Hello, I'm Dr. Anadale and I teach philosophy at Mount Saint Mary's
University and Seminary in Emmitsburg, Maryland. I want to say a few words today
about Aristotle's theory of the soul. I will talk first about how it contrasts
with Plato's dualistic theory of the soul. I'll say a little bit about first
and second actuality, and then I will talk briefly about the powers of the
soul. Now Aristotle's theory of the soul is best understood in terms of two other
doctrines. First, the body and soul are joined together for Aristotle as matter
and form. Like matter and form they are inseparable. Second, all transitory
existence for Aristotle moves from potentiality to actuality. So, for example,
a seed grows into a tree. The seed does not lack the form of the tree and
it doesn't like the matter of the tree. But if it has the same form and the same
matter why do we not say that it is identical to the tree? In a sense it is.
In a sense the seed in the tree are the same thing. But they're not strictly
identical. There's something different about them, and that difference is
exactly what Aristotle wants to talk about. In a similar way we could say that the
calf that grows up into a full-grown cow is not identical with the cow but it
plainly is the same being. So how are they different? Well, in growing the seed
produces another embodiment of its form, that is, the tree. This form was present
always as potential but was actualized through growth and it is the inner telos
or entelechy of the seed, of the living thing, its development or movement from
potentiality to actuality constitutes a process of growth as it unfolds over
time. Now, thinking about the human soul as an entelechy allows Aristotle to
avoid the dualism of Plato's theory of the soul. Plato, the Pythagoreans, and
even the Stoics tended to see the soul as inhabiting the body the way a pilot
inhabits a ship. Think of the dialogue at the end of Phaedo, the death scene where
Crito asks Socrates, "How should we bury you?" Socrates says, "Any way you can
if you can catch me." Then he teases Crito, saying "Crito imagines that this dead
body he will encounter in an hour's time is actually Socrates, but really the real
Socrates will be gone. The real Socrates is the soul of Socrates. What you'll look
at after my death is simply the empty container that Socrates used to inhabit."
This is Plato's dualism about the body and the soul. But Aristotle holds that
the substantial reality of a human being is the union of body and soul. Without
the soul the body does not exist as a unity and the soul cannot exist apart
from its body. One helpful way to think about this, that
I get from Jonathan Barnes, is to think: for Aristotle having a soul is rather
like having the skill. Nobody thinks of a carpenter's skill as somehow being a
part of the carpenter or inhabiting the carpenter at some particular place, his
hand or his brain or elsewhere. That's not the kind of thing that skill in
carpentry is. That's not the kind of thing that a soul is either. It's not
part of the self; it is an ability or a skill that the self possesses. It's the
power to do certain things that the self does. Now, one important consequence of
this theory of the soul is that each soul is united to one and only one body.
So there can be no transmigration of souls, there can be no reincarnation,
something the Plato believed in, and there also can be no otherworldly
afterlife. There is no ghostly Socrates floating around in Hades or dwelling up
upon the forms. That simply is not something that happens. An interesting
question for Christian theology would be whether you can take this theory of the
soul and combine it with the Christian doctrine of the resurrection of the body
and come up with a workable system of theology. I'll leave that for the
theologians to work it out but it's worth some attention. Another important
consequence is that this doctrine gives unity to each human being.
Aristotle rejects Plato's multi-part soul. He says I don't feel desire in one
part of my soul and anger or shame in a different part of my soul simultaneously.
I have a single soul which has multiple powers.
Now for Aristotle the soul is not a substance in the fullest sense, but the
soul actualizes matter into a composite and this composite, this actualized
matter, actualized body, ensouled body, that is substance in the fullest sense.
Thus for Aristotle the oneness of the body and soul is not an interesting
question. He actually says this (this is on page 555 of the Mckeon Basic Works of
Aristotle). Aristotle writes, "that is why we can wholly dismiss as unnecessary the
question of whether the soul and body are one. It is as meaningless as to ask
whether the wax and the shape given to it by the stamp are one." Aristotle says
this is not an interesting question. Obviously they are one and inseparable.
Let's move on to some interesting questions. So, an interesting question is
going to be for Aristotle: How does the soul actualize the body?
What are these kinds of actualization? So let me give you an example to explain
something of this. The soul for Aristotle is the first actuality of the body and
is therefore inseparable from it. So think of three people. Arthur: Arthur is
totally ignorant about something, let's say it's the Pythagorean theorem. Arthur
does not know the Pythagorean theorem but he is capable of learning about it.
If somebody taught it to him he could learn, he could have the knowledge,
he just doesn't have it right now. That's Arthur. Now, second person: Bob. Bob knows
the Pythagorean theorem but he's not thinking about it right now because he's
asleep. That's my second person, Bob. The third person, Chris, knows the Pythagorean
theorem and is right now explaining it to someone else. Now, what are we going to
say about this? Obviously Arthur's knowledge of the Pythagorean theorem is
potential only. He doesn't have it; he could conceivably have it, but that's the
best we're going to get for Arthur. Bob has the knowledge in a way. He has
acquired it, it's filed away in his mind, but he's not using it right now because
he's doing something else, he's sleeping. Chris has the knowledge in the fullest
possible way: he both possesses the knowledge and he's putting it to use
right now by thinking about it as he explains it
to somebody else. So in Aristotle's language we would say that Chris has
actualized his knowledge in two senses: he possesses it and he's using it,
whereas Bob has only the first actualization. We would say Bob's
knowledge is both actual in the sense that he has the knowledge and potential
in the sense that he's not making full use of the knowledge right now. So there,
these are the first and second levels of actuality.... For Aristotle
the soul is the first actuality of the body. The second actuality of the body is
the soul acting. living well. So being alive is the first actuality, living well
is the second actuality. Now the soul for Aristotle is not a type of activity but
instead it is the potential or the ability to engage in certain kinds of
activities, most importantly the activities of nutrition, sensation, and
thought. Furthermore it's not an undeveloped potential like Arthur's
knowledge. Rather it is the actualized potential to engage in some sorts of
activities. So that these are the powers of the soul: the basic powers of the soul
are the powers of nutrition and growth and these are typical of plants. Add to
these the powers of sensation of motion and of feeling pleasure and pain, and these
are the powers that animals have, the additional powers that animals have in
addition to the plant powers. And then the last powers of the soul are the powers
of thought and intellect, which human beings uniquely possess. And it's
possession of those extra powers that sets us above animals, the same way that
animals are set above plants. It's not a matter of a sort of inter-species bigotry.
It's simply that we can do more stuff, we have more ability to do things with our
souls. The same way that animals can do things that plants can't, we can do
things with the intellect, thought, and understanding that animals are not
capable of. Now, about this power of thought: Aristotle makes an observation
that there's something unusual about thought. It seems potentially to be
separable from the soul. Now this might be a kind... we might suspect this being a
kind of backsliding towards a Platonic dualism. But Aristotle is making an
important observation: he's recognizing that
of all the powers of the soul, thought is somehow different. He says this on page
558 of McKeon: "it alone is capable of existence in isolation from all other
psychic powers." That lead me to speculate that if there's any part of the soul
that could potentially survive death and separation from the body, it will be the
intellectual part of the soul. That's going to be important for theologians
later on. So, to wrap up, let me just contrast briefly the Aristotelian soul
with the Cartesian idea of the soul, which will be important when we look at
modern philosophy later on. Aristotle's idea of the soul is definitely not
Cartesian. There is no distinction in Aristotle between the inner and outer
realms of the soul, there's no sense of special privilege in my access to a
knowledge about my own perceptual states, my own thoughts or knowledge. Secondly,
the soul for Aristotle is not a substance but a capacity, so the question
of how the soul substance relates to the body substance never comes up for
Aristotle. Where that becomes a problem that occupies Descartes for a tremendous
amount of... gives Descartes lot of difficulty. And finally for Aristotle
there's very... the soul has very little to do with my own sense of individuality,
with my own personality, with what separates me from other beings. That is
all going to come from my body, my matter. The soul is simply going to be that which
animates my body, which allows me to be alive and to exercise the different
activities that I actually exercise in the course of being alive. So that's my
brief introduction to Aristotle's theory of the soul. Thank you for watching today.
Goodbye.