Prima Pars
63. Summa I, Q.14, aa.14–15: God's Knowledge of Statements and Why It Never Changes; Does Truth Require We Know Things as They Are?
Class of 2007-01-18
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/10-prima-pars/063-summa-i-q-14-aa-14-15-gods-knowledge-of-statements-and-why/

[0:00] Now, it should be a little easier. To the fourteenth, one proceeds thus: It seems that God does not know what, enunciable things, right, or statements.

[0:20] Now, you may recall in our study of logic, right? You know that Thomas, there, following Aristotle, divides the acts of reason, the logic directs, into three in a certain order, right? And the first act of reason is understanding what something is, like understanding what a man is, or what a dog is, or what an animal is, and so on. And then the second act he calls, following Aristotle, composing or dividing, where you compose or put together an affirmative statement, let's say man and animal, and say man is an animal, right?

[0:58] That's an enuncibilia, one of them, and or you divide them and say man is not a dog or something like that, forming another statement, right? Well, does God know? statements? Well, the simplicity of God might seem to be opposed to the putting together and dividing of these statements.

[1:21] I says to know enunciable things belongs to our understanding according as it puts together or divides, but in the divine understanding there's no putting together, because he's altogether simple as himself. Therefore, God doesn't know enunciable things. But, it's only showing he doesn't know them if he does in the way we know them, right? He doesn't know them by putting them together and so on.

[1:52] Moreover, all knowledge is through some likeness, but in God there's no likeness of enunciable things, since he is what, altogether simple and they're composed. And now in verb in there, right? Subject, predicate, copula. Is there is not. Therefore, God does not know enunciable things.

[2:19] Now, again, this is what is said in Psalm 93: God knows the thoughts of men, and some of these thoughts are what, statements, right?

[2:31] But enunciable things are contained in the thoughts of men, so he knows that I think that man is an animal and man is not a dog and so on, right? So he must know these statements, huh? Therefore, God knows enunciable things, right?

[2:52] I answer: It should be said that to form enunciable or stateable things, you might say, huh, is in the power of our understanding, right? To form statable things, to form statements. God, however, knows whatever is in the ability of Himself, His own ability, or the ability of the creature, as has been said above. Therefore, it is necessary that God knows all the statable things which are able to be formed.

[3:28] But again, the way He knows is not the way the thing is. There is no falsehood there. But you have to really see that in human knowing first, like I was mentioning before. We can know things in separation that don't exist in separation, right? So you can know me to be a philosopher without knowing me to be a grandfather. But the nurses in the hospital might know me to be a grandfather without knowing me to be a philosopher.

[3:57] But one of these is known without the other, even though they don't exist without the other, right? And you can know things in even the reverse order that they come into reality without being false. So you have to start to gradually see that the way we know doesn't have to be the way things are, and then it's not so strange that the way God knows is not the way things are, but yet He knows these things truly.

[4:22] What? He created. Yeah, but yet He knows these things truly, right? Everything is known because it's been created. Yeah, He knows them as his effects, Yeah. Like even Satan, devil, He knows everybody, but now nobody knows before when He's created, only God. Yeah. And God knew them before they were created too.

[4:47] Okay. But just as He knows material things an immaterial way and composed things simply, so He knows statable things, but not by making statements,

[5:06] as if in His understanding there was a composition, right, or a division of things that could be enunciated. But He knows each thing through a simple understanding, by understanding the essence or nature of each thing.

[5:25] Just as if in us, right, if we in this that we understand what a man is, if we were able to understand everything that could be said of what man,

[5:40] which does not take place in our understanding, which runs from one thing to another. What did Shakespeare say? Ability for a large discourse, looking before and after, an account of the fact that the understandable form of our of us thus represents one thing that does not represent the what the other, right? So when I get this understandable form whereby I understand what a triangle is, I don't see the Pythagorean theorem in that thought.

[6:16] But I've got to run reason out that the interior angles equal to two right angles. Whence, in understanding what is a man, we do not understand from this other things which can be what present in man, but in a divided way, according to succession, we come to know these things.

[6:52] And therefore, in account of this, those things which you know apart from each other is necessary for us to put them together by way of some what composition or division by forming a enunciation, I'd call it a statement.

[7:11] But the understandable form of the divine understanding, which is his very essence, suffices to showing all things. Whence, by understanding his own essence, he knows the essence of all things and whatever things can what happen to them. Right.

[7:42] Now the first objection says that argument proceeds if God knew enunciable things in the manner of enunciable things, right? If his way of knowing was the way the thing was, but he knows composed things in a simple way, just as he knows material things in an immaterial way.

[8:11] The second objection was saying what? How can he bear likeness? Right. But the second should be said that the composition of a statement signifies some being of the thing, and thus God, through his very being, which is his very nature or essence, is a likeness of all those things which are signified through what statements. Every affirmative statement is saying that something is something, right? So since God is is itself being itself, his nature, right, which is the form which he understands, is like everything that is said by any statement whatsoever.

[8:59] Okay. So by knowing being itself, he knows the what partaking of being in every statement that signified by every. Statement. Marvelous mind there, huh? Place it. Got to put the mic down. We're practically dead, huh?

[9:24] You know, I was quoting Shakespeare there earlier. There, where Macbeth speaks of life as a walking shadow, right? But I found there's a golden chain there, huh? You know, is saying that one of the church fathers is saying that this life is a shadow of life, umbra, a shadow of life. This life in our mortal body is a shadow of life. So it's not too far from saying life is a walking shadow.

[9:53] This is part of the you know the despair there of Macbeth at the end, but there is a certain aspect to that, huh? So God knows statements, huh? But not the making statements.

[10:21] By knowing his own being, he knows that to be that is in every statement, because they all partake of that being that he is.

[10:37] But he knows his being perfectly, and therefore he knows in every way that it can be partaken of. He wouldn't know himself perfectly, right? He didn't know he could be what partaken of, right? You know,

[11:03] sometimes you know Thomas will go back to the. Aristotle teaches in the eighth book of the wisdom there that the natures of things are like numbers, right?

[11:17] And you can kind of see what what that is. Even Shakespeare is saying that in the exhortation, right? He says, "What is a man if his chief good and market of his time be but to sleep and feed, a beast no more? " Okay. So body plus life equals plant. Body plus life plus sensation equals animal. Body plus

[11:47] plus reason equals man, right? So like man is four, and beast is three, and plant is two, and yeah, yeah. And so you could play a little bit of Shakespeare's words and say, you know, what is a beast if his chief good and market of his time be but to what grow, huh? Or plant no more, right? But then you could transfer over the numbers and say, what is.

[12:12] Three, if it be half of four. A two, no more, right? Okay. But now, in a way, two is contained in three, isn't it? And three is contained in four. So, if four knew itself completely, in a way, it would know three and two and one, right? And even to some extent, in knowing myself, I kind of know what a cat is, because he has something of what I have, but not all that I have.

[12:48] Because he has sensation like I have, and he has some of these emotions, right? And when the cat was afraid of the dog, and I took up the cat, you can see the, you know, feel the, the shaking there in the cat, in the cat. And I had some cats that were afraid of dogs.

[13:05] And the, I kind of know his fear because that's something I have too sometimes, fear, right? Huh? Okay. So if four knew itself completely, it would know three and two, right? Well, God would be like a what? Kind of like it is a number in a sense, huh? And therefore, knowing himself fully, he knows but everything that could what partake of him more or less perfectly, right?

[13:35] So, in knowing being himself, because he is being himself, I am who I am. He knows everything that could be in any way whatsoever,

[13:48] as it could more or less share that being that he has. Okay. Now look at article. Fifteen. Whether the knowledge of God is variable, right? Okay. Does he ever change his mind? You know, is he pretty stubborn? What do you think?

[14:20] To the fifteenth, one proceeds thus: It seems that the knowledge of God is variable. For the knowledge of, for knowledge, science is said relatively to the what? Knowable, right?

[14:38] But those things which imply a relation to creatures are said of God from time. So God is said to what? Be a creator, right? In time, right? Okay. And therefore, they're varied according to the variation of what? Creatures.

[15:03] Therefore, the knowledge of God is variable according to the variation of creatures. Moreover, whatever God is able to make or do, He is able to know. But God is able to what? Make many things than the ones He has made.

[15:33] Therefore, He could know more things than He knows, right? And thus, His knowledge is able to vary according to growth and diminution. Moreover, God knows that Christ has been born, right? He knew He was to be born. Yeah. Yeah. Now He what? Does not know that Christ is to be born, right?

[16:07] Because Christ is not what? not in the world. Yeah. Therefore, not whatever God knows, does He know? Not everything that God has known, right? Does He know? And therefore, the knowledge of God seems to be variable.

[16:30] But against all this nonsense is what is said in James, Jacob, chapter one, verse seventeen: that before God there is what? No change, right? Or even the what? Shadow of a change, huh? Okay. A variation. Not even the slightest hint of a change in God, huh? Doesn't He get bored? Always the same. It's always the same, huh?

[17:06] That's the whole thing, man. Yeah. That's how people understand your bit of vision, right? You know, it's gonna, it's gonna change? No, it's gonna always go. It's gonna be the same.

[17:22] Realize that God must be infinite, right? For us never to get bored, huh? But you know, was it origin? You know, thoughts, and eventually you get kind of restless, you know, and want to go back into this kind of life we have now. Another

[17:43] reason why she is inappropriate for God. I don't even know who they are. I answer should be said that since the knowledge of God is His very substance,

[18:11] this is clear from what has been said already, and His substance is altogether what unchangeable. Therefore, it is necessary that His knowledge be what altogether invariable, right?

[18:32] So that's what they call syllogism, I guess. The minor premise is the knowledge of God is His what substance, right? The major premise is His substance is unchangeable, never varies, right? Therefore, His knowledge is unchanging, right? Okay.

[19:05] Okay. Now, the first objection was taken from what the relation that God has what to creatures, right? Now you may eventually realize that those relations are not real,

[19:21] and it's kind of interesting because Aristotle was the first thinker to realize not only that there are relations that are not real, they're only in the mind, right? But also, it's possible to have this mixed case where you have a relation that's real from one end and not from the other end, okay? That something can have a real relation to something else, and that other thing has no relation to you, but you understand it by a kind of return relation, huh?

[19:59] Okay, And the example Aristotle especially brought out was that if I know something, right, I have a certain relation to the thing I know. But does that thing have relation to me because it's known by me?

[20:18] And that thing in itself doesn't really have the kind of being that something has knowing that's inside me, right? So I'm really affected by that object and I have a relation to it, but it's not really related to me.

[20:42] Okay, to the first, therefore, it should be said that Lord and Creator in names of this sort imply relations to creatures according as they are in themselves, right?

[21:02] But the knowledge of God implies relation to creatures according as they are what in God, right? I know. What's the difference between that, right? Well, when you talk about creation, you're talking about an activity that has an external what product, yeah.

[21:28] When you talk about knowing or loving, right, you're talking about an activity that is not transitive like that. That remains within the doer, right? So Thomas is making use of that distinction, right?

[21:46] So we don't say that God is Creator before there are things that are created, right? So God is not a Creator before those things exist, because Creator names an activity that has an exterior product, right? Okay, so when you have that activity, you have an exterior product. But knowing, as such, doesn't involve an exterior product,

[22:16] and so God can know something even when it doesn't what exist, right? It's still in His knowledge, right? But He can't create a thing if it doesn't exist in itself, because He would not create anything. Okay, there's a little difference between those two kinds of operations, and Aristotle, of course, you know, first brought out that distinction.

[22:40] So the first, therefore, it should be said that Lord and Creator and names of this sort imply relations to creatures according as they are in themselves. But the knowledge of God implies a relation to creatures according as they are in God.

[23:03] Because by this is something understood in act that is in the one understanding. Of course, even Empedocles has seen the thing known must be in some way in the knower, right?

[23:19] But things created are in God in an invariable or unchangeable way. In themselves, they are what? Yeah, they are unchangeable. that's one way of trying to answer objection. Or another way can be said that Lord and Creator and names of this sort imply relations which follow upon acts which understood to what end up with creatures. Themselves, according as they are what, God, in themselves, yeah. And therefore, these relations are said variously of God, according to the variation of creatures, right?

[24:14] But knowledge and love, and things of this sort, imply relations which follow upon acts, which understood to be only in God, right? And therefore, they are what predicated without variation of God, huh? Okay. It doesn't go into the business about Lord and Creator is not involving a real relation to creatures, right? But we say God begins to be a Creator when he has a creature, right? But he doesn't begin to know when the thing he knows exists in itself, right?

[24:58] Okay. But he doesn't begin to be a Creator when he doesn't have something that is created, because creation names an activity that is transitive that has an exterior product. You know, in the very beginning, of Nicomachean *Ethics*, Aristotle makes that distinction between those two acts, huh?

[25:19] The transitive act that has an exterior product and the one that doesn't. You know, in English, sometimes we they'll use the term doing, right?

[25:35] And then they'll divide doing into doing and making, huh? Now that might first sight seem to be what irrational, right? Because you've got what you're dividing and the yeah, but you know we're speaking, right? Okay. Just like sometimes we divide animal, instead of dividing animal into man, let's say, and beast, we might divide man against the animals, right?

[26:19] And so they always say to students, if the biology professor says man is an animal, he's perhaps not insulting you. It means to be seen. But if your girlfriend calls you an animal, she's probably insulting you. But it's using the word animal in a different sense. Now, why does one of these keep the common name and the other get a new name in this case?

[26:48] Yeah, because man adds something significant, right? Okay. Now you go back to comparison of the numbers, right? I'm going to divide two into what? Two and two plus one.

[27:07] Okay. Now the number that is just two will keep the name two, and the number that is not just two, the two plus one, we get a new name, name three. Well, it's like that, right? Because animal means a living body that has senses, and the beast has nothing significant or noteworthy beyond that. But man is something very important, so he gets a new name, man, and they keep the word animal, right?

[27:37] Okay. Now my stock example there to use Aristotle's and all things, not his example but, not his example, but one like that. I say, how many fingers do I have?

[27:53] Four fingers and a thumb. We sometimes say, right? Okay. So one of the five fingers now gets its own name, and the other four keep the name finger, right? Well, something about this opposable thumb, as a biologist calls it, is very important for holding your bottle of beer, whatever it is. Something, but it stands out, you know. Even without being a sore thumb, it stands out, right?

[28:20] Like these other four, right? So it gets a new name, thumb, right? And sometimes the other four called the what? Fingers, yeah, yeah. Well, that's what you have in these in these examples. Well, in the case here,

[28:39] making is not really more perfect than the doing, but making has besides the doing a product, then. So it has something noteworthy, right? It doesn't make it a more perfect doing, but it has something that is noticeable, right? In addition to the doing, right?

[29:04] And that's why we kind of joke, you know, huh? The philosopher doesn't seem to be doing anything; he gets through doing what he's doing, and he's got nothing to show for it, right? But the carpenter, he gets through with his doing; he's got there's a house there, or a chair, or a table, or something, right? So making gets a new name, and doing keeps the what? Common name, right?

[29:27] So creation is like making, and understanding and what? Loving is like what? Doing, right? And if I understand you or love you, and you don't know that I understand or love you, right? It doesn't affect you at all, does it?

[29:57] And it's really accidental to my understanding and loving you that you know that I understand and love you, right? So, you know what the girl says. He doesn't even know I exist, right? So you might know somebody and love them, and they don't even know that you know them and love them.

[30:22] So, but it's not accidental to making that you affect something outside of you. You better not be making anything. So, Lord and Creator and names of this sort imply relations which follow upon acts which are understood to what in in some exterior thing, right? In this case, to the creatures themselves, according as they are in them in themselves. And therefore, relations of this sort are said of God, even though the relations are reasoned, right?

[31:07] They're said variously of God, right? According to variation of creatures. But knowledge and love and names of this sort are activities of this sort imply relations which follow upon acts which are understood to be in the doer, right? In this case, in God Himself. And therefore, they are what there isn't any variation when these things are said of Him.

[31:45] Okay. The second thing is, can't God make things that He hasn't made, right? To the second, it should be said that God knows also those things which He is able to make and has not made, right?

[32:04] Whence, from the fact that He is able to do more things or to make more things than He has made, it does not follow that He is able to what know more things than He knows, unless this be referred to as the what knowledge of vision, right? The knowledge of those things that are or were or will be, right? I mean, excuse me, that knowledge of yeah, that's what that knowledge of vision is, as opposed to the knowledge of simple intelligence, right?

[32:33] Knowledge of things that He could make or we could do, but neither He nor we would ever make, right? According as He is said to know those things in act according to some time. Ah, but from this that He knows those things which are able to be which are not, ah, or not to be which are, it does not follow that His knowledge is variable, but that He knows the what variability of things.

[33:05] If ever there was something that God before did not know and afterwards knew, right, then His knowledge would be what Variable, But this is not able to be, because whatever is or is able to be according to some time, God knows in His what eternity all once. And therefore, from this that something is laid down to be in some time, it follows that eternally it has been known by God.

[33:44] And therefore, we're not not to concede that God is able to know more things than He knows, huh? Because this statement implies that before He did not know and afterwards He did know, right?

[34:03] So he has no joy of discovery, God, huh? Oh, you assume delight when you when you see something for the first time, huh? Now the last objection was taken from knowing about God to be what born and so on, right?

[34:35] Now to the third, it should be said that the ancient nominalists said that the same this is the same enunciable thing that God was what?

[34:53] Yeah. Because the same thing is signified to these three, namely the what birth of Christ, huh? And according to this, it follows that God, whatever he what knows, right, has known, he will know because in the same way he knows God as what or Christ rather as born

[35:21] because it signifies the same thing as that Christ what will be born, right? But this opinion is false, he says. First, because the diversity of the parts of narration causes a diversity of the what Enunciables.

[35:42] Also, because it would follow that a statement that was once true would be always true, right? Which is against the philosopher who says, huh? This again is a reference to the categories, huh?

[36:01] That this statement Socrates sits is true when he's sitting and false when he what rises, yeah. That's interesting, huh? Because you know when you study the statement, there's two ways of dividing a statement.

[36:36] One way of dividing it is into affirmative and negative. The other way of dividing a statement is into true or false. Okay. Now, which is a division of a genus into species?

[37:06] Two. What? The two. Well, some might say, shouldn't this be the division into kinds? Isn't the distinction of true and false more important distinction than distinction of affirmative and negative? Which is more important, these distinctions? Okay. But, Aristotle points out, a statement can remain the same, right, with exactly the same subject and predicate and copula,

[37:43] and due to the change of the thing, pass from true to false, right? So, an example given, Socrates is sitting, or Berquist is sitting, right? Well, that statement a minute ago was true, now it's become false. But has the statement really changed? No, it's the same statement, right? It has the same parts, right?

[38:10] But does an affirmative statement ever become a negative statement? No. This is really a different kind of statement now, the affirmative and negative, huh? So, when Aristotle divides statement into affirmative and negative, he's divided into different kinds of statement, right? You know, this distinction of true and false is in some sense more important, right? He talks about the opposition between true and false, and so on in that book, you know.

[38:41] But this is the division into different kinds. huh So you say Berquist is sitting, and Berquist is not sitting. Well, not the same statement, right? And one is joining together Berquist and sitting, and the other is separating them, right? So these are two different kinds of statements you might think about Berquist and sitting. But either one of these could be what true at one time and false at another time.

[39:11] What do we say about the true and false? They're not different kinds, then. Yeah. Now, you see, there are some statements that are always true, like two is half of four. Some statements that are always false, like two is half of five. And some statements, like Berquist is sitting, that are sometimes true and sometimes false.

[39:53] Okay. So going back to the philosopher there, that's in the categories again, right? And therefore he says it ought to be conceded that this is what not true that whatever God what he knows if it refers to the what enunciables themselves right but from this it does not follow that the knowledge of God is variable

[40:30] for just as it is without variation of the divine knowledge that he knows one and the same thing sometimes to be and sometimes not to be right

[40:41] so without any variation of the divine knowledge he knows that something enunciable some statement sometimes is true and sometimes is false but the knowledge

[41:00] of God would be variable if he knew enunciable things by way of what enunciable things by putting together and dividing as happens in our understanding

[41:15] whence our knowledge is varied either according to truth and falsity if for example the thing changing we retain the same opinion about that thing right or it changes according to diverse opinions right if we first opine that someone sits and afterwards we think that he what does not sit right which neither is able to be true in God right okay so if I think that Berquist is sitting or Socrates is sitting and I don't realize he stood up right there's been a little change in me I was thinking truly and now I'm thinking falsely right or if I think that Socrates is sitting now and then later on when I see him stand up I think he's standing and not sitting well I avoid falsehood

[42:08] but I'm thinking something different than I thought before but God doesn't what know the statements by way of what statements huh okay I always say in logic and after we take up statement now we do the statement and we all kind of freeze you know

[42:32] if God was present he'd say I don't make statements although I know them right see how this runs through the whole this what Aristotle had first taught us and that I call it the central question of philosophy right does truth require that the way we know be the way things are right and you have to see that the answer to that question is what no. You have to see it in our knowledge at first, right?

[43:10] And you have to see it maybe in particular things, you know, like like when Aristotle first brings it up there in the books of natural hearing, and he's talking about the difference between natural philosophy and mathematics,

[43:30] and he's talking about how the mathematician talks about quantity in separation from matter, from ordinary matter, and he says that the mathematician is not false in knowing quantity in separation from matter, even though it doesn't exist in Separation from matter.

[44:02] Quite, Plato thought that the mathematician would be false in knowing quantity in separation from matter, if quantity didn't exist in reality in separation from matter. And so, the universe of all that is in Plato involves not only the sensible world, right, but also the mathematical world, then, that there are numbers and quantities and so on existing outside of our mind in separation from sensible things. Otherwise, he says, the mathematician would not be knowing things as they are,

[44:52] and therefore he would not be knowing truly, right? Aristotle says, well, no, it's a question, he says, of is quantity knowable without what sensible matter, right?

[45:11] And if it's knowable without sensible matter, then the mind is not false in knowing it without sensible matter, even though it doesn't exist without sensible matter. It would be false, though, if it said, like Plato said, that in fact it does exist in separation from sensible matter, huh? But in explaining that, and also the same question arises about universal, right? Because when I know what a man is, you know, man is a two-footed animal that has reason, huh?

[45:56] Now, knowing what a man is, is any man in my definition of man? Is Socrates or you or me in the definition of man? No. So I'm knowing what a man is in separation from all men, because no man appears in the definition of man.

[46:21] Now, is my mind false in knowing man in separation from all men? Does man exist in separation from all men? In the real world, aren't there just Socrates and you and me and the other? Right. Well, Plato said that there's now another world, right, the world of the forms, right, corresponding to the definitions that Socrates, his master, right, had shown the importance of, and so on.

[46:59] And of course, Socrates had argued that. It's by definition that our mind really is eventually able to know things for sure, right? So if it's through definitions that we know the truth, I mean, if you take things that are very sure about, like, like you know, take no odd numbers even, right? I'm very sure about that, right? But it's through the definition of odd and even that I know that no odd number is even, No prime number is even.

[47:29] I'm very sure about these things. But if it's through definitions that we know things truly, and through definitions we know the universal in separation from singulars, and truth requires it the way you know be the way things are, then truly the universals must exist in separation from what singulars. Yeah. Now again, Plato, I mean Aristotle says no. You can know what Socrates and Plato have in common in separation from their differences and so on,

[48:09] even though what they have in common doesn't exist in separation from them. And the mind is not false, unless it says that what they have in common outside of your mind exists in separation from them. Now when Thomas comes to comment on that passage, he, you know, there's two ways, right, that Plato thinks that the truth of mathematics and the truth through definitions requires us to say that mathematical things exist in separation from sensible things, and universals exist in separation from the singulars.

[48:54] But Thomas goes back to something easier, like the one example was given before, when I'm saying I'm both a philosopher and a grandfather, right?

[49:10] I'm both a philosopher and a father, right? Okay. And can you know these things that are found together in me? Can you know one of them truly without knowing the other?

[49:29] Yeah. Now if you know one of those without the other, you can say your knowledge of me is incomplete. But is incomplete mean false? See, is it false to say I'm a philosopher, leading out that I'm white, that I'm an American, that I'm a father, I'm a grandfather? A couple times. That's a present count. Yeah, what? Is it? If you say this philosopher is not an American, or this philosopher is not white, or this philosopher is not a grandfather, right?

[50:09] Then you'd be false, right? But people sometimes correspond with me by email, and they like something I've said, and they read something I said somewhere, and they don't know I'm white or black, you know, but they know I'm sometimes a philosopher. And but are they false in leading out that I'm white? You know, talk about my grandchildren, you know. They need that out, you see.

[50:42] Well, for Aristotle and for Thomas following the master there, the question is: Is my being a philosopher knowable without my being a grandfather? And in this case, both are knowable without the other.

[51:09] So the principle Aristotle is saying, and Thomas is following here, is something is knowable without something else, then it's not false to know it without the other thing, even though it can't maybe be without the other thing, right?

[51:33] And then he applies it to more difficult cases, even if man cannot be without Socrates or Plato or Aristotle, and so on, other individual men. But it's knowable, what?

[51:48] Yeah. So the mind is not false in knowing something that is knowable, even though it's kind of strange, right? That something is knowable that,

[52:05] in those cases, can't exist without the other, right? But Thomas takes a simple example of me being a philosopher, or a grandfather, that kind of example, where it's accidental, right? And you can be a philosopher without being a grandfather, and you can be a grandfather without being a philosopher, right? And therefore, it's easy to see. But in this individual, as an individual, they're both found.

[52:30] So am I a philosopher without being a grandfather? No. But my being a philosopher is knowable without my being a grandfather being known, and there's no falsity in knowing my being a philosopher without knowing my being a grandfather. I don't tell everybody I'm a grandfather. You guys must know by now. Everybody who meets me knows that, right? I don't announce in class, you know, everything about me.

[52:56] I'm white now, and I like to be seen white, but. If I had somebody blind in class, right? You know, they might know me to be a philosopher, but not know that I'm a white philosopher, right? You know, this poor blind man there, being but knowing me falsely, he knows me to be a philosopher. He doesn't know me to be white. Those things are really knowable without the other.

[53:19] So that was one of the greatest discoveries in the history of the world. of human thought that Aristotle made, right? And so, as I mentioned, you know, one of my teachers there, Boethius was his name, huh? Back around what was it, four eighty, something like that, twenty five, something like that. Boethius begins that fifth book where he's going to go to talk about God's eternal knowledge of temporal things and the future contingents and so on.

[53:51] But he goes back and has Lady Wisdom introduce Aristotle as her true follower. That's kind of interesting that that she's introduced as she's introduced as her true follower, because it's also about truth itself, right? And what's required for truth, right? And does truth require that the way we know be the way things are?

[54:18] It comes up, you know, going back to the question you asked me earlier about science. There, it goes back there, you know, when in modern science the characteristic way of knowing is by the experiment, right?

[54:33] And so, if you are accustomed to that way of knowing, you might think that's the only way of knowing, and you'll find this in in in modern scientism, and they'll say we we know by what making, and therefore Karl Marx will conclude, right, that we only can know what we make, and we're the beginning and the end of what we make. Therefore, we must be God ourselves, right?

[55:08] But in the sense they're saying that if we know by making, then all we can know is what we make, and maybe that isn't quite true, right? Because the way we know is not necessarily what, yeah.

[55:28] So we might be able to discover the way things are yet, by making, Although it may be complicated as Heisenberg's pointing out, you get down to the subatomic levels there, right? But in what is it? Love's labor is Lost. Who cannot be betrayed by a plot, right?

[55:51] We can sometimes set up a situation to reveal somebody's character, right? You know, in Loz, in in, uh... Excuse me, all's well that ends well, yeah. where the character you know claims to be a brave man and you know a stand-up soldier soldier and so on. And what they do is, when he's out one night, they disguise themselves like the enemy and they grab him, they capture him, right?

[56:20] And then they bring him back and speaking a lot of foreign language and so on, they threaten his life and he reveals all the battle plan, everything. He spills the whole beans, and then they what? Reveal themselves, right? He's completely disgraced, right? Of course, the name of the character is Paroles, huh? Paroles, which means, I suppose, in French, words, right?

[56:43] And he complains, "Who cannot be betrayed by a plot, right? " And there is a kind of a joke like that, where the guy is at the party, right? And he poses a hypothetical question, you know, to the ladies there. To the ladies, would you sleep with a man tonight, you know, for a million dollars? Well, a million dollars? You know, I would sleep with a man for a million dollars.

[57:12] And so then later on in the in the the party he comes and offers the girl twenty dollars for an evening. Just who do you think I am? And he answers, "You know, we already know what you are. We're just dickering about the price."

[57:35] But the point is, there are some circumstances that would bring out your character, right? Okay. So in a beautiful play, there are a fellow there, right? Now when Desdemona's going to bed there the night, she's going to be killed by a fellow, right?

[57:51] You know, and she's talking to her maid there, you know, Yaku's wife, And Desdemona is so chaste, you know, truly chaste. She can't understand how a woman would, you know, for the whole world, you know, do this sort of thing, right? And her maid, you know, being part of the world, says, "Well, for the whole world, I think I want, she says. but next morning, I'd say I haven't done it.

[58:15] I mean, you get kind of the world in real life, you know. She kind of just doesn't want to do that. You know, it's it's it's the innocence that can't realize, you know, the evil in other people. And

[58:32] but to see, in other words, if you're given an opportunity to have a million dollars, whatever it is, then your true character might come out, right? You know the old the old proverb: Every man has his price, right? You know, and I've heard over and over again. You know, you know people change jobs like that. Was an offer you couldn't refuse. So you can set up a you can make a situation that might reveal somebody's what character, right?

[59:00] That ordinary circumstances would not, right? Now you know you're not supposed to you know cause somebody to fall, you know, you know to those by whom scandals come, you know. But you could set up a situation to reveal somebody's character, and in a way, you're knowing him as he is. You know, there's an expression they call it the moment of truth, right? It's the moment of truth.

[59:26] Your signs and circumstances really reveal what your character is. So, but in a sense, if you made these circumstances to to reveal the character, I remember seeing a movie one time where it was about the CIA, you know, and and there's going to be people being interviewed to work for the CIA or some secret organization like that, right? And they were being invited to kind of a country place there in Virginia, wherever it is, they do this sort of stuff.

[59:55] And they were supposed to be there a certain day, you know, to be to begin to be interviewed and reviewed, you know. And when they all had arrived, someone came and said that the that the investigators, you know, were called into something, you know, and we're going to have a week or two week delay here, you know. Just relax, enjoy yourself, right? Well, unbeknownst to them, that two weeks when they were waiting for the investigators, you know, the interviewers to arrive, right, was revealing the thing was going on.

[1:00:25] And some people were falling in love with the woman there, and so on. You know, that's not the guy you want on the spy team. out there, people who are easily what led astray, right? And so, essentially, setting up the circumstances to what see who is a good, you know, stable person, you know, or who's easily influenced by women, maybe we'll be spilling secrets and so on, right?

[1:00:51] And so, you're knowing somebody as he is, not as you made him, right? But you did make the circumstances that revealed him as he is, right? He's weak to woman, or he's weak to booze drinking, or something, right? Whatever his particular difficulty is, right? But you don't want somebody who's who's weak to booze and therefore spill the thing there or weak to woman, right? You know, because booze and woman are used to get secrets out of people all the time, right?

[1:01:23] So you can you can make these things, but you're not making this man weak to booze by exposing him to booze, right? I mean, Plato has that in in I guess the Republic, right, where the young men are going to be what given these drinking parties and so on, right? And unbeknownst to them, they're being observed by the others, right? And then they see who's weak in their character under the influence of these things, right?

[1:01:52] Some people drink to excess, you know, lose their self-control and so on, and so they're being what you're revealing what the character really is under these circumstances. All you set up the thing, right? So

[1:02:10] you haven't made this guy an alcoholic, but you're revealing he's alcoholic by by these what circumstances, huh? So by making, you only know what you've made.

[1:02:33] You've made this party, right? But you make known something by it, huh? As it is. So, but you you find this, and you know, it starts with Kant and then Marx draws the conclusion from it, right? But they see that in modern science, the way you know is by making, and then it's not too far for them to go from there to say, well, then you know only what you make.

[1:02:59] Maybe that's maybe that's a little bit of a jump in itself, right? But the first step, I mean, is is something from custom because when they're accustomed to this kind of knowing, they're accustomed to knowing by experiment. And therefore, they think that's the only way of knowing. You only know by making. And then the next jump, which is you know, if you only know by making, then you only know what you make.

[1:03:26] And then you only know that, of which you are the beginning of the end, because that's all you could know. You only know yourself as God, right? Because we are the beginning and the end of all we make. So you only know yourself as God, right?

[1:03:42] And before you knew yourself as the maker, then you you you had this fancy about a maker outside of yourself, and you call it God. That's really fundamental what Aristotle said, right? But you know, I mean, the first time you go through theology, you are not going to understand everything. In fact, every time you go through these things, you see something new in them, right? But the more you go through them, too, the more you realize how these things depend upon things all the way back to the things we learned first in philosophy, right?

[1:04:16] And you know, it's it's first in the second book of Natural Hearing when Aristotle is distinguishing between natural philosophy and mathematics that he starts to make this point, you know. But then comes up in other parts of philosophy, and ultimately in the last books of Wisdom. But

[1:04:36] that's a surprise. I mean, geometry: one theorem builds up another theorem all the way back, and you realize all these things finally develop. Okay, I should open this now here or not here.