145. Abstraction, Matter, and the Knowledge of Material Things

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Lecture Notes

Main Topics #

The Paradox of Understanding Material Things #

• Material things depend on matter for their existence
• Yet understanding seems to separate form from matter
• How can we abstract from matter if matter is essential to the definition?
• The resolution lies in distinguishing types of matter (individual vs. common)

Two Kinds of Abstraction #

1. Abstraction by composition and division: Falsely separating what is united in reality (e.g., saying “man is not an animal”) — this IS false
2. Abstraction by simple consideration: Understanding one thing without attending to another (e.g., understanding “animal” without understanding “man”) — this is NOT false
   • Example: Understanding color without understanding sweetness, though both exist in sugar
   • Example: A blind person can know sugar is sweet without knowing it is white
   • The difference is real but the knowledge remains true

Matter: Individual vs. Common Sensible Matter #

• Individual sensible matter (materia signata): The specific flesh and bones of a particular person (e.g., Duane Berquist’s flesh and blood)
• Common sensible matter: Flesh and bone in general, which belongs to the definition of the species “man”
• The intellect abstracts from individual matter but retains common matter when understanding natural things
• This is why we can understand “man” without understanding the individual differences of each person

The Intellect’s Mode of Knowledge Differs from the Mode of Being #

• Truth does not require that the way we know matches the way things are
• Plato incorrectly assumed it does; Aristotle correctly denied this
• The intellect grasps things in an immaterial way, while they exist materially
• This difference is not falsity but rather reflects the immateriality of intellect
• Example: The eye sees color without material incorporation of color; similarly the intellect knows material things immaterially

Plato vs. Aristotle on Forms and Knowledge #

• Plato’s insight: Our understanding is immaterial, and therefore its objects must be immaterial separated forms
• Plato’s error: He failed to distinguish the two modes of abstraction; he made universals exist separately in an immaterial world
• Aristotle’s correction: Universals exist only in individual material things in reality, but are understood in separation by the mind
• Plato effectively created a three-decker universe: sensible world, mathematical world, world of forms
• Aristotle denies this: there is only one reality, but the mind understands it in multiple ways

The Role of Phantasms (Images) in Understanding #

• Images are likenesses of individual material things retained in imagination
• The agent intellect (intellectus agens) illuminates images, making them intelligible in act
• The agent intellect does NOT abstract by the power of the images themselves
• Rather, through the agent intellect’s power, intelligible forms are abstracted from images
• The intellect understands universally from particular images
• Yet the intellect must always turn back to images to understand; it cannot understand material things without imagining

The Development of Knowledge #

• Sensation: Sensing individual dogs
• Memory: Remembering what was sensed
• Experience (experientia): Collecting many memories of similar things into one experience
• Understanding: The agent intellect abstracts what is common to all those particular instances
• Boethius’s principle: “A thing is singular when sensed or remembered, but universal when understood”

Key Arguments #

Objection 1: Understanding as Falsity #

Objection: If we understand material things by abstracting from particulars, and those particulars exist united in reality, aren’t we understanding falsely?

Response:

• Distinction between modes of abstraction is key
• Falsity only occurs in the first mode (composition and division), not the second (simple consideration)
• We truly understand what is common to all without denying individual differences exist
• Analogy: Understanding “triangle” universally in geometric demonstration, though any imagined triangle must be equilateral, isosceles, or scalene

Objection 2: How Can We Abstract from Matter If Matter Belongs to the Definition? #

Objection: Natural things are defined by matter; how can understanding separate from matter?

Response:

• Distinguish common sensible matter from individual sensible matter
• “Man” includes flesh and bone in general in its definition
• But individual flesh and bones (these bones, these muscles) do not belong to the definition of man
• The intellect abstracts from individual matter while retaining common matter
• Contrast with mathematics: mathematical species (circle, sphere, cube) can be abstracted even from common sensible matter, though not from intelligible/imaginable matter (extension)

Objection 3: Images Cannot Impress Themselves on Immaterial Power #

Objection: Images relate to intellect as colors to sight. Sight receives impressions from colors; therefore intellect should receive impressions from images, not abstract from them.

Response:

• Images and colors do not have the same mode of existence as their respective cognitive powers
• Colors exist in bodily matter; the power of sight is bodily; they can impress on each other
• Images exist in bodily organs but the human intellect is immaterial and not the act of a bodily organ
• Therefore images cannot impress themselves on the intellect by their own power
• The agent intellect must illuminate images and abstract intelligible forms through its own power
• The result is an intelligible form in the possible intellect, which differs in mode from the phantasm

Objection 4: The Agent Intellect Cannot Be Like Light #

Objection: Aristotle compares the agent intellect to light, but this comparison seems imperfect.

Response:

• The comparison is not in every way similar
• Light illuminates colors by making them visible in act
• The agent intellect illuminates images by rendering them capable of having intelligible forms abstracted from them
• The images become illuminated in the sense that from them, intelligible intentions can be extracted

Objection 5: Understanding Requires Constant Reference to Images #

Objection: If we truly abstract from images, why must we constantly turn back to them to understand?

Response:

• The proper object of human intellect is the essence of material things as existing in particulars
• We abstract intelligible forms from images to understand universally
• But because our intellect is united to a body, we cannot understand these abstracted forms except by turning back to the images
• Analogy: To see the color of your clothes, I must turn toward your clothes, even though the seeing occurs in my eye, not in your garments
• Similarly, to understand a material thing, I must imagine it, even though understanding occurs in my intellect, not in the imagination

Important Definitions #

Abstractio (Abstraction) #

The operation by which the intellect considers the nature or essence of a thing apart from the individual conditions that individuate it in material reality, without denying that those conditions exist. Not a separation of things, but a separation in how we know them.

Materia Sensibilis Communis (Common Sensible Matter) #

The matter in general that belongs to the definition of a natural species — e.g., flesh and bone in the definition of “man” — as opposed to the specific individual matter of a particular thing.

Materia Sensibilis Signata (Individual Sensible Matter) #

The particular matter designated as belonging to this individual thing — e.g., these specific flesh and bones belonging to this person — which does not belong to the definition of the species.

Phantasma (Image/Phantasm) #

The sensible likeness of a particular thing retained and preserved in the imagination (imaginatio), which serves as the material from which the agent intellect abstracts intelligible forms.

Forma Intelligibilis (Intelligible Form) #

The immaterial likeness of a thing received in the possible intellect (intellectus possibilis), by which the intellect is actualized to understand.

Intellectus Agens (Agent Intellect) #

The active power of the human intellect that illuminates phantasms and abstracts intelligible forms from them. It renders the potential (possible) intellect actual in understanding.

Intellectus Possibilis (Possible Intellect) #

The receptive power of the intellect that is actualized by receiving intelligible forms abstracted from phantasms. It is called “possible” because it is potential before understanding occurs.

Universale (Universal) #

What is common to many things; exists only in the mind as universal, though it corresponds to what is truly common in multiple particular material things in reality.

Examples & Illustrations #

The Color and Smell Example #

• Sugar possesses both color (white) and taste (sweet) united in reality
• The eye sees the color without the sense of taste perceiving sweetness
• This is not false knowledge; it is incomplete but true
• Similarly, the intellect understands human nature without understanding individual differences
• The point: knowing one thing without another, when both exist united, is not falsity

The Triangle Demonstration (Geometric Interior Angles) #

• When demonstrating that the interior angles of a triangle equal two right angles:
  • Draw a line through one vertex parallel to the opposite side
  • By the parallel postulate, alternate angles are equal
  • Therefore the three angles equal two right angles
• This proof works for any triangle (equilateral, isosceles, or scalene)
• Yet any triangle one imagines must have sides either equal or unequal
• The intellect understands the universal “triangle” abstracting from whether sides are equal or unequal
• The imagination always apprehends a particular triangle with particular side relationships
• This demonstrates that the intellect’s universal understanding differs fundamentally from imagination’s particularity

The Cube Example #

• Cubes can be wooden, ice, or plastic
• The intellect can understand “cube” apart from any specific material
• Yet no cube exists in reality except as made of some material
• This shows abstraction from individual matter (this wood, this ice) while not denying matter exists
• Contrast: Plato would say a cube exists in an immaterial world separate from material cubes

The Shakespearean Sonnet #

• To define what a Shakespearean sonnet is:
  • Read many individual sonnets
  • Compare them
  • Notice what they have in common: 14 lines, iambic pentameter, three quatrains and a couplet, specific rhyme scheme
  • Arrive at the universal definition
• One understands the universal form without understanding every particular sonnet
• Yet the definition corresponds to what is actually common to all particular sonnets
• This mirrors how the intellect works: it abstracts universal definitions from experience of particulars

Helen Keller and Water #

• Teacher pours water on Helen Keller’s hand repeatedly while saying “water”
• At a certain point, breakthrough occurs — the sensible sensation connects with the sign
• This illustrates how sensation, memory, and then understanding develop
• The understanding of “water” grows from repeated particular sensations

Locke’s Problem with Universal Ideas #

• Locke tries to understand the general idea of “triangle”
• He asks: are the sides equal or unequal in the general idea?
• Being unable to answer definitively, he says “both and neither”
• But any imagined triangle must have sides either equal or unequal (cannot be both and neither)
• His error: confusing the universal idea understood by reason with the particular image imagined
• The proper answer: In the definition of triangle, the sides are able to be equal or unequal; they are actually neither (in the definition), though any actual triangle must be one or the other

Distinction from Philosophy and Theology #

• Philosophy: Proceeds from knowledge of material things to knowledge of immaterial things (and God as cause)
• Theology: Proceeds from God downward, beginning with what we share in God’s knowledge
• Example: Chilson’s introduction to philosophy follows the order of Summa Contra Gentiles (theological order) rather than the philosophical order
• This explains why the two approaches can seem contrary in method

Questions Addressed #

How can we understand material things if matter is essential to them? #

Answer: By distinguishing individual sensible matter (which individuates and does not belong to the species definition) from common sensible matter (which belongs to the species definition). The intellect abstracts from individual but not common sensible matter.

Is the intellect false when it understands universals? #

Answer: No. Understanding one thing without attending to another (second mode of abstraction) is not the same as falsely separating them (first mode). The intellect truly grasps what is common without denying individual differences exist in reality.

How does the intellect abstract from images if images cannot impress themselves on an immaterial power? #

Answer: The agent intellect, through its own power, illuminates images and abstracts intelligible forms from them. The forms that result in the possible intellect differ in mode from the phantasms, just as the immaterial understanding differs from material imagination.

Why must the intellect turn back to phantasms if it has already abstracted from them? #

Answer: Because the proper object of human intellect is the essence of material things as they exist in particulars. Although understanding is immaterial and abstracted, the human intellect remains united to a body and cannot understand material essences except by imagining the particular instances of those essences.

Why did Plato make his error about separated forms? #

Answer: Plato saw truly that our understanding is immaterial, but he failed to recognize that the intellect can know things in separation (in the mind) without those things being separate in reality. He did not distinguish the two modes of abstraction, and so he made separated universal forms exist in an immaterial world corresponding to our immaterial knowledge.