De Anima (On the Soul)
45. De Anima III.5: The Agent Intellect as Light—Separable, Impassible, Unmixed, and Act
https://berquistcourse.com/course/philosophy/4-de-anima/045-de-anima-iii-5-the-agent-intellect-as-light-separable-impassible/

[0:00] Okay, up to chapter five here on page thirty-nine. Our text, and Aristotle has shown that the we usually call reason or the understanding is a

[0:26] undergoing ability, right? And that we see, huh? That because we see the natures of all material things, it has to be lacking in any material nature.

[0:39] And then he went on to show the object and that acts upon it, huh? And that could be described as the what it is, right?

[0:55] Of a thing sensed or imagined, huh? So he takes the example there of the what it is of a natural thing, which is sensible, or the what it is of a what mathematical thing, which is imaginable.

[1:13] And he saw the distinction there between what it is and the individual, right? Between what water is and the water in front of me here, or between what a man is and the man in front of me here, right? Okay, or even what a chair is and the chair in front of me, right? Okay.

[1:39] And so the object of reason is something also universal, common to many. And so Boethius says in logic there in the beginning of logic that the thing is singular when sensed, but universal when understood.

[2:01] Now in some way though the reason does know the singular not directly but as the source of its own what thought from which its thought is taken.

[2:17] But the individuals are not actually what understandable. So what makes them to be actually understandable? Well, Plato doesn't have that problem because for him the universals exist in the world by themselves. But Aristotle elsewhere says that you can't really have what a man is right exist in the world by itself, because part of understanding what a man is is it involves what flesh and blood and bones.

[2:51] And if you have flesh and blood and bones outside the mind, you are going to have a what singular. Okay. So at the beginning of chapter five, he's going to point out that there is another ability or power. Now in Latin they sometimes call these the

[3:17] when we've talked about so far the intellectus possibilis. huh Okay, but this is the understanding that what undergoes. So it's called the undergoing understanding. What's

[3:46] able in a way to become all things, because it would receive the natures of all the things around us. And then the intellectus agens,

[4:02] which people kind of transliterate into the what agent intellect, but we could call the acting upon understanding. So Aristotle begins by saying that everywhere you have

[4:28] something that's able to be right and does come to be, is actualized. You need something that is able to become something, and something that makes it actually become that. And it's analogous to once you have the material world, where you have matter and the what art, right? And the matter is able to receive all kinds of forms, right? The matter, let's say if it's wood, is able to become a chair, a table, and a door, right?

[5:05] But there's something else that makes the wood actually to be what a table or a door or something of that sort, right? So the same thing in regard to the understanding part of the soul. There's something which is able to receive the what it is, right, of all these things, but that what it is has to be what separated from the individuals in order to be received.

[5:34] And so there has to be something which is what proportional to the art there that makes things that are able to be what understood actually understandable. Okay.

[5:52] So he begins by saying there, chapter five. But since just in every nature, and of course you might, as Thomas does in the commentary, say in every nature where there is what something going from ability to act, right? There's something going from ability to act, and there's something whereby it is what made actual. Okay.

[6:21] The one like matter, you could say, in each genus. This is what is in potency. All those things in that genus, huh? Or to use the word I prefer to use, its ability. All these things, right? The other, the cause in the sense of the act sense, and what brings about by making them all.

[6:45] So something proportional to the art, right, which actualizes something, and the matter which is able to what undergo to receive to be made actual, huh? Okay.

[7:06] So this is also then necessary in the understanding part of the soul that you have these what differences, right? Something which is able to receive, right, the natures of all things, and something that makes those natures actually understandable.

[7:24] And there is on the one hand the sort of mind or understanding, right? I guess I'll use the word what nous, huh? Which is what we usually translate by understanding, huh? Okay.

[7:42] In which all things come to be, huh? Okay. The understanding that is able to become all things. What the Greek actually says, huh? To become all things, huh? Okay. But to receive all things, you could say that too.

[8:00] And on the other hand, another kind of understanding, right? That is able to make all things. He says in the Greek, huh? Okay. It's more active there in the in the Greek, right? But the same idea. Okay.

[8:22] Now he translates the next words there, referring now to that second understanding, the acting upon understanding, like some state, like light, huh? On the Greek, what he uses is the word what hexis, huh? Which the translator here has translated by state, huh? And Thomas says now some people misunderstand what he means by that, huh? Okay.

[8:53] Hexis is usually translated into Latin as habitus, and therefore in English the word habit. And some people, he says, understand this as referring to the habit of natural understanding. But even the habit of natural understanding presupposes this acting upon understanding. So he says that's not how you should understand his use of the word hexis there, right? You should understand it in a broader sense, the sense he says in which Aristotle will distinguish between.

[9:37] Go back to natural philosophy, between matter, right, or ability in general, and the act which is what have, right, as opposed to the lack of the act or lack of the forma.

[10:00] So in calling it a habitus there, hexis in Greek, he means that unlike the undergoing understanding whose nature is to be what in potency or inability, whose very nature is to be like a what blank tablet which nothing is written, to be able to receive all the natures of these things, right?

[10:26] Unlike that, it's what like a form, like an act, and therefore it's said to be what something have, a habit, right? In other words, he says we should understand the word hexis there in Greek there,

[10:48] in the sense, in the broad sense, for having as opposed to what not having or lacking something, okay? Because this is as an act or something active in comparison to the undergoing understanding which is as

[11:12] an ability, right? And of course, the thing that is able to receive something but hasn't received it yet could be said to lack, right? Okay, and lack is the opposite of habitus, a habit, okay? That becomes more clear as he goes on to point out that the acting upon understanding is something actual, right, as opposed to the undergoing understanding which is something in ability or in potency to receive things, huh?

[11:44] True. And then he makes a second comparison, which is that this new ability we're talking about, this ability, in the active sense, the acting upon understanding, it's something like what light is.

[12:12] Now, what way is it like light? For in a way, light makes what is potentially color, color enact. So, if this room was completely dark, none of the colors would be what actually visible, would they? But you turn the light on, and the colors which are are visible in potency and ability become actually what visible, right? When the light is turned on.

[12:53] Well, as light is to the seeing of the eye, right? So is this acting upon understanding to the seeing or understanding of the undergoing understanding. So, if something becomes actually understandable and able to what be received in the undergoing understanding because of the what activity, right, of the acting upon understanding. Now, that sounds very strange at first, but we are aware of the fact. To go back to what we learned long ago, I think how sensing comes first in our knowledge, right?

[13:40] And the next step after sensing is memory of what we sensed. And the next step after memory of what we sensed is to gather together many memories of the same sort of thing.

[13:59] And then we're aware of our ability here, which is the ability of the acting upon understanding, to separate out what is common to those many what things of the same sort that have been seen, right? So there's a dog in the yard, and my mother says, "There's a dog, Blaine." And then another day, there's another dog, and see the dog, right? And so I sensing individual dogs, and starting to remember maybe the dog I saw yesterday, and maybe the dog I see today, right?

[14:39] And gradually gathering an experience of dogs, which is nothing other than a collection of many memories of the same sort of thing. In this case, the dog.

[14:52] And but everything up to this point is a singular, right? Sensing, memory, even experience is a collection of singulars. But it's what a dog is, the universal that is actually what understandable and able to be received in the undergoing understanding. And so, I need an ability or power, which they call the agent intellect, or I'm calling it the acting upon understanding, that will separate, right, something universal from the what images of all these singulars, and that is then received in the undergoing understanding.

[15:36] So actually, our actually understanding is result of the activity of what both of these abilities or what powers, huh? Okay. So notice, huh? Just as we carried the word what to see, huh? Which first names the act of the eye, huh? And then we carried that word to see over to the what

[16:11] act of the imagination, huh? And then finally we carried over to the act of what understanding, right? Understanding. So likewise, this word light has been carried over, huh? From what makes something potentially visible, actually visible, right?

[16:35] Over to this what acting upon understanding, which makes something potentially understandable, right? Understandable and ability actually understandable, huh? By being separated from the individuating matter that you have in the senses or the what imagination, huh? Okay. So that first paragraph is concerned then with seeing that in the understanding part of the soul, there are these two different what abilities or powers, right? And one is an ability to undergo, to receive the natures of all material things, but in this universal way, right?

[17:38] And the other is ability to separate that universal nature from the singulars that are found in the what senses or in the imagination, huh? Okay.

[17:55] Now in the second paragraph, three thirty-seven, he's going to say some things about the nature of this new power now that we're talking about, huh?

[18:10] And he's going to say what four things about it, huh? And this mind or this understanding, huh? Meaning the what the acting upon understanding. It's separable, right? It's something

[18:31] separated from matter, right? Okay. You could have translated that separated. The Greek word is choristos right? Okay. So he's saying it's separated, and it doesn't what? It's apathes, right? In the first sense of the word, passion, right? But maybe in other senses too. It doesn't what? Yeah, yeah. Okay.

[19:07] And it's not mixed with matter, huh? But then, because it's active, its substance is what? Act rather than what? This passive potency or ability that is the undergoing understanding,

[19:32] huh? Okay. Why does he distinguish between unmixed and separable, separated? Well, they're very close, right? If you recall back in in the previous reading, there, he he said that the what? The mind is not a body. That's more direct, and it's not mixed with matter, right? Oh yeah. Okay. Yeah. So it's a little bit, I was just lecturing the other day there on that fragment DK12, of Anaxagoras, huh?

[20:09] And. He says that the mind is unlimited, right, and it's self-ruling, and it's mixed with nothing, right. Okay. And then he gives a reason why it's mixed with nothing. Then he goes on. He says the thinnest of all things, and then he says the purest of all things. Now, same to students. I used to think that when he said purest, he was just saying the same thing he had said before.

[20:40] That's another way of saying, you know, unmixed, right? But on second thought, maybe before he was saying that the mind is not mixed with other things, right? Mm-hmm. But when he says it's the purest of things, he means that it is not a mixture of things itself.

[21:05] Okay. That's one thing to say that that something is a mixture of things, right? It's a it's composed of a number of things mixed together, right? Okay. But whether it is or is not, it's another thing to say that that the whole of that thing, right, is or is not mixed with what other things, right? Okay. So what do they have in college? They have a dance called a mixer.

[21:34] Okay. So you're mixing with other people, right? See, okay. But you yourself are also what a mixture of flesh and blood and bones and all these things, right? Okay. See, so it's one thing to say that what I don't mix with other people, I stay with myself, right? And another thing to say that I'm not myself a mixture of different things, right? Two different things to point out, isn't it?

[22:02] See. And you see, he says he gives us before as the reason why it's not mixed with other things that if it were, it couldn't rule them, right? Yeah. Okay. And so I try to you know explain Anaxagoras' reason by saying the first thing we demand of a judge is that he be impartial, right? Which means he's not a part of those between whom he's what deciding or judging, right?

[22:37] So if I have an interest in your company or something like that, and your two guys are got a financial squabble, I shouldn't be the judge because if I decide in your favor, one of your favor is going to benefit me, right? If I decide for you, it wouldn't benefit me, right? Might harm me financially. See, so I shouldn't be judging between the two of you, right?

[23:00] Right. Um. But then after he says that the mind is the thinnest of all things, that's really a reason to say it's the purest of all things. Because if it were a mixture of different things, those things would be thinner than it, and it therefore would not be the thinnest of all things, right? Okay. Okay.

[23:31] So maybe although in the reverse order here, of course. He's saying something like those two things, right? It's not a body, right? It's not in some way mixed up with a body, right? Because neither case would be prevented, right? In the case of the undergoing understanding from what understanding all things. Okay. Now he's going to give one reason for those first three things, and in a way for the fourth thing he says about it—that it's act.

[24:08] For, I don't like the way he translates that. You could translate that way, but I think it's more the the one making the maker, right? For the maker is always more honorable than the one undergoing, right? And the principle, in the sense of the active principle, than the what matter, right? Okay.

[24:45] So the teacher is more honorable than the student, right? And the Michelangelo is more honorable than the what marble, right? But in general, we see that the maker is what more honorable than the what matter, right?

[25:09] And so, if the undergoing understanding is not a body and doesn't undergo in the way matter does, right? And it's not mixed with matter, then even more so with the acting upon understanding. But because it's acting upon it itself has to be as an act rather than as a what like matter or like potency or ability, huh? Yeah. And notice that's that's analogy, right? He's saying that the acting upon understanding is to the undergoing understanding a bit like art is to what matter, right?

[25:55] And art is something actual, right? In fact, the form that the artist is going to induce in matter, already has an action in his head, right? But that form exists in the matter only in potency or in ability. That's not until the art acts upon the matter, right? That's actual.

[26:25] Now, that's not altogether identical that proportion, but because the acting upon understanding is really acting upon the what images, huh? And separating out, right, what is common from the singular, huh? And in that sense, it's acting upon the what undergoing understanding, right? So Thomas raises the question: How can the soul be both in potency to something and in what act with respect to the same thing? And he says, well, the undergoing understanding is in potency to any determined material nature. And those determined material natures are in the what?

[27:19] What we sense or imagine, An approximate sense in the images, huh? But the images, although they have these different natures in them, they're not actually what? Understandable yet. But the acting upon understanding is actually immaterial, and so it makes them immaterial, so they can be received in the undergoing understanding. So it's not an ability and potency in the same what? Way. The determined natures of the what?

[27:56] Different things that we have images of. Those determined natures are not in the acting upon understanding. If that were so, we wouldn't need the images at all to learn. We'd have to come to know what a dog is through sensation, memory, and experience of dogs. But it's a matter of experience. Then come to a knowledge of what a dog is through sensation, memory, and finally experience. So the determined natures there are in these things, but those determined natures are tied up with the individual things, and therefore not actually understandable yet, not actually immaterial.

[28:35] So the acting upon understanding makes these things what? Actually universal and therefore actually understandable. This is the key to understanding eventually the angels and God. The fact that something becomes understandable when it's separated from what? Matter, right? And that's a sign for us that something was by its very nature immaterial. It would be actually what? Understandable. And that's why God and the angels naturally understand primarily themselves, because they're actually understandable.

[29:15] They're actually immaterial substances, huh? But these material substances are not actually what? Understandable. They're understandable only in ability or in potency. So there's some truth in what Immanuel Kant said that the things in themselves, meaning material things, are not knowable, right? They're not knowable in act. They're not understandable as a saying act, right? But they're understandable in ability.

[29:50] So in a way, from one middle term, huh? he says that if the undergoing understanding is immaterial and it's not acted upon the way matter is acted upon, and it's not mixed with matter, then the active principle, right? The maker, as it were, huh? What is analogous to art is going to be of this sort, even more so. The condition is going to be in its very substance or nature as an act, as a form, as a habit to us, right, rather than as a potency for form, an ability to receive form.

[30:33] It seems it's St. Thomas was saying the the act that it has is its immateriality, and because it's actually immaterial, it can make other things material. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it doesn't contain the determinate, the definite natures of these things, right, material things. Those definite natures are found and represented in a way in the images, okay. And so, there's something

[31:06] actual in the images, right, that is not in the understanding part to begin with, until he sees them, right. So in that sense, it's not in act with respect to the images, but in potency, right. But there's something that the understanding part has, and especially the acting upon understanding, that the images don't have, and that's to be actually immaterial, right. And so the acting upon understanding makes the image to be actually understandable, and that does so by separating

[31:48] the natures of these things from the individuation, to the images,