Ockham the Scotist?

Ockham begins his Ordinatio with a three hundred seventy page epistemological Prologue, a precedent established in Henry's Summa. The first, seventy-five page, question, misleadingly titled "Whether it is possible for the intellect of a Wayfarer [i.e. a human being still in the present state of life] to have evident knowledge of the truths of theology," is in fact mostly about establishing the distinction between intuitive and abstractive cognition. This distinction was pioneered by Scotus (I've written about it over here), but quickly became standard and is one of the major indicators of earlier versus later scholasticism.

Ockham's account differs from Scotus' in a number of ways. Probably the most significant is that for Scotus intuitive cognition is by definition characterized by the actual existence and presence of the intuited object to the cognitive power apprehending it: when I consider something in the abstract it might exist or might not exist, so far as my ability to think about it is concerned, but if I'm going to see something it really has to be there in front of me; for Ockham, on the other hand, the existence of the intuited object is not strictly necessary. He has a simple argument for this: the object is one thing; the intuitive act, as a quality of my mind, is another, wholly distinct thing; of two separate and distinct created things either one can exist without the other, at least by the power of God; therefore the mental act can exist without the object. - Never mind the problems this raises!

As I mentioned, Scotus seems to have originated the distinction and when Ockham was writing it was not universally established. Some people must not have liked the use Ockham was putting it to, because he seems to have been accused of introducing dangerous novelties into his theology, and he defends himself by appealing to Scotus. This is rich, since Scotus is a kind of intellectual arch-enemy to Ockham, although he's deeply indebted to him even when he's engineering his antipodes. This is an interplay we've written about before. In any case, in this first question Ockham quotes and alludes to Scotus' writings on intuitive and abstractive cognition pretty extensively. Some Scotists seem to have accused him of misinterpreting the Doctor. In places Scotus talks as though the only thing we have direct intellectual intuition of in this life are our own internal acts, while Ockham says that we also have intuition of external sensible objects. He attempts to show that at least in certain places Scotus thinks the same thing. And then, in a remarkable passage:

And if someone should say that elsewhere he claims the opposite, that moves me but little, for I don't take him as an authority, nor do I hold this opinion because he said it, but because I think it true. And if elsewhere he says the opposite, I don't care. But here he holds it, and therefore his followers ought not to condemn it as a novelty.

Et si dicatur quod alibi ponit oppositorum, illud parum movet me, quia non allego eum tamquam auctoritatem, nec dico praedictam opinionem quia ipse dixit eam, sed quia reputo eam veram. Et ideo si alibi dixit oppositum, non curo. Hic tamen tenuit eam, et ideo sequaces sui non debent eam contemnere tamquam novam.

Am I the only one who senses in this outburst of attitude a big chip on Ockham's shoulder about Scotus and the Scotists? This is how Peter Olivi sounds sometimes about Aristotle. Attitude aside, however, it's a salutary sentiment worthy of a real philosopher.

Does Existence have a Quiddity?

Below are some thoughts from Alexander of Alexandria's Quodlibet. For those of you who don't know, Alex was a Franciscan theologian who lectured on the Sentences just after Scotus, in 1306-1307. The question excerpted below is about intuitive cognition, which Alexander extends to a discussion of divine foreknowledge.

Alexander de Alexandria, Quodlibet, q. 9 a. 2 (London, British Library, Ms. Add. 14077, ff. 158? I can't remember).

... quod Deus cognoscat hoc fore in tali instanti difficle est videre

Quidam enim dicunt quod hec est quia Deus est suum esse et ideo cognoscendo suum esse cognoscit existere cuiuscumque [rei].

Hoc dictum primo videtur dubium, nulla enim consequentia videtur esse 'Deus est suum esse, ergo cognoscit existentiam cuiuscumque rei' nisi aliter probaretur.

Secundo videtur dubium quia supponunt unum quod non est concessum ab omnibus, scilicet quod in omni creatura differt esse et essentia, in solo autem Deo est indifferens unum ab alio.

Tertio quia et si Deus videndo suum esse videat existentiam cuiuslibet rei, inquantum existentia est quedam quidditas et hec esse quidditativa; possumus enim dicere quod existere est quedam quidditas, quia potest dari aliquis conceptus de eo, tamen quod cognoscendo suum esse cognoscat hoc fore in tali instanti est dubium, cum hec dependeat a voluntate divina. Ideo enim hoc erit quia Deus vult hec esse.

Alii dicunt quod Deus cognoscendo essentiam suum vel ydeam alicuius rei cognoscit hoc fore.

Sed hoc est ita dubium sicut primum, quia ydea ut ydea, ut videtur, aspicit proprie esse quidditativum et quid est hec et non aspicit fore vel non fore; erit ideo completa contingentia per eam non cognoscuntur, licet enim per ydeam hominis cognoscitur homo et per ydeam certus? cognoscatur cursus, tamen per istam ydeam non cosnoscetur istud hoc curret nisi aliud concurreret. Posset ergo dici sicut alias dixi quod Deus hoc cognoscit cognoscendo determinationem sue voluntatis, quod autem scientia talium aliquo modo dependeat a voluntate patet: certum est enim secundum omnes quod Deus non necessario vult ea que sunt ad finem, non enim necessario vult a fore. Si autem non necessario vult, sequitur quod potest velle et nolle. Si autem potest velle et nolle, potest scire et non scire et totum sine mutatione sui, sicut habet declarari in tractatu de prescientia de sedero tantum? de sedeo?

Translation:

... it is difficult to see that God knows this to be in such an instant.

Some [idiots] say that this is because God is his own being [or, 'act of being' or 'existence'] and therefore by knowing his own being he knows the existence of everything else.

This statement seems doubtful, first, for 'God is his own being, therefore he knows the existence of every other thing' does not seem to be a valid consequence unless it be proved in some other way.

Second, it seems doubtful because they presuppose something which is not granted by all, namely, that esse and essence differ in every creature, and in God alone is one indifferent with respect to the other.

Third, because even if God by seeing his own esse would see the existence of every other thing, insofar as existence is a certain quiddity and quidditative esse, for we can say that existence is a certain quiddity because a concept of it can be granted, nevertheless that by knowing his own esse he knows this to be in such an instant is doubtful, since this depends on the divine will. Therefore, this will be because God wills this to be.

Other [idiots] say that God knows this to be by knowing his own essence or the idea of something.

But this is doubtful just as was the first, because idea as idea, as it seems, is directed toward quidditative esse properly and what something is and does not consider something to be or not to be; therefore the complete contingency[?] is not known through it, for although man is known through the idea of man, and through the idea of running a runner is known, nevertheless that this one runs is not known through the idea unless the other concur.  Therefore it can be said, as I have said elsewhere, that God knows this to be by knowing the determination of his will; that however the knowledge of such things depends on the will in some way is clear: for it is certain according to all that God does not will necessarily those things which are for the end, for he does not will necessarily that a will be. If however he does not will necessarily, it follows that he is able to will and not-will. If however he can will and not-will, he can know and not know the total [creature?] without any change in himself, as I have to declare in my treatise on foreknowledge...

Intuitive and Abstractive Cognition

This post is meant to belong to the series Fundamenta Scoti, all of which so far have been by Faber, so it seems to be my turn. The subject of intuitive and abstractive cognition didn't appear on Faber's original list, but it's an important and influential part of Scotus' thought, so here it is.

To begin with, let's briefly recall how thinking works in Aquinas, whose epistemology is probably the scholastic one most familiar to any readers coming here. For Aquinas it goes, roughly speaking, like this: first the senses receive sense impressions. From these sense impressions the mind forms phantasms, reproductions or representations of the sense-data in the imaginative power. Out of the phantasms the intellect abstracts universal intelligible content, forming intelligible species, which are always and necessarily universal. Understanding consists in the apprehension of these intelligible species. When we want to understand something about individuals, what we do is take our understanding of the universal intelligible content and apply it back, in a kind of reflex action, upon the individual phantasms, which always and necessarily represent singulars, understanding that this universal is the intelligible content of this singular. (For Aquinas anything not universal in the singular material object is matter, which is intrinsically unintelligible.)

For Scotus things are different. Besides what is abstracted as a universal there is an irreducible singularity to a form, a haecceitas or thisness which makes the thing not only "such-and-such" a thing but also "this" thing. Since the principle of individuation is formal, not material, it is also intelligible, which means that, contrary to Aquinas, it is not the case that all intellection is of universals.

In addition to this Scotus recognizes a kind of cognition which Aquinas either does not or else doesn't flesh out very fully. In addition to abstractive cognition there is also a kind of cognition he calls intuitive, which is related to abstractive roughly as vision is to imagination, and indeed Scotus calls intuitive cognition a kind of intellectual "vision". Abstractive cognition abstracts from actual existence, and its object can be considered regardless of whether it is real or imaginary or hypothetical or past or distant; intuitive cognition is the kind of knowledge we have of something as existing and present to us in its actual existence. Key texts in which Scotus considers this distinction are found in Ordinatio Book II Dist. 3 P.2 Q.2, and in Questions on the Metaphysics Book VII Q.15. Here's a snippet from the latter:

There is a double intellection; one quidditative which abstracts from existence; the other, which is called “vision,” is of the existent as existent. The first, although it is generally of the universal, can be primarily of the singular . . . For the singular of itself is not determined to existence, because is abstracts from it just as the universal does. The second intellection is of both together, i.e. of the singular insofar as it is existing. And in this way . . . it does not include some accident but only existence, which does not pertain to the individual’s formula, neither insofar as it is a quiddity, nor insofar as the singular participates in this quiddity.

In addition to the familiar kind of cognition in which the intellect abstracts a universal from the phantasm, here Scotus argues that there is another way for our minds to encounter things, a direct and immediate “act of simple awareness in which some object is grasped . . . as present and existing here and now.” (The quote is from Allan Wolter.) The fact that we apprehend our own mental acts and memories has been cited as evidence that our minds grasp singulars not only in their common natures but also qua singulars, even if not in their very singularity. This distinction between these two kinds of cognitions makes this possible, although it may require some elucidation.

I cannot apprehend my thoughts or my memories (or take mental cognizance of any of my experiences) only as thoughts or memories in general, but only as my thought which I am thinking now, or my experience which was given to me then and there. Grasping my thought in this way is different from grasping the absolute nature of thought; knowing my thoughts involves knowing of their actual existence, even if in this particular thought of mine which I consider I can find nothing to distinguish it from every other thought. Thinking about the nature of thought in general (as when I think about logic) and considering the particular train of thought I am engaged in now are examples of “a double intellection; one quidditative which abstracts from existence; the other, which is called ‘vision,’ is of the existent as existent.” An analogy can be drawn between these two cognitions and the two faculties of sense and imagination; both sense and imagination involve the presentation of images to the awareness but imagination can take place without the presence or existence of its object: it is “abstractive”; while sensation only happens when an existent object is present to act upon the sense-faculty to directly produce the sense act: it is “intuitive.” Now just as the imagination presents singular images abstracted from existence, so the intellect in the type of thinking Aristotelians are most familiar with considers concepts whose objects may either exist or not. These abstractive concepts, Scotus points out, are usually but not always universals: I can think about the rage of Achilles as well as the serenity of Socrates, even if the one probably never existed and the other did, for both Achilles and his rage are intelligible as individuals whether they ever actually were or not. And when I think of Achilles and Socrates I don’t primarily think “man” and then add some determining difference to distinguish them, but first I think of the individuals, under whom “Greek” and “man” and “ancient” are included (though only one of whom perhaps also includes “wise”).

On the other hand, just as sensations only occur when the sense-object is existing, present and acting on the sense-organ, so Scotus argues that there must be an analogous intellectual activity which is so moved. One reason to think this is because of an argument Scotus advanced at the beginning of the Question, that the intellect as the superior power must know whatever the inferior sense power does. Superior power or not, however, according to the accepted maxim whatever is in the intellect (at least as regards material objects) was first in the senses, and here the intellect shares some of the defects of the sense. The intellect, like the sense powers, perceives the singular as singular without apprehending the singularity precisely speaking. Socrates and Achilles can both then be understood as individuals having the same quiddity, and as either existing or not existing, “for the singular of itself is not determined to existence, because it abstracts from it just as the universal does.” Only Socrates, however (presuming Achilles to be a non-existing fictional character), can be both seen and understood as “this singular insofar as it is existing.” This intellectual grasp however is only sufficient for the intellect to know the existence of something as a “this”; for the knowledge of quiddities, either of the essential nature or the quiddities of the accidents, pertains to abstraction, and the sense is not moved by the singularity which contains the quiddities per se.

(By the way, . Much of the difficulty for other philosophers on this issue and on the intelligibility of singulars in general came from the traditional Aristotelian axiom that while sense was concerned with particulars, the understanding pertained to universals. Some non-Christian philosophers took this to mean that the intellect was as unconcerned with particulars as the senses were with universals, to the extent that even God does not know individuals, a doctrine which seems to contain traces of the platonic tendency against which Scotus has been fighting from the beginning. While none of Scotus’ Christian opponents could follow the implications of the axiom so interpreted to such extremes, they still had difficulties in grappling with it. In the passage just cited Scotus shows that the axiom can be interpreted to mean that the intellect can do something the senses cannot, without meaning that sense has a domain of its own from which the intellect is excluded, thus eliminating the difficulty. See Sebastian Day, Intuitive Cognition: A Key to the Later Scholastics, 59-60.)

In men, intuitive intellectual cognition, since it never acts without the sense in considering material things, is subject to the limitations of sense in a way that an intellect not hampered by such restrictions would not be. Scotus writes:

The intellect immediately receptive of the action of the object can be moved by singularity; not however that which is receptive through the mediacy of a natural action. Only the first is [true of] the angelic intellect which sees immediately the material singular. The second is [true of] our intellect, on which nature acts only through the mediacy of something begotten in the sense, which can be called a material natural action, with respect to that which is intelligible, operative on the intellect.

God, on the other hand, has no need for universal concepts. This is because God knows everything he knows by an immediate intuitive cognition. Not having to rely on intermediary senses and images to think with, he has no need to abstract anything from them. Our minds, however, are limited in what they can grasp intuitively and must rely on abstraction for the rest, which as it turns out is not wholly adequate.

Scotus' theory of how we think about sensible things seems to go something like this.. The sense faculty apprehends the substance as a “simul totum,” as a unified conglomeration of attributes, colors and noises and shapes and smells, etc., and alongside this activity the intellect has an intuitive grasp of the fact that the sense is perceiving this “simul totum,” this existing acting something. From the phantasm of the attribute-conglomeration the intellect removes accidents one by one until it grasps the nature underlying them: my mind understands that this short white bald Greek-speaking something is a man, to whom the accidents short and white as so forth belong. “And thus,” Scotus continues, “the terminus a quo and the terminus ad quem of the reflection is something confused and in the middle it is distinct.” I take it that the terminus a quo is the confused conglomeration in the phantasm. The nature stands in the middle and is understood distinctly because it is the primary principle of assimilable action in the substance. But the mind can penetrate no further before becoming entangled in the accidents. Socrates acts on my mind to the extent that I understand not only the common nature humanity but also the fact that this something acting on me (known by intuitive cognition) is this man (known by abstractive cognition). I can therefore name him not only by species but as an individual. But when I attempt to go on and grasp what makes Socrates himself and no one else, all I have to fall back on are his characteristics of being short, bald, ugly, wise—-none of which are unable to be true of other men, either singly or all together. Even though Socrateity does not form an accidental unity with humanity, I only understand him in a quasi-accidental way, as the (an) individual man with these accidental, non-unique attributes. Thus the terminus ad quem remains confused as well. I know that containing the humanity and supporting all the accidents of Socrates is Socrateity, but I do not ever reach a concept of Socrateity which actually picks him out of all other possible men. “And without such a concept we never conceive the singular distinctly.”

Besides the way we encounter sensible objects, however, Scotus' account of intuitive cognition has widespread implications ranging from how we know our own acts to the nature of the beatific vision.

Noone on Scotus on Intuitive and Abstractive Cognition

Here is a lecture by Dr. Timothy Noone on Scotus from the recent Scotus and Newman conference.

Auriol on Scotus on Intuitive Cognition and the Beatific Vision

Here is an interesting summary of some of Scotus' views by Peter Auriol, that seems to me to be fairly accurate. This is from a discussion of the nature of theology, specifically of Scotus and Godfrey's criticisms of Henry of Ghent's special mode of illumination restricted to theologians, the lumen medium.

Petrus Aurioli, Scriptum super primum Sententiarum, Prooemium sect. 2 (ed. Buytaert vol. 1 p. 191):

"Primo quidem, quid est notitia abstractiva et intuitiva. Est enim intuitiva, quae concernit rei praesentialitatem et existentiam, et terminatur ad rem ut in se existentem. Abstractiva vero dicitur quae abstrahit ab esse et non esse, existere et non existere, et a praesentialitate; quemadmodum rosam intueor dum eam praesentem conspicio, abstractive vero cognosco dum eius quidditatem et naturam considero. hae autem duae sunt possibiles in intellectu; certum est enim quod angelus intuetur rosam dum est; cuius tamen essentiam abstractive considerat, etiam dum non existit.

Secundo vero probant quod divina essentia possit cognosci abstractive, sicut et quelibet quiddiativa natura; Deus enim potest facere sola voluntate, quidquid facere potest mediante sua essentia; sed mediante sessentia movet intellectum beati ad suam notitiam claram et nudam, quae quidem est intuitiva, pro eo quod terminatur ad eam, ut praesentem realiter et existentem, quoniam ut sic movet. Ergo sola voluntate poterit movere intellectum ad notitiam suae essentiae nudae et clarae. Certum est autem quod talis notitia sub illa ratione terminatur ad divinam esentiam, sub qua ratione intellectus movetur ad eam; non movetur autem per praesentialitatem et existentiam essentiae divinae, sed per imperium omnipotentis voluntatis. Ergo nec terminabitur talis notita ad essentiam ut existentem et praesentem, sed ad essentiam mere abstrahendo ab existentia et praesentialitate et per conseuqens non erit intuitiva, sed potius abstractiva."

Translation:

First indeed, what is abstractive and intuitive knowledge. Intuitive knowledge is that which concerns the presence and existence of a thing, and is terminated to the thing as it is existing in itself. Abstractive cognition, however, is that which abstracts from being and non being, existence and non existence, and from presence[or presenciality]. Just as when I cognize a rose, I consider it as present, but when I know it abstractivly I consider its quiddity and nature. These are two possible [modes of cognition?] in the intellect; for it is certain that an angel knows a rose while it is, nevertheless it considers its essence abstractivly, even while it does not exist.

Second they prove that the divine essence can be known abstractivly, just as any other quidditative nature; for God can do by means of his will alone, whatever he can do by means of his essence; but by means of his essence he can move the intellect of the blessed to clear and naked knowledge of himself, which indeed is intuitive, on account of the fact that the intellect of the blessed terminates at the divine essence as really present and existing, since as such it moves. therefore by the will alone he can move the intellect to clear and naked knowledge of his essence. It is certain that such knowledge under that aspect is terminated to the divine essence, under which aspect the intellect is moved to it; it is not moved, however, by the presence and existence of the divine essence, but through the command of the omnipotent will. therefore such knowledge will not be terminated by the essence as existing and present, but to the essence merely by abstracting from the existence and presence and consequently it will not be intuitive but rather abstractive.