De Anima (On the Soul)
150. Aquinas Summa I q.86 a.3–4: Matter, Form and Necessity in Contingent Things; Knowing the Future: Eternity, Causes, Dreams and Animals
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[0:00] Okay, we'll go back to begin the paragraph. And each thing is contingent because of matter, right? Because a contingent is what is able to be and not be, but that ability to be and not be is pertains to matter. That's in a sense what matter is. But necessity follows upon the definition of form, because those things which follow upon form of necessity are in something. But matter is the principle of individuation.

[0:32] But the universal notion is taken by the what separation or abstraction of form from particular matter. For it has been said above that per se and directly the understanding is of what universals. like we did in the De Anima, that the proper object of our understanding is the what it is of something sensed or imagined, but the what it is is something what universal. So what a triangle is is something universal.

[1:12] What a circle is is something universal. What a dog is is something universal. What a chair is something universal. Okay. And that was Plato's discovery, right? That in material things and even in these imaginable things, these geometrical things, the individual and what it is are not identical.

[1:40] And when the reason understands what a triangle is, it's understanding something universal. So we often quote Boethius there, talking about Porphyry's work. The thing is singular when sensed, but universal when understood. So when I see this chair or feel it, it's an individual chair, right? When I understand. What is this? What is this? It's a chair, right? Then it's now become something universal, separated from the individuating conditions of matter.

[2:16] That's because the mind is what immaterial. It's necessary to separate it from the individuating conditions of matter, part outside of part. Okay. We've talked about that before. You know, you can see that in the parts of a. You know, if you look at the parts of a circle, the individual circle, say this here, this part and this part, they meet at a common boundary, right?

[2:51] And say if you have a square, right? You can say this part and this part meet at this line. But now, when I understand what a square is, and I signify in words what I understand, that this is a equilateral

[3:14] and right-angled quadrilateral. Does the equilateral, right-angled, and quadrilateral do they meet at a line? Do they meet at a point? They meet at a surface? No. And this is the other definition of continuous. One definition of the continuous is that which is divisible forever. The other definition is it's a quantity whose parts, but meet at a common boundary. So the left and the right side of the line meet at a point.

[3:58] Two sides here of the square at a line, and the two sides of the chalk here at a surface, a plane. But the parts of a what definition don't meet. These meet at a point. Equilateral, right-angled. You'd have what? This would be a line. That is not a line. Okay. And we saw before, of course too how thoughts are not divisible, what, forever.

[4:30] So between any two points in a line, there's always a stopping point in between, and so on. But this is not true about thoughts.

[4:41] Remember how we're taking the example of the syllogism there, right? So you lay down that every mother is a woman, and then you put next to that, no man is a woman, and there's only one thought that comes next. That no man is a mother, right? It's like that with definition too, right? You want to go from quadrilateral to square. We add the quadrilateral, right-angled. It's not a square yet.

[5:09] But you add equilateral and right-angled, and you're at square now. And there's no other stopping points in between, right? Between quadrilateral and right-angled, or to quadrilateral, equilateral.

[5:30] But in the continuous, there's no such thing as the next line, next bigger circle. Is there a next longer line? No, not the line is divisible forever, right? It's not a next one.

[5:52] Aristotle is often saying in the text, "Next." But if thinking was material and continuous, if you really had a line of thought, you know, or a line is something continuous, then there wouldn't be a next thought, would there?

[6:14] Just think the trouble would be at teaching, right? You know, it's like going from taking the train, let's say, from Worcester to Boston, and it's going to stop at Framingham, but someone has to stop But some other place before you get to Framingham, and then some other place before that, and so on. You'd never get out the get to get to Boston, would you? If you had to stop at all the intermediary things.

[6:43] You should have talked about this first, professor, before you went to that. You know, we used to talk about a good lecture sometimes, you know, you'd kind of anticipate almost the next thought, right? Because he's kind of leading your mind along, step by step, huh? But sometimes, you know, if the if the if he jumps, right? You see. But if thought was continuous, he'd always making a jump, right, and leaving out all the things in between, huh?

[7:09] Be jumping from point to point, huh? And never completing any line of thought. because it would be impossible to. How many points did you have to make in order to make any point? Yeah.

[7:27] So thoughts are like numbers, and not like the continuous. So it has been said above that per se and directly, the understanding is of universals, and sense of the what singulars, of which also indirectly, right, by reflex, coming back, in some ways, the understanding has been said above. If, therefore, contingent things, in so far as they are contingent, are known direct. By sense. I mean, thus, therefore, I say, contingent things, in so far as they are contingent, are known directly by sense.

[8:11] by what sense, and only indirectly by the understanding. But the universal, necessary reasons of contingent things are known by the what understanding, right? Once, if one pays attention to the universal

[8:30] definitions of things knowable, all sciences are about necessary things. If, however, one pays attention to the things themselves, thus, some sciences are about necessary things, and some about what contingent things.

[8:51] And from this is clear the reply to the what objections. so it goes back to the distinction he's making there at the beginning of the body of the article, right? Does time ever stand still?

[9:39] English is interesting. The English word to understand, and the word itself comes from the word to stand, right? So, how can you understand something that doesn't stand still?

[10:04] Well, could you make this distinction that he makes you at the beginning, right? Is there something that stands still in time? Universal, not in time.

[10:22] Well, doesn't time always have a before and after? So there is something of necessity there, right? Or take change, huh? You know, the Heracliteans are saying that everything's changing, everything's flowing, and you can't say anything because it'll be changed before you can finish your sentence, right? But if you say that

[10:58] what changes is other now than it was before, right? Does that ever change? Does a thing ever change without being without becoming other than it was? What

[11:22] you say? No, no. So if I say change is becoming other, either in quality or in place or something, right? I have an unchanging knowledge about change.

[11:39] Okay. If we descend to this in the concrete, right, and talking about a situation that is always fluid, right? You can't really characterize it because it's going to be different before you finish your description of it, right?

[12:05] So, we want to take a little break before our next article, or what? Sure. Okay. Future, future things. To the fourth one proceeds thus: It seems that our understanding does know future things. First objection: For our understanding knows through understandable forms, which abstract from the here and now, and thus they have themselves indifferently to all time. You can see that in the first act, anyway, right? When you understand what a dog is, is that past, present, or future?

[12:45] Seems to abstract from all of them, right? Sure. Okay. But it's able to know present things, right? Therefore, it's able to know future things. Moreover, man, when alienated from his senses, is able to know some future things, as is clear in those what, sleeping, right? And in the what, mentally disturbed, I guess, huh? Phrenetic. But when he is alienated from his senses, his understanding is more what, vigorous, huh?

[13:25] That's maybe a question, huh? Okay. Therefore, the understanding, quantum est de se as regards itself, is able to know the future things. Aristotle has, you know, a book on dreams, right? He also has a book on prophesying by dreams, huh? Okay. And of course, we're familiar with Saint Joseph and other people being what, inspired, right? Enlightened, you might say, right? By what, in the dream, right? You know, flee, go down to Egypt, or come back from Egypt, and so on, right?

[14:19] Moreover, the understandable knowledge of man is more efficacious than the knowledge of any what, the beastly animals, the brutus. But there are some animals which know the future, right? As the what, cornicule, what are they? Crow. Yeah. They signify there's going to be a future what, rain, huh? Okay. Therefore, much more is human intellect able to know future things, huh?

[14:59] I know, Sirrahm. There is some evidence that the animals seem to have some knowledge of when the weather is going to change, that we don't seem to have, right? Aren't we superior in our knowledge, our understanding, to them? Of course, the second objection you took those who are kind of mentally sick, almost, not phrenetics right? Okay, and maybe there is something to this, right?

[15:27] But it's said against all this in the Book of Ecclesiastes: "Much or many, much is the affliction of man, who is ignorant of past things, and in no way is able to know the what future things, right? "

[15:48] I answer: It should be said that about the knowledge of future things, in the same way one should distinguish as about the knowledge of contingent things. For future things, as they fall under time, are singulars, which our understanding, the human understanding, does not know except by a coming back upon itself, right? As we said above, we saw it the other day. Remember, it knows directly only the what it is, right, the universal, but then it comes back upon its own act and upon the image of which it was taken, And then as a kind of indirect or reflect knowledge of the what singular.

[16:35] But the reasons for future things are able to be universal and perceptible by understanding, and about these also there can be sciences, so they can predict, right, an eclipse of the sun, right?

[16:52] But that we may speak in general about the knowledge of future things, it should be known that future things are able to be known in two ways: in one way in themselves, right; in another way in their what causes, right.

[17:13] And in themselves, future things are known, not able to be known except by God, whose knowledge is not in what time, but in eternity. To which are also present future things, in so far

[17:33] as his eternal insight, at the same time, is over the whole what course of time. So Thomas, you know, when he talks about eternity there. You'll use this little comparison here that the moments of time are like the points on a what circle, and one is before or after another, right? But the eternal now is outside of time, not in time. It's like the center of the circle, right?

[18:06] And the center of the circle is directly opposite each one of these, right? So every moment of time, past, present, and future, are present to God in His eternal now. So He's seeing all of them in His eternal now. But in time, what is before and after? another? That kind of amazing thing there. the eternity. That's how Boethius develops their definition of eternity, right? An understanding of God's now is the future.

[18:43] There in the last book of the Consolation of Philosophy. But we. Have to wait till we study God a bit know more about eternity. What's interesting now when when he begins the fifth book, Boethius of the Consolation of Philosophy, it's written in the form of a dialogue, right? And of course, he identifies himself as a member of the Academy, which is Plato's school. And of course, he's writing in a kind of Platonic way, insofar as he's writing in the form of a conversation.

[19:22] But instead of a Socratic conversation, he doesn't have a conversation with Socrates, but Lady Wisdom comes down, right? Now, sapientia in Latin is what, feminine, right? So Lady Wisdom comes down to console him in prison there, and so there's a conversation between Boethius and Lady Wisdom, but she's leading the conversation.

[19:47] Well, when she gets to the fifth book, Lady Wisdom introduces Aristotle as her true follower, and here Lady Wisdom is going to follow Aristotle as opposed to what, Plato, because he's going back to that central question of philosophy that we talked about: that does truth require, right, that the way we know be the way things are?

[20:24] And Aristotle answers to that question, what? No. Plato seems to answer yes, right? Well, this is necessary before you can talk about God's knowledge, right? God knows the future now, They say in his eternal now, right? And he knows time, in other words, eternally. But when you say he knows time eternally, you don't mean he knows time to be eternal, no. But the eternity is on the side of his knowing, right?

[20:59] So the way he knows is not the way things are, right? But he knows things as they are. He knows them truly, right? That's an amazing thing to see, right? But you have to begin to see a little bit even our own knowledge, huh? That the way we know things, we can, the way in which we know things, and the way in which we truly know things can be different than the way things are.

[21:27] What we say about things has to agree with them, right? And you can see a little bit of this in our knowledge of the past, right? We could talk about last week's class now, couldn't we? Maybe you remember it.

[21:45] So you talk about the past, and you think about the past now, right? Is that a contradiction there? To think about the past now, because the past is not now. See, but the now is in your knowing, right? But you don't know the past to be now.

[22:08] You don't attribute the presence of your knowledge to the past. We talk about the future although we don't really know it that way, but we talk about what we're going to do, you know, this evening or something, right? Okay, so we talk about the future now, but we don't think the future is now, do we?

[22:36] Okay. But you know the the more common things Aristotle talks about is how the order in our knowing is even what contrary to the order of things, huh? So we tend to know the effect before the cause, even though in things the cause is before the effect. But there's no falsity in knowing the effect before the cause, unless you were to say that the order in my knowing is the order in things.

[23:09] As I say to the students, I know you before your parents, huh? But in reality, your parents came before you. But am I false in knowing you before your parents? No, the falsity would come of if I say because I know you before your parents, therefore you are in reality before your parents. See, but you have to distinguish the order in our knowing and the way we know from the order in things.

[23:34] not the same thing, huh? So God knows the what future things in themselves. That's because of His knowledge being eternal. To whom also He says are present, right? Things which in the course of things are future, right? Insofar as His eternal insight is at the same time over the whole course of time, as has been said above when we treated the science of God, right? So you see the treats in store for you when you come to study God.

[24:24] Saint Thomas says they study the body, so I can study the soul. I study the soul, so I can study the angels. I study the angels, so I can study God.

[24:35] But insofar as these future things are in their causes, they are also able to know, be known by us, right? And if they are in their causes from which something takes place by necessity, right, then they are known by the certitude of science, as the astronomer. Foreknows the future what? Eclipse right.

[25:00] If, however, they are in their causes, so that from them something comes to be for the most part, thus they thus they are able to be known to a certain what? conjectura, which means a guess, right?

[25:19] Either more or less what? Certain, right? According as the causes are more or less inclined to their what? Effects, okay. Do you see the distinction he's making between knowing the future in itself, right? Only God knows the future in itself, and not even the angels know the future in itself. But it could be revealed as you as you were talking earlier during the break there to the prophets, huh?

[25:49] Sure. Maybe some special illumination from God, huh? Okay. But we can know the future insofar as what? It has a root in causes, right? And if those causes produce the effect by necessity, then you could be certain about the future, right? That's mainly in astronomy. But if you cannot, the only for the most part, right? Well, then you have to what? Guess. Okay. All the way down to the weatherman, right?

[26:23] Okay. But you know we have a number of arts of guessing, right? And to some extent, even the what? The economists say, and the weatherman both have an art of guessing. They have some reason for their guess, but still a guess. Barring unforeseen circumstances, the economy will pick up. Jobs will pick up. Yes.

[26:52] Okay. Now the first objection is talking about how our mind transcends time in a way in its knowledge. To the first, therefore, it should be said that that reason proceeds about the knowledge which is through universal reasons of causes, from which future things are able to be known according to the order of the effects to the cause. What he just brought out in the solution there. Response.

[27:28] They could say, "Secundum quid we know, every man it'll come be born this the future, right? Secundum quid? There' no man, right? " I always pick upon some. I'll say that the one I always pick upon some girl in my in my class, and I'll say, "You know, my brother Mark. And she'll say no, and I said they are. What she said, she looked at herself in the mirror.

[27:57] And I said, you know what a man is? Yeah, my brother. That's my brother Marcus. So you do know my brother Mark, don't you? But notice, in some way, she knows every man, every brother in the world, doesn't she? In some way.

[28:16] The other favorite example, though, is see, there's a knock on the door over there, right? And I said, you know who's at the door? You see, you don't know it's knocking at the door. You say no. You open the door, and it's your mother. Don't even know your mother, huh? You see, you said you didn't know the person knocking at the door. Who's knocking at the door?

[28:36] It's your mother knocking at the door. Therefore, you don't know your mother, right? Don't see, you know, what's wrong with that argument? Two different senses of. Yeah, but but see, in this case, you're reasoning from what? You're not. Knowing your mother in some way, you're not knowing your mother as the person knocking the door. You know your mother, but you don't know her as the person knocking the door, right?

[29:06] So in some way, your mother is unknown to you, right? But that's not a reason to say that simply speaking, you don't know your mother.

[29:17] Do you see that? On Thanksgiving, there President Bush went down to the eat turkey dinner with the soldiers, right? The guy came out, you know, and said you need something more important to read this. They didn't know who was going to come out. It's the President of the United States coming out, right? So that means they didn't know the president, and they recognized him immediately. Came out, right?

[29:49] So they knew the president, but they didn't know him as the man is about to come out there. If President Bush knocks on that door right now, I wouldn't know who's knocking at the door, would I? Even though I know President Bush. He's making a retreat. What? He's making a retreat. You might be doing that, yeah. The Bing Crosby, I guess his wife used to go up to the the not the the um distribution master.

[30:19] Not in the Cistercian monastery right Was it. Bing Crosby's wife. Second objection. Talking about those who are asleep and alienated from the senses. huh?

[30:38] To the second, it should be said. There's Augustine says now in the twelfth book of the Confessions. The soul has a certain power of what divination, you might say, huh? That from its nature is able to know future things. And therefore, when it is withdrawn from the what bodily senses, and in some way returns to itself, right? It becomes partaker of a knowledge of the future.

[31:11] And this opinion is what reasonable if we lay down that the soul got its knowledge of things by partaking of the forms as a Platonist laid down. Because thus the soul, from its own nature, would know the universal causes of all effects, but it would be impeded by the body, right? Whence, when it is what separated from the senses of the body, it knows future things, huh?

[31:48] But because this way of knowing is not connatural to our understanding. But more that we get our knowledge from the senses. Therefore, it is not according to the very nature of the soul that it knows future things when it is alienated from the senses. But more through the what, being acted upon by some superior causes, whether they be bodily causes, right, or what, spiritual causes, huh? I know it's, um, you know it's opinion of the the ancients, like Aristotle and Thomas, but also the moderns, that the what, um, tides and so on are influenced by the what, moon, right, huh?

[32:40] So it's not absurd to say that the, uh, sun or the moon or other bodies, right, might be influencing things down here, right? And when you're, um, in in your senses, maybe these things can what, act upon you, right? And since they cause things down here, there's a maybe some kind of knowledge of future, isn't? At least in their causes, huh? Okay. But also, when Saint Paul was carried up to the third heaven, huh?

[33:14] Whether in his body or not, he did not know, right? But his soul was certainly alienated from his senses, and therefore it's kind of open to the influence of what, spiritual things, right? Okay. Um.

[33:30] Of spiritual things. Um. In spiritual, I mean simply immaterial things, right? As when by divine power, by the ministering of the angels, the human understanding is what, illuminated, huh? And the images are ordered to knowing some future things, huh? What about the dreams there? The what? The pharaoh, right? Hmm. And sometimes, you know, the man who has a dream is given the the illumination to understand the dream, but sometimes he's not, and you have to go to Daniel or you have to go to Joseph or somebody, right?

[34:09] Okay. And the images are ordered to knowing some future things. Or also when through the operation of the demons, right, there comes about some commotion in the imagination, to for signaling some future things which the demons know, right? Because they know more about the causes, right? Than we do.

[34:37] And these impressions of the spiritual causes, the soul is more apt to receive when it is alienated from the senses, huh? Because through this it is nearer to the what, spiritual substances, huh?

[34:55] And more free from exterior what. Things that make us unquiet, and this also can happen through the impression of the upper bodily causes, huh? For it is manifest that the higher bodies act upon the lower bodies. Whence, since the sensitive powers are acts of body organs, consequently, from the impression of celestial bodies, there is in some way changed a what? The imagination. Whence, since the celestial bodies are the causes of many future things, there come about in the imagination some signs of some future things.

[35:40] And these signs, are more perceived at night by those sleeping, then in the day, and by those awake. You know, so many people, you know,

[35:55] feel you know a pressure in their chest in a dream or something like that, right? They wake up and maybe the blankets have been kind of bunched up there or something, right? But they seem to sense or be impressed more of certain things than they would if they were actually using their senses, right? That's kind of unusual, huh?

[36:16] And he quotes something from Aristotle's book on sleep and being awake. The things that are carried for the day are dissolved more, and more without disturbance is the air of the night, and the nights are more silent. And in the body, they make sense and account of sleep, because even little motions inside, right, are more sensed by those sleeping than by those what awake. And these motions make what images, from which future things are foreseen, right?

[36:52] This is a very obscure thing, right? Huh? But Aristotle talks about it, and many others talk about it, huh? Whereas I was reading? You know, the other day there, you read about occasionally one of these accounts, you know, where a cat is left, you know, and taken, you know, hundreds of miles away from its house, and finds its way back. And it's kind of amazing, you know.

[37:20] And they don't really know how this is done at all, right? But it's absolutely incredible that you know these things are apparently they're true, you know, that pets have been known to go hundreds of miles to get back to their original home or something. How can how can they do that?

[37:45] Of course, these birds are quite the navigators, you know, which is kind of more amazing. The cat, kind of used to the birds, you know, going south and so on.

[38:03] So Thomas is not denying, that sort of knowledge of the future, might come in dreams, huh? Would it be through the influence of the bodily causes, right?

[38:16] Or due to what divine illumination, huh? Of course, when the saints go into ecstasy, they are what not aware of their senses, right? And you could wave your hand in front of their eyes, and they wouldn't be aware of it, right? They're being drawn to some higher kind of knowledge, right, than the knowledge we get through our senses. Okay, now this—is the last objection—is taken from not from human beings, but from the brute animals, right?

[39:01] Why should they have some knowledge we don't have, right? To the third, it should be said that the brute animals do not have anything above imagination that orders the images, right? As men have reason, and therefore the images or the imagination of the brute animals, totaliter, right, wholly follows the what? Celestial influence, huh? Now we're always imagining at the command of our reason, right? We're always imagining at the command of our reason, right?

[39:44] Okay. Like I was saying in geometry, huh? So our reason is always coming in there and messing up the images, right? And memorizing things and other things like that, and okay, but the animals, right? Their images kind of what free, right? And more therefore able to be influenced by these heavenly bodies, huh? And therefore, from the motions of these sort of the animals,

[40:16] uh, the future things are more able to be known as rain and things of this sort. than from the motions of men, who are moved too much by the counsel of reason,

[40:30] that's why maybe the frenetic people. They talked about might know the future more because they're more subject to these things, huh? At least that's the origin of the word lunatic, right? Lunatic is more influenced by Luna, the moon, than we are, right? And I guess there are more murders or something committed under the full moon, and they? say that. That's what they're saying. Yeah. And more people jump off the bridge in the spring.

[41:02] You know. So it's much much more difficult than like mental institutions and rehabs and stuff like that. Yeah. Call it a big old game about the full moon, right? Interesting when you read about the Indians, you know. The Indians always thought someone who was kind of out of his mind had some kind of, you know, superior knowledge, huh? They had a certain respect for people out of their mind, right?

[41:30] Whence the philosopher Aristotle, right, says in the book on sleep and being awake that some most what imprudent people, right, are most foreseeing, right? For their understanding is not affected with cares, right? It's like a desert and what empty, right, from all things.

[42:00] And they are moved according as the mover is led. Some words missing here. The end here. Mota. But they're more. They're more like the animals, that sense. They're more like the what?

[42:20] No, it's not the most intelligent people that seem to have this kind of foreknowledge, right? It's the brutes, and these people who are kind of empty-minded, right? Yeah.

[42:34] So. Now, next time we start to do at least the first article is kind of long, but do at least two articles, maybe more, of this next question, which is how the soul knows itself,