Autor: Lonergan, Bernard J.F.

Buch: Verbum: Word and Idea in Aquinas

Titel: Verbum: Word and Idea in Aquinas

Stichwort: Identität: Erkennender - Erkanntes, actio - passio; Thomas: identity -> assimilation; intellectus possibilis (possible intellect)

Kurzinhalt: the sense in potency is unlike the sensible in potency but ...; je nach Gesichtspunkt: Potenz und Form, Immaterialität des Erkennens; immaterielle Rezeption

Textausschnitt: 264 It will be most convenient to begin from the theorem that knowing involves an identity in act of knower and known. This identity is an extension of the theorem in the Physics that affirms the identity of action and passion; one and the same real movement as from the agent is action and as in the patient is passion.1 Now in the De anima it is seen that this theorem holds no less with regard to operations (actus perfecti) than with regard to movements (actus imperfecti).2 The one operation 'sensation' is effected by the sensible object and received in the sensitive potency; as from the object, it is action; as in the subject, it is passion; thus sounding is the action of the object, and hearing the passion of the subject, and so, by the theorem of identity, sounding and hearing are not two realities but one and the same.3 (158; Fs) (notabene)

265 From this theorem Aristotle immediately deduced, first, an alternative account of sensitive empirical consciousness,4 secondly, a solution to the question whether unseen things are colored,5 and thirdly, an explanation of the fact that excessive stimuli destroy senses.6 Aquinas fails to manifest the slightest difficulty concerning this theorem in his commentary, yet rarely if ever does he employ it in his independent writings. There one may read repeatedly that 'sensibile in actu est sensus in actu, et intelligibile in actu est intellectus in actu.' But the meaning is not the original Aristotelian identity in second act7 but rather assimilation on the level of species.8 Quite probably the cause of this shift from identity to assimilation was the terminological imbroglio of 'action' to which we have referred already.9 (158f; Fs)

266 That knowing is by assimilation is a theorem offering no special difficulty. It was a matter of common consent: 'hoc enim animis omnium communiter inditum fuit, quod simile simili cognoscitur.'10 Its grounds in specifically Aristotelian theory are reached easily: as the thing is the thing it is in virtue of its form or species, so too the knowing is the ontological reality it is in virtue of its own form or species; further, unless the form of the thing and the form of the knowing were similar, there would be no ground for affirming that the knowing was knowing the thing. (159; Fs) (notabene)

267 It is a short step from a theorem of assimilation to a theorem of immaterial assimilation. If knower and known must be similar on the level of form, there is no necessity, indeed no possibility, of assimilation on the level of matter. The contrary view had been advanced by Empedocles, and against it Aristotle marshaled no less than ten arguments.11 His own view was in terms of potency and act, action and passion: the sense in potency is unlike the sensible in potency;12 but the sense in act is like the sensible object on the general ground that effects are similar to their causes;13 it followed that the senses were receptive of sensible forms without the matter natural to those forms, much as wax is receptive of the imprint of a seal without being receptive of the gold of which the seal is made.14 (159f; Fs) (notabene)

268 In human intellect immaterial assimilation reaches its fulness in immaterial reception: not only is the matter of the agent not transferred to the recipient, as the gold of the seal is not transferred to the wax; not only is the form of the agent not reproduced in matter natural to it, as in sensation; but the form of the agent object is received in a strictly immaterial potency, the possible intellect. Thus the structures of sense and intellect differ radically. The sensitive potency, such as sight, is form of the sensitive organ, the eye; just as soul is the form of the body.15 Sensation itself is the operation not merely of the organ nor merely of the potency but of the compound of organ and potency.16 Directly, the sensible object acts on the sensitive organ;17 but since matter and form, organ and potency are one, the movement of the organ immediately involves the operation of its form, the sense.18 (160; Fs) (notabene)
Kommentar (19/05/2007): da wäre ein Ansatzpunkt von Rahners Theorie ...

269 On the other hand, the possible intellect is not the form of any organ;19 it has no other nature but ability to receive;20 it stands to all intelligible forms as prime matter stands to all sensible forms;21 and precisely because it is in act none of the things to be known, it offers no subjective resistance to objective knowing.22 Thus possible intellect stands to its first act, which is science, as the sensitive organ stands to its first act, which is the sensitive potency;23 both sensation and understanding are the operations of compounds, but sensation is the operation of a material compound, while understanding is the operation of an immaterial compound; since, then, operari sequitur esse, the substantial form of man must be subsistent but the substantial form of a brute cannot be subsistent.24 (160f; Fs) (notabene)