The Embodied Soul: Aristotelian Psychology and Physiology in Medieval Europe between 1200 and 1420 (Historical-Analytical Studies on Nature, Mind and Action, 11)

This book contains a collection of papers devoted to the problems of body, mind and soul in medieval Europe between 1200 and 1420. Modern discussions of the mind-body relationship seldom look back into the past further than the psycho-somatic dualism of Descartes which started the mechanistic approach in biology and medicine. The authors of the volume go beyond that fault line to investigate the tradition of medieval natural philosophy and its ancient sources and analyze the issues forming a borderland between physiology and psychology. They also demonstrate that the medieval tradition was rich and diverse for it offered a wide variety of the discussed problems as well as the methodological approaches. This volume is the first attempt to cover a diversity of topics and methods employed in the medieval debates on body, mind and soul as well as their interrelationships. The Embodied Soul is a must-have for all those interested in puzzling dilemmas of how a living organism functions and how its inner life can be explained as well as for all those interested in the history of thought in general. Chapter 14 is available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com. Preface 6 Contents 7 Chapter 1: The Development of Aristotelian Psychology and Physiology in Medieval Europe Between 1200 and 1420: Introduction 9 1.1 Introduction 10 1.2 The First Phase: Aristotle’s De anima and Avicenna’s Liber sextus naturalium 10 1.3 The Second Phase: Parva Naturalia’s Translatio Vetus and Averroes’s Commentaries 12 1.4 The Third Phase: The Reception of the Last Wave of Translations 16 References 21 Chapter 2: Physiology of Taste and Intentionality in John Blund’s Tractatus De Anima 24 2.1 On Blund’s De anima 25 2.2 Body, Soul and the Senses 26 2.3 What the Soul Is 27 2.4 Touch and Taste 29 2.5 How Flavour is Manifested to Taste 32 2.6 Voluntary Attention 33 2.7 Perception, Qualities and Sense Data 35 2.8 Perception and the Source of True Knowledge 39 References 41 Primary Literature 41 Secondary Literature 41 Chapter 3: Anthropology of Gilbertus Anglicus’ Compendium medicinae 43 3.1 The Shadowy Figure of Gilbertus Anglicus 44 3.2 From Ancient to Scholastic Medicine 47 3.3 In Search of the Definition of the Soul 50 3.4 The Problem of the Soul’s Immortality 54 3.5 The Problem of Intellect 57 3.6 Conclusion 58 References 61 Primary Literature 61 Secondary Literature 61 Chapter 4: A Stain on the Bronze: Some Medieval Latin Commentators on De insomniis 2, 459b23–460a32 63 4.1 Introduction 63 4.2 Adam of Buckfield and Albert the Great 66 4.3 Some Thirteenth- and Fourteenth-Century Quaestiones on De insomniis 2, 459b23–460a32 71 4.4 Conclusion 74 References 76 Primary Literature 76 Secondary Literature 76 Chapter 5: Pygmies, Twins, Monsters: Human Nature and Its Borderlines in Albert the Great 78 5.1 Introduction 79 5.2 Pygmies and Human Reason 79 5.3 Twins and Human Fate 84 5.4 Conclusion: Humans or Monsters? The Intention of Nature 92 References 94 Primary Literature 94 Secondary Literature 94 Chapter 6: Why Philosophers Father Foolish Children: Peter of Spain, Albert the Great, and James of Viterbo on the Transmission of Intellectual Qualities 96 6.1 Introduction 97 6.2 The Salernitan Question and Peter of Spain’s Quaestiones super libro “De animalibus” 98 6.3 Albert the Great’s Quaestiones super libris “De animalibus” 99 6.4 Sperm, Complexion, and Generation 101 6.5 Heat and Moisture in Albert’s Physiology: Old Men and Generation 104 6.6 Two Faces of Melancholy: Aristotle and Galen 107 6.7 What Is Unnatural Melancholy? 109 6.8 James of Viterbo’s Quodlibet IV, Question 23 112 6.9 Conclusion 114 References 115 Primary Literature 115 Secondary Literature 116 Chapter 7: Bodily Prerequisites of the Mind: The Spirit as the Highest Product of Digestion 119 7.1 Introduction 119 7.2 Aristotle’s Notion of Pneuma 121 7.3 Galen’s Pneumatology 122 7.4 Costa ben Luca’s Definition of Spirit 124 7.5 Avicenna’s Connection Between the Humours and the Spirits 126 7.6 Albert the Great: The Spirit as the Highest Product of Digestion 129 7.7 Conclusion 133 References 134 Primary Literature 134 Secondary Literature 135 Chapter 8: The Role of the Intentio Individualis in Albert the Great’s Sense Perception Theory 137 8.1 Introduction 138 8.2 Albert the Great and the Individual Intentions 139 8.3 The Inner Senses, Avicenna, and the Animal Problem 142 8.4 Averroes and the Intentio Individualis 149 8.5 Albert the Great: Paraphrases and Intentio 153 8.6 Accidents, Forma Totius, and Praedicatio per se Tertio Modo 157 8.7 Conclusion 162 References 164 Primary Literature 164 Secondary Literature 165 Chapter 9: Death, the Intellect and the Resurrection of the Dog: Geoffrey of Aspall’s Questions on the De Longitudine et Brevitate Vitae 166 9.1 Introduction 166 9.2 Manuscripts 169 9.3 Authenticity 171 9.4 On the Death of the Intellectual and Sensitive Souls 172 9.5 Conclusion 177 Appendices 178 Appendix 1 178 Appendix 2 187 Appendix 3 188 References 193 Primary Literature 193 Secondary Literature 193 Chapter 10: Medieval Views on the Subject of Thought and the Intellectual Soul 194 10.1 Introduction 194 10.2 Aquinas’s View 196 10.3 Aristotelian Evidence Against the Independence of Thought from the Body 199 10.4 Aquinas’s Defence of the Independence of Thought 200 10.5 Giles of Rome 203 10.6 Thomas Wylton 209 References 214 Primary Literature 214 Secondary Literature 214 Chapter 11: A Medieval Defence of Innatism: The Case of James of Viterbo 215 11.1 Introduction: Thomas Aquinas on Innatism and Related Mistakes 215 11.2 James on Innate Perception and Intellectual Cognition 218 11.3 James of Viterbo on Pre-existing Forms in Matter 222 11.4 Innate Virtues 225 11.5 Conclusion: Back to Aquinas 227 References 228 Primary Literature 228 Secondary Literature 229 Chapter 12: The World of Senses. On the Process of Cognition in Walter Burley 230 12.1 Introduction 230 12.2 The Process of Cognition as a Process of Abstraction 232 12.2.1 The External Senses 232 12.2.2 The Internal Senses 236 12.2.3 The Intellect 243 12.3 Active and Passive Elements of the Human Sensorium 246 12.4 Object of Cognition 250 12.5 Conclusion 251 References 251 Primary Literature 251 Secondary Literature 252 Chapter 13: “Is Touch One Sense or Several?” A Late Medieval Scientific Question 253 13.1 Introduction: The Issues Presented by Touch 253 13.2 Two Late Medieval Reflections on the Unicity or Plurality of the Sense of Touch 259 13.2.1 Tommaso del Garbo on the Unicity or Plurality of the Sense of Touch 259 13.2.2 John Buridan on the Unicity or Plurality of the Sense of Touch 262 13.3 Conclusion 269 References 272 Primary Literature 272 Secondary Literature 273 Chapter 14: Buridan Wycliffised? The Nature of the Intellect in Late Medieval Prague University Disputations 276 14.1 Introduction 277 14.2 Prague University Disputations Around 1400: Scholarly Practices and Manuscript Sources 279 14.3 The Intellect Disputed: A Review of Sources 284 14.4 The Nature of the Intellect: Conceptual Tensions Between Materialism and Immortality 288 14.5 Doctrinal Sources and Positions in Prague Disputations 295 14.6 Conclusion 304 References 305 Primary Literature (Manuscripts & Editions) 305 Secondary Literature 306 Author Index 310 Subject Index 313