73. The Soul as Form of the Body: Thomas's Resolution

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Lecture Notes

Main Topics #

The Central Problem #

• Understanding appears to be a non-bodily operation (immaterial and universal)
• Yet the same subject (man) both understands and performs bodily operations (sensing, walking, digesting)
• This requires explaining how a form can be united to the body while having powers transcendent of matter

The Six Objections #

1. From Aristotle on Understanding as Separated

   • Understanding is separated from the body, not an act of a body
   • Therefore the understanding principle cannot be united as form to the body

2. From Determinacy of Form

   • Every form is determined by its matter
   • Understanding must remain in potency to all intelligible things
   • Therefore the understanding cannot be form of a body

3. From Reception According to Mode of Receiver

   • Understanding is received immaterially and universally
   • Bodily reception is material and individual
   • Therefore understanding cannot be act of a body

4. From the Power Analogy

   • Intellectual action is not the action of a body
   • Therefore the intellectual power is not power of a body

5. From Subsistence of the Soul

   • The soul has being by itself (subsistent)
   • Form is that by which something is, not what is
   • Therefore the soul cannot be form of a body

6. From Incorruptibility

   • The understanding principle is incorruptible and remains when the body corrupts
   • A form cannot exist without its matter
   • Therefore the understanding principle is not form of a body

Thomas’s Central Response: The Principle of Operation #

• Foundational principle: That by which something first operates is the form and act of that thing
• Health analogy: Health is that by which the body is healthy (a form); science is that by which the soul knows (a form)
• Universal principle: Nothing acts except insofar as it is in act; that by which something is in act is that by which it acts
• Application: The soul is that by which we first live, sense, move, and understand; therefore the soul is the form of the body

The Soul’s Unique Status: Non-Immersion in Matter #

• The more noble a form, the more it dominates matter and transcends it
• The human soul is the noblest material form
• Floating body metaphor: The soul is like a body floating on water—partly in the water, partly above it
• Result: The soul can have powers (understanding, will) not exercised through bodily organs while remaining the form of the body
• Body’s participation: The body shares in the soul’s existence but does not completely absorb it

The Distinction Between Essence and Power #

• By its essence, the soul is form of the body
• By its powers, the soul has operations that transcend the body
• This distinction is possible because the soul’s existence is shared by the body but not wholly immersed in it
• Plant and animal souls, by contrast, have no independent existence apart from the body

Key Arguments #

The Argument from Shared Operations #

• Premise 1: It is the same one who senses and walks and understands
• Premise 2: Sensing requires bodily organs; understanding does not
• Premise 3: If the soul were merely a mover (as Descartes holds), understanding could not be attributed to the whole man
• Conclusion: The soul must be united to the body as form, making both sensing and understanding operations of the composite

The Argument from Difference (from Aristotle’s Metaphysics VIII) #

• Premise 1: In a definition, difference is taken from the form of a thing (as genus is from matter)
• Premise 2: The differentiating characteristic of man is rational
• Premise 3: Rational pertains to the understanding principle
• Premise 4: The form is that by which a thing has its difference
• Conclusion: The understanding principle must be the form of man

The Argument from Assimilation #

• When you eat chicken, pig, or fish, the matter becomes human flesh through digestion
• Yet you do not quack like a chicken or moo like a cow
• Explanation: Matter is common (able to be any animal), but form differs
• Point: That by which you are actually a man (your form) determines your operations, not the matter you share with animals
• Application: Form, not matter, is the principle of operation and differentiation

The Latin Technical Terms and Their Senses #

• Intellectus: Used by Thomas in multiple senses:
  • The power or ability to understand
  • The act of understanding itself
  • A habit or virtue of understanding (natural understanding, intellectus)
  • Here: The understanding soul itself (anima intellectiva, the intellectual substance)
• Nous (Greek): Corresponds to intellectus; one of the virtues of reason in Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics
• Mens (Latin): Sometimes nearly synonymous with intellectus; sometimes includes will and other higher faculties (as in Augustine’s trinitarian psychology)
• The confusion arises because English ‘intellect’ typically names only the power, not the substance

Important Definitions #

Form and Matter (from Nature) #

• Form: That by which something is actually what it is; the principle of actuality
• Matter: That by which something is able to be what it is; the principle of potentiality
• In nature, form is more nature than matter because by form a thing is actually one natural thing rather than another
• Application to art: The Pietà is a work of art because of its form (the sculpting), not because of the marble (the matter)

Subsistent #

• Having existence by itself, not merely as an attribute of something else
• The human soul is subsistent (unique among material forms)
• Plant and animal souls are not subsistent; they exist only in the body
• The soul’s subsistence explains its incorruptibility and survival after bodily death

In Act (in actu) vs. In Potency (in potentia) #

• In potency: Able to have or do something; the state of possibility
• In act: Actually having or doing something; the state of realization
• Principle: Something is in potency receives from that which is in act
• Application: The cookie cutter, which is in act regarding the Christmas tree shape, gives that form to dough that is in potency to receiving it

Mode of Receiving (modus recipientis) #

• The way or manner in which something receives an act depends on the nature of the receiver
• Example: Wine poured into different-sized containers fills each according to its capacity
• The wine is the same; the reception differs
• Application to understanding: The same intelligible form is received immaterially in the soul but cannot be received at all in bodily matter

Examples & Illustrations #

The Cookie Cutter #

• Dough is in potency to the shape of a Christmas tree
• The metal cutter is in act regarding that shape
• The cutter gives the shape it actually possesses to the dough that is able to receive it
• Point: That which is in act gives to that which is in potency; form actualizes matter

Eating and Assimilation #

• When you eat chicken, pig, or fish, the matter becomes human flesh through mastication and digestion with acids
• Yet you do not quack, moo, or oink because you have a human soul, not theirs
• If a lion ate you, the matter in you that can become lion would actually become lion
• Point: Form, not matter, determines what operations a being performs and what it actually is

The Floating Body #

• A body floating on the ocean is partly in the water, partly above it
• The human soul is similarly related to matter: not entirely immersed, yet united to the body
• The part above water is not absorbed into the water; similarly the soul’s higher operations (understanding, willing) are not absorbed into bodily matter
• Yet the whole body (the floating thing) remains one thing

Color Perception and Taste #

• Painters are far more sensitive to shades of color than ordinary people
• Women tend to distinguish colors more finely than men (aqua vs. blue, etc.)
• Expert wine tasters discriminate qualities in wine that others cannot
• Point: The same thing (color, wine) is received differently according to the mode of the receiver (the receiver’s sensitivity and training)
• This illustrates how understanding (immaterial reception) differs from bodily sensation (material reception) even in the same person

Homer and Acquired Taste #

• Berquist initially could not get into reading Homer
• Years later, with a good edition, he read a book a night and could not stop
• Point: One must turn to different forms of literature in different ways; one acquires taste through exposure and proper orientation
• Relates to how the soul must be properly disposed to receive intelligible forms

Peripatetic Philosophy #

• The Peripatetic school was called this because peripatein means to walk around
• Therefore Aristotle and his students must have been able to think and walk at the same time
• Point: This shows that it is possible for one to sense and understand simultaneously, which requires a unified soul that is form of the body

Notable Quotes #

“That by which first something operates is the form, the act of that, to which the operation is attributed.” — Thomas Aquinas (explaining Aristotle), on the fundamental principle connecting operation to form

“Nothing acts except insofar as it is in act. Whence that by which something is in act is that by which it acts.” — Thomas Aquinas, on the universal principle of actuality and operation

“The soul is that by which we first live, sense, move, and understand.” — Aristotle (cited by Thomas), definition of the soul from De Anima II

“It is the same one who is sensing and walking and understanding.” — Thomas Aquinas, emphasizing the unity of the human subject across diverse operations

“That by which the body first is healthy is health; that by which the soul knows first is science.” — Thomas Aquinas, on the analogy of form in both body and soul

Questions Addressed #

Q1: How can the soul be form of the body if understanding is not bodily? #

• The soul is form of the body by its essence
• But the soul has powers that are not bodily powers (understanding, willing)
• The soul is not entirely immersed in matter like plant and animal forms
• The body shares in the soul’s existence but does not completely absorb it
• Therefore: The soul can be form of the body while having operations transcendent of matter

Q2: How can the same subject both sense and understand when one is bodily and one is not? #

• It is the composite (soul and body united as form and matter) that performs both operations
• Sensing is an operation of the composite using bodily organs
• Understanding is an operation of the soul that transcends the body
• Both are truly operations of the same man because the soul is his form, not merely an external mover
• Proof: If the soul were merely a mover (separate substance), understanding could not be attributed to the whole man, but it is

Q3: What is the connection between form and operation? #

• That by which something first operates is its form
• Nothing acts except insofar as it is in act
• That which is in act gives to that which is in potency
• Therefore, to identify what form a thing has, look to what it characteristically does
• Application: Man’s characteristic operation is understanding; therefore understanding must be the operation of man’s form (the soul)

Q4: How does the soul’s subsistence differ from that of angels if it remains the form of the body? #

• Angels are complete substances in themselves; they have being entirely by themselves
• The human soul is subsistent but not complete; it has being by itself yet is naturally ordained to union with matter
• The soul’s subsistence explains its incorruptibility (it cannot be destroyed when the body dies)
• But the soul’s incompleteness (its natural inclination to the body) explains why it remains the form of this body even after separation
• Implication: This supports belief in bodily resurrection; the soul naturally tends toward reunion with the body

Scholastic Vocabulary #

• Prima operatio: The first operation by which something characteristically acts
• Actus primus: First act (the form)
• Actus secundus: Second act (the operation flowing from the form)
• Potentia: Potency; the capacity to receive or become something
• Forma substantialis: Substantial form; that which makes something what it is
• In potentia: In potency; able to be but not yet actually being
• In actu: In act; actually being or having something