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.

The Anti-Razor

Dr Feser fairly recently had a post about Ockham's razor, and perhaps it was remembering this that made me sit up when I came across the "anti-razor", formulated in the Scotist work (anonymous, despite the title) Logica Campsale Anglicj, valde utilis et realis contra Ockham, that is, The Logic of the Englishman Campsall, very useful and realist, against Ockham. It goes like this:

Whenever some affirmative proposition is verified about things, if one thing does not suffice to verify such such a proposition, one must posit two, and if two do not suffice, three, and so on to infinity.

In his preface to the critical edition to Ockham's Quodlibeta Septem, Joseph Wey notes that the same principle was formulated by Walter of Chatton. I translate from p. *35:

It may be useful to note here that Chatton also frequently employs a limiting principle or rule . . . which can be called a certain "anti-razor" or complement of the principle of parsimony, namely 'When a proposition is verified about things, if two things do not suffice to verify the proposition, one must posit a third.' Ockham does not accept this rule, but rather vehemently opposes it.

Gideon Gal discusses the authorship of pseudo-Campsall's anti-Ockhamist logic in the preface to the critical edition of Ockham's Summa Logicae. There's a funny remark in there which seems to imply that the logical debates in early 14th-century Franciscan England were damaging to fraternal charity. The Campsall-logic can't have been by John of Rodington, he says on *60-*61:

Furthermore, John of Rodington, who as they say was a very holy man, did not adhere so faithfully to the doctrine of the Subtle Doctor nor so bitterly opposed the doctrine of the Inceptor as the author of the Logic against Ockham. If anyone were to say that the author is John of Reading, we could well believe him . . . It seems to us that some of the things he said and wrote are very similar to those which William Ockham found vain and ridiculous and rebuked in the Summa Logicae . . . this can easily explain the acrimony of the author against Ockham, especially if their contention took place in a single academic community [coram scholaribus communibus].

Gal goes on to discuss the anti-razor as well as the case for and against Walter of Chatton and the anti-Ockham being one and the same.

In any case, as the editor of the anti-Ockham notes, the anti-razor has been independently formulated by a modern author, K. Menger, in "A Counterpart of Ockham's Razor in Pure and Applied Mathematics: Ontological Uses," Synthese 12 (1960), 415:

. . . what is needed is a counterpart to the Law of Parsimony - so to speak, a law against Miserliness - stipulating that entities must not be reduced to the point of inadequacy and, more generally, that it is vain to try to do with fewer what requires more.

The benefit, such as it is, of the Ockhamist metaphysics is that it's clean and tidy, wiping all the conceptual barnacles and encrustments off the mental slate. The main critique of the formalizantes must always be that its wild and florid growth produces a profusion of pseudo-entities multiplying out of control. The goal of metaphysics, however, is not to produce either an invigoratingly pure and arid conceptual desert, nor an exciting and exotic conceptual rainforest, but to understand reality as it is. So metaphysics will have to do with the right amount of entities, neither more nor less than necessity demands.

If Faber and I ever get around to producing for public consumption an edition or translation or modern rewriting of the Diologus curiosus inter Dunxsistam et Okamistam, "A Curious Dialogue between a Scotist and an Ockhamist," no doubt the anti-razor will resurface.

Question

Not to constantly bash Thomists... but they deserve it so I will anyway. When did "analogicity" become a useful word to describle analogy? I saw it in Stephen Hipp's (u. of st. thomas) essay in the Scotus Quadruple Conference proceedings and now in the title of steven Long's (ave maria u.) talk at the Fordham... conference. Seriously, this is but more evidence that there is nothing left to say about Aquinas and analogy that hasn't been said a hundred times each decade since the death of Thomas.

Bad News

So here are some rather sad stats. I was looking at the "cluster map" down on the sidebar, and it turns out we have had 12 visitors from Pakistan, but only 7 from the Vatican. So apparently we're not making much of a difference after all.

Death Documents of Petrus Thomae

A slow day, so here are the final historical records of Petrus Thomae. He was busted for fortune-telling and necromancy, and thrown into the papal prison at Noves, south of Avignon, where he died ca. 1340.

From Brady's article, "the Later Years of Petrus Thomae," p.255-6:

Item, cum dilectus magister Fulco laborasset pluribus diebus et mensibus
scribendo processus et scripturas inquisitionis factae contra fratem Petrum
Thomae poenitentiarium, Garinum de Layto Pisiensem, sortilegos et nigromaticos,
Bertrandum de Narbona falsarium et relegatum..., solvimus eidem magister
Fulconi pro salario suo et scripturis ac labore V florenos auri.

p. 57:

Oct. 13 [1340]. Eadem die idem dominus Guillermos Bos de bonis quondam fratris
Petri Hispani, condemnati et mortui in carceribus Novarum, per ipsum receptis
camerae praedictae assignavit: 8 flor. auri, 14 den. Tur. gross., 7 regali auri,
2 sol., 5 den., Iulhat. arg.

Walter of Bruges on Intelligible and Virtual Being

The following is a quote from Walter of Bruges, a figure so obscure he failed to make it into our co-blogger Michael’s dissertation (even though he has a fairly large question on spiritual matter that contains discussion of Avicebron’s views). But Michael will undoubtably try to convince us that 450 pages is long enough for a dissertation. I don’t know about you, but I would have read a 500 page dissertation. Anyway, Walter of Bruge was a Franciscan who lectured at Paris during the 1260’s. The quote is from the question on spiritual matter and contains some talk of intelligible being, hence my posting of it here (it turns out blogs are also a handy way to store information one might otherwise lose).

I Sent. d. 8 a. 5 (ed. Longpre, Archives, d'histoire doctrinale et lit.... 1932 p.272)

Ad quartum dic quod anima recipit duos modos accidentium: nam recipit accidentia intentionalia, ut similitudines vel species quibus cognoscit eas et recipit etiam accidentia realia, ut virtutes et vitia. Prima non habent contrarietatem in anima, quia sunt ibi tantum secundum intentionem, non secundum naturam suam, et ideo non distinguunt eam nec dant animae esse, sed recipiunt in ea esse intelligibile; et haec non sunt in anima ut in subiecto vel materia simpliciter, sed ut in loco, quia anima conservat ea in esse intelligibili, sicut locus conservat locatum; et sic considerantur ut media intelligendi res quarum sunt similitudines; tamen in quantum huiusmodi similitudines animam scientem reddunt et quoad hoc perficiunt, etiam possunt dici esse in anima ut in subiecto et distinguere eam ab anima ignorante et dare animae esse scientificum. Alia vero accidentia, scilicet vitia et virtutes, simpliciter sunt in anima ut in subiecto et distinguunt eam et dant ei esse virtuale, nec sunt in ea ut in loco, sed vere ut in subiecto.

To the fourth say that the soul receives two kinds of accidents: for it receives intentional accidents, as likenesses or species by which it knows them and it receives also real accidents, as the virtues and vices. The first kind do not have contrariety in the soul, because they are there only according to intention, not according to their nature, and therefore they do not distinguish it nor give being to the soul, but they receive in it intelligibile being, and these are not in the soul as in a subject or matter simply, but as in a place, because the soul conserves them in intelligible being, just as place conserves the located; and so they are considered as means of understanding the things of which they are the likenesses; nevertheless insofar as likenesses of this kind make the soul knowing and perfect it with respect to this, they also can be said to be in the soul as in a subject and to distinguish it from a soul not-knowing, and to give to the soul the ability to be scientific. But the other accidents, namely the vices and virtues, simply are in the soul as in a subject and distinguish it and give virtual being to it, nor are they in it as in a place, but truly as in a subject.

Around the Net

The following is a quote from a First Things essay by Edward Oakes, SJ on Newman's idea of a university:

Precisely as a science that is obedient to a supervenient revelation and yet must use reason to reach its conclusions, theology is inherently volatile, and within it a legitimate pluralism must be recognized. Thus, theologians are bound to disagree about reason’s proper role in submitting to revelation, and differing positions on that initial point will legitimately generate different schools of thought. One is no less Catholic if one agrees with Duns Scotus on the univocity of being over against Thomas Aquinas’ preference for the analogy of being, despite the fact that a large majority of theologians competent to have an opinion on the matter prefer Thomas over the Scot. Nor is one less faithful to revelation if one prefers Plato over Aristotle—or at least we must say this: If one wants to argue Aristotle’s precedence over Plato, this position will have to be decided on strictly philosophical, not theological, grounds—a point on which the medieval theologians were all agreed.

Oakes is a Balthasarian, I believe, so such statements as admitting that one is no less catholic if one sides with Scotus is probably not so remarkable as it would be if he were a straight-laced Thomist. Many are the real-time conversations in which Thomists have tried to convince me that the Church requires us all to be Thomists (surely an odd appeal to authority from a group that regularly attacks nearly all non-Thomists for not respecting the faith-reason distinction). But it is a rather remarkable statement given the current climate in post-modern theology, in which the "narrative" of "univocalist ontology" generally relegates Scotus to the category of monster.

Regarding said narratives, the beef some of us have with them is that they don't deal with arguments. What is actually interesting about Scotus is that he makes good and interesting arguments. It's not about system-building (though there is a system), or reconciling authorities, or building a giant mosaic of the fathers, but about arguments. Revelation supplies the data, the cold hard facts that can't be ignored, and reason supplies arguments. That is the appeal I, and I suspect my co-blogger Michael, finds in Scotus. And this is also the source of our irritation with some species of modern theology: they deal with vague notions of how general ontologies and onto-theologies somehow "lead" to other nasty conclusions like the holocaust or abortion, and quote nary an argument on the way.

Leibniz: Theorist of Spiritual Matter?

From a letter of Leibniz to Johann Bernoulli (Philosophical Essays, p. 169-70):

"You rightly judge that the passive is never actually separated from the active in creatures. What God could have done, I don't venture to say. The passive alone and the vacuum seem, at least, incompatible with his wisdom, even if they aren't incompatible with his power. Neither is it certain that there are intelligences completely separated from bodies except for God. Many Church Fathers have also inclined to the contrary, attributing bodies to angels."

Formal Distinction

The Formal Distinction, of course, is not a “fundamental position” in the sense employed by the other posts in this series. It is a tool rather than a doctrine, though it does have its own set of arguments designed to show its necessity. It is fundamental in the sense that it is part of Scotus’ solution to a variety of problems in both theology (relation of personal properties, divine attributes, and so on, to the divine essence) and philosophy (the relation of being to the other transcendentals, discussions of universals and particulars). Consequently, prior to examining these issues we must lay out what Scotus thinks the formal distinction is.

It is well-known that there were three sorts of distinctions developed by the scholastics. The first is the distinction of reason, or logical distinction; this is a distinction generated by the intellect, is not based on anything outside the intellect in the world; though the scholastics use it a great deal, they don’t have much to say on its nature. It posits the least degree of distinction in the entities to be distinguished, a difference only in thought. In later scholasticism, in reaction to Scotus, it was differentiated into a distinction of reason-reasoning and reason-reasoned but this desperate Thomist move need not concern us here.

There is also the real distinction, which was also used by everyone but very little was done to define it. Aquinas posited this between essence and existence, for example, though he arrived at it by arguing from a distinction concepts (see De ente), and never bothered to define it. After Aquinas, it became common to distinguish this distinction from the rational distinction by what is today called the “separability criterion”; according to this, two things are really distinct if they are separable and one can exist without the other (for example, the body and soul). I don’t know who first used this criterion; generally Giles of Rome is blamed by those Thomists particularly obsessed with detailing the precise stages of decline away from Aquinas. It is also found in Godfrey of Fontaines, Scotus and later fourteenth-century philosophy (note that I have made no great search for it). This is not the only version of the real distinction, however, for Thomas of Sutton interprets it as having distinct beings (res) in act, as well as any distinction not caused by the intellect.

There were also various versions of what is often called a “middle distinction” a distinction supposed to be half-way between the mind and reality. Generally, most theologians in the thirteenth-century used them, and often attacked other versions of them for violating the principle of excluded middle. A classic example can be found in Bonaventure, and Aquinas employed one early in his career as well. For Aquinas, this was the celebrated distinction in the mind with a fundamentum in re, in which entities were potentially distinct in the world but rendered actually distinct by the “completive” action of the intellect (ratio completiva). This distinction was somewhat popular, adopted by even non-thomists such as Henry of Ghent, who also authored a “middle-distinction” which he called an “intentional distinction” .

Anyway, the point of all this is to make it clear that while there are “general” notions or theories of distinction with common terms to describe them, often individual authors have their own ideosynchratic theories. So one has to be careful not to simply quote Scotus and then view him refuted by Thomas of Sutton simply because the latter rejects a “real distinction”

Turning to Scotus, we find that he also employes the rational and real distinctions, as well as the formal. It is a matter of dispute whether the formal distinction is a middle distinction or a real distinction. I myself am on the real distinction side, as will become clear, but the topic was disputed during the medieval period, and still disputed today. The contemporary form of the dispute is whether Scotus changed his mind at Paris and mitigated the reality of the distinction, or did not. However, a great deal seems to hang not on what Scotus actually said but in what order he is thought to have said it. That is, different conclusions about the distinction are often reached by holding a different chronology of Scotus’ works. Most of the “Scotus changed his mind” crowd hold to Balic’s (the father of the modern Vatican critical edition) claim that the Ordinatio is the last work of Scotus, and should be the ultimate and final arbiter of any apparent contradictions, and is equivalent to the Summa of Aquinas. This then leaves the chronology as Lectura-Reportatio-Ordinatio. The opposition has a different view, which runs Lectura-Ordinatio-Reportatio+further additions to primative text of Ordinatio. I will say no more about this controversy, and the interested reader can consult Hoffmann’s bibliography (see the sidebar) under the names: Hester Gelber, Marilyn Adams, Michael Jordan, Richard Cross, Stephen D. Dumont.

The obvious division based on differences in terminology is between the Ordinatio/Lectura and the Reportatio. A common observation that appears to be true is that at Oxford Scotus spoke of entities, formalitates that were distinct, while at Paris he focused rather on the distinction itself rather than on what was being distinguished (though, as is apparent from the Quaestio de formalitatibus and other passages of the Reportatio, the formalitates are still present).

The basic division of distinctions for Scotus is between those caused by the mind and those independent of the mind. Distinctions independent of the mind he calls distinctions ex natura rei. This includes the real distinction, which he calls a distinctio realis-actualis and devotes little space to the examination of it, and the formal distinction. The real distinction is distinguished from the formal distinction by real separability. Items distinguished by a real distinction can exist independently of each other, while for the formal distinction this is not the case; they are inseparably united.

Texts:

Ordinatio II d. 1 q. 4-5 (ed. Vat. VII, 101-103):
“...nihil est idem realiter alicui, sine quo potest esse realiter absque contradictione... Hanc etiam propositionem ‘illa sunt distincta realiter quorum unum potest manere sine altero’, negaret protervus. Ista autem negata, perit tota doctrina Philosophi VII Topicorum...”	... nothing is really the same as something, without which it can really be without contradiction... a reckless person might deny this proposition also, ‘those things are really distinct of which one can remain without the other’. With that denied, however, the doctrine of Aristotle in VII Topics is destroyed.
Ordinatio II d. 3 pars 1 q. 2 (ed. Vat. VII, 198):
“Accipio igitur quod nihil potest concludi ‘distinctum ab alio’ nisi vel propter separationem actualem, vel potentialem, vel propter proportionem istorum ad aliqua alia quorum alterum est ab alterio separabile.”	I hold therefore that nothing can be distinct from another unless either because of actual separation, or potential, or because of the proportion of those things to some other of each one is separable from the other.
Ordinatio I d. 2 pars 2 q. 1-4 (ed. Vat. II, 355):
“Sed numquid haec distinctio dicetur realis? Respondeo: non est realis actualis, intelligendo sicut communiter dicitur, ‘differentia realis actualis’ illa quae est differentia rerum et in actu... et sicut non est realis actualis, ita non est realis potentialis...”	But should this distinction be called real? I answer: it is not real-actual, meaning by this as is commonly held a real-actual difference, that which is a difference of things and in act... and just as it is not real-actual, so it is not real-potential.
ibid. (350):
“Et intelligo sic ‘realiter’, quod nullo modo per actum intellectus considerantis, immo quod talis entitas esset ibi si nullus intellectus esset considerans; et sic esse ibi, si nullus intellectus consideraret, dico ‘esse ante omnem actum intellectus’.”	And I interpret the term ‘really’ as in no way by the act of the intellect considering, indeed that such an entity would be there if no intellect would be considering. And so to be there, if no intellect would consider I call ‘to be before every act of the intellect’.
Quaestiones super libros Metaphysicorum Aristotelis IV q. 2, edited by Robert Andrews et al. (St. Bonaventure, N.Y.: The Franciscan Institute, 1997), 354-355:
Ideo quaelibet potest dici pars perfectionis, non tamen realiter differens quod sit alia natura, sed alia perfectio realis – alietate, inquam, non causata ab intellectu, nec tamen tanta quantum intelligimus cum dicimus ‘diversae res’; sed differentia reali minori, si vocetur differentia realis omnis non causata ab intellectu... Exemplum huius aliquale in continuo, in quo sunt multae partes; ista multitudo est realis, sic quod non causata a ratione. Non tamen tanta quantam hic intelligimus ‘diversae res’, sed minor realis, quia multitudo non simpliciter diversorum in uno tamen toto contentorum.”	Therefore whatever can be called a part of perfection, nevertheless no really differens as it is another nature, but another real perfection – by an otherness, I say, not caused by the intellect, nor of the kind that we understand when we say ‘diverse things’; but by a real-minor difference, if a real difference be called every difference not caused by the intellect... An example of this is of the continuum, in which there are many parts; that multitude is real, such that it is not caused by reason. Nevertheless we do not here understand ‘diverse things’ but a minor-real, because a multitude not simply of diverse things contained in one total.
Quaestiones super libros Metaphysicorum Aristotelis VII q. 19 (Opera Philosophica IV, 370):
“Alia est opinio... Sed realis differentia ponitur habere gradus. Est enim maxima naturarum et suppositorum; media naturarum in uno supposito; minima diversarum perfectionum sive rationum perfectionalium unitive contentarum in una natura.”	There is another opinion... but a real difference is posited to have grades. For it is most of all of natures and supposits; medium of natures in one supposit; least of all of diverse perfections or perfectinal definitions unitively contained in one nature.

As for their correlatives, real and formal identity, Scotus sees the highest form of identity as being formal identity. This the identity of sharing the same definition. The second highest is real identity.

Texts:

Ordinatio I d. 2 pars 2 q. 1-4 (ed. Vat. II, 356):

“...possumus invenire in unitate multos gradus – primo, minima est aggregationis; in secundo gradu est unitas ordinis, quae aliquid addit supra aggregationem; in tertio est unitas per accidens, ubi ultra ordinem est informatio, licet accidentalis, unius ab altero eorum quae sunt sic unum; in quarto est per se unitas compositi ex principiis essentialibus per se actu et per se potentia; in quinto est unitas simplicitatis, quae est vere identitas (quidquid enim est ibi, est realiter idem cuilibet, et non tantum est unum illi unitate unionis, sicut in aliis modis) – ita, adhuc ultra, non omnis identitas est formalis. Voco autem identitatem formalem, ubi illud quod dicitur sic idem, includit illud cui sic est idem, in ratione sua formali quiditativa et per se primo modo.”

We can find many grades in unity: first, the least is that of aggregation. In the second grade is unity of order, which adds [order] over aggregation. The third is accidental unity, where beyond order there is [an] informing, although it is accidental, of one from another which are thus one. In the fourth is the per se unity of a composite [composed] from essential principles per se in act and per se in potency. In the fifth is unity of simplicity, which is truly identity (for whatever is there is really the same to any other, and not only is it one by the unity of that union, as is the case in the other modes); so still beyond this [real unity of simplicity], not every identity is formal. I call however formal identity where that which is said to be the same includes that to which it is the same in its formal-quidditative definition per say in the first mode [of per se predication; this means to predicate a definition or part of a definition].

Here we find that real identity is equivalent to simplicity, which is “true”identity. Beyond this however is formal identity. consequently, simplicity/real identity is compatibile with formal non identity (= formal distinction).

An argument based on intuitive cognition that was to prove influential shows how Scotus arrives at the formal distinction; this also illustrates his practice of referring to entities that are formally distinct:

Ordinatio I d. 8 q. 4 (ed. Vat. IV, 257):

“Praeterea, intellectus intuitivus nullam habet distinctionem in obiecto nisi secundum quod exsistens est, quia sicut non cognoscit aliquod obiectum nisi ut exsistens, ita non cognoscit aliqua distincta formaliter in obiecto nisi ut exsistens est. Cum ergo intellectus divinus non cognoscat essentiam suam nisi intellectione intuitiva, quaecumque distinctio ponatur ibi in obiecto – sive sit distinctiorum obiectorum formalium, sive ut rationum causatarum per actum intellectus – sequitur quod ista distinctio erit in obiecto ut actu exsistens est: et ita si ista est obiectorum formalium distinctorum in obiecto, erunt ista distincta formaliter (et tunc sequitur propositum, quod talis distinctio obiectorum formalium praecedit actum intellectus), si autem sit rationum causatarum per actum intelligendi, ergo intellectus divinus causabit aliquam intellectionem in essentia ‘ut relationem rationis’, ut est exsistens, quod videtur absurdum.”

Furthermore, an intuitive understanding has no distinction in an object except according as it is existning, because just as it does not know some object save as existing, so it does not know something to be formally distinct in the object unless as it is existing. Since therefore the divine intellect does not know its essence except by an intuitive intellection, whatever distinction is posited there in the object – whether it is of distinct formal objects or as definitions caused by the act of the intellect – it follows that that distinction will be in the object as it is existing in act; and so if that is of formally distinct objects in the object, they will be formally distinct (and then the matter at hand follows, that such a distinction of formal objets precedes the act of the intellect), if however it is of definitions caused by the act of understanding, therefore the divine intellect will cause some intellection in the essence, as a relation of reason, as it is existing, which seems absurd.

To boil this down:

1.intuitive cognition, which is cognition of the object as present, causes no distinction in the object being cognized.

2. Since the divine intellect knows the divine essence by intuitive cognition, any distinction (whether of diverse formal objects or definitions caused by the intellect) posited in the divine essence will be in the essence as it is existing in act.

3. If the distinction is of distinct formal objects, then Scotus has what he is trying to prove, a formal distinction.

4. If it is of definitions caused by the act of understanding, then the divine intellect will cause intellection in the essence, which is absurd.

At Paris the basic organization of distinctions is into distinctions that are simpliciter, that is, absolute or unqualified, or secundum quid. Under the secundum quid distinction falls both the formal distinction and another distinction called adequate non-identity (for situations in which one of the distinguenda exceeds the other). The difference between the two classes of distinctions is in a series of four conditions. All four are required for a distinctio simpliciter, while only the first three are required for a distinction secundum quid.

Reportatio I-A d. 33 q. 2 (ed. Wolter-Bychkov II, 328):

“...ad hoc quod aliqua simpliciter distinguantur, quattuor requiruntur condiciones. Prima est quod sit aliquorum in actu et non in potentia tantum, — quomodo distinguuntur ea quae sunt in potentia in materia et non simpliciter, quia non sunt in actu. Secunda est quod est eorum quae habent esse formale et non tantum virtuale, — ut effectus sunt in sua causa virtualiter et non formaliter. Tertia condicio est quod est eorum quae non habent esse confusum (ut extrema in medio et miscibilia in mixto), sed eorum quae habent esse distinctum propriis actualibus. Quarta condicio, quae sola est completiva distinctionis perfectae, est non-identitas...”

For this that something is distinguished simpliciter, for conditions are required. The first is that it is of things in act and not in potentcy only, in the way in which those things are distinguished which are in potency in matter and not simpliciter, because they are not in act. The second is that it is of those which have formal being and not only virtual, as an effect is in its cause virtually and not formally. The third condition is that it is of those which do not have confused beng, as the extremes in a medium and mixable in the mixted, but of those which have distinct being by their own actuals(?). The fourth condition, which alone completes perfect distinction, is non identity.

The terminology of this distinction appears to come from discussions of fallacies, especially the fallacious move from secundum quid to simpliciter. This is a common fallacy treated by numerous medieval logicians. The ‘secundum quid’ is a determinatio deminuens, a determination that once applied diminishes the reality of what it is applied to.

To sum up:

There are basically two versions of the formal distinction, corresponding to Scotus’ Oxford and Parisian periods. In the Oxford version entities are formally distinct if they are found in a third thing inseparably united but really identical. This distinction obtains apart from any cognitive activity on the part of God or creatures, even when the subject of the distinction is God. At Paris Scotus is more interested in discussing the reality of the distinction itself, which he says is a diminished distinction, not a fully distinct or fully actual distinction. He sets out a series of conditions for an unqualified distinction, and if the last is not met there is only a qualified distinction present (the other features of the Oxford account, such as obtaining prior to the operation of the intellect, hold true of Paris as well).

Scotus on the Incarnation

Click here for a post on Aquinas, Scotus and the incarnation from Christianity Today. The middle ages apparently aren't completely dead. [thanks to Crystal]

Update: Richard Rohr has an article on Huffpo, which is also on the incarnation. Except, the incarnation he is interested in is the big bang.

Here are a few choice quotes:

"The Incarnation of God did not happen in Bethlehem 2000 years ago. That is just when we started taking it seriously. The incarnation actually happened 14.5 billion years ago with a moment that we now call "The Big Bang." That is when God actually decided to materializeand to self expose."

[...]

I know it is no longer words, doctrines, and mental belief systems that can or will reveal the fullness of this Cosmic Christ. This earth indeed is the very Body of God, and it is from this body that we are born, live, suffer, and resurrect to eternal life. Either all is God's Great Project, or we may rightly wonder whether anything is God's Great Project. One wonders if we humans will be the last to accept this."

What does this have to do with Scotus? Well, he does come up:

Christ, for John Duns Scotus (1265/66-1308) was the very first idea in the mind of God, and God has never stopped thinking, dreaming, and creating the Christ. "The immense diversity and pluriformity of this creation more perfectly represents God than any one creature alone or by itself," adds Thomas Aquinas (1224-1274) in his Summa Theologica(47:1).

He even quotes Scotus:

God remains in immediate sustaining attentiveness to everything that exists, precisely in its 'thisness.'" -- John Duns Scotus

I fail to see why we can't have doctrines and arguments and still take care of the earth, or "earth" as the haters of pronouns would have it. Can't say that I've ever seen Scotus say that Christ was the first divine idea, but I suppose that's not really the point; the quote from Scotus looks like it was translated by Matthew Fox. But hey, any publicity is good publicity. Perhaps now when the powers that be see Scotus on my CV or grant application they'll fork over the cash because they think he's just like them.

Hello, Fireman!

In times to come, your children may only faintly remember the bookstores of their early years, and your grandchildren will think of them as a quirk from your past. If I had a Facebook account, I would post this:

In light of the Borders bookstore Co. preparing to file bankruptcy, due in large part to Amazon.com sales and their Kindle gizmo, one fellow, who knows his stuff, said this:

"I think that there will be a 50% reduction in bricks-and-mortar shelf space for books within five years, and 90% within 10 years," says Mike Shatzkin, chief executive of Idea Logical Co., a New York consulting firm. "Book stores are going away."

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704329104576138353865644420.html