Mind and Imagination in Aristotle

Description

Aristotle invented the science of psychology and some of his works—particularly his remarks on mind and imagination—amount to early exercises in cognitive psychology. ... In so doing he offers a new perspective on the way imagination works with the cognitive soul as a whole. Preface___ix I. Aristotle on the Science of the Soul___1 1. Psychology as a Branch of Physics__3 2. Form and Function in the Aristotelian Soul___9 3. On Cognitivism in the Aristotelian Soul___18 II. The Canonical Theory of Imagination___23 1. The Canonical Text___24 2. Perception and Its Ingredients___30 3. Acquisition of [Relpresentational Structures___39 4. The Functional Incompleteness of Imagination___45 5. Functional Incompleteness and the Ingredients of Imagination___57 III. The Consistency of the Canonical Theory___64 1. Metaphorical versus Canonical Imagination___64 2. Reconciling Theory and Practice in De Anima III.3___71 3. The Decaying Sense Interpretation of Imagination___84 4. What Images Are Not___90 IV The Relation between Thought and Imagination___100 1. Thought, Supposition, and Imagination___100 2. The Necessity of Images for Thought: A Restricted Version___109 3. A General Version of IM___113 4. Images, Perceptual States, and Thoughts___116 5. Distinguishing Thoughts and Images___122 6. The Mechanics of [Relpresentation in De Memoria___136 7. Language and Thought___141 V. The Mind___160 1. Mind as a Faculty: De Anima III.4___162 2. The Functional Organization of Mind: De Anima III.5___168 3. Mind and Nature___172 4. The Analogy between Productive Mind and Light___177 5. The Attributes of Productive Mind___181 6. De Anima III.5 and the "Paradoxes" of Thought___195 7. Thinking and the Object of Thought___202 VI. Human and Divine Mind___209 1. Thought and the Language of Divinity___209 2. Separatist Passages in De Anima___211 3. Mind as a Self-Mover___216 4. The Alleged Isomorphism of Productive and Divine Mind___220 5. The Supposed Sameness-in-Kind of Human and Divine Thought___229 6. The Human Mind as a [Relpresentational System___245 Appendix A: Post-Aristotelian Evidence for the Incompleteness Thesis___255 Appendix B: Apprehensive versus Autonomous Thinking___260 Appendix C: The Return of the Unmoved Mover___265 References___269 General Index___279 Index of Passages___287