42. Truth in the Mind and the Contrariety of Knowledge and Love

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Lecture Notes

Main Topics #

Truth as a Property of the Mind, Not Things #

• Truth and falsity are not found in things or in simple apprehensions (understanding what “man” or “stone” is)
• Truth and falsity are found only in the mind, specifically in statements that compose or divide concepts
• Simple apprehensions lack truth value; truth emerges only when the mind puts together concepts (affirmative statement) or divides them (negative statement)
• Example: “Man” alone has no truth value, but “man is an animal” or “man is not a stone” are true or false
• This is a fundamental principle: truth requires correspondence between the mind’s composition/division and the composition/division of things

Goodness and Badness: Existing in Things #

• Goodness and badness are chiefly of things, not primarily of the mind
• This contrasts sharply with truth, which is a property of mind
• This difference reflects the distinct natures of knowledge and love

The Contrariety of Knowledge and Love #

• Knowledge operates by bringing things into the mind: the knower receives the thing known
• Love operates by the heart going to the thing loved: the lover goes out to the beloved
• Augustine: “The soul is more ubi amata [where it loves] than ubi animata [where it animates the body]”
• Our Lord: “Where your treasure is, there your heart shall be”
• These are contrary operations, not contrariety in the strict sense, but contrary in how they work

The Same Knowledge of Opposites #

• Same knowledge of opposites: knowing virtue requires understanding vice; knowing health requires understanding sickness; knowing blindness requires understanding sight
• A doctor who knows high blood pressure must know proper blood pressure
• Rhetoric enables persuasion to good or bad; medical knowledge can save life or end it
• Aristotle teaches in Book V of Politics how to preserve and how to overthrow a government—same knowledge for opposites
• The reason: in knowledge, opposites are both put into the mind through definition and understanding
• Example: blindness is defined as “lack of sight in an animal apt to have sight”—sight is included in the definition of blindness

Different Love of Opposites #

• No same love of opposites: love of one opposite excludes love of the other
• The reason: love goes to the thing in itself, and in things themselves, one opposite excludes the other
• If I love sight, I cannot love blindness; if I love virtue, I cannot love vice (in the same respect)
• This reflects the condition of things: being blind excludes sight; having sight excludes blindness
• Knowledge puts opposites together in the mind, but things keep them apart

Theological Order: Goodness Before Truth #

• In Thomas’s Summa Theologiae:
  • God’s goodness is treated under God’s substance (as a perfection of divine substance)
  • God’s truth is treated only after God’s understanding and operations are established
• This reflects the principle that goodness exists in things, while truth exists in mind (understanding)
• Contrast with Plato: Plato begins with “the Good itself” and “the Beautiful itself” as the beginning of all things
  • Plato does not explicitly recognize that the Good itself understands and wills
  • He sees goodness/beauty before recognizing divine understanding and will
• Contrast with Aristotle: Aristotle begins with “mind and will” as the first principles
• Thomas’s synthesis: goodness is more fundamental than truth in the consideration of God’s substance, but truth cannot be properly understood until understanding and operations are addressed

Knowledge Requires Analysis; Love Does Not #

• To know something well requires analysis (Greek: ana-lysis, taking apart)
• Love is not a taking apart; the lover does not analyze what is loved
• Figurative speech is more appropriate to love than precise analysis
• Music, the perfect sign of love, can communicate without words
• This reflects the deep contrariety between how knowledge and love operate

Key Arguments #

The Location of Truth Argument #

• Premise 1: If you dig in the ground, you find rocks and soil, not truth
• Premise 2: If you walk through the ocean or air, you find no truth or falsity
• Premise 3: Truth and falsity must be somewhere
• Conclusion: Truth and falsity are found only in the mind, not in things themselves
• Refinement: Not just anywhere in the mind, but in statements (composition or division of concepts)

The Same Knowledge of Opposites Argument #

• Premise 1: To know one opposite, one must know what the other opposite is (for definition and comparison)
• Premise 2: In knowledge, the mind puts both opposites into itself through definition and understanding
• Premise 3: The mind can hold contradictory definitions simultaneously without contradiction
• Conclusion: The same knowledge encompasses both opposites
• Example: A doctor’s knowledge of health necessarily includes knowledge of sickness; medical knowledge can heal or harm

The Different Love of Opposites Argument #

• Premise 1: Love goes to the thing in itself, as it is
• Premise 2: In things themselves, one opposite excludes the other (ontologically)
• Premise 3: If I love one thing as it is, I cannot love its opposite as it is (same respect)
• Conclusion: Love of one opposite excludes love of the other
• Contrast: Knowledge holds opposites together; love keeps them apart

Important Definitions #

Truth (Veritas) #

• Primary location: In the mind, specifically in statements
• Condition: Requires composition or division of concepts that corresponds to composition or division in things
• Not in simple apprehensions: Understanding what “man” is does not yet give truth value
• Requires putting together or dividing: “Man is an animal” (true) or “Man is not a stone” (true)

Knowledge (Scientia) vs. Love (Amor) #

• Knowledge: The knower receives the thing known into the mind; cosa in cognitore (thing in the knower)
• Love: The lover goes out to the thing loved; cor in amato (heart in the loved thing)
• These are fundamentally contrary operations in how they direct consciousness

Being as True (Ens Verum) vs. Accidental Being (Ens per Accidens) #

• Being as true: Has a cause that is indeterminate; is an “underblowing” of the mind
• Accidental being: Also indeterminate, hence set aside from fundamental metaphysical consideration
• Primary being: Being as being in things themselves, apart from truth and accident

Examples & Illustrations #

Augustine’s Boy on the Shore #

• Augustine saw a boy digging a hole in the sand and putting ocean water into it
• Augustine asked, “What are you doing?”
• Boy replied: “I’m putting the ocean into this hole”
• Augustine responded: “You can’t fit the ocean into that little hole”
• Application to knowledge of Trinity: “Neither can you get the trinity fully into your mind”
• Application to love: “But you could jump into the ocean—and that’s what he does in loving God”
• Point: Knowledge tries to bring things into the mind (limited); love goes out to the thing (more capable of infinity)

Truth Examples #

• “Man is an animal” — TRUE (composition of what is together in things)
• “Man is not a stone” — TRUE (division of what is divided in things)
• “Man is a stone” — FALSE (composition of what is divided in things)
• “Man is not an animal” — FALSE (division of what is together in things)

Medical Knowledge #

• A doctor who knows high blood pressure must understand proper blood pressure
• Medical knowledge can be used to save a baby’s life or to end it
• The doctor, through knowledge, knows how to do both

Questions Addressed #

Where is Truth Found? #

• Question: If you search physically in the world, where would you find truth or falsity?
• Answer: Nowhere in the physical world; truth is found only in the mind, in statements that compose or divide
• Implication: Truth is not a property of things but of the mind’s judgment

Can There Be the Same Knowledge of Opposites? #

• Question: If you teach ethics, don’t you teach both virtue and vice? Don’t you make students capable of vice?
• Answer: Yes, knowledge encompasses both opposites because knowledge puts both into the mind through definition
• Challenge: This raises questions about teaching subjects that enable harm (rhetoric, medicine, statecraft)
• Aristotle’s response: This is the nature of knowledge; knowledge itself is neutral

Is There the Same Love of Opposites? #

• Question: Can you love both virtue and vice? Both sight and blindness?
• Answer: No. Love of one opposite excludes love of the other because in things themselves, opposites exclude each other
• Reason: Love goes to the thing as it is, and opposites cannot both be as they are in the same thing

Why Does Thomas Put Goodness Before Truth in Theology? #

• Question: Why is God’s goodness discussed under divine substance, but truth only after divine understanding?
• Answer: Because goodness exists in things (and God is substance), while truth exists in mind (and requires understanding)
• Implication: Goodness is more fundamental in being; truth is more derivative, dependent on mind

How Do Knowledge and Love Work Contrary to Each Other? #

• Question: What is the deep difference between how knowing and loving operate?
• Answer: Knowledge draws things into the mind; love directs the heart toward things. They are contrary motions.
• Implication: This explains why analysis (taking apart) belongs to knowledge but not love; why precision belongs to knowledge but not love

Notable Quotes #

“Where do you find truth or falsity? If you dug down to the ground, you know, would you find truth or falsity? No, I think you’d find rocks in this soil, but you don’t find truth or falsity.” — Duane Berquist, illustrating that truth is not in physical things

“The soul is more ubi amata, where it loves, than ubi animata, where it animates the body.” — Augustine, on the nature of love’s movement

“Where your treasure is, there your heart shall be.” — Jesus Christ (Matthew 6:21), illustrating love’s direction toward its object

“I left my heart in San Francisco.” — Popular song (cited by Berquist), illustrating how love makes the lover’s heart go to the beloved

“The good and bad are chiefly of things, huh?” — Duane Berquist, highlighting the contrast between truth (in mind) and goodness (in things)

“You don’t find any truth or falsity in the Gated Sister [simple apprehensions], right? Which simplifies life, right? Not to worry about falsity. But you don’t get any truth either.” — Duane Berquist, on why simple concepts lack truth value