a faculty whose proper act is not in response to physical laws, but logical ones (and the like) - i.e. non-material laws.
But it is equally true that it is NOT the case that "to be an individual person" means to be a form/matter union: neither God nor angels are bodily beings. So it is not in virtue of being bodily that they can do things like think and act.
Once a human being is real, i.e. is a form informing body to become a soul / body union, that soul is (a) individual by reason of the matter , and (b) non-mortal, by reason of its capacity to understand abstract truth, universals, immaterial being, etc. Hence it can persist after death. The question of how it can act after death is secondary to the prime point that it can persist.
(So far as I know), there is nothing that forbids us from proposing that because the soul of a human (unlike an angel) does not act independent of the body, the separated soul (rather: the person whose existence is (temporarily) constrained to an imperfect piecemeal existence as a separated soul) but who retains his ordination toward a body cannot act in the normal manner. However, if God supplies the defects, the separated soul (person) CAN act by thinking and willing, which operations (and their faculties) are not per se material kinds of acts. If the the person so existing "acts" by thinking, it is the "person" acting just as much as when he was normally alive, in virtue of the faculties of his soul and the (supplied) assistance of God.
(sometimes incorrectly translated as ‘soul’)
Since psuche is a Greek word, using it here is pointless without some kind of a translation. If "soul" is not the best translation, then please supply a better one. Until then, I am willing to accept that whatever I have said about "soul" might be better said about X, but that doesn't necessarily undermine my point.
@ Tony,
Delete"Once a human being is real, i.e. is a form informing body to become a soul / body union, that soul is (a) individual by reason of the matter , and (b) non-mortal, by reason of its capacity to understand abstract truth, universals, immaterial being, etc. Hence it can persist after death. The question of how it can act after death is secondary to the prime point that it can persist."
The fact that we are able (when we are old enough, when we have learned enough, and assuming we aren't affected by Alzheimer's or other brain diseases, by the way) to "understand abstract truth" doesn't prove that the ability to do so is itself somehow abstract or non-material. I can understand that a triangle (oh noes, not triangles again!) has three sides because human beings have invented the laws of geometry which state that a triangle has three sides. That is just a fact. Why can't I think about the fact that a triangle has three sides using material brain functions in which the firing of particular neurons corresponds to the concept of a triangle? Claiming that such conceptualising is impossible without a non-material soul makes about as much sense as claiming that thnking about the Titanic requires a mind which sinks when it hits an iceberg.
"However, if God supplies the defects, the separated soul (person) CAN act by thinking and willing, which operations (and their faculties) are not per se material kinds of acts."
Cool story bro. It seems to me that, without a physical body (and no memories of being alive, as they are stored in my deceased brain presumably?), I wouldn't be 'me'. I'd just be an abstract 'thing' floating around conceptualising triangles and other really boring stuff. All the things that make me 'me' would be gone. Thanks but no thanks.
Tony,
Delete“Since psuche is a Greek word, using it here is pointless without some kind of a translation. If "soul" is not the best translation, then please supply a better one.”
I don’t believe Hacker intends to prohibit the use of the word “soul” in this case. He is trying to point out that one needs to distinguish the Christiian/Thomistic use from Aristotle’s.
He provides a better explanation here:
“The Aristotelian tradition, as one might expect of its originator, is inspired primarily by biological reflection. The Aristotelian concept of the psuche (a term commonly translated, somewhat misleadingly, as ‘soul’) is a biological concept, not a psychological, let alone a theological or ethical, one. The psuche is conceived to be the source of the distinctive activities of a living thing – the ‘principle’ of life that makes it the kind of being that it is. The soul, as Aristotle conceived it, is the set of potentialities the exercise of which is characteristic of the organism. Consequently, it is not only human beings that have a psuche, but all living creatures, including plants. What is distinctive about the human soul is that it incorporates not only the vegetative powers of growth, nutrition and reproduction, and the sensitive powers of perception, desire and motion, but also the uniquely human rational faculties of will and intellect. The soul is not an entity attached to the body, but is characterized, in Aristotelian jargon, as the ‘form’ of the living body. The soul stands to the body of a human being roughly as the power of sight stands to the eye. The powers of a thing cannot survive the death of the thing itself. However, Aristotle equivocated, sometimes arguing that the rational soul, in particular the capacity to reflect on necessary truths (later denominated ‘the agent intellect’), is itself immortal. This, not obviously coherent idea, was to be the handle that Aquinas seized in order to accommodate Aristotelian philosophy to Christian doctrine.
(The quote is from page 22 of his book Human Nature: The Categorical Framework. Here is a LINK to a Google sample of that book.
I will try to address some of the other points you make in your post later. Thanks for taking the time to so clearly express your position.
Hal,
DeleteI'm really not at all familiar with the Wittgensteinian view; thank you for allowing me to download Hacker and Baker's paper.
It's clear to me too that we mostly agree, and I'm happy for that. But until I've properly digested On Misunderstanding Wittgenstein I don't think I can add much more to refining our seemingly narrow dispute. For what it's worth, I read Tony's comment and think he's spot-on. I'm looking forward to learning from your exchange.
Objecting Anon,
Delete“The fact that we are able (when we are old enough, when we have learned enough, and assuming we aren't affected by Alzheimer's or other brain diseases, by the way) to "understand abstract truth" doesn't prove that the ability to do so is itself somehow abstract or non-material.”
No, the argument is that some thinking is determinate in a way no physical process can be.
And while it is easy for you to assert that you can understand or apply formal concepts with only material brain functions you owe us an explanation as to *how* you can do this. This is not so easy, and I seriously doubt that you can manage it without sleepwalking into the homunculus problem.
DeleteEdward Feser
@FeserEdward
Twitter physicists: “In a tweet or two, can you give me some quick remedial lessons in metaphysics and philosophy of science so I can cobble together a rationalization for those drive-by tweets in which I dismissed your field in a way that revealed I didn’t really know what I was talking about? Thanks!”
To the Twitter Physicists : All astrophysics is ultimately about metaphysics,
"Claiming that such conceptualising is impossible without a non-material soul makes about as much sense as claiming that thnking about the Titanic requires a mind which sinks when it hits an iceberg."
DeleteThat analogy makes as much sense as thinking that the Titanic will only sink if I think it is sinking with my sinking thinking material brain.
Tony,
DeleteYou wrote:
"It is indeed correct that when the form "human" informs a body so as to make a man, it is "the man" that thinks, feels, senses, etc. Apart from being a real, individuated being, the form "human" can do none of these, and when you have a form/body union making the man, it is the man who acts. However: if you shove the man off a roof, he falls not in virtue of his human form being "human", but in virtue of his body being subject to physical laws."
A human being is a kind of animal. All animals are subject to physical laws. But a bird pushed off a roof does not fall, it flies. A human would fall. That is because birds and humans are different kinds of animals. They have different corporeal powers. So I don't see why you would deny that it is due to his 'human form' that he falls when pushed off the roof just as it is due to his 'human form' that he is able to act for a reason. I would consider his falling to be a passive power.
Just as there are different corporeal powers between kinds of animals there are differing psychological powers. We attribute all of these powers on the basis of their behavior, they are logical criteria of identity. For example, when we see a human solving a complex math problem we are justifed in asserting that his mathematical skills are great. Conjecturing about what goes on in his mind is irrelevant.
You also wrote:
"And if he thinks "triangle" as a universal, he may require the assistance of the imagination and an individual phantasm, but the conceived thought as act is primarily in virtue of a faculty whose proper act is not in response to physical laws, but logical ones (and the like) - i.e. non-material laws "
To have a concept such as TRIANGLE is to know how to use the word "triangle". It is only because we have the faculty of language that we can attribute concept possession to human beings.
I think it is misconceived to posit these powers as an entity that that can exist without the human being. This goes back to the observation I made in an earlier post: The word 'mind' and the word 'soul' are façons de parler. They don't refer to an entity such as the brain or an immaterial soul. They are used to talk about the mental and moral powers of a human being. That being the case, it makes no sense to talk about the mind interacting with the body whether one conceives of the mind as an immaterial entity (such as the soul) or a material entity (such as the brain).
Zoe,
Delete"I don't think I can add much more to refining our seemingly narrow dispute. "
No problem. These are complex conceptual issues. It is informative and interesting to share these different perspectives. They can also be helpful in learning weaknesses or problems with ones own views.
The biggest problem with these online discussions is that we miss out on the body language that is exhibited in face to face discussions. That exacerbates the chance for misunderstanding one another.
Also, you should be aware there is a great deal of differing views regarding Wittgenstein's philosophy. This is partly due to the big differences between his early and later philosophical views. I tend to favor the British vs the American views of his philosophy. So I find myself strongly disagreeing with Quine,, Kripke, Searle and Dennett. While I favor Hacker, Bede Rundle, Severin Schroeder, Hans-Johann Glock and G. E. M. Anscombe.
"I think it is misconceived to posit these powers as an entity that that can exist without the human being."
DeleteYes.
"This goes back to the observation I made in an earlier post: The word 'mind' and the word 'soul' are façons de parler."
No, except inasmuch as all words, as such, are such. (What else could a 'word' be but a 'façon de parler'?) But then again, a 'façon de parler' is not just a 'façon de parler'; it actually means something, and not just whatever any inept language user mistakenly takes it to mean. Same goes for 'mind' and 'soul.'
"They don't refer to an entity such as the brain or an immaterial soul."
That depends on how they are used. They might well be used (rightly or wrongly, justifiedly or ineptly) to refer to such things.
"They are used to talk about the mental and moral powers of a human being."
They might be, but not necessarily exclusively those.
"That being the case, it makes no sense to talk about the mind interacting with the body whether one conceives of the mind as an immaterial entity (such as the soul) or a material entity (such as the brain)."
Why not? Why can't mental and moral powers interact with the body?
To have a concept such as TRIANGLE is to know how to use the word "triangle". It is only because we have the faculty of language that we can attribute concept possession to human beings.
DeleteI think it is misconceived to posit these powers as an entity that that can exist without the human being.
As I tried to clarify, I posit that these powers do not "exist without the human being". They are not self-existent free-floating "powers", they are indeed powers of one single human being. That human being persists in existence after the body is too injured to sustain life, because the powers are powers that imply non-material functioning - their act is spiritual act. Thus, because the human person persists, the powers do not become free-floating existents, they remain powers OF a human person.
It's just that the human person in that condition is incomplete, and cannot operate fully. The form that came into real existence as in terms of the real human being, being a form-and-matter composite, required matter in order to be determinate and thus individuated. Once it has been so, it is individual and remains so even when the body is too injured to sustain life.
Thus we might loosely speak as if the person's soul is a free-floating "entity" in that condition, but that's just improper jargon: what exists is the person, an individual whose form (an aspect of him) is ordered toward a body, and without the body cannot be considered the whole of an entity.
David,
DeleteI agree with all of your statements on my earlier post.
As to your question: "Why can't mental and moral powers interact with the body?"
Would you mind providing some examples of these powers interacting with the body?
Thanks much.
How about reading plans and building a piece of furniture. Or gathering seeds and planting them and growing a crop. Or thinking a thought, typing it out, then clicking the PUBLISH button.
DeleteTony,
Delete“It's just that the human person in that condition is incomplete, and cannot operate fully. The form that came into real existence as in terms of the real human being, being a form-and-matter composite, required matter in order to be determinate and thus individuated. Once it has been so, it is individual and remains so even when the body is too injured to sustain life.”
Not sure why you say ‘real existence’ and ‘real human being’ and not simply ‘existence’ and ‘human being’.
In any case, I don’t understand how a human being can be individuated and exist without a body. I agree that a human being having suffered some injury or disease which makes him incapable of employing his corporeal powers can still have the capacity to use his mental powers. But I don’t see how those powers could continue free of a living body.
I believe my conception of the mind is much closer to the Thomistic one than to a Cartesian or a materialism conception. It is interesting and enlightening to discuss these similarities and differences. Thanks for helping to make this a civil discussion.
FYI, here is Hacker’s summary of the conception of the mind he presents in his book “Human Nature: The Categorial Framework”:
Not a substance
Neither identical with the human body, nor distinct from the human body; i.e. the questions of sameness and difference
makes no sense
Not a part of a human being
Informs the living organism, but is not ‘embodied’ in it
To possess a mind is to have an array of powers of intellect and will.
The distinctive powers of the mind are all linked to responsiveness to reasons.
Excludes sensation, perception, fantasia and appetite
Not an agent
Does not stand in a causal relationship to the body
Not a subject of psychological attributes, acts or activities
Not essentially private
Not essentially transparent
The intellect and the will, and their actualization in thought and action, are not essentially indubitable to the subject.
David,
Delete“How about reading plans and building a piece of furniture. Or gathering seeds and planting them and growing a crop. Or thinking a thought, typing it out, then clicking the PUBLISH button.”
I agree that those are some of the powers that a human being has. Using those powers the human being as an agent in this world can interact with a patient: he can read a blueprint, he can use other substances to build furniture, plant seeds, type, etc.
But I don’t think those powers are interacting with the human body. I don’t conceive of powers as agents. That appears to be a reification of powers.
Okay, then how about some different examples: cutting your toenails, getting a tattoo, looking at yourself in a mirror, thinking about your own death and what will happen to 'you' and your various powers thereafter.
DeleteI'll add, I think you do conceive of powers as agents (of a sort), but for some reason you don't want to admit it. Something to do with a fear of reifying powers, as if admitting that powers are a kind of agent implies 'reification,' which in your view would be absurd (but it's really not: 'reification' is just a word, and we are free to use (conceive) it in perfectly sensible, non-absurd ways if we choose).
DeleteThe distinctive powers of the mind are all linked to responsiveness to reasons.
DeleteExcludes sensation, perception, fantasia and appetite
Not an agent
Does not stand in a causal relationship to the body
Not a subject of psychological attributes, acts or activities
I do not think that "does not stand in a causal relationship to the body" works at all: Aristotle's point is that the soul stands in a causal relationship to the body, i.e. FORMAL cause. Granted, the mind is not identical to "the form" simply speaking. But to go further: when the mind apprehends a good, and the will chooses the good and commands action toward that good, the body responds with an outward activity that manifests (and is dependent on) the will's act of choice and the mind's act of apprehension. And will is, per se, the intellective appetite, able to will that which is understood by the mind as good.
I don't know how to fit in "not a subject of psychological attributes" in, if the mind is, per se, that whereby we know: isn't "a knower of X" a psychological attribute? Sure, you can posit that it is the person who knows X, but he knows it in virtue of his mind, not in virtue of his big toe (you can cut off his toe, and he will still be a knower of X), or his appetite for food, or his sense of hearing. At least in some real sense, the toe can be "the subject" of an infection, the appetite for food can be the subject of satiety, and the mind the subject of "knowing X".
not a part of a human being
Well, it is a facet of being a human, and while it is not a locable part, it is a part insofar as it is an inherent aspect of a human being that makes him to be human specifically. The form that informs matter to make the form/matter composite is, certainly, "part" of the composite - just not "part" in the manner which matter can have parts. And it is "causal" to the body in the sense that form is act to prime matter, though not in agent cause sense. (As matter is causal to the substance in the manner of material cause, not agent cause).
I suspect that your beef with Aristotle is more with respect to the form/matter issue, than with mind/body, because most of the points above relate to results that Aristotle derives from the soul being the form of the substantial being, and the idea that the form of a man entails intellectual powers. St. Thomas brings to that the fact - from revelation - that intellectual powers can be in an individual subsistence WITHOUT body, thus implying that being an individual subsistence does not necessarily depend on matter.
David and Anonymous,
DeleteThanks much for your replies. I think they are very helpful in clarifying the conceptual differences between a Wittgensteinian conception of the mind (or soul) and a Thomistic/Aristotelian conception.
I should be able to respond to each of your posts later today.
Here is a short selection from the chapter on Powers in Hackers’ book on Human Nature that hopefully will help to give you a better understanding of my conceptions regarding them:
"1. Possibility
Since substances are agents, they can do things and act on other things. The first-order powers of agents are their abilities to do things and to bring about (sustain or prevent) change, on the one hand, and their liabilities to change or to resist change, on the other. The philosophical investigation of such powers of substances in general and of human beings in particular is an investigation into the concepts and conceptual relationships pertaining to their potentialities (and lack of potentialities) for doing and undergoing things.
We distinguish the actuality of possibilities (‘existential possibility’) from the possibility of actualities (‘problematic possibility’).1 The linguistic forms that pick out the actuality of a possibility are ‘It is possible to . . .’, ‘It is possible for . . .’ and ‘It is possible that A should
. . .’ (i.e. ‘possible that . . .’ followed by a subjunctive). The characteristic form appropriate to discourse concerning the possibility of an actuality is ‘It is possible that . . .’ followed by an indicative. So, for example, ‘It is possible that she is in London today’ asserts the possibility of an actuality, whereas ‘It is possible for her to be in London today’ asserts the actuality of a possibility. The two quite different kinds of statement are differently tensed. When discussing what can or could be done or befall, we tense the possibility: ‘It is, was, will be, would be, would have been, possible to . . . (for . . . , that A should . . . ).’ By contrast, when discussing what may be or may have been so, we tense that which is possible: ‘It is possible that A did V, is V- ing, will V.’ So we can say that it was once possible for A to V, but it no longer is (the opportunity having been missed), but we cannot say that it was once possible that A did V, but no longer is. Rather, we assert that it once seemed possible that A did V, but now that possibility can be excluded. The possibility of an actuality implies the actuality of the corresponding possibility, but that a certain possibility exists does not imply that it is possible that it is, was, or will be actualized (see table 4.1).
A possibility that is actual may itself be a logical, physical, technical, psychological, economic, moral or legal possibility (and doubtless others too) – depending on which aspects or features of a situation are taken into account. What is logically possible is what makes sense. A logical impossibility, as we have noted, is not a possibility that is impossible. It does not exclude anything other than a form of words – which is excluded as lacking any sense. What is physically possible is what is consistent with the laws of nature and the intrinsic natures of things. What is physically impossible is what is inconsistent with the laws of nature or beyond the physical powers of things. It is therefore not logically impossible, for the description of what is physically impossible makes sense – it describes a (logical) possibility that is not, as a matter of fact, available to a substance, including such substances as human beings, due to limitations on their physical powers. What are technically possible are courses of action made available by existing skills, techniques and machines. What is psychologically possible is what a person can bring himself to do in the face of his revulsions, terrors, compulsive neuroses, etc. What is legally possible for a legal subject is what he is empowered or permitted by law to do."
Anonymous,
Delete“I do not think that "does not stand in a causal relationship to the body" works at all.”
If you conceive of the mind as an entity then of course a causal relationship between the mind and body makes sense. But I don’t share that concept. Cartesians and Materialists conceive of the mind as an etity: a mental substance for Cartesians, the brain for Materialists. Even if Aristotle should share that same conception, I would find fault with it. There are similarities between Wittgenstein’s and Aristotle’s views but I am basically coming from a Wittgensteinian perspective on these issues.
“I don't know how to fit in "not a subject of psychological attributes" in, if the mind is, per se, that whereby we know: isn't "a knower of X" a psychological attribute? Sure, you can posit that it is the person who knows X, but he knows it in virtue of his mind,…”
We attribute it to the human being because it is the human being who has the capacity to reason and to acquire new knowledge. It is like having a skill. Skills are not entities. Nor are they parts of a human being.
@ Zoe,
Delete"No, the argument is that some thinking is determinate in a way no physical process can be."
That isn't an argument, it's just a claim. Physical processes are determinate (unless you're referring to quantum mechanics?), whereas non-physical processes (whatever they are) seem to have whatever characteristics you claim them to have in order to avoid facing up to the fact that you are going to die and no longer exist at all.
"And while it is easy for you to assert that you can understand or apply formal concepts with only material brain functions you owe us an explanation as to *how* you can do this."
The answer is: using material brain functions. This gives as much explanatory detail as 'using non-material soul functions', with the added advantage of appealing only to things which we know exist.
"That isn't an argument, it's just a claim."
DeleteWell, that depends what you mean by 'argument' (vs. 'claim'), doesn't it? You can go ahead and say (or type), "That isn't an argument," which will involve a physical process, but what "That isn't an argument" means is not determined by (or semantically determinate as a function of) just that physical process, is it?
Note that Zoe's claim, "some thinking is determinate in a way that no physical process can be," could well be complemented by the claim "some (or rather: all) thinking is indeterminate in a way that no physical process can be."
@ David McPike,
Delete"Well, that depends what you mean by 'argument' (vs. 'claim'), doesn't it?"
An argument is a claim supported by reasons and/or evidence. A claim is an unsupported assertion. There's no 'because of reason X or evidence Y' in zoe's sentence. Maybe it's a form of argument which assumes an awareness of background information?
"what "That isn't an argument" means is not determined by (or semantically determinate as a function of) just that physical process, is it?"
No, it's determined by other physical processes such as the operation of human brains. Your argument could be applied to any language, such as birdsong—do birds require non-physical minds because nothing about the meaning of a particular birdsong is determined by the sound of the birdsong itself?
If you conceive of the mind as an entity then of course a causal relationship between the mind and body makes sense. But I don’t share that concept. Cartesians and Materialists conceive of the mind as an etity: a mental substance for Cartesians, the brain for Materialists. Even if Aristotle should share that same conception, I would find fault with it. There are similarities between Wittgenstein’s and Aristotle’s views but I am basically coming from a Wittgensteinian perspective on these issues.
DeleteYou still don't seem to be addressing the point: the form is to the substance as formal cause. And it stands as formal cause by its being the form of the matter. This is not in the nature of an agent cause acting on an independent entity, and thus it has nothing of the Cartesian or materialist sort of duality issue. If you stop conceiving of the form as an entity, you can avoid an "agent"ness of forms.
The mind (in a human) is not congruent with "the soul", and so it is not to be equated simply as such with "the form of the substance". The soul of a human imparts sense faculties to the substance, and it would be silly to assert of the mind that it has (or imparts) sense faculties.
But the intellectual aspect (in re the intellectual appetite) of the person DOES stand in the nature of a cause of action carried out bodily, by commanding action toward some end. It should not be conceived as a separate entity (sitting inside the skull) pushing levers to "make" the body act, it causes the body to move in the manner of will, commanding. That is a distinctive capacity to act. It would be just as foolish to deny this is a kind of causality, as it would to deny that the foot "moves" because the leg moves it (under a different mode of "moves" than the will moving the leg). Yes, "the person" kicks the ball, but so does the foot, and the leg, and the will, in distinct senses.
Tony,
DeleteI don't conceive of either the mind or soul as entities. And as I've already mentioned, the human being (like other animals) has the power of self-movement.
None of the powers of a human being are entities or substances. Nor are they agents. it is the human being who is the agent using his intellectual powers that can decide when and how to move or refrain from moving.
Powers are not themselves agents, but rather the potencies of agents.
That is why when the human being dies, all of his powers (potentialities for acting and thinking and feeling, etc.) die with him.
"Maybe it's a form of argument which assumes an awareness of background information?"
DeleteThat's the only form of argument.
"No, it's determined by other physical processes such as the operation of human brains."
That isn't an argument (or is it?), it's a claim. Right? No, it is an argument, an argument in the mode of petitio principii (something, n.b., that can't be accomplished in the non-rational medium of bird song).
"The Aristotelian concept of the psuche (a term commonly translated, somewhat misleadingly, as ‘soul’) is a biological concept, not a psychological, let alone a theological or ethical, one."
ReplyDeleteI will just say that that is a rather brutal misreading of Aristotle (with all due respect to Hacker). In reality Aristotle's soul (psuche) is a biological concept, as well as a psychological (duh!), theological, and ethical, one.
David,
ReplyDelete“Okay, then how about some different examples: cutting your toenails, getting a tattoo, looking at yourself in a mirror, thinking about your own death and what will happen to 'you' and your various powers thereafter.”
In all of your examples I would answer: it is the human being. Humans have the capacity of self-movement and to make plans and think thoughts. The human being is the agent. He can cut his toenails, go to get a tatoo, look at himself in the mirror, think about his own death.
When he is at the tattoo parlor it is the tattoo artist who is the agent acting on the patient when he tattoos him.
Regarding the reification of powers:
“A third kind of confusion is to reify powers. It was a confusion of alchemists to suppose that they could get the powers of one substance to migrate to another, as if the powers of a thing were ingredients that could be distilled and then transferred. If one thinks of powers as being kinds of things, then one will be prone to view the relation between a power and its actualization as a causal, rather than a logical, relation, as if the power of an agent to V could make the agent V. It is instructive to learn that opium has the power to put people to sleep, but, as Molière mocked, foolish to explain why or how opium puts people to sleep by reference to its power to do so. The reification of powers is particularly rife in faculty psychology, in which the actions of sentient agents are attributed to their faculties. Locke noted that although understanding and the will are two faculties of the mind, one must not suppose these words ‘to stand for some real Beings in the Soul, that performed those Actions of Understanding and Volition. . . . this way of Speaking of Faculties, has misled many into a confused Notion of so many distinct Agents in us, which had their several Provinces and Authorities, and did command, obey, and perform several Actions, as so many distinct Beings.’ And he warned wisely that ‘if it be reasonable to suppose and talk of Faculties, as distinct Beings, that can act . . . ’tis fit that we should make a speaking Faculty, and a walking Faculty, and a dancing Faculty, by which those Actions are produced . . . ’. The dangers against which Locke warned have not disappeared, and distinguished thinkers still succumb to these confusions. “(From the chapter on Powers in Hacker’s “Human Nature”)
David,
DeleteI'm sorry I failed to paste the rest of the quote from Hacker's book. Here it is:
"The dangers against which Locke warned have not disappeared, and distinguished thinkers still succumb to these confusions.
‘This way of talking’, as Locke noted in 1690, ‘nevertheless, has pre- vailed, and, as I guess, produced great confusion.’ Nowhere does it produce more confusion than in attributing powers to the mind and conceiving of the mind as the agent that exercises the distinctively human powers of intellect and will.
Powers are not themselves agents, but rather the potencies of agents. The possessor of the power to V is the agent that has the ability to V."
So if you want to say the human being as such has the power to cut toenails, what about a human being who lacks that power ('the actuality of that possibility,' if you want to get turgid about it), for any number of reasons?
DeleteDavid,
DeleteThanks for the question.
Our talk of the powers of a human being involves describing the normal powers of a healty human. That is we are clarifying or explaining the concept HUMAN.
That does not entail that evey indiviual human will have those powers. Humans are living beings that can suffer loss of their powers due to injury or disease or the normal process of aging. Sometimes external circumstances with prevent the actualization of a normal power.
Inanimate substances can also lose some of their powers due to damage from other agents.
Human beings can suffer loss of their powers with suffering a loss of their very 'human being.' So their powers cannot simply depend on their 'human being' as such. Powers evidently depend on some particular 'thing' which contingently belongs to the human being. In other words, explaining powers requires a kind of 'reification' of those powers.
DeleteDavid,
Delete"Human beings can suffer loss of their powers with suffering a loss of their very 'human being.'"
I disagree. Being a disabled human or a blind human does not change the fact that they are still human beings Being a living substance it is part of the nature of human being to suffer impairment to many of their faculties due to aging.
Pehaps I'm simply misunderstanding your position. But I can't see any reason for reifying a power in this case.
As to your point regarding what a power depends on, I take it you mean the power's vehicle. Hacker discusses it in his chapter on Powers:
"It is often useful to distinguish between a power and its vehicle. The vehicle of a power, if it has one, is the ingredient, constitutive matter, form or structure in virtue of which the substance that has the power to V can V. In some cases, how the substance V’s is explained by reference to the operation of its vehicle. The vehicle of a power is an actuality, not a potentiality. It is something that can, for example, be weighed (in certain cases) or its dimensions measured (in others). The vehicles of the powers of many stuffs are ingredients. So, for example, the vehicle of the power of whisky to intoxicate is the alcohol that is one of its ingredients, the vehicle of the power of hemlock to poison is coniine, and the vehicle of the power of fresh lime juice to prevent scurvy is vitamin C (ascorbic acid). Adequate knowledge of physiology and neurophysiology will explain the operation of molecules of C2H5OH on the relevant parts of the brain that renders the whisky-drinker drunk, just as physiological and chemical theory will explain the operation of 2n-propylpiperidine in poisoning anyone who drinks hemlock, or the operation of ascorbic acid in the prevention or cure of scurvy. But note that the distinction between the possessor of a power and the vehicle of the power cannot be drawn with reference to the intoxicative power of alcohol itself or to the poisonousness of coniine, or to the curative power of vitamin C. Nevertheless, the distinction is clear and important in discourse concerning medicines, drugs and foodstuffs, where we wish to know the so-called active ingredient in the substance or partition of stuff."
Above first sentence shd read:
DeleteHuman beings can suffer loss of their powers without suffering a loss of their very 'human being.'
Thanks for the correction. I certainly agree with this.
DeleteAm still having difficulty understanding why that would entail the reification of a human's powers.
David,
DeleteJust adding more from Hacker’s explanation regarding the distinction to be made regarding powers and their vehicles:
Once the distinction between power and vehicle is drawn, the error of yet another form of reductionism is readily exposed. Central state materialism was prone to reduce a power to its vehicle, and to think of a power, thus reduced, as the cause of its actualization or manifestation. Thus it has been argued that:
“. . . to speak of an object’s having a dispositional property entails that the object is in some non-dispositional state or that it has some property (there exists a ‘categorical basis’) which is responsible for the object manifesting certain behaviour in certain circumstances . . . if brittleness can be identified with an actual state of the glass, then we can think of it as a cause, or, more vaguely, a causal factor, in the process that brings about the breaking. Dispositions are seen to be states that actually stand behind their manifestations. It is simply that the states are identified in terms of their manifestations in suitable conditions, rather than in terms of their intrinsic nature. Our argument for a ‘Realist’ account of dispositions can equally be applied to capacities and powers. They, too, must be conceived of as states of the object that has the capacity or power.” (D. M. Armstrong, "A Materialist Theory of the Mind")
This form of reductionism, as Anthony Kenny pointed out, is no less misconceived than Megarian and Humean reduction of powers to their exercise. It is striking how much more tempting vehicle reductionism appears to be at the micro-level of molecular, atomic and ionic theory than it is at the gross level of observable mechanisms. No one would identify the horsepower of the car with the state of its engine. Nor would anyone look for its horsepower under its bonnet, save in jest. But many are prone to identify powers of stuffs, things and of animals (including humans) with the molecular structure of their ingredients, constituents or parts. (Materialist philosophers and cognitive neuroscientists are particularly prone to identify psychological and intellectual powers – such as knowledge or memory – with neural structures.) But this is confused. Although many powers may indeed have a ‘categorical basis’ in their vehicle, nevertheless the potency is distinct from, and not reducible to, the structure or form of the vehicle. One and the same power, in different artefacts (e.g. in different computers or calculators operating with different systems, or in clockwork and electronic watches), may have an entirely different vehicle or categorical basis. If the powers were reducibleto their vehicles, they could not be identical – but they often are. The possibility of a substance’s V-ing cannot be reduced to what makes it possible for the substance to V, but only explained by reference to it.
You can reify vehicles, but you can't reify corresponding powers? That seems entirely ad hoc. If you have reified the vehicles, then you have reified the corresponding powers (and this has nothing to do with the separate issue of reduction).
DeleteDavid,
DeleteI'm not sure I understand how one can reify a vehicle. Generally the vehicles of the powers of a substance are a part of the substance. For example the parts (the spring and gears) of a mechanical watch give it the power to keep track of time.
As I posted above (quoting Hacker):
"It (the vehicle) is something that can, for example, be weighed (in certain cases) or its dimensions measured (in others). The vehicles of the powers of many stuffs are ingredients."
It is already something concrete.
How can you reify that?
A power of a substance is a potentiality that can be actualized. A substance can lose some of its powers and still continue to exist. A power cannot exist without the substance it is a power of.
'Reify' means 'thingify,' i.e., regard as a thing. Obviously the parts of a substance are things, res, so yes you are reifying the vehicles of powers when you regard parts of the substance as vehicles of powers, and you are not treating powers merely and simply as powers of the substance as such. You, however, seem to be assuming that reification means treating some thing that is not a thing as if it were a thing, i.e., treating reification as intrinsically nonsensical. If you want to think about reification that way, I guess there's not much to discuss.
DeleteDavid,
Delete“ 'Reify' means 'thingify,' i.e., regard as a thing.”
‘Reify’ (or ‘thingify’) also means ‘to convert into a thing’,
We agree that substances and their parts are things. So there is, in my view, no problem regarding some of those parts as vehicles of powers. These vehicles are things.
A power (a potentiality that can be actualized) is not a thing. So, for example, the power of sight is not a thing. It is the veicle of that power (the eyes and connected neural tissue) that are things. If that vehicle is destroyed the power of sight is lost.
To reify a power is treating something that is not a thing as if it were a thing. That is why I reject the view that the powers of a substance (including the cognitive & cogitative powers) can exist as things after the death of a human being.
David,
Delete"...you are not treating powers merely and simply as powers of the substance as such. "
Not sure I understand what you mean here.
I think it a mistake to reduce a power to its vehicle. That is identifying the power with its vehicle.
The vehicle for the power of measuring time is different in a mechanical watch from that in an Apple Watch. But the Apple Watch and the mechanical watch can be said to have the same power: to track time.
Distinguishing a power from its vehicle does not negate the fact that it is a power of a substance. It is still true that an Apple Watch or a Mechanical watch have the power to keep track of time.
Here's a bit of a smartass question, then, Hal: So what is your criterion for judging that some 'thing' (e.g., a power) is not really a 'thing'?
DeleteMy problem is I can't see that your (and Hacker's) distinctions between 'things that can be reified' and 'things that can't be reified' are based on anything other than ad hoc assertion.
David,
Delete"So what is your criterion for judging that some 'thing' (e.g., a power) is not really a 'thing'?"
The word "thing" has many uses. It can be used to refer to physical objects as well as abstract objects.
Our rather long discussion has revolved around substances and their powers. Substances are material things: space-occupying, spatio-temporal continuants. So in the context of this discussion a “thing” is a substance.
To reify a power would amount to treating it as another kind of substance and that is a conceptual error that leads to the nonsensical view that the power itself is an agent.
Perehaps our differences regarding reification are a result of differing conceptions of substances. You apparently agree with me that agents who have these powers are substances but wish to also include their powers in that category.
Do you believe the power of a substance is also a substance?
------------------------------------------------------------------
"My problem is I can't see that your (and Hacker's) distinctions between 'things that can be reified' and 'things that can't be reified' are based on anything other than ad hoc assertion."
I’ve not claimed that powers can’t be reified. In fact I pointed out earlier that it is not uncommon for philosophers to reify them.
My claim is that it is a misconception to reify them. In the same way, it is a misconception to reduce them to their vehicles
As I stated above, to reify a power would be to treat it as a substance but it does not meet the criteria we normally apply to identifying substances. Substances are material things that are spatio-temporal continuants.
So you think you can reify substances, because 'reify' really means 'substantify.' Well! That settles the question, if that's what 'reify' means. But it doesn't. As you noted, 'thing' can mean different 'things,' i.e., not just substance. You then assert that in the context of this discussion 'thing' means 'substance,' but that is entirely ad hoc. I certainly do not think that the powers of substances are also substances. The point is rather that the powers of substances are real accidents of substances. If powers were identical in being to the essence of the substances of which they are the powers, then the being of the substance would be inseparable from the being of the power. But modus tollens, therefore...
DeleteDavid,
Delete"So you think you can reify substances, because 'reify' really means 'substantify.' "
Where did I say that?
I said that a power is not a substance. To reify it is to treat it as a substance. That is a conceptual mistake.
"I certainly do not think that the powers of substances are also substances."
Well, at least we are in agreement on that.
But then I don't understand why you think that I was mistaken in pointing out that powers shouldn't be reified.
David,
Delete“If powers were identical in being to the essence of the substances of which they are the powers, then the being of the substance would be inseparable from the being of the power.”
I didn't use your thomistic terminology, but this appears to accord with what I posted earlier:
“A power of a substance is a potentiality that can be actualized. A substance can lose some of its powers and still continue to exist. A power cannot exist without the substance it is a power of.”
Maybe it would be helpful to try and focus on what areas we agree on. That might make it easier to see where the real differences are.
Right now I feel you don't understand what I am saying. I imagine you feel the same.
Cf. Studies in Political Morality, Jeremiah Newman, pp 262-271
ReplyDeleteDavid,
ReplyDelete"('the actuality of that possibility,' if you want to get turgid about it)"
LOL!
I'm not a big fan of the terminology. When I first became acquainted with the terms I was constantly mixing them up, confusing one for the other.
David,
ReplyDelete"You, however, seem to be assuming that reification means treating some thing that is not a thing as if it were a thing.."
Sorry, but I think this needs to be addressed.
Treating something that is not a material object as a material object is the standard usage of the term 'reify' in a philosophical discussion. I've been in numerous discussions over the years and this is the first time I've encountered someone claiming that is a misuse of the term.
The following quote is from Here
“Reification is when you think of or treat something abstract as a physical thing.
Reification is a complex idea for when you treat something immaterial — like happiness, fear, or evil — as a material thing. This can be a way of making something concrete and easier to understand, like how a wedding ring is the reification of a couple's love. However, reification is often considered a sign that someone is thinking illogically. For example, if you think of justice as something physical, you're confusing ideas and things, which can lead to problems.”
So your claim that I was reifying the parts of a substance (material things) by pointing out that those parts are a ‘vehicle of a power’ doesn’t make sense to me. I was merely describing the parts of a substance that enable it to have the power it has.
Here's Merriam-Webster: "The meaning of REIFY is to consider or represent (something abstract) as a material or concrete thing : to give definite content and form to (a concept or idea)."
Delete'Reification' is most certainly not restricted to the narrow concept of treating the abstract as a physical thing. In any case, powers are indeed real 'physical' (i.e., not merely abstract!) things. Is that a claim you would dispute??
And this: "Treating something that is not a material object as a material object is the standard usage of the term 'reify' in a philosophical discussion."
DeleteWith due respect, false. That may be one usage; it is certainly not the only one.
David,
Delete“Here's Merriam-Webster: "The meaning of REIFY is to consider or represent (something abstract) as a material or concrete thing : to give definite content and form to (a concept or idea)."”
That accords with my understanding of the term. So it looks like we have one more thing we agree on.
“'Reification' is most certainly not restricted to the narrow concept of treating the abstract as a physical thing. In any case, powers are indeed real 'physical' (i.e., not merely abstract!) things. Is that a claim you would dispute??”
Of course powers are real. They are possiblities or potentialities that can be said to exist even if they are never actualized. A possiblity (potentiality) is not a physical thing.
I’m not a materialist or physicalist. I don’t believe that the only things that can exist are mateial (or physical) things.
It is nonsensical to treat a possiblity (potentiality) as a physical thing. Can you place a possiblity (potentiality) in your pocket or weigh it or measure it’s dimensions?
David,
DeleteQuestion for you:
Do you agree that the power of a substance is a potentiality that can be actualized?
I ask because I'm getting the impression that you are using the word "power" to refer to its actualization.
The fact that a substance has a power does not imply that it will be actualized. So in this discussion I've been focused on the existence of this potentiality (possiblity).