Persons, Agent Intellects, Transcendental Egos

[levinas12]

I had a phenomenology professor years and years ago who asked us, in so many words, “if I kill your body, do I also kill your transcendental ego?” He was referring to Husserl’s notion of a transcendental center of consciousness which, in some respects, is “outside” the world. It’s important to emphasize that the transcendental ego is distinct from the empirical ego.

The immediate philosophical ancestor of Husserl’s transcendental ego is Kant’s transcendental unity of apperception (which likewise is distinct from the empirical, psychological ego).

But there’s another related notion further back in the history of philosophy - the famous agent intellect. Aristotle and/or his Arab commentators specified just one agent intellect across all human beings. Aquinas denied the unicity of the agent intellect insisting, on the contrary, that each of us has his/her own agent intellect.

Agent intellects and transcendental egos are similar in that both are “active individuals”. And both seem to be able to survive the death of the body.

I would suggest that these notions are related to “person”.

A human person can exist without the body - i.e., is immortal like Aquinas’ individual agent intellect and Husserl’s transcendental ego.

I’m not advocating a Cartesian dualism of substance - because a “person” qua “person” is not a substance. “Person” nevertheless requires a rational substance (and the agent intellect belongs both to the rational substance and to the person).

But the “person” survival of death is unusual because the “form” that animates the human body cannot exist separately unless that “form” undergoes a certain modification. I’m not suggesting we become temporarily “angels” - rather we become something else - neither an animated human body nor a naturally immaterial rational substance.

I think “transcendental ego” and “agent intellect” help to clarify what happens to a human being when he/she dies but retains personal consciousness. We no longer “perceive” through material phantasms but, somehow, we continue to “perceive” the world, other people, and, of course, God. Otherwise, how would the saints be able to intercede for us right now?

 

[John_Martin]

I had a phenomenology professor years and years ago who asked us, in so many words, “if I kill your body, do I also kill your transcendental ego?” He was referring to Husserl’s notion of a transcendental center of consciousness which, in some respects, is “outside” the world. It’s important to emphasize that the transcendental ego is distinct from the empirical ego.

The immediate philosophical ancestor of Husserl’s transcendental ego is Kant’s transcendental unity of apperception (which likewise is distinct from the empirical, psychological ego).

But there’s another related notion further back in the history of philosophy - the famous agent intellect. Aristotle and/or his Arab commentators specified just one agent intellect across all human beings. Aquinas denied the unicity of the agent intellect insisting, on the contrary, that each of us has his/her own agent intellect.

Agent intellects and transcendental egos are similar in that both are “active individuals”. And both seem to be able to survive the death of the body.

I would suggest that these notions are related to “person”.

A human person can exist without the body - i.e., is immortal like Aquinas’ individual agent intellect and Husserl’s transcendental ego.

I’m not advocating a Cartesian dualism of substance - because a “person” qua “person” is not a substance. “Person” nevertheless requires a rational substance (and the agent intellect belongs both to the rational substance and to the person).

But the “person” survival of death is unusual because the “form” that animates the human body cannot exist separately unless that “form” undergoes a certain modification. I’m not suggesting we become temporarily “angels” - rather we become something else - neither an animated human body nor a naturally immaterial rational substance.

I think “transcendental ego” and “agent intellect” help to clarify what happens to a human being when he/she dies but retains personal consciousness. We no longer “perceive” through material phantasms but, somehow, we continue to “perceive” the world, other people, and, of course, God. Otherwise, how would the saints be able to intercede for us right now?

It would have been Plato, most likely, not Aristotle. Aristotle would have maintained that there is an individual soul for the individual person, in which are active (agent) and passive intellect which process the knowledge of individuals into knowledge of universals.

 

[John_Martin]

Actually, the soul, being the form of the human being, while animating the body (the soul/body composite being the act of the form) learns, comes to understand itself in its act (composition with the body). The intellect that comes to know itself in the body and to will itself, are still in the soul in a state of Act (not in the brain). And when the body dies, there is understanding in the intellect and intent in the will that remain. Upon the separation of death, the soul does not return to a state of potential to know if again united to a body or potential to desire. It, like the angels, simply “knows” and “wills”, yet without the ability of union to what it loves (union with what it knows as good) since it no longer has its body through which to enflesh what it knows.

 

[Bahman]

I had a phenomenology professor years and years ago who asked us, in so many words, “if I kill your body, do I also kill your transcendental ego?” He was referring to Husserl’s notion of a transcendental center of consciousness which, in some respects, is “outside” the world. It’s important to emphasize that the transcendental ego is distinct from the empirical ego.

The immediate philosophical ancestor of Husserl’s transcendental ego is Kant’s transcendental unity of apperception (which likewise is distinct from the empirical, psychological ego).

But there’s another related notion further back in the history of philosophy - the famous agent intellect. Aristotle and/or his Arab commentators specified just one agent intellect across all human beings. Aquinas denied the unicity of the agent intellect insisting, on the contrary, that each of us has his/her own agent intellect.

Agent intellects and transcendental egos are similar in that both are “active individuals”. And both seem to be able to survive the death of the body.

I would suggest that these notions are related to “person”.

A human person can exist without the body - i.e., is immortal like Aquinas’ individual agent intellect and Husserl’s transcendental ego.

I’m not advocating a Cartesian dualism of substance - because a “person” qua “person” is not a substance. “Person” nevertheless requires a rational substance (and the agent intellect belongs both to the rational substance and to the person).

But the “person” survival of death is unusual because the “form” that animates the human body cannot exist separately unless that “form” undergoes a certain modification. I’m not suggesting we become temporarily “angels” - rather we become something else - neither an animated human body nor a naturally immaterial rational substance.

I think “transcendental ego” and “agent intellect” help to clarify what happens to a human being when he/she dies but retains personal consciousness. We no longer “perceive” through material phantasms but, somehow, we continue to “perceive” the world, other people, and, of course, God. Otherwise, how would the saints be able to intercede for us right now?

This is how understand the problem. There are several ways that identity can be preserved. Unfortunately none of the former models of mind could explain it as you mentioned soul needs the body in hylemorphic dualism to form identity hence identity is gone upon destruction of body. The resurrection cannot resolve the problem since it cannot grant and preserve identity but recreate it hence the person in new body is granted a new identity hence s/he/it could be anyone/anything.

That is how I see that the problem can be resolved. First we have access to dream and dead world. Dreaming within dream is equal to experience dead world. So we wake up in death world as we wake up our second dream, namely death. Death is not a downward process and it is upward, by which I mean that it is toward an deeper end. Death somehow is similar to fall of a leaves before winter time granting the possibility of branching at spring time. So we are leaves serving the tree of life, becoming branches or fruit at the end of our service, either sticking to tree of life and serve the tree and other leaves and branches for longer time or it become independent tree.

 

[John_Martin]

…

I think “transcendental ego” and “agent intellect” help to clarify what happens to a human being when he/she dies but retains personal consciousness. We no longer “perceive” through material phantasms but, somehow, we continue to “perceive” the world, other people, and, of course, God. Otherwise, how would the saints be able to intercede for us right now?

We do not perceive the world, other people, etc. after we (the soul) separates from the body, since we (the soul) are the form of a being that perceives through a body. Instead, whatever new thing we might know is “simply” placed in our intellect, by another intellect, much as our soul now animates symbols (thoughts) or specific memories or phantasms in our physical thought. The are just there new in our soul, as now they just appear (come to mind) in our conscious thinking.

The Saints, experience “beatitude”, meaning happiness. Their will is in a state of enjoying completion of union with what is loved. When you pray to a Saint, the sequence of events is that it is actually God who hears your prayer, and who animates the knowledge of your prayer in the intellect of the Saint. Then, the Saint in the same instant knows that it would be good to know you as being aided by God, and desires this. This would lead to dissatisfaction of his will since he cannot help you without a body to effect his will, thus unhappiness in the Saint. However, God, in that same instant knows the desire of the Saint that you be helped. And again God inspires the Saint to know God’s plan for helping you. He, in effect, gives the Saint the continued happiness of knowing his will is in the same moment satisfied. Now, the actual plan for you may be that you, yourself end up in heaven, but the Saint is fully satisfied with that knowledge, and is not unhappy that your specific want is not addressed in the way you proposed it in your prayer. He understands about you what God knows about you and that is very good, and he continues in his beatitude.

 

[levinas12]

It would have been Plato, most likely, not Aristotle. Aristotle would have maintained that there is an individual soul for the individual person, in which are active (agent) and passive intellect which process the knowledge of individuals into knowledge of universals.

I’m not sure you’re right about Aristotle’s position on the agent intellect. There’s still some controversy about this. But certainly the Arab commentators maintained the unicity of the agent intellect across human beings.

You speak of an “individual soul” in Aristotle. It’s my understanding that the “human soul” in Aristotle is individuated by the matter. This is not to say that Aristotle subscribes to a “human soul” that can exist separately from the matter - but, at least for Aristotle, “human soul” is the “principle of operation” of the human body - and is basically the same in all human beings. If there’s no body, can a part of the operation remain? This is where Thomas begins and Aristotle maybe ends on a negative note.

All this follows from an understanding of Aristotle’s “human soul” as distinct from what we mean by “person” (as a unique, unrepeatable, singular identity).

 

[levinas12]

This is where Thomas begins and Aristotle maybe ends on a negative note.

Thomas argues that a part of the human soul remains after death; but, with respect to Aristotle, the whole business is not very clear at all.

 

[levinas12]

IThis is where Thomas begins and Aristotle maybe ends on a negative note.

I need to clarify. Thomas asserts that a part of the human soul survives death because its operation is immaterial. And, additionally, according to Thomas, the agent intellect is not extrinsic to human beings, but rather is intrinsic to each of us - there are as many agent intellects as there are human beings - each of us has our own individual agent intellects.

I’m not sure that Aristotle would agree with Thomas on this.

The question is where the individuality of each human being’s agent intellect comes from, if it doesn’t come from the matter, i.e., the body.

All of this is not to say that Thomas is wrong. Quite the contrary.

It’s just tthat the matter cannot be the basis for the individuality of a human being - because our agent intellects remain “individuated” without the matter.

That’s why I think the notion of “person” is so important - only the singularity of a person can explain our fundamental individuality - not the matter. Although matter somehow belongs to a “human person” - hence the necessity for the resurrection of the body - but a human person can nevertheless survive death, i.e., exist without the matter.

Husserl’s transcendental ego = person. And if you can’t extinguish a transcendental ego, you can’t extinguish a “person”.

 

[John_Martin]

The person is the individual soul’s identity, as if when you wanted to get in touch with an individual specific soul, you were to “spiritually” call out his name (which literally does not happen this way). Since the soul is rational, has intelligence, understanding of itself and not just understanding of universals, it understands its own identity.

Think of your material self, then, as the manifestation of your soul knowing itself.
Since your soul is “self-aware”, you are materially self-aware because you are exactly what your soul knows about itself. From Aquinas, and also, I believe in Aristotle (though I have not fully read him), " the object known is in the knower to the extent that it is known". The object of the human soul’s knowing itself is temporal and material, and is your material being. As you materially grew from a baby to an adult, your soul has been learning to know itself in your learning to know yourself, because you (materially) are your soul understanding itself yet as an object of your soul.

It is not a “part of the soul” that survives your material death, but the complete soul, the knower of you. Your material being is no longer capable of any animation and ceases to be an object of the knower in the knower knowing itself. And it leaves, unable to actualize its current understanding of itself in the composite. Your soul is real being, individual, a person, when it leaves, with intellect and will, but no material through which to actualize its knowing with its will. At that point it is only able to know its own actuality via a Form above itself (God) by knowing itself as an object of God’s knowing (just as we materially can know ourselves as objects of our soul knowing itself). God can “animate it with knowledge of its actuality and knowledge of the satisfaction of its will (which is called blessedness)” (there are also purgatory and hell, which can also be detailed in a similar manner)

The key to seeing this understanding of Thomas is to consider that you, all you see of yourself in material consciousness, are (in being and thinking) an object to your soul. Not just any object, but you are what your soul sees (understands) in considering its own being. I materially say, “I am John”, because my soul is understanding and desiring itself saying “I am John”.

 

[lmelahn]

I had a phenomenology professor years and years ago who asked us, in so many words, “if I kill your body, do I also kill your transcendental ego?” He was referring to Husserl’s notion of a transcendental center of consciousness which, in some respects, is “outside” the world. It’s important to emphasize that the transcendental ego is distinct from the empirical ego.

The immediate philosophical ancestor of Husserl’s transcendental ego is Kant’s transcendental unity of apperception (which likewise is distinct from the empirical, psychological ego).

But there’s another related notion further back in the history of philosophy - the famous agent intellect. Aristotle and/or his Arab commentators specified just one agent intellect across all human beings. Aquinas denied the unicity of the agent intellect insisting, on the contrary, that each of us has his/her own agent intellect.

Agent intellects and transcendental egos are similar in that both are “active individuals”. And both seem to be able to survive the death of the body.

I would suggest that these notions are related to “person”.

A human person can exist without the body - i.e., is immortal like Aquinas’ individual agent intellect and Husserl’s transcendental ego.

I’m not advocating a Cartesian dualism of substance - because a “person” qua “person” is not a substance. “Person” nevertheless requires a rational substance (and the agent intellect belongs both to the rational substance and to the person).

But the “person” survival of death is unusual because the “form” that animates the human body cannot exist separately unless that “form” undergoes a certain modification. I’m not suggesting we become temporarily “angels” - rather we become something else - neither an animated human body nor a naturally immaterial rational substance.

I think “transcendental ego” and “agent intellect” help to clarify what happens to a human being when he/she dies but retains personal consciousness. We no longer “perceive” through material phantasms but, somehow, we continue to “perceive” the world, other people, and, of course, God. Otherwise, how would the saints be able to intercede for us right now?

It was Averroes who postulated a single transcendent agent intellect; in my opinion, he is misreading Aristotle.

For Kant, the transcendental ego (what he calls the “‘I think’ in general” (ich denke überhaupt) doesn’t really exist, in the normal sense of that word. Rather, it is a condition of possibility for thinking: it is, as it were, the structure in which thoughts are possible. The existence of a “real” (empirical) ego, for Kant, is problematic and practically consigned to the unknowable “noumenon.”

(The term “transcendental” for the moderns does not mean “common to all reality,” as for the Medieval philosophers, but “having to do with notions that are independent of experience.” For the Medievals, “transcendental” is an ontological term; for the moderns, logical or epistemological.)

Husserl seems to have conceived the “transcendental ego” a bit more as we expect: as the subject that receives experience but is itself unperceived.

I would be a mistake, in my opinion, to equate the transcendental ego of Kant and Husserl with the agent intellect of Aristotle and Aquinas. The “transcendental ego” is most properly an epistemological concept (and, from the point of view of Aquinas and Aristotle, a rather problematic one), whereas the agent intellect describes a real “power” or faculty of the human soul.

Some background: in Aquinas’ conception, a man is first and foremost a single, unified entity (one with an independent existence, hence a “substance”—or more precisely a concrete substance or suppositum—in Thomistic/Aristotelian parlance). Although he evidently has a corporeal dimension, man is a spiritual creature: that is, he does not depend on his corporeity for his existence. There is, so to speak, a “part” of him that goes beyond the strictly material world; we call that “part” the soul, and the visible “part” the body.

(I use “part” in quotation marks, because we are not talking of parts in the normal sense of the word. In reality the body and the soul are what Aquinas calls metaphysical “principles,” without which a man cannot exist, but which individually can never have an independent existence. Yes, the soul can exist while deprived of a body, but it does so in a severely handicapped state.)

Just as man’s corporeal dimension has powers that produce certain actions (growth, nutrition, sensation, and so on), his spiritual dimension also has faculties specific to it: the intellect (by which he knows) and the will (by which he loves).

Nevertheless, Aquinas accepts from Aristotle (practically from the De anima) that man acquires his knowledge through his senses. The question then becomes: “How does the purely sensible knowledge produced by the senses come to be assimilated by a spiritual faculty such as the intellect?”

Aquinas, taking his cue from the De anima, deduces that there must be a power that illuminates the data given by our senses and transforms them into concepts accessible to a spiritual reality: he calls that power the “agent intellect.”

We are not to imagine the agent intellect as a faculty separate from the intellect, but as the person’s very intellect inasmuch as it acts on the sensible images received.

My point here is that the person is a reality that is prior to the intellect; the intellect, from Aquinas’ point of view (and, in my opinion, also from Aristotle’s) is simply a power or capacity of that person.

It is the person who thinks and loves, not his intellect or his will; but he uses his intellect and will in order to think and love.

But it is important to reiterate: “person” for Aquinas means a concrete, living reality, never a hypothetical condition of possibility.

 

[levinas12]

It was Averroes who postulated a single transcendent agent intellect; in my opinion, he is misreading Aristotle.

For Kant, the transcendental ego (what he calls the “‘I think’ in general” (ich denke überhaupt) doesn’t really exist, in the normal sense of that word.

(The term “transcendental” for the moderns does not mean “common to all reality,” as for the Medieval philosophers, but “having to do with notions that are independent of experience.” For the Medievals, “transcendental” is an ontological term; for the moderns, logical or epistemological.)

Husserl seems to have conceived the “transcendental ego” a bit more as we expect: as the subject that receives experience but is itself unperceived.

I would be a mistake, in my opinion, to equate the transcendental ego of Kant and Husserl with the agent intellect of Aristotle and Aquinas. The “transcendental ego” is most properly an epistemological concept (and, from the point of view of Aquinas and Aristotle, a rather problematic one), whereas the agent intellect describes a real “power” or faculty of the human soul.

Some background: in Aquinas’ conception, a man is first and foremost a single, unified entity (one with an independent existence, hence a “substance”—or more precisely a concrete substance or suppositum—in Thomistic/Aristotelian parlance). Although he evidently has a corporeal dimension, man is a spiritual creature: that is, he does not depend on his corporeity for his existence. There is, so to speak, a “part” of him that goes beyond the strictly material world; we call that “part” the soul, and the visible “part” the body.

(I use “part” in quotation marks, because we are not talking of parts in the normal sense of the word. In reality the body and the soul are what Aquinas calls metaphysical “principles,” without which a man cannot exist, but which individually can never have an independent existence. Yes, the soul can exist while deprived of a body, but it does so in a severely handicapped state.)

Just as man’s corporeal dimension has powers that produce certain actions (growth, nutrition, sensation, and so on), his spiritual dimension also has faculties specific to it: the intellect (by which he knows) and the will (by which he loves).

Nevertheless, Aquinas accepts from Aristotle (practically from the De anima) that man acquires his knowledge through his senses. The question then becomes: “How does the purely sensible knowledge produced by the senses come to be assimilated by a spiritual faculty such as the intellect?”

Aquinas, taking his cue from the De anima, deduces that there must be a power that illuminates the data given by our senses and transforms them into concepts accessible to a spiritual reality: he calls that power the “agent intellect.”

We are not to imagine the agent intellect as a faculty separate from the intellect, but as the person’s very intellect inasmuch as it acts on the sensible images received.

My point here is that the person is a reality that is prior to the intellect; the intellect, from Aquinas’ point of view (and, in my opinion, also from Aristotle’s) is simply a power or capacity of that person.

It is the person who thinks and loves, not his intellect or his will; but he uses his intellect and will in order to think and love.

But it is important to reiterate: “person” for Aquinas means a concrete, living reality, never a hypothetical condition of possibility.

 

[levinas12]

It was Averroes who postulated a single transcendent agent intellect; in my opinion, he is misreading Aristotle.

in

I may be wrong but I think Averroes posited an extrinsic possible intellect as well; Avicenna and Al-Farabi, only an extrinsic agent intellect

For Kant, the transcendental ego (what he calls the “‘I think’ in general” (ich denke überhaupt) doesn’t really exist …

I’m not sure about this … granted that the transcendental unity of apperception is a condition of possibility, it also seems to have an ontological dimension (certainly it prefigures in important respects Hegel and 19th century idealism)

Husserl seems to have conceived the “transcendental ego” a bit more as we expect: as the subject that receives experience but is itself unperceived.

Yes. We are drawing closer to “person” in Husserl. And in Heidegger’s “da”

I would be a mistake, in my opinion, to equate the transcendental ego of Kant and Husserl with the agent intellect of Aristotle and Aquinas. The “transcendental ego” is most properly an epistemological concept (and, from the point of view of Aquinas and Aristotle, a rather problematic one), whereas the agent intellect describes a real “power” or faculty of the human soul.

I agree. There’s no simple equation. But I still think the agent intellect is an important background for Husserl. From Aristotle (although this is in question) through the Neo-Platonism to the Arab interpreters, the agent intellect seems to be an individual. In Aquinas, it is a power (of the person) - but even in Aquinas it seems to be the only activity of the person that survives death.

Some background: in Aquinas’ conception, a man is first and foremost a single, unified entity (one with an independent existence, hence a “substance”—or more precisely a concrete substance or suppositum—in Thomistic/Aristotelian parlance). Although he evidently has a corporeal dimension, man is a spiritual creature: that is, he does not depend on his corporeity for his existence. There is, so to speak, a “part” of him that goes beyond the strictly material world; we call that “part” the soul, and the visible “part” the body.

I know that Cartesian dualism is always lurking in the wings. And needs to be avoided.

Yes, the soul can exist while deprived of a body, but it does so in a severely handicapped state.)

How can a metaphysical principle “exist”? Whence its “individuality” now that “exists” without the matter? The Aristotelian “soul” is not equal to “person” - it is a purely formal principle.

We are not to imagine the agent intellect as a faculty separate from the intellect, but as the person’s very intellect inasmuch as it acts on the sensible images received.

Yes in Thomas but not in the long philosophical history that stretches from Aristotle through Neo-Platonism and the Arabs down to the scholastics.

My point here is that the person is a reality that is prior to the intellect; the intellect, from Aquinas’ point of view (and, in my opinion, also from Aristotle’s) is simply a power or capacity of that person.

It is the person who thinks and loves, not his intellect or his will; but he uses his intellect and will in order to think and love.

But it is important to reiterate: “person” for Aquinas means a concrete, living reality, never a hypothetical condition of possibility.

I totally agree - but the problem remains: how do we philosophically account for our personal identity after death (without our bodies). As a Catholic, I believe that our personal consciousness continues intact (although modified). In order for this to happen, world disclosure (Heideggerian term) must continue as well (although modified).

 

[John_Martin]

I totally agree - but the problem remains: how do we philosophically account for our personal identity after death (without our bodies). As a Catholic, I believe that our personal consciousness continues intact (although modified). In order for this to happen, world disclosure (Heideggerian term) must continue as well (although modified).

You account for it in the fact that this conscious formulation you were doing as your wrote your response is not your agent intellect at work. The object known is present in the knower. In the case of humans, the living material being is this known object of the person knowing itself and loving itself (intellective will effecting [en-acting] its knowledge of itself through the sensitive passions). If I may be blunt, we are instruments of our persons, full duplications in material, the mystery is not how the consciousness continues intact after our death materially, but how we materially can be conscious in duplication of the real consciousness of our souls, which we do not in any way perceive, since we can only perceive with the senses. That we somehow always have the words and thoughts we know correct coming into our thoughts is that they are moved to be, in the soul actualizing its self-understanding of those same ideas in us using the symbols available in material thinking.

This knower, the center of us, the soul, the person, is not centered physically in our material thought, needing to be transferred to the soul upon death. It simply “unplugs” from being able to use this body any longer as its material act of self-knowledge. There is no more temporal interaction with the “other”.

 

[lmelahn]

in

I may be wrong but I think Averroes posited an extrinsic possible intellect as well; Avicenna and Al-Farabi, only an extrinsic agent intellect

I will need to check on this. Avicenna posited a series of 10 “movers,” the last of which was so “weak” that it could only produce human souls and material creatures. (Avicenna, like most of the Muslim interpreters of Aristotle was highly influenced by Neoplatonism.) But as far as I know, only Averroes identified the last “mover” with the agent intellect.

I’m not sure about this … granted that the transcendental unity of apperception is a condition of possibility, it also seems to have an ontological dimension (certainly it prefigures in important respects Hegel and 19th century idealism)

Kant, although he is difficult to read, has the advantage of being absolutely clear and precise. There can be very little doubt that he calls into question our ability to know the existence of the human soul “speculatively.” (And Kant very much buys into Cartesian dualism, and so for him the “soul” would be equivalent to the person, if it could be known.) That is the purpose of his so-called “paralogisms of pure reason” (Critique of Pure Reason, Transcendental doctrine of elements, Transcendental dialectic, Book II). (Yes, he really does divide his Critique in that many subsections.)

For Kant, any attempt at an ontological interpretation of the ego is illegitimate, just like
attempting to prove the existence of God or of the world.

Yes. We are drawing closer to “person” in Husserl. And in Heidegger’s “da”

I assume you mean Dasein. I have read Heidegger’s Being and Time, however,
and I think that Heidegger’s intention is actually to minimize the importance of individuality. (Note how Dasein in German simply means “being there.”) Your namesake (Levinas) does place emphasis on personhood, especially on interpersonal relationship.

I agree. There’s no simple equation. But I still think the agent intellect is an important background for Husserl. From Aristotle (although this is in question) through the Neo-Platonism to the Arab interpreters, the agent intellect seems to be an individual. In Aquinas, it is a power (of the person) - but even in Aquinas it seems to be the only activity of the person that survives death.

I assume we are talking about “after death” but “before the General Resurrection.” (Aquinas actually makes a philosophical justification for the resurrection of the body; he concludes that there is no strict philosophical necessity for the resurrection, but that philosophy shows that such a resurrection is most fitting.)

Strictly speaking, however, the agent intellect (the capacity of the intellect to illuminate sensible data) is unable to work after death (i.e., in the absence of the body), because there are no senses to produce those data. The intellect and the will, as spiritual faculties, continue to work as before.

I know that Cartesian dualism is always lurking in the wings. And needs to be avoided.

After studying a lot of modern and postmodern authors (starting with Descartes, but also Kant, Hegel, Heidegger, Gadamer, and to a lesser extent Husserl, Sartre, and the contemporary phenomenologist Jean-Luc Marion), I have come to the conclusion that none of these has ever completely overcome Cartesian dualism, although many have tried. (Heidegger, for example, tried to do away with soul/body dualism, but he ended up with Being/beings dualism or Dasein/sein dualism.)

(More in a separate answer. I your responses were that interesting! ).

 

[lmelahn]

How can a metaphysical principle “exist”? Whence its “individuality” now that “exists” without the matter? The Aristotelian “soul” is not equal to “person” - it is a purely formal principle.

I agree that a metaphysical principle cannot exist independently. Here you touch on a point that I think only Aquinas’ metaphysics has been able to answer. We all agree (I think) that death consists in the dissolution of the body, not exactly the “separation” of the soul from the body, as it is commonly (but somewhat misleadingly) portrayed.

Aristotle (and Aquinas) teach that the soul is the substantial form of the body (or better said, of the person, although Aristotle did not have a fully developed concept of person).

Moreover, the matter (in this case, the body) is the so-called “principle of differentiation.” That is, the body is what makes it possible for there to be many individuals members of the species called “man.” (Up to here, pure Aristotle, which Aquinas fundamentally accepts.)

That poses a sticky problem for intermediate eschatology (the status of persons who have died but whose bodies have not yet resurrected): how can they be distinct individuals?

Although Aristotle was undoubtedly not confronted with the problem of eschatology, I think he had the beginnings of the answer: in his Metaphysics, Book 9 (or Theta), he discusses various kinds of act and potency pairs. He notes that existence (to hyparchein) is the act par excellence, and that the potential principle that goes with it is to pragma, the concrete thing.

Therefore, I think at Aristotle has laid the foundations for what I consider Aquinas’ greatest philosophical contribution: the discovery of the real composition between the act of being and the essence.

So, you see, human nature is different from that of sub-human substances (such as animals or plants or what have you): it is far more noble. Every substance (even the humblest material substance) is composed of being and essence, but the human essence is so noble (in comparison with sub-human things) that it is capable of standing by itself. Unlike animals, men do not disintegrate when their bodies disintegrate.

Moreover, when men do lose their bodies (i.e., when they die), they do not lose either their identity or their personality. What guarantees both is their act of being, which for a substance is like the fountain from which all their actuality flows.

In Aquinas there is no dualism, and no slavish reliance on hylomorphism (unlike the Franciscan school).

In short, for Aquinas the human soul is not a purely formal principle. It is actually a mediating principle between the fundamental source of actuality (the act of being) and the matter (the body), and also between the act of being and the person’s various actualities (faculties, qualities, and so on).

Yes in Thomas but not in the long philosophical history that stretches from Aristotle through Neo-Platonism and the Arabs down to the scholastics.

Aristotle is rather terse in his De anima. He does not seem to have been able get around the fact that the agent intellect is “act,” and therefore (it would seem) superior to any other faculty. In this regard, Aquinas makes a genuine refinement or correction: the agent intellect is only “agent” inasmuch as it mediates between our sensible knowledge and our intellectual knowledge. I don’t think there can be any doubt, however, that Aristotle considers the agent intellect as belonging to the individual. (Among other things, his Nicomachean Ethics, with its theory of virtues and vices, would otherwise not make much sense.) Averroes, in my opinion, makes a fundamental misreading of Aristotle in this regard.

I totally agree - but the problem remains: how do we philosophically account for our personal identity after death (without our bodies). As a Catholic, I believe that our personal consciousness continues intact (although modified). In order for this to happen, world disclosure (Heideggerian term) must continue as well (although modified).

I think I answered the part about personal identity above; in intermediate eschatology, the world-disclosure would have to take place through our vision of God, because our natural path to knowledge is through the senses. (Of course, in that case of the Beatific Vision, being does not simultaneously veil itself in its disclosure—sorry, I couldn’t resist a Heideggerian joke .)

 

[levinas12]

… our souls, which we do not in any way perceive, since we can only perceive with the senses…

This knower, the center of us, the soul, the person, is not centered physically in our material thought, needing to be transferred to the soul upon death. It simply “unplugs” from being able to use this body any longer as its material act of self-knowledge. There is no more temporal interaction with the “other”.

You are definitely on to something here.

As Aquinas pointed out, there is a certain immateriality to our thinking. And this would carry over, with modifications, to Husserl’s transcendental ego (which is not just a condition of possibility but also a being).

After death, in the absence of our “senses”, I think we can still “perceive” reality (in some immaterial way). The angels can do it (although I’m not saying we become angels after death).

And is there a hint of this “immaterial perception” in our own self-awareness right now? Isn’t there something like a transcendental intuition of the transcendental ego?

Warning: this may take us down a Cartesian path.

 

[levinas12]

…Of course, in that case of the Beatific Vision, being does not simultaneously veil itself in its disclosure—sorry, I couldn’t resist a Heideggerian joke …

Thank you for your entire response … it was nice, very nice … and I hope Heidegger has had his own veils removed by now …

You are right about Kant. And Aquinas. And Aristotle (probably). But assuming a Neo-Platonist/Arab understanding of the agent intellect as a separate immaterial being - we have something like a template for the transcendental ego. I know, I know - Merleau-Ponty would be upset about this.

We need to talk more about Husserl’s understanding of the transcendental ego.

Heidegger’s Dasein poses an interesting problematic. In Being and Time, it was the closest Heidegger came to the notion of “person” (with the unrepeatability/uniquness/singularity of the “da” filling in for “person”). Later, Heidegger would talk about the Dasein of the German people, etc - thus moving away from a “Kierkegaardian” understanding of Dasein)

Have you read Spaemann? Sokolowski?

You mentioned Marion. Do you know any good books that unpack Marion for the rest of us?

And I’m still searching for a book that “unpacks” Levinas. I have a few already but none of them are entirely satisfactory. There is one coming out in January 2015 but I forget the author’s name (I’ll find out if you’re interested).

 

[John_Martin]

…

And is there a hint of this “immaterial perception” in our own self-awareness right now? Isn’t there something like a transcendental intuition of the transcendental ego?

…

These thoughts we are writing to each other do not exist in our material consciousness ready to use when we need them but out of “sight”. These thoughts are movements of the soul’s will driving the sensitive appetite to activate shared, learned, symbols into and out of our conscious thought. Our symbol driven material consciousness is just a mirror of what the intellect, in the soul, knows itself concerned to see of itself at the moment.

When you listen to someone or read their words, the intelligent symbols appear in your material consciousness sequentially from without (through your ears or eyes). When you think “original thoughts”, the intelligent symbols appear in your material consciousness sequentially (and remarkably correct) from your soul, your will implementing them through your sensitive appetites (simulating the senses perceiving the words). [this, of course, is the speculation on the definition of the soul by looking closely at the actual functioning of material consciousness, and naming “soul” as that which has these effects. I find it useful to use myself as the proving ground for whether this is “really real”.]

 

[lmelahn]

…]

Heidegger’s Dasein poses an interesting problematic. In Being and Time, it was the closest Heidegger came to the notion of “person” (with the unrepeatability/uniquness/singularity of the “da” filling in for “person”). Later, Heidegger would talk about the Dasein of the German people, etc - thus moving away from a “Kierkegaardian” understanding of Dasein)

After Heidegger’s “about face” (Kehre) he certainly seems to suggest that Dasein is constituted by the very disclosure of Being (Sein). Hence man (Dasein) is (it would seem) entirely determined by Sein, which is revealed (and simultaneously veiled) through the historical context (beings, or Seiendes). (Of course, it is often difficult to understand exactly what it is that Heidegger is getting at.) My feeling is that Heidegger used Existentialist vocabulary in Being and Time, but already had the his post-Kehre ideas in mind.

Have you read Spaemann? Sokolowski?

Not yet, but I will if I get a chance. (I am working on a doctorate in a different area, so it will probably have to wait until after that.)

You mentioned Marion. Do you know any good books that unpack Marion for the rest of us?

I had a seminar on him, which helped a lot. I think he is too recent for there to be any textbooks on him. Perhaps you could try one of his more accessible works, such as De surcroît (in English, published as In Excess).

His fundamental idea is that there are phemomena that “give themselves” so intensely that they burst open the Kantian “modes” of categories (quantity, quality, relation, modality). In this way, he thinks he can show that there is a way to gain access to the noumenon (not his terminology, but that is the idea).

And I’m still searching for a book that “unpacks” Levinas. I have a few already but none of them are entirely satisfactory. There is one coming out in January 2015 but I forget the author’s name (I’ll find out if you’re interested).

Sure. I appreciate it.

If you are brave, you can read my master’s thesis (which is very Thomist and written for Thomists, but which you might find interesting). In that paper, I address the question of why beings always strive for perfection (although, of course, that is a prelude for understanding what makes man strive for his fulfillment).

The point that might interest you is Chapter 3, which describes how Aquinas conceives the act of being actus essendi. (There is also some historical background on how people have misinterpreted him.) In my opinion, many late-19th and 20th-century philosophers correctly realized that modern philosophy (Descartes though Hegel, roughly speaking) is too static and rigid. That is why, for example, Heidegger sought Being (Sein) over and above beings (Seiendes) in so many of his works. The actus essendi is, I think, what these philosophers were looking for.

You might also like the part about how Aquinas correctly applied Neoplatonic notions in his works (for example, section 3.1.2 on the unlimitedness of being, and the historical part in chapter 2).

 

[levinas12]

Sure. I appreciate it.

Here’s the commentary on Levinas that coming out in a few months:

barnesandnoble.com/w/levinass-existential-analytic-james-r-mensch/1119612418?ean=9780810130548