Dominik Perler

Ockham affirms that a human being consists of three really distinct forms that exist in matter, thus defending a «pluralist» position in the debate about the soul. However, he takes a «unitarist» position with regard to the rational soul, claiming that intellect and will are not really distinct. Why does he not admit a plurality of forms in the rational soul as well? And why does he think that the rational soul as a whole is really distinct from the sensory soul? This paper examines these questions, thus analyzing Ockham’s metaphysics of the soul. It pays close attention to his arguments both for a plurality of forms and for the unity of the rational soul. It argues that Ockham carefully distinguishes between forms that are metaphysical parts of a human being, and faculties that are ways of acting of a specific form. This distinction enables him to reject both a radical unitarism that accepts one single form in a human being, and an excessive pluralism that posits as many forms as there are faculties

When we are asked what the term ‘Socrates’ signifies, we answer spontaneously, I suppose: “the man Socrates.” And when we are asked what the term ‘white’ signifies, we tend to answer: “the color white” or “whiteness.” Although our second answer may be less spontaneous than the first, either because we may have some difficulty in explaining what a color is, ontologically speaking, or because we may be reluctant to commit ourselves to such a controversial thing as whiteness, we may nevertheless be willing to grant that ‘white’ signifies something, however this thing is to be explained in detail. But when we are asked what ‘Socrates is white’ signifies, we might hesitate in giving an answer. Some may say: “Well, this sentence signifies nothing other than Socrates and the color white.” Others may respond: “It signifies Socrates insofar as he is white” or “the fact that Socrates is white.” Still others may reply that there is no answer because only terms signify something; a sentence, on the other hand, does not signify but expresses something or brings something to the understanding.

Late medieval and early modern commentaries on De anima are Janus-faced texts. They look backwards, continuing ancient debates about well-known Aristotelian topics, and forwards, introducing new concepts and methodological principles that pave the way for non-Aristotelian theories of mind. The eleven essays in this volume, which cover the period between the late thirteenth and the early seventeenth centuries, elucidate this double orientation by presenting case studies of Aristotelians who engaged in discussions about classical issues and thereby opened the door to new theories such as materialism and substance dualism. The papers do not aim at providing a survey of the commentary literature, but focus on specific texts. Some of them deal with often neglected sources. Thus, Olaf Pluta presents a detailed analysis of Nicholas of Amsterdam’s Questions on De anima and nicely shows that one can find a form of “soft materialism” in his philosophy of mind. For Nicholas rejected the thesis that the intellect is a separable, immaterial entity, claiming instead that intellectual states are always dependent on material ones without being reducible to them. Other papers provide a fresh re-interpretation of well-known texts

Der Verf. diskutiert, ausgehend von E.A. Moodys klassischer Distinktion zweier Prädikationstheorien, der Inhärenz- und der Identitätstheorie, die Frage, ob Ockham wirklich, wie meist behauptet, ein Vertreter der Identitätstheorie ist. Er weist nach, daß Ockham Inhärenzrelationen vertritt und sich damit klar von einer simplen Identitätstheorie absetzt, daß aber das Fundament für diese Relation die klare Trennung zwischen sprachlichen Ausdrücken und Begriffen einerseits und nicht-sprachlichen Identitäten andererseits ist. Ockham vertritt freilich keine Inhärenztheorie etwa nach der Art Walter Burleys, sondern konstatiert, daß der Prädikatsausdruck nicht auf ein significatum totale, sondern ausschließlich auf ein significatum singulare referiert. Es muß sorgfältig unterschieden werden zwischen akzidentieller und essentieller Prädikation. Bezeichnenderweise finden sich diese Präzisierungen nicht an einschlägiger Stelle in der Summa logicae. Die Erklärung der semantischen Funktionen von Prädikatsausdrücken kann nicht einheitlich vorgenommen werden, sondern ist an ontologische Einzeluntersuchungen geknüpft. Das realistische Verständnis der Prädikabilien wird von Ockham durch ein konzeptualistisches ersetzt - prädiziert wird nicht eine res, sondern ein Begriff. Er vertritt eine Identitätstheorie nur im Hinblick auf die Suppositionsbedingungen für Subjekts- und Prädikatsausdruck. Im Unterschied zu Ansätzen bei Crathorn und Johannes Mirecourt wird nicht jede Art von Inhärenz zurückgewiesen. Ockham bleibt, anders als etwa Gregor von Rimini, dem traditionellen Substanz-Eigenschaft-Modell treu

Les Études philosophiques est une revue publiée par les Presses universitaires de France. Fondée en 1926 par Gaston Berger et d’abord publiée à Marseille, la revue fut initialement le Bulletin d’une société philosophique régionale. Il s’agissait de rendre compte des travaux locaux tout en assurant la communication des orientations et des résultats de la recherche au plan international. La revue s’est attachée à maintenir cette double vocation, ancrage dans la tradition philosophique et ouverture sur l’actualité de la philosophie en train de se faire. Elle est un lieu d’élaboration et d’échange de la recherche philosophique ; elle donne un état de la recherche française et internationale, en publiant des études d’histoire de la philosophique mais aussi bien des articles de percée rédigés par de jeunes chercheurs ou des philosophes de réputation internationale. Son principal domaine de publication est l’histoire de la philosophie, qu’elle aborde via des dossiers sur des auteurs, classiques ou contemporains (Aristote, Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Jean Scot Érigène, Duns Scot, Michel Henry, Claude Bruaire, Martin Heidegger, Carl Schmitt, Michel Foucault, etc.), sur des textes (le Discours de Rectorat de Heidegger), sur des problématiques ou des thèmes (Le Pascal des philosophes, La méthode phénoménologique, La philosophie des mathématiques, etc.). La revue publie chaque année quatre numéros ; chaque numéro est composé d’un dossier de 6 ou 7 articles dirigé par un spécialiste français ou étranger du domaine considéré ; les articles en langue étrangère sont toujours traduits en français ; sont joints généralement un ou deux articles dans la rubrique des Varia. La revue s’attache à laisser une part importante à des recensions ou notes de lecture sur des ouvrages significatifs, de langue française ou étrangère, récemment parus. La revue est accessible en version électronique sur Cairn (depuis 2011) et sur Jstor (1928-2005).

The studies that make up this book were written and brought together to honor the memory of Jan Pinborg. His unexpected death in 1982 at the age of forty-five shocked and saddened students of medieval philosophy everywhere and left them with a keen sense of disappoint­ment. In his fifteen-year career Jan Pinborg had done so much for our field with his more than ninety books, editions, articles, and reviews and had done it all so well that we recognized him as a leader and counted on many more years of his scholarship, his help, and his friendship. To be missed so sorely by his international colleagues in an academic field is a mark of Jan's achievement, but only of one aspect of it, for historians of philosophy are not the only scholars who have reacted in this way to Jan's death. In his decade and a half of intense productivity he also acquired the same sort of special status among historians of linguistics, whose volume of essays in his memory is being G. L. Bursill-Hall almost simultaneously ­ published under the editorship of with this one. Sten Ebbesen, Jan's student, colleague, and successor as Director of the Institute of Medieval Greek and Latin Philology at the University of Copenhagen, has earned the gratitude of all of us by memorializing Jan 1 in various biographical sketches, one of which is accompanied by a 2 complete bibliography of his publications.

This book is about the nature of sensory perception. Contributions focus on five questions, i.e.: (1) What distinguishes sensory perception from other cognitive states? Is it true, for instance, that perceptual content, in contrast to the phenomenal content of sensations like pain, always depends on the perceiver´s conceptual resources? (2) How do we have to explain the intentionality of perceptual states? (3) What is the nature of perceptual content? (4) In which sense do the objects of sensory perception depend on the constitution of the perceiver? How, for instance, do secondary qualities like colours, sounds and smells depend on the perception of human subjects? (5) How can we account for the intentionality of misperceptions? These questions are addressed through the interpretation of classical historical texts as well as in the context of systematical reflections. The authors: Margaret Atherton, Michael Ayers, Peter Baumann, Martha Brandt Bolton, Thomas Grundmann, Gary Hatfield, Rolf-Peter Horstmann, Andreas Kemmerling, Bertram Kienzle, Martine Nida-Rümelin, Dominik Perler, Jay F. Rosenberg, Katia Saporiti, Ralph Schumacher, Gerald Vision, Russel Wahl.

Thomas Aquinas’ thesis that emotions are “motions of the sensory appetitive power”, which are controlled by the rational power, raises three fundamental problems. (1) How can this thesis be reconciled with the assumption that emotions are to be ascribed to a person and not to a sensory power as an inner agent? (2) How can emotions have a cognitive content if they are nothing but appetitive states? (3) How is it to be explained that emotions are often not under rational control or that they even have a strong impact on so-called rational activities? All of these questions are discussed with respect to the example of fear. This example shows that Aquinas defends a complex position which takes both the cognitive dimension of emotions and the mutual relation between sensory and rational states into ac- count.

Das Archiv für Begriffsgeschichte wurde 1955 von Erich Rothacker als Basis für ein Handbuch begründet, um – so der Untertitel – »Bausteine zu einem historischen Wörterbuch der Philosophie« zu sammeln. Da es mittlerweile neben dem von Joachim Ritter 1971 begründeten »Historischen Wörterbuch der Philosophie«, dem das Archiv für Begriffsgeschichte vorarbeitete, eine Reihe von begriffsgeschichtlichen Lexika gibt, erweiterte sich dessen Aufgabe im Laufe der nunmehr 50 Jahre seines Bestehens sowohl inhaltlich wie methodisch zu einem interdisziplinären Organ für alle begriffsgeschichtliche Forschung. Das Archiv für Begriffsgeschichte trägt damit der wachsenden Einsicht in die Bedeutung von Sprache und Sprachwandel für alle Wissenschaften Rechnung und schafft sowohl Voraussetzungen für die Arbeit an den großen begriffsgeschichtlichen Handbüchern, wie es diese auch ergänzt.

Welche Überlegungen Leibniz‘ sind nach der Kritik der Postmoderne noch gültig? An unterschiedlichen Aspekten erarbeitet der vorliegende Band eine Neuinterpretation und betrachtet das Werk aus einem veränderten Blickwinkel: So rekonstruieren die Autoren Leibniz‘ Vorstellungen zu Toleranz und Wahrheit aus seinen kirchenpolitischen Stellungnahmen; und seine Strategie der Abgrenzung zwischen Tieren und Menschen wird auf ihre Brauchbarkeit für die aktuelle Debatte überprüft. Auch Leibniz‘ Theorie der Perzeptionen wird vor dem Hintergrund vergleichbarer Theorien der Gegenwart (u. a. Hirnphysiologie, Konstruktivismus, Psychoanalyse) ausgeleuchtet. Den üblichen von der Substanz ausgehenden Interpretationen seiner Metaphysik wird hier eine Interpretation vom Wesen her entgegengesetzt.

Der Wahrheitsbegriff ist einer jener schillernden philosophischen Begriffe, die in unteschiedlichen Kontexten ganz unterschiedlich verwendet werden und zur Klärung verschiedenster Probleme dienen. Nähert man sich den spätmittelalterlichen Wahrheitsdiskussionen, muss man zunächst die grundsätzliche Frage stellen, was die Autoren des 14. und 15. Jhs. unter Wahrheit oder dem Wahren überhaupt verstanden. Er scheint zunächst, als finde man in den einschlägigen Texten eine klare, leicht verständliche Antwort auf diese Frage. So hält Wilhelm von Ockham in seiner Summa Logicae fest: 'Was sind also Wahrheit und Falschheit? Ich behaupte, Aristoteles würde sagen, dass Wahrheit und Falschheit keine von einem wahren oder falschen Satz wirklich verschiedenen Dinge sind'. Genau dieser aristotelischen Auffassung schließt sich Ockham an, indem er betont, under Warheit sei nichts anderes als eine Eigenshaft von Sätzen zu verstehen

What kind of entities are faculties? How are they related to the soul and to the entire living being? How can they be classified? And in what sense are they responsible for a large variety of activities? This chapter examines these questions, which were extensively discussed by scholastic authors, and focuses on the metaphysical models established by William of Auvergne, Thomas Aquinas, William of Ockham, and Francisco Suárez. It argues that there was no unified scholastic doctrine. While some authors (e.g. Ockham) took the faculties to be mere ways of acting of the soul, others (e.g. Suárez) conceived of them as distinct entities with their own power. The latter theory gave rise to a new model of the soul—a model that presented it as a complex entity with many distinct causes.

Die Freiburger Zeitschrift für Philosophie und Theologie wurde 1886 als Jahrbuch für Philosophie und Spekulative Theologie gegründet. 1914 erhielt sie den Namen Divus Thomas, 1954 ihren heutigen Namen. Seit ihren Anfängen versucht die Zeitschrift, mit ihren wissenschaftlichen Abhandlungen und Rezensionen die ganze Spannweite der philosophischen und theologischen Forschung zu berücksichtigen, wobei im Bereich der Theologie vor allem den systematischen Fächern, im Bereich der Philosophie der Philosophiegeschichte (Mittelalter und Neuzeit) und in beiden Bereichen der Ethik besondere Beachtung geschenkt wird. Die Freiburger Zeitschrift für Philosophie und Theologie weiss sich der Tradition europäischen Denkens verpflichtet und konfrontiert diese mit den Herausforderungen gegenwärtiger Forschung in Philosophie und Theologie.

Late medieval philosophers in the Aristotelian tradition developed two theoretical models in order to explain the signication of words. Some - including Thomas Aquinas - claimed that spoken words immediately signify concepts, but extramental things only mediately, while others - such as William of Ockham - held the view that they immediately signify things. The present essay analyzes these two semantic models, paying particular attention to their metaphysical and epistemological background. It shows that the «indirect signication model» defended by Thomas is not a model committed to representationalism or semantic idealism, as some recent commentators have claimed. It is rather a model that relies upon two crucial theses: human beings form concepts by abstracting universal forms from extramental things; and spoken words signify those universal forms having an immaterial existence in the intellect. Ockham's refusal of the «indirect signication model» is mainly motivated by his rejection of these controversial claims.

Unlike many thirteenth- and fourteenth-century authors, Scotus never wrote a grammar or logic handbook. Nor did he compose a treatise dealing explicitly with the grammatical and semantic issues that were eagerly debated at his time - for instance a treatise about the famous “properties of terms” or the “modes of signifying.” The only work concerning grammar and semantics, entitled Tractatus de modis significandi sive Grammatica speculativa, that was attributed to him until the beginning of the twentieth century, proved to be inauthentic; it was written by his contemporary Thomas of Erfurt, a leading representative of the school of the “modistae.” Given such an apparent lack of writings dedicated to grammatical and semantic problems, one may have the impression that Scotus was not particularly interested in linguistic analysis and that he should be regarded as a theologian, metaphysician, and moral philosopher, but not as a philosopher of language. Yet such an impression would be quite misleading. Although Scotus never wrote a grammar or logic handbook, he had a keen interest in linguistic theory. This interest is most obvious in his commentaries on the Isagoge, on the Categories, and on Peri hermeneias. In these early writings, Scotus does not confine himself to paraphrasing Aristotle’s and Porphyry’s view. He rather uses their opinion as a starting point for a thorough discussion of fundamental issues in philosophical semantics – a discussion that allows him to critically examine various linguistic theories of his contemporaries and to develop his own theory. Such a discussion can also be found in some parts of his later works, especially in his metaphysical and theological writings.