243: De Anima, part 3

Hi welcome to classical stuff. You should know a podcast about classical world ancient things. We're renearest often ease We're renearest ottel. We're going way back to the ancients This is great where we are and it's stuff you should know and we talk about it I know your my name is Graham Donaldson, and I'm joined with Thomas pointed question Maggie.

Hi and AJ's secret recording Annenberg. So no one's gonna know what you're right. No, but I just said it now you're like no one's gonna know And now we're gonna tell them now. Yeah pointed reference.

So we should include it Anyway, I have record before grandma's ready and he was recording text to his wife I was telling her how to I forgot to make them form the bread at home and I was giving telling her how to form it into a Bull and what is it? What is that? What is that? Hamburg?

It's a loaf a loaf of bread to clear out one It's called a bull is I mean for that? anyway, so I Recently was made aware that I have sense and motion and I just I mean I'm probably knew it all along but I sort of like I realized it pretty deeply Yeah, and so I needed for me for a loop I have no idea what it's what it's deal is and so I wish there was a book that could tell me about my animation and My and whether it's like based on a large number or not whether you're your soul is numbers. Yeah. Yeah, actually I was reminded of this Aristotle episode where he's talking about the soul being linked to number when Plato in his Republic talks about the beginning of the end of the of the Golden Society is when families stop having children According to like the right prime number.

There's a perfect time to have a child. What time is that? I first prime when AJ starts. Yeah, no, it's ridiculous If AJ's got a play to book kicking around here I can find it but every play to basically says when people Stop realizing the time the right time to have a children and then he has this huge paragraph talking about how the numerical time The right time to have a child based on numbers and you will get fortunate and happy children But parents are always gonna do that There's gonna crank out another and then you're not gonna have fortunate and happy children That's the beginning of the end of the aristocratic society and then it's just chaos ever since anyway, what's he serious?

I don't think he was I think he's being funny, but it's hard to tell with Plato sometimes Very do you have Republican or no? Well, you do your interests are fine. So it's right there next to believe this We recorded my classroom. I don't know this.

I don't know how we got here. How do we get here? Something about prime. No, the soul the soul having number no soul is not okay in any case This is part three of my series on Aristotle's day anima and I oh man as I was putting this episode together It's just you regret this I know I thought I could do it.

I was like I can I got this I went in so confident feeling myself just like I've read a lot of old books I can understand I'm I feel so far out of my depth. I there were whole chapters I read and I was like It's all it's like read in the dictionary like I can't except I understand the dictionary It's just a word salad that means nothing to me is this part three of three? Halloween when you first started this you talked about a five part series, so I we're pairing this down No, it's well, it's three books, right? But I think some of them might have taken longer, right?

I don't know but maybe I should have done in five parts But there are parts that just make so much nonsense It's just so much nonsense that I cannot talk about the chapter because he's comparing the soul to divisible and indivisible Lines and segments and points and concave versus con it's just total gibberish and speaking of gibberish I think you have the play does it too. Yeah, good. This is the beginning of the end of the city Okay, if up to this point we had the perfect city and then Plato says this But seeing that everything which has a beginning has also an end even a constitution such as ours will not last for the Constitution being This city but will in time be dissolved and this is the dissolution in plants that grow in the earth as well as an animals that move on the earth's surface fertility and Storility of soul and body occur when the Circumferences of the circle of each are completed which in short-lived existences pass over a short space and in long lived ones over a long Space but to the knowledge of human fecundity and sterility all the wisdom and education of your rulers will not attain the laws which regulate them Will not be discovered by intelligence, which is a Lloyd with sense But will escape them and they will bring children into the world when they ought not now that which is divine birth has a period Which is contained in a perfect number, but the period of human birth is comprehended in a number in which first increments by Involution and evolution of squared and cubed obtaining three intervals in four terms of like and unlike waxing and waning numbers make all the terms Commence or inable and agreeable to one another the base of these with a third added when combined with five and raise the third power Furnishes to harmonies the first a square which is a hundred times as great and the other a figure having one side equal to the former But oblong consisting of a hundred numbers squared upon rational diameters of a square high e Emitting fractions the side of which is five each of them being less by one or less by two perfect squares of irrational amateurs and a hundred cubes of three Now this number represents a geometrical figure which has control over the good and evil of births I think somebody has actually drawn this figure so if you do that then you have here if you have a child according to this figure Now maybe it has to do with the stars Maybe has to do with like aligning when you have a kid according to the stars But it seems like Aristotle a student of Plato came by this crazy this crazy math stuff by honestly right if he sat through lectures like that It's like it made sense to him. I was like of course.

I can't believe I had kid in December All right. Well, yeah, so what he just read was what certain chapters of this section were like all the way through beginning to end Just it's okay I think I think with the point where I generally understand what he's trying to say and so I'll be reading a few excerpts here Here and there I will skip the parts that have to do with old arguments that we really don't Engage anymore stuff that has gone away because now we understand better how the sense organs work and better how say sound is transmitted through air Well, he talked about how Certain senses are connected to certain things so the ear is connected to air because it's composed of air and it gets the senses that are unique to air and then we have special sense objects which only relate to one of the senses but most are Common sense objects, which means like I can see a cake and by virtue of seeing it I also kind of tell that it's sweet even though I'm not actively tasting it and I can and both air and water transmit colors So colors comment to both It's just a whole lot of talk about the mediums and how things come to us We just understand better how things come to us like he thought that color was transmitted through the air because it's transparent Well, we know that color yes It does come through the air but you don't need air to see color We've been to space and we see color because of light right we understand better how light works We it's just it's just wrangling over things that we don't really wrangle over anymore because we understand better how these things work Oh, is this all you'd call this scientific work from Aristotle like his views on the soul come from his like observations of how Yeah, and part of it is just trying to figure out how the human mind and body works and human back and body works Uh-huh, so it's some of it is just now totally irrelevant right where we're like okay He didn't really fully understand how to sense his work for example He's the whole first chapter which I'm going to skip is talking about where why there are no other senses than the five And he kind of attaches it to the mediums and touch and that sort of thing well the truth is there's lots of stuff that we don't see There's a lot of light there's dark dark matter There's all kinds of radiation that we cannot see via our senses at all like we have to use some other thing to get it to The medium where our senses can take it in so in that sense I think he and I think he even knows that there are a few organs that certain animals have where they can sense things that we can't But I don't know so I'm gonna skip that first chapter the chapter that talks about no other senses other than the five Focus I think on the stuff that number one I understood and number two that seem relevant to the audience is that fair? Yes, okay, so skipping chapter one of part five because it's to establish that there are no other senses of the five He jumps into chapter two, which is what it means to be aware of sensation So for example your eyeballs see color yes, right? So they are in the act of seeing what does the realizing of that like there there must be something outside that So I am seeing now and it's collects all that information Yeah, and kind of codifies it right and he says well so it might not be the eye if it's something outside the eye then it had It like collects and codifies all that information and then there must be you can go infinite regress here now That's collecting it there's got to be something else started bringing that together So he's like why not just describe it to the first in the series so the eyeball not only sees but kind of realizes that it is seeing While I think now we better understand how that stuff is transmitted to the brain which is the seat of all this He doesn't seem to think that the intellect has any specific organ I don't know what their thoughts on the brain were whether it was just like a soup in your skull I thought it was that the heart was like that since making Oregon and the brain was like a radiator like it like warmed up liquids and stuff Yeah, I'm not sure they nailed it I don't know if they had the physiology correct But there is this is where we get into some actually interesting philosophy about about how he tells that there must be something else other than just The sense organs so we perceive we can perceive separate things at the same time So say if I'm seeing something that is white I know at the same time that it is not black and I can do comparison there And I can also compare between that whiteness and say bitterness for my tongue and I can do that simultaneously while I am seeing the white and so there must be something sort of other than just the sense organs that is Gathering all this together right modern science would say what that thing is big a cell spreadsheet I'm sorry big brain excel spreadsheet behind your eyes just like all the cells all the way down well Yeah, so I'm gonna read a quote about it So in this way it becomes clear that flesh is not the ultimate sense organ right so whatever your body is It's not it's not the top top guy to put suppose that it is requires the supposition that on contact with the object the sense organ itself discerns What is doing the discerning?

So your eyeball would have to be the one figuring out what is discerning which thing is like that's ridiculous right? No more indeed is it possible that it should be by separate things that we perceive that sweetness and whiteness are the objects of different senses So we have to have one thing that perceives that these two things are different right because it was different things They would never be a meeting where I could say that is whiteness that is sweetness right rather It must be some single thing that they are manifest to otherwise from the mere fact that I see one thing and you see one thing It would be obvious that those things were not the same whereas it can only be a single thing that asserts their difference Sweetness then being a different thing from whiteness is the same single thing that asserts them to be so and as it asserts So it does both think and perceive clearly then it cannot be by separate things that we discern what are separate This was one of the clearest passages that I read There's something to say between all the different sense there's a central discerning thing Yes, there's some sort of central discerning thing that can take in all of the sense information and discern between the things even from different sense organs That is the eyes never gonna be able to sense taste taste right? So I cannot look at whiteness and say that is different than taste without something that brings those two together So when I look at a white freezy and I say okay, is that gonna taste like pineapple or is that gonna taste just like The free slippy those things that come in the plastic tubes that you have a kids and they Oh, what are those calls of your mouth freeze pop freeze pop flavor ice flavor ice flavor ice flavor ice No, I see three Z's. Look at all wrong.

I don't know this pop. No look at freeze. No, it freezes Flavor ice freezer pops assorted in tropical flavors and they come in these long skinny tubes and pops and you and when you put them You can cut the corners of your mouth because our little shark plastic sure. Yeah, we had free Z pops Okay, freeze ease.

I'm really tracking with us now that we got this down to pops anyway But if I'm looking at the white one I can say who was that gonna be pineapple or is that just gonna be like generic sweet? Yeah, and you know what we're just by looking at it It's gonna be the brain right isn't he talking about it again I don't think they knew about the brain, but like we when you're reading this like do you think that the brain is the answer to what he's talking About yeah, okay cool. Yeah, so he's now going to sort of differentiate what happens in the mind He's gonna tackle okay. There must be something going on besides just the sense organs.

What is that thing and how do we divide it? So we are chapter three cool the nature of imagination cool So he says thinking and perceiving must not be the same thing right perceiving something is white is not the same as thinking and here's why your perception is always true right There's anything that comes in through your senses even if it might even if you may think the wrong thing about that They never lies to you. You never see white when in reality. You're actually seeing gray.

Yes, but those what is coming through your eyeballs is always the same Right, it's not going to it's correct to me right like But other people might see something different other people might see something different and maybe he didn't know much about colorblindness But in any case there you can't like see a thing that's green and think oh that's false right It's just you're just receiving that just receiving that information information information is always true. It's not like yes You might think something wrong about that thing that say I see a thing and think it's green when in fact It's under some lights and it's actually a different color. Well, I'm still receiving green right? That's still that's still true I'm thinking though can be false.

Yes, I can think the wrong thing I can be an error and he says perceiving is enjoyed by all animals right all animals see stuff right if you'll stuff they do stuff thinking though Only by the rational but imagination is different from both those things. So here's how imagination works It is clear however that perceiving and understanding are not the same for while all animals have a share of the former only a few have a Share of the latter right everything can feel stuff But you're not gonna see a grubworm that is thinking deep thoughts about all the things he's perceiving and that's for thinking which can be both correct and incorrect correct through being understanding knowledge and true opinion Incorrect through their opposites not even this is the same as perceiving for the perception of special sensibles is always true And is enjoyed by all animals while thinking admits of being false and is enjoyed by no animal that does not have rationality for imagination Is a different thing from both people receiving thinking imagination can occur without perception nor supposition without imagination So you can't have imagination without perception you can't have thinking or supposition without perception It's kind of a base requisite for both or I can't think without seeing stuff right But it's not the same thing because it's must be something different Okay, now imagination is the capacity to bring forward an image that does not exist so I can think about a truck with chicken legs Right do you guys have it? Oh, I see my brains. I see it.

Did you perceive that? It's on the road I'm receiving my brain So you can you can imagine this and you've never seen this a chicken truck, right? And so there must be something happening here. Would you say that that is a true or false thing?

Hope it's true. Maybe okay. Well, here's the other thing that's all you false thing and it's different also from belief I'm not really yet. Oh, so yes, but okay So it's different from belief because belief you cannot have a thing without the company emotion So when I believe a thing is scary and I see that scary thing.

I'm going to feel scared Yeah, right. Can you imagine a scary thing and not feel scared? I can imagine sure I feel like I can imagine the concept of scary thing And I feel scared but if it's not scared by it, it's not scary I don't know if that's going to go in with the thing if it were real We believe that this thing was real and living in your closet. You feel fear There was an evil chicken truck that tried to chew your toes off at night living in your closet or leave it Be scared, but I can imagine that thing all day.

That's kind of funny. That is very funny So it must be different than strict belief, right? Belief always brings an accompanying emotion imagination doesn't I can imagine all kinds of things things It might be funny and not laugh things might be scary not for scared things It might be pretty and not feel emirious feelings, right? So if you believe in it then it's been the emotions there exactly then that thing would be real So it must be different than belief and both of these are different than perceiving so you have perceiving right and then you have kinds of thinking Which are supposing which is belief and imagining you guys with me?

I'm tracking okay So he gives a list of arguments and there's kind of funny bit here that I actually had a conversation with some folks about and We'll get there. So he gives up like five reasons why we know that imagination is not the same as perception So imagination is not the same as perception is clear from following arguments one Perception is either a potential potentiality or an activity as for instance our site and seeing so you can either like you might be able to see and you can Also actively see yet there are appearances in the absence of either of these such as the appearances in sleep So for example, I see things when I'm sleeping there aren't really there. Yeah, so it must be different. I dream perception So that's reason number one I craze dream last night.

What do I have so I was by myself in New York City Man, it was somewhere else and I just remember feeling melancholy in my dream and I had to go find dinner And I was in New York and I had to go eat and I was like kind of bomb that I was gonna be eating by myself and the only restaurant I could find every time I went to a restaurant. It was a TGI Fridays and So you went I had to go to TGI Friday's I had to go to TGI Friday's in New York City for dinner But I can't every time I came in I was like the girls like welcome to TGI Fridays I would be like can I have a table for one please and the girl in the dream said that because it was already It was so late at night. They were only serving parties No, they were only serving dessert and so I had to have like a comically large sunday for dinner alone at the bar at TGI Fridays in New York City That was my dream I just it was there was just such a I feel like it was like one of those like French on you We movies like I just had this feeling of existential dread when I woke up It's like when you sit down at the side. It's like all around me I was just like I think I had like a big red plastic spoon to eat my Sunday with at the bar at TGI Friday I don't know what's coming up, but it had like it like mountains of whipped cream and like a comically large cherry on top and all Anyway, did you stare for lonely?

I don't remember that probably okay. Well, that's my dream. Okay. So what is there a stop about that?

That just shows your imagination. Yeah, right number two perception is but imagination is not always present Okay, you're always having things coming through your eyeballs when you're awake, but not always not necessarily always imagining stuff sometimes you're just out there Doing things something about the truck that was a chicken legs that's still it was gonna haunt me There are times when you won't be thinking about it. I think I think there was gonna be less times than there was yesterday Okay, so that's reason number two number number number let's see and if it were in a Sorry, I was gonna jump a section and if it were in activity that they were the same It would be possible for all animals to have imagination But it is held that while an ant and B do the grub does not have imagination Okay, this is the you can give a why oh, but can you guys imagine a reason why an ant and B would be considered to be imaginative while I grew up? Would not they build they build?

Oh, that's what I can up with because they they have structures They're looking at a blank canvas to like what this is a free and great hive Exactly, they have to be able to imagine a structure that does not yet exist and then be able to build that structure And so for the same reason I think there's a variety of insects we could say have imagination They're little and blueprints and little be white hats. Yep termites. They built those big big hive thing. My dog doesn't build No, you know imagination In fact actually we talked about this we had a dog named Gladys It started chasing an imaginary thing around the house And she would see it and she would growl at it and run around and chase it and we went to the doctor and the doctor said dogs Do not have imaginations This is some sort of like psychotic break that your dog is having and seeing imaginary things But dogs cannot have fun imaginary playtime, so it's weird.

That's very weird because our dog will Stare up at the ceiling and kind of like act as if there's something on the ceiling and we call it ceiling monsters because he's like What's the thing? For cats, like a ghost that cats are supposed to be like staring at me but they're just staring at me They're just like that. I don't know if there's a dog walking around. I'm asleep tonight.

Sorry about that Yeah, I don't know what to believe about ants because they're certain ants that will build small ant bridges across things So they have to have some sort of if I hold onto my buddies antlers antlers Hold on my buddies antenna. We're gonna get across the summer. They can't be that smart because they can like walk in circles to death Yeah, so I don't know what to believe about those. Anyway, that's what my guess is that they build they build things Alright number three while perceiving is always a vertical and I look that up it means true in real life while perceiving is always true Imagineings are for the most part false Number four it is not when we are in a state of accurate activity in connection with the sense object that we say this appears to me as a man But rather whenever we do not clearly perceive whether it is a real or a looser man Okay, I don't know what that means.

No, no, no Five as we said above visions appear even to those whose eyes are shut so it must be different perception Right? Okay, and imagination is also different from belief for conviction follows belief Which is a task of reason and animals don't have reason right you believe a thing you are convicted about it You want to continue to pursue that thing that is an active reason right? I think this is true therefore I will do anything about it Active reason so belief and imagination not the same thing. I don't know how much I buy that What about like when your dog comes up to you?

He's like if I sit your dog is talking to you If I can't know if you're not comes up and sits and is very good. He believes he's gonna get a treat That's not reason though. That's like a that's just like a response. Oh, okay.

That's what conditioning Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, he says that conviction is As it is is not possible for those the whole beliefs not to be convinced of things while none of the animals have conviction many of them have imagination So ants and bees can build but they don't necessarily have a conviction about a belief I don't know how he proves that or how he gathers that how could it be otherwise? I don't know yeah, I'm not quite sure anyway I find some of his other arguments pretty convincing that imagination and sense perception are not the exact same thing So we have some other faculty that animals do not have imagination like we want to this we can also talk yeah Well, so can animals have some sort of language. Yeah, but not as I mean like not as complicated as my language I don't think so I'm a language.

No, no be dances. They have like body language sure I can dance to It's good as any be a patch of flowers while you're dancing as good as any be that's you're not paying close enough attention. Yeah, that's apparently not Okay, so anyway, we have imagination most animals do not catch more flies with me Um, he also says imagination is movement coming from the activity of sense perception meaning all of this comes from our senses Right? We can't really have imagination without these things It's not a separate deal, but it works upon everything that's come through our senses Okay, so that's sort of like our first movement into the soul of man Which is that we have thinking and belief and we also have imagination and those things are separate from the senses and sort of bring them all together Is my understanding good so far so far?

Okay? Number four is what is intellect this is where we get a little bit into the weeds. Oh Oh, you guys thought that was the hard bit. Oh, is this you?

Okay, I'm just imagining you angrily reading this like in preparation I was I sat there and I was like what is this? I don't know and the funny thing is I would look at the footnotes to understand it and I was like I don't even understand the footnote This doesn't make any flipping sense and I just got Angrier and angry but isn't it felt more embarrassed and then even the commentator in a couple of chapters says clearly this chapter is fairly Desortinized that I was like are you killing me? I don't know Isn't this don't you think any consolation of these were just his lecture notes? Is that true for this also?

I don't know. I thought it was true. How do we know this? Well, it was definitely true for Nick and Mackeen I think was it yeah, that's why it's called that Nick and Mackeen was a student Wasn't it was a kid?

It's not there's a question of what it means because he does have a son but there's another meaning attached to it I don't look at that, but it could be the person's notes. Okay. Well, I'm so sorry I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

I'm cracking the gold one. Yeah, there's a couple of challenges that I just have question marks by like I just it's just Question marks. It doesn't seem relevant. So I'm trying to give you guys the straight dope We're sophisticated men of leisure.

We can we figured out. Yes, I believe in us intellect Oh is the potential for thought no internal appearance that would affect that from without so before it thinks it must not Be any of the things that exist. So it must not be mixed with the body So my brain can comprehend all the things that exist and because it can't be already one of those things Because you don't want some sort of pre-existing connection We don't want it to be blue because then it wouldn't be able to perceive certain things We don't want it to be a truck a chicken truck because then I guess perception of other things would be a little bit goofy So it has to be the potential for thought unmixed with a body And I think this is where it gets a little weird and where modern science would say I don't know that's naturally true You can be a brain and still perceive brains Oh, it's interesting. I guess I'm not following like is he trying to say there's something behind that like that He's hypothesizing so there's like something behind the brain that is allowing the perception Well again I don't think he knows about the brain But he's kind of saying that there's something something back there that isn't mixed with the body And is something else that allows us to perceive and imagine all of these things because if it was mixed with the body It wouldn't be able to perceive it It's kind of like tainted right if so it would have quality like hot or cold or have some organ like a perceptive faculty Which we know to be the brain right?

I think this is another one of those like well Maybe he's talking about consciousness right because you can have brain like okay That's a different thing we're getting there consciousness is different than what he's what he's kind of highlighting right now He's kind of saying there must be something that is unmixed with the world because it can perceive all things in the world Right. I think he might be wrong here But he says but he says here This is the place of forms right where you can think okay. I know what a table is it's unmixed I'm not a table my brain is not a table but I can see that thing and say yes that fits my category for table If we're talking about modern philosophy, we might say it is the place where you hold all of the categories of things right? The human perception is a business of categorization.

We see a thing we say that's a thing. I like it is also a cat It is also a furry thing. We just put it under all these categories I think he's saying this is where that exists So maybe like memory maybe we could think of it kind of like memory. Is that make sense?

So unmixed with a world It's something else Again, I think now we would say it exists in the brain I don't think he would and then he says it's different from other faculties and that it isn't destroyed or desensitized by excess So your eyeballs can be destroyed by too much light. Yeah, or we'll have problems with too much dark Yeah, your taste. I don't know how you destroy with taste too much So yeah, so I'm gonna do you have right? Yeah, I don't rip you up man or touch I think if you're just beaten to death Right here, he's saying you can't perceive too much to break it No, no in the sense organs you can't too much sound too high or too low is gonna You know mess up your ears, but with thought there's not too much thinking a really big thought does not diminish the small ones In fact, sometimes it makes them more peaked right it makes them sharper.

So he says it's a little bit different than anything else like that What's the biggest thought you think? God? I'm saying like when you say when you talk about big thoughts and small thoughts, what's the difference? What does that you mean like actually think of big things like he doesn't say he just says when you think a grand or big thought That it doesn't make the small thoughts any different so I don't know if your thoughts Maybe he's just thinking all these things like clearly I can still think about ducks Yeah, I am crushing it here and it's not destroying my ability to think yeah, okay And then there's a section where I just have question mark question mark huh question mark And this is I think the part where he starts talking about the a point being divisible and indivisible And there's so you have a line there's a point in the middle.

It isn't divided. But you can imagine it divide it But it's not it's not it's not but it's not but it's not but it's not no question mark Maybe it's got but I don't know how that relates to the soul so I just put question mark question mark on and go great Okay, I'm gonna read you all chapter five. Well, is he trying to prove that like dude don't even What you doing not useful to try my guys side. There's no point here back off.

Yeah, I Question I will not be able to help you through it like I promise you Don't let me don't let me cook on some do you want me to read the section? I just want to know what it means? Yes, he wants to care it is it long. Let me see if I can find it.

Okay, I want to go deep in the lore Let's get let's get go for it. Okay. You guys ready this boy. This is why this is why there's a question Just don't worry fast sometimes very fast.

I know I do I'm excited now size and to be size are not the same Nor water and to be water and what are you saying to be? And so with many other things though not with all as in some cases they are the same and so we discern the being a flesh and Flesh either by something else or by something in a different state. Yeah for flesh far from being with our out matter is like the snub a This in a that it is then with the perceptive faculty that we discern warmth and coldness and those things of which flesh is the formula But with something else that we discern being flesh and this is either separate or related to the perceptive faculty In the way that a bent line is related to itself when straightened and again in the case of those things that exist in abstraction The straight line is like the snub in requiring extension But what it is to be straight if straightness and being straight are not the same Is different? Let us call this duality and this we judge either with something else or with the faculty in a different state In the way then that the things are separable from matter in general in that way are the things connected with the intellect The entire section there's more sounds do you want the more no I don't probably not did you get did tell you got something?

There's this relationship between the different or kids right the line in the bit line. He was saying like okay hot and cold is perceived by the flesh Right no, I don't think he said hot and cold and something about the flesh being the what's called the formula hot and cold didn't come into This are you thinking size and to be size no no hot cold is perceived by the flesh with it Which is its formula or something like that? I guess I guess anyway, let's move on. Yeah This is this is why like question mark question mark huh?

It doesn't I couldn't track there's so much abstraction and so much it's again It sounds like I'm overhearing 20% of a conversation and don't have reference for all the things Yeah, okay, however chapter five is Desurnable delightful is delightful and this is kind of where he brings this is what soul is this is part of him to do it That's chapter five and then I'm all oh and then I'm also gonna read all chapter eight. Don't worry. They're pretty short Okay chapter five. It's like half page now in all nature There is for each genus something that is its matter and it is this that is all those things and potentiality and something else That is their cause productive of them in virtue of bringing them all about as for instance a skill stands towards the matter It uses alright this does actually make sense so for everything that exists There is the matter and something that caused it okay, so if I've got like a chicken truck Yeah, that's the matter and there must have been something made my chicken truck It's some creative genius.

Yeah, some creative genius made a giant chicken chopped off the leg stable into the truck and then put like a What do they call the water? What's the what's the the comb fan they come up there? Right, so there is a cause no less in the soul then must these different features occur and indeed There is an intellect characterized by the capacity to become all things Or I think we'll call it memory and an intellect characterized by that to bring all things about and to bring them about in just the way that a state Like light does for in a way like also makes things that are potentially colors colors in actuality So you have the potential matter of thought and then you have the active thought piece the active intellect that brings those things about like It does now this latter intellect is separate unaffected and unmixed being in substance activity So it is the activity of thought bring all those all those memories to the forefront and making things in the mind He doesn't explain it very well, but this is my understanding of it right? You've got all this potential potential to imagine chicken truck and then the thing that says yes now we are imagining chicken truck We're gonna take chicken.

We're gonna take truck. We're gonna combine those two things together And that's what we are up to that activity is what he's talking about the active soul It's the cause okay for in all cases that which acts is superior to that which is affected and the principle to its matter So he says this is the superior soul the active one and while knowledge in the actualized state is identical with the fact known Knowledge in the state of potentiality though temporarily prior in the individual case does not in general even have temporal priority Not entirely clear. Yeah, nor is it the case that the intellect is now thinking now not it is further in its separate state that The intellect is just that which it is and it is this alone And here's the kicker that is immortal and eternal though We have no memory as the separate intellect is unaffected while the intellect that is affected is perishable and in any case It's nothing without the other so you have your memory Yeah, and you have your active soul okay now the memory can be destroyed sure right bonk your head you forget stuff the active soul He says this is the thing that is eternal Right the thing that selects from your memory brings them to the forefront and does things now This is where we get into the realm where we actually don't know if this is true And so like I don't think we have a full enough understanding of the brain to say that he's wrong So if you are wondering where the eternal soul is gonna come from we talked about Mona's last time that the soul is just part of the body It's the form of the body it he says this is the piece This is the piece that cannot be destroyed It is your active soul the one that draws from the memory and brings it together and he says this memory isn't even any good without this active soul But it is eternal meaning that apparently we have no memory when we get to eternity like we are blissful happy active souls But without the memory of what we were as a body is that gonna make sense I said that said I Don't know that and here's where my you know non-cristian river the river the river left Yeah, you forget everything so that kind of makes sense to me So if you are a Christian listener and well, we're gonna get a Christian a little bit here So if you're not a Christian this may not interest you as much but this is where we are We are making a statement that's not science cannot yet disprove and that's that the active soul the one that runs things now The way that I have been thinking about it all days is in consciousness. Well, this would be consciousness This is the thing that stays so your your ability to think of yourself as you to move about in the memories of your mind This is the eternal soul now I don't know that science has a good answer for this yet without an eternal soul And I think maybe like I'm not I don't want to make an appeal to ignorance and say because we don't have evidence It must not exist right but right now science has not said here is the active soul to me if I think of the mind as a computer And many people make that analogy that the mind is a computer well computers don't really do much without some agent bang on the keys Right there has to be something directing a computer's activity open the browser go to Facebook or what's or go to X and you know look at all Beyonce's tweets Right there's something that is selecting from the memory of the computer and bringing those things to the forefront now How that happens in the mind is still unknown so if you are looking for a place to locate the human soul I think this is it this is the thing that escapes right say a person drowns Body is the same and I don't I didn't do any research on this I don't know if cell death in the brain happens over those two minutes It might just be lack of oxygen and all those cells die But but a quick a quick death and if the cells are the same This is the thing that has gone.

Yeah, right is that directing agency that consciousness that is out Does that make sense? Okay, this is probably the most one of the more controversial spots thoughts. What do you guys think? Is this the breath that is breathed into Adam?

I would guess yeah. Yeah, yeah I think that's the just thinking back in our conversation last time of like is the brain the soul like are those the same things It's one just like a more poetic reference to the other I think the question you're asking is the one I've had bouncing around my head of you know The moment before death and the moment after death the body's virtually the same Yes, but something clearly has happened in that body. What is that this active soul is departed? And that's what that's out this would answer again any time that we I just find it like the kind of exploration of the existence of a soul And it's this isn't like this isn't a religious document This is like a philosophical document that he's trying to explore I guess again There are differences here from like a theological position of what the soul is but just that he reasons into a soul I just I always find that interesting when again here.

He's talking about the soul elsewhere He'll reason into why there must be a god. I just I think that's interesting I appreciate when we bring things up like that well granted He reasoned a lot of other stuff too. It's not great that we do not stick with for sure Yeah, some stuff that we are not on board with and he may eventually come across like some people are just bored Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean eventually sure science might discover that organ that is the act of soul And this is the thing that that moves things, but even then it's hard to say exactly what would prompt that to action right? Does that make sense sure you can maybe point to chemical interactions, but So sure yeah, we might eventually find the thing that says this is the act of soul we can remove it There's still memory the body will still react to certain memories certain ways and there's no real consciousness there But I don't think we have yet and if you are you know brain scientists out there and you're like oh contrary I push up your glasses We love to hear from you because if I don't believe in free will isn't there no contradiction here Like if I don't think that there's anyone behind if I think everything is just reaction That's like built into people from the beginning isn't there no need for a soul to persist like there's no thing behind the perception of the response Like it is all just body.

Yeah, but that's the thing is I we don't know if it's all just body yet So I've been doing a thing. I don't know if I brought this up last time I've been doing a lot of thinking about life Heavy like what no not like my life just like the actual what life is and we talked a little bit about last time The one thing I was thinking of is that every Everything that currently exists is an unbroken line of life Yeah, right my life has been bestowed from elsewhere and if I give life to something else it came from me Right, so whatever if you're an evolutionist or creationist either way since the first motions of life It is unbroken right that is an unbroken chain from then till now and this is where we're gonna Christianity and unless you're thinking about Jesus Christ He is the only and soul instance of unbekweath life including Adam Adam received his life from the godhead I guess he was a baby. He was a baby right yes, but then he died the resurrection is that point where the life is self-bekweath Mary didn't bring him back up. Sorry.

Yes, right? So he was unbroken through through until the resurrection even the other people that are raised in the Bible were raised by virtue of someone else's life Right. Well Lazarus Jesus rose up. He gave that life back.

What about Like the dead kid with Elijah. I guess Elijah did it. Yeah, like again all life all life save solely the resurrection What would you say God raised him elsewhere bequinced? I mean you could say whether you would say that God raised Lazarus Yeah, but in this case you'd say it was he since he is God it was God self-raised Right.

So if that is the truth then the only real pure life that is self bestowed is that in the godhead? What does that change? What does that? What does that add to earth's adult's conversation?

Oh nothing It's a fun idea right that the that is the only only instance We know of a self-bekweath life because even if God has been internally existing there was no point at which he declared life for himself Gotcha, right whereas in the resurrection he did kind of cool kind of just a fun thought I stumbled across now Okay, how are we done on time? No, let's find out. Are we all more time? Let's go over it Okay, so we did all of chapter 5 and then 6 and 7 make no sense cool I just have stuff huh stuff huh, and I don't think they're entirely useful.

So we're gonna read chapter 8 Which is the definition of the soul you guys though with me? You were so with you chapter 7 very short. I'm gonna find the right text pulled up or if these are just summary No chapter 7 is a little long. I'll never mind.

Okay. Okay chapter 8 though is fairly short And it gives us a summary of what we may have missed in the chapters I skipped yeah, so but now by way of summing up what has been set about the soul Let us repeat that the soul is in a way all the things that exist right? You are potential you have all the forms inside your mind and you can recognize all the things that exist right? I can make those images true to myself For all the things that exist are objects either of perception or thought and knowledge is in a way the things that are known Perception in a way the things that are perceived so in your in your soul The only way to get stuff into your soul is you know it and that's the thing there and then the way you get it in there is by perception But we must inquire how this is so knowledge then and perception are divided in relation to their objects They in their potential state corresponding to the objects in their potential state and in the same correspondence obtaining between the actualized states and the Process sorry, I think he's gonna give an algae that will help I could be wrong and the perceptive and cognitive faculties of the soul are also those of thought Now it must be either the things themselves that the faculties potentially are or their forms And as it is obviously not the things themselves since clearly stone for instance is not in the soul It must rather be the form of stone in the soul So it's like the potential of the thing It's the form of stone not the actual stone that is wrangling around and bonk around inside your body There is thus an analogy between the soul and the hand the hand is a tool of tools the intellect a form of forms And they sense a form of sense objects So the hand is a tool of tools it will do all the tools stuff whereas the mind is a form of forms You are your mind your soul is like a gathering together of all the souls of the universe Right your perception is a gathering together of all the possible perceptions that you can get is that gonna make sense just following?

And since there is No, no, no, no, it's wrong. Oh my soul is gathering all the souls in universe No, all the forms like for meaning like I understand a table because I have the idea of table in my head Gotcha, right and you there is nothing you can think of that are isn't part of the forms in your mind Right, you got categories in there for everything and if there's no category for it You're just like well, I don't know what that is right And since there is as it is thought no separable things apart from perceptible sizes is where my confusing the objects of thought are in the forms that are perceived Both those that are spoken of as an abstraction and those that are conditions and affectations of the objects of perception I don't know if the rest is useful Yeah, he's just talking about images as sense data without matter Okay, so that's the soul the soul is just like the form of forms it gathers together all the form of stuff in the universe Okay Then he kind of goes to the parts of the soul and he says look like we can keep on cutting down the parts of the soul Right in the intellect you can have a bunch of different intellects in imagination you can have different types we can keep on going But here's here's the stuff so he says this chapter 9 There's the nutrient part which is present both in plants and all animals So you grow there's the perceptive part which could not easily be given either as rational or irrational just perceiving Then there's the imaginative part though It is different from all the parts in its way of being what it is It's very problematic on the assumption of separate parts of the soul with which it is to be identified and from distinguished In addition to these there's the desiderative part your desires seemingly both conceptually and potentially distinct from all So you can imagine things but the desire of those things seems to be separate from your imagining of it There's perception and there's growth right and I think all of this is leading up to his what causes motion question So remember the soul is supposed to do a few things it's supposed to cause motion. I forget the others It's supposed to perceive I think those are big things perceiving cause motion and so he's like okay What is it exactly that causes motion and he points out that well must have imagination and desire? It's not nutritive right if it's new just nutrition then plants would be moving around better than they are right You have to be able to imagine something and desire it right if you can imagine it then you can want it It's not just perception because some animals perceive but remain stationary right they don't clearly want stuff They can you touch a sea enemy it's gonna pull in its little doodles but we don't see it actively going out to get things right It doesn't what a sea enemy you see enemies see an enemy.

Oh, what do you call them? Oh, you know I grew up in prairies. You don't see any. No, what is it?

See those like little sea slugs. I got all the nothing. Oh, it looks like a troll doll showing a picture of a sea enemy to a gram for the first time I mean you touch it in it. You know it will react but it doesn't clearly want anything.

It's not going to be in a go-getter Once you stop touching apparently yeah, maybe and this is where I might disagree with some of his conclusions But he says there are some things that perceive right they can tell you're there but they don't really want anything Right, like I think a Venus fly trap would come here. They want they don't know flies. They react to a fly being there But they're not like reaching for flies. They're just sort of they just sort of closes right so reaction that happens This was a question we got because we say that motion is like a part of the soul so if they're making motion Do they have souls?

Well plants do have we call it heliotactist they grow towards the Sun and they will do twice Sun flowers move around all the time exactly but do sunflowers feel desire not really so desire must be different than perception Is what I'm saying like there must be something else. Okay, but I can tell if my plants are happy Sure, can you great you plant whisper what's happening? No, you can tell me plants I tell them I tell them I don't get enough water they're gonna get droopy My how have a narrow plant if I don't give enough water it sleeves gets out. Oh, that's what I drew Yeah, and then when I water it goes blue It's really sweet.

Okay, so he says intellect doesn't do it alone You can think about things and then not go after them right even if the things seems desirable and desire doesn't do it itself because I can desire something and my intellect will say no no stay away right so motion must be some sort of combination of these but he says Really the thing seems to be desire right I can think about a lot of things But desire is the thing that really gets me going and so the dessert the desiderative faculty my capacity to want things is that thing that gives motion Right, yes, it can't really function without the intellect but just the intellect isn't gonna make you move Right it has to be that capacity to desire And it says it's three things in concert making this happen the good that can be done That's number one like you see a good and I think this is recognized by intellect He doesn't say it, but I think that's the deal and then the faculty of desires like oh, that's a good thing I should go after that thing that I just imagined and then the animal moves its bodily functions body soul together goes after the thing So this is his final explanation You're not made of fire or by air moats or whatever the other explanations were in pre few episodes ago That's not how movement works It's you see a thing with your intellect that seems good you want that thing that desiderative faculty the capacity to desire and then you move forward Yeah, the last few chapters are sort of only so he says that the soul is the will He's pointing out that the thing that makes motion is desire Right, he's trying to answer that question. What is it in the soul that moves a person? Right people were claiming it was fire and water and or fire and air and moats and magic things desire desire It's like it's desire man, and it's not strict intellect. It's a capacity that you have to want stuff So is it the imperative part of man?

I would say that's a fair assumption. Yeah, the imperative part And then he talks about animals that possess only touch and that and all animals must have a nutritive soul and then 13 The rest is sort of like scientific considerations. We don't really care about anymore Because we just understand anatomy and science better so Takeaways I think talking about the the eternal faculty of the soul is that one not it's not memory It's that thing that selects from memory. We would call it consciousness, right?

You can sit down and say I'm going to think about cats and cats painting pictures And you can select those two things from your memory and guide your brain there and it is that capacity? That's the eternal soul. I think that's where you finally sort of end up motion doesn't come from airfire It's your capacity for desire and then imagination is different than intellect which is all different from perception, right? I think that's the big takeaways here and also don't read this Yeah, I apparently there are commentaries that I just didn't get to one is by Thomas Aquinas I wonder if that would make more sense and I again I just seems like I fully understand this I would have to read six other books that sort of lay the groundwork for some of the terminology he uses And then also read commentaries and then also sometimes there's not a very good writer Like there's so many ethereals and he doesn't give any examples and any analogies to help you pick it apart And he's using so much jargon from those early arguments that I just can't parse it You're not gonna do that you're gonna read the commentaries and no you're supposed to learn about the soul.

Yeah I'm not doing this anymore. I'm all set. I'm all good. I don't know probably gonna go swimming Let's take a break.

You're right. Take a break man. You're tired. It is I do desire it and my intellect says it is good So yeah, that's right and I hope this has been at least semi informative It's entirely possible that I got a bunch of this stuff wrong But I think those few takeaways that I highlighted are right.

I think I understood understood those correctly Yeah, I wouldn't recommend reading it Maybe read a quick commentary or you know what better yet find a great lecture on YouTube that goes over that kind of connects this to all the other things Um, I found a few that look pretty good I didn't have the time with my three hours this morning to watch a full hour long lecture. Maybe I'll do it for next time Probably not. Yeah, if I'm honest So any last thoughts or questions boys we made it so I'm pretty good. Well If you're desiring to get in touch with us You can email us at Class school boys.

What's our email address? The guys guys Guys, that's the boys That's the boys the guys at classical stuff. Now you can find us on the social media network formerly known as twitter X It's classical stuff on twitter, but spelled weird. Um, you can patronize us on patreon where you can ask where we do a monthly AMA we do in between episodes We're also more active on there if you want to contact us We should comment on more of our patreon stuff.

We definitely sort of like pay more attention to the patreon members Um, but we try to get back on emails and stuff, but if you're a patreon member, we're a lot more better at getting back to you That's a lot more better. Yeah a lot more better. I don't know if that's saying much But um, yeah, this has been graham aj and thomas talking about the soul and If you're still listening you're our soul listener. I don't know.

What are you doing? Well, it's three of five stars. Yeah, the puns are not that great. No, I wasn't reading you I guess three of five I just figured that people have turned off by now the people that haven't should be should be rewarded.

Okay, I was actually Can I attach the recording we made of your goofy intro here? So if you've made it this far you listening and you've earned the easter egg and this is where you find mine. I think it's a great idea I think it's great. I think it's a great idea.

I think it's a great idea. I think it's a great idea. Five minutes to take for the oven to heat up. What did I always say?

Just telling you man, we ran out of parchment paper and she's just wondering how to form the bread into a boule Okay, but make sure that you when you're forming into the boule you are a little more forceful than normal to get all the air out I forgot I forgot to deal with the bread before I left the podcast Do you want to continue your intro? Have you been recording this whole thing? That's so incredible. Yeah, I got done some recording text in this one That's so mean we can stay this for a Easter egg or something.

Oh, I might just take a main episode. Yeah Hi, welcome to class with stuff you should know this is a podcast about About invasions of privacy. Incredible Um Really thrown off right now. Yeah, yeah class goes.

Oh, my name is Graham Can you keep this up the entire episode? It was incredible. It's so bad. Yeah.

All right, let's start for real I refuse flat out refuse How much do you want to finish this platform? This is classical stuff. You should know it's podcast. We talked about Bools.

I don't know what that was. We talked about bread. Let's do it. Oh