Let’s examine this a little closer.
The argument employs the logical fallacy of a special pleading for only beings with rational souls. The difference between a rational being and an irrational being is a difference in substance (form).
I’ll address your statement about macroevolution later.
This is merely a failure of observation. Aristotle didn’t know of bacteria and spoke only of nutritive, sensitive, and rational souls. He distinguished living things from non-living things by the power of nutrition, and distinguished animal from non-animal by the power of sensation and local movement, and rational from animal by the power of thought. He did not observe sense in plants so he assigned them to the lowest order of soul, but we now know that plants do indeed sense and even move. We can now also observe bacteria which also possess sense and local motion, the hallmarks of animal life.
From Humani Generis:
Do you not think that something like Australopithecus was “pre-existent and living matter”? It pre-existed humans and it was alive. Souls are a different question: “immediately created by God”. My scenario separates the origin of the physical human body from the origin of the human soul, just as Humani Generis does.
Not necessarily. All true men are descended from both Adam and Eve. Any descendant of one of their children is necessarily descended from both Adam and Eve as grandparents, however there can also be two other grandparents, without souls but with biologically compatible DNA. Those grandchildren are descended from Adam and Eve, but not exclusively from Adam and Eve. The scientific evidence of modern human DNA shows that our descent was of the non-exclusive variety.
A human zygote is a single cell and not rational by any reasonable measure. What I am discussing happens at the time of conception when the zygote forms from a compatible egg and sperm and God adds a soul to the, currently, non-rational entity.
The rational soul is different from the animal soul in its very manner of existence, the rational soul being a subsistent form. Non-subsistent forms (including animal souls) can be made from existing forms and matter, but subsistent forms must be created directly.
The rational soul is indeed different enough from animal souls to require a different set of rules.
What was Adam’s date? They were whatever hominids were alive at that time and with biologically compatible DNA. Depending on the date for Adam, they might perhaps be Homo heidelbergensis or early Homo sapiens. If you want a 4000 BCE date for Adam then they were definitely Homo sapiens.
OK. God knows that the zygote will grow into a rational human being and gives it a rational human soul at conception. Not a problem, God can do what He wants.
I agree. I was supporting your point against the incorrect accusation of special pleading. Rational souls and animal souls are fundamentally different, animal souls being more toward accident and human souls being more toward substance.
I see rossum already made some excellent replies. His thoughts mirror mine. It matches current scientific understanding and Church doctrine. Very compelling. I’m not saying it happened that way for sure, but you have to go with what your knowledge tells you.
You’re welcome! It’s worth reading up on how we can know that the rational soul is subsistent as it gets into some fascinating areas that are even more relevant today than they were in Aquinas’ time. Modern work in artificial intelligence and the theory of mind go right to this question.
There are some among us without original sin and rational souls? How can we tell?
Probably not at this point as it would require both parents not having rational souls. There would have been an interesting situation for some time after Adam arrived though. How long that lasted is difficult to know, but it’s a safe bet that in 2019 everyone can trace their lineage back to Adam.
First, your arguments above claim that there are only three substantial forms in all creation: non-life, irrational life (bacteria to cat) and rational life (human beings).
Not in the slightest. I honestly don’t know how you’re coming to this conclusion. I’m not trying to insult you, but I’m not sure you understand what a substantial form is. A subsistent form is a substantial form that exists on its own even if matter is removed, while a non-subsistent form only exists in matter. An animal and a human both have substantial forms, but the animal form is non-subsistent while the human form is subsistent. A cat and a bacterium both have substantial forms that are distinct, but both substantial forms are non-subsistent.
Nominalist evolutionists would say so, but one doesn’t have to be a nominalist to believe in evolution. One substantial form can come from a different substantial form without any difficulty, so long as the new substantial form is contained at least virtually in the old, and the matter that is to receive the form is properly disposed.
It’s fine that you believe this, but this notion isn’t required in Thomism, and Aquinas himself did not subscribe to it. As I cited previously he explicitly used examples of new species arising without God being directly involved except insofar as He placed all eventual forms virtually within the works of the six days. Aquinas did not say that God directly created the mule (which he explicitly called a new kind of creature), for example, but rather that the form of the mule prexisted virtually in the horse and the donkey. Aquinas also allowed for new species to arise from putrefaction, through the action of the stars and the elements.
You wrote, but you didn’t articulate. You may prefer concision, but you must still actually present the points of your argument in order for it to be understood. You’ll have to explain both what you mean by the “tree of life” and “a grassy field”, and how they apply to this discussion, for me to engage with your argument. I’m not trying to dictate the “rules of engagement”, I just honestly have no idea what your argument actually is because you haven’t expressed it.
Your claim that he was special pleading was simply wrong. Special pleading would require that two things that are the same are being treated differently, but rational souls are indeed sufficiently different from material souls to require a special act of creation while animal souls simply require generation; it is you that reduced both to “substantial form” without recognizing the fundamental difference between them. This is explicitly laid out in the Summa, and while Rossum may not agree with Aquinas’ arguments (or may not be familiar with them) his point stands.
Are you asking whether there are some among us who appear human but are really irrational?
By the quality of their internet posts?
