Moser Thomas Aquinas Esse intentionale and the cognitive as such.pdf

7/27/2019 Moser Thomas Aquinas Esse intentionale and the cognitive as such.pdf

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THOM AS AQUINAS, ESSE INTENTIONALE, AND THE

OOGNITIVE AS SUOH

RO IE MOSER

IS POPULAR AMONG AQUINAS SCHOLARS to present

esse

intentionale as the mode of being that distinguishes cognizant from

noncogn izant beings. St. Thom as says something is cognizant jus t in

case it is able to posse ss, in addition to its own form, the form of some

othe r thing.' When I am actually knowing, I posses s the form of the

thing known. The form of the thing known has a mode of being in the

knower which mode of being is the distinguishing m ark of the

cognitive as suchand many scholars say this distinguishing mode of

being is

esse intentionale.

In this paper, I argue against this reading of

this part of Aquinas's doctrine of knowledge. Thom as does not feature

esse intentionale

as the mark of the cognitive, but rath er assigns it

mo re of a subo rdinate status . The view tha t

esse intentionale

is the

definitive mark of the cognitive does not properly highlight the way it

features for Thomas as something of a junior partner to the more

fundamental esse immateriale.

Here I wish to question a popular l ine of reasoning for reading

Aquinas as saying that esse intentionale is the m ark of the cognitive.

In what follows, I take John Haldane's work as offering a view

represe ntat ive of th is sor t of reasoning. I ra ise some pro blem s for

maintaining that Thomas held this view, both f rom within Haldane 's

This article is the winning essay of the Philosophy Education Society's

2009 Dissertation Essay Contest.

Correspondence to: Robbie Moser, Canisius College, Department of

Philosophy, 2001 Main St., Buffalo, NY, 14208.

' The cognizant are distinguished from the non-cognizant in this respect,

that the non-cognizant have nothing but their own form alone, whereas a

cognizant entity is disposed to have the form of ano ther thing as well. For the

species of the thing known is in the knower. (cogno scentia a non

cognoscentibus in hoc distinguuntur, quia non cognoscentia nihil habent nisi

formam suam tantum; sed cognoscens natum est habere formam etiam rei

alterius, nam species cogniti est in cognoscente.)

Summae theologiae

in 5'.

Thom ae Aquinatis Opera Om nia Leonine edtion. Part 1, Vols. 4-5 (Rome

1888/9), part 1, question 14, article 1; hereafter ST. All translations of St.

Thomas's works from the Latin are my own, taking the translations of the

English Dominicans as a starting point.


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76 ROBBIE MOSER

approach specifically and from Thomas' text s more generally. In the

first section of the paper, I show why Thomas might be thought to

present esse intentioncde as the defining mark of knowledge as such.

In the second section, I raise a problem specifically for Haldane's

reading of the texts, but also, I think, a more general problem for any

view that ta ke s Aquinas as sayingesse intentionale is uniquely mental.

In the third section I highlight an often overlooked distinction Aquinas

makes between modes of intentional being. This distinction shows that

Thomas is concerned with allowing esse intentionale to exist

extram entally as such in an imperfect being. In section four, I ske tch

a picture of cognition that includes such extramental being, although

this sketch goes only part of the way tow ard achieving a plausible and

persp icuous description of Thom as's metaphysics of cognition. In the

concluding section, I describe why and how the present reading best

fits with the largely acknowledged, broader reading of Thomas as

being thoroughly unconcerned with a Cartesian problematic.

I

Thomas says something is cognizant just in case it is able to

po ssess, in addition to its OAvn form, th e form of som e o the r thing.^

The form of the thing known has a mode of being in the knower, a

representational mode which is the distinguishing mark of the

cognitive as such. Joh n Haldane stands with many scholars who say

this distinguishing m ode of being isesse intentionale. ^In this section I

present w hat I take to be the strong est case for their reading.

^

The cognizant are distinguished from the non-cognizant in this respect,

that the non-cognizant have nothing but their own form alone, whereas a

cognizant entity is disposed to have the form of another thing as well. For the

species of the thing known is in the knower. (cognoscentia a non

cognoscentibus in hoc distinguuntur, quia non cognoscentia nihil habent nisi

formam suam tantum; sed cognoscens natum est habere formam etiam rei

alterius, nam species cogniti est in cognoscente.)ST1.14.1.

^ See especially John Haldane, references cited throughout this paper.

See also Jeffrey E. Brower & Susan Brower-Toland, Aquinas on Mental

Representation: Concepts and Intentionality,

hitosophical

Review 117

(2008): 193-243; Paul A. MacDonald, Jr., Direct Realism and Aquinas'sAccount of Sensory Cognition,

The

Thomist

7

(2007): 343-78, at

347;

Peter

Geach, Form and Existence, reprinted in Aquinas s Summa Theologian:


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INTENTION LE ND THE COGNITIVE

76

Throughout Haldane's various presentations, it is always clear

why he thinks Thomas holds thatesse intentionale is the mark of the

cognitive. The primary reason is thatesse intentionale is the bearer of

the feature of representation or intentionalify: a cognitive being

represents, or is about, some other thing, while a noncognitive being

cannot represent or be about anything else. This feature of

aboutness is what Thomas means by the knower's possessing the

form 0/another thing : the form possessed is itself of another. It is

intrinsically representative of something other than

itself.

For Haldane, the cognitive mode of being, the mode that is

intrinsically representational, isesse intentionale:^a species inesse

intentionali

represents an extramental form in

esse naturali

and as

such,esse intentionale is the representational mode of being proper to

cognizance.* On this view, the distinction between the cognizant and

the noncognizant is the same as the distinction between the

Critical Essays,

ed.

Brian Davies (Lanham,

M.D.:

Rowman

and

Littlefield,

2006),

111-28,

at 126;

Robert Pasnau,

Theories of Cognition in theLater

Middle Ages

(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 38-45; Brian

Davies, TheThoughtof Thomas Aquinas (Oxford: Clarendon Pre ss, 1992),

127-8.

Though Davies well stres ses the importance of immateriality to

Aquinas's account of cognition,hestill says, [knowledge] occurs whenthe

formof a material thing comestohave

esse intentionale

asopposedto

esse

naturale. (128); Yves Simon, An Introduction to the Metaphysics of

Knowledge,

trans. Vukan Kuic

and

Richard J. Thompson (New

York:

Fordham

University Press, 1990),

12-13;

Jean-Luc Soler, Lanotion d'intentiormat

chez Thomas d'Aquin, Philosophie24 (1989), 13-36.

See

the

doctrine

of the

quo

of the

cognitive form

or

species,

at, for

example,

ST 1.85.2.

See also

Quaestiones disputatae de veritate,

in

S.

Thoma e Aquinatis Opera Om nia, Leonine edition (Rome, 1970) 9.4,

especiallyad 4, for the doctrine that thespecies is a signum invirtueof

whichit is an id quo. Hereafter, this tex t is cited asDV.

' John Haldane, Mind-World Identity Theo ry and the Anti-Realist

Challenge, in Reality, Representation andP rojection,ed. J.H aldaneand C.

Wright (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993), 15-37,

at

26.

^

Forhisdevelopments of this view,see, for example, Haldane, Mind-

World Identity Theory ; John H aldane, Forms of

Thought, in

he

Philosophy

of Roderick Chisholm,

ed. Lewis Edwin Hahn (Illinois: Open Court, 1997),

149-70; John Haldane, Realism with a Metaphysical Skull, in Hilary

Putnam: Pragmatism

and

Realism,

ed.

James Conant

and

Urszula Zeglen

(London: Routledge, 2002), 97-104.


4/27

7 ROBBIE MOSER

represen ta t iona l esse intentionale and the nor i represen tat ional esse

naturaleJ

This use of the intent ional /natural dis t inct ion is the main reason

for thinking that esse intentionale is the m ark of the cognitive. This

use further takes support from a curious text on angelic cognition, in

which Thomas presents var ious modes of being re levant to cogni t ional

being. The issue is ra ised in a bro ade r discussion of ho w angels kn ow

things other than the m selves ( in this case , other angels) . I t looks as if

what Thomas says i s tha t esse intentionale is the pure ly

representat ional or cogni t ive mode of being dis t inct f rom the

immater ia l . Thomas wri tes :

One angel knows another by the species of such angel existing in

his intellect. [This species] differs from the angel whose likeness it

is,

not according to esse materiale and esse immateriale, but

according to esse naturale and esse intentionale. The angel is

himself a subsisting form in his natural being (in esse naturali), but

his species in the intellect of another angel is not so, for there it

posses ses only an intelligible existence (esse intelligibile). This is

like the case of the form of color in a wall having esse naturale,

where as in the transmitting m edium it has only esse intentionale.

' Haldane acknow ledges a debt to Pete r Geach's work for Ha ldane's

introduction t o the notion of individualized forms. From this I guessed (but

am not su re) that Haldane inherited directly from Geach the notion of theesse

intentionale/esse naturale distinction as marking the cognitive from the non-

cognitive. Geach writes: What makes a sensation or thought of an

X

to be

of

an X is that it is an individual occurrence of the very form or nature which

occurs in Xit is thus that our mind 'reaches right up to reality'; what makes

it to be asensation or thoughtof an

X

rather than an actual

X

or an actual X-

ness is that X-ness here o ccurs in the special way calledesse intentionale an d

not in the 'ordinary' way called

esse naturale.

G. E. M. Anscombe and P. T.

Geach,

Three Philosophers

(Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1961), 95. I notice thatfor Geach, the forms are not numerically identical : Though the essences of

this cat and that cat are not identical^they contain different individualized

formsthey are exactly alike, and so a single mental likeness

(species)

in a

ma n's mind can correspond to both. (84)

ST1.56.2 ad

3 ,

quoted below; to nam e jus t a few relevant d iscussions of

this text in the later twentieth-century, see Anthony Kenny, Intentionality:

Aquinas and Wittgenstein, in his The Legacy o f W ittgenstein (Oxford: Basil

Blackwell, 1984), 61-76, at 65; Gerard Casey, Imm ateriality and

Intentionality , inAt the Heart of the Real, ed. Fran O'Rourke (Dublin: Irish

Academic Press, 1992), 97-112; Robert Pasnau,

Theories of Cognition in the

Later MiddleAges,38-45.

Unus ngelus cognoscit alium per speciem eius in intellectu suo

existentem, quae differt ab Angelo cuius similitudo est, non secundum esse


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ESSE INTENTIONALE AN D THE OOGNITIVE 7 7

Here Thomas is concerned with the distinction between the

immaterial being of the known angel and the immaterial being of the

cognitive species by which the knowing angel know s. This is the

problem Thomas sets out to solve: since an angel and a cognitive

species are both immaterial, they are not distinguished from one

ano ther as species are usually distinguished from substan tial forms. In

human knowers, the cognitive form is distinct from the substantial

form of the thing known in virtue of the cognitive form's imm ateriality.

In the case of the angel, the known angel has its own immaterial

being it is a ceriain subsisting form ' and the species has a

different bu t still imm aterial being in the know er. Accordingly,

Thomas frames the distinction between the thing known and the

cognitive species in terms of esse intentionale: Thomas says the

know n angel has natural being esse naturale), while another angel's

knowledge of him has intentional being

esse intentionale).

The point at issue in the angel text seems to be the question of the

representational or intentional character of knowledge: what

distinguishes cognitive being from some noncognitive mode of being

now tha t immateriality is common to both?

Thomas seems to say that the representational character is

precisely that which distinguishes the immaterial species from the

imm aterial natu re. The specie s causing knowledge is distinguished

materiale et immateriale, sed secundum esse naturale et intentionale. Nam

ipse ngelus est forma subsistens in esse naturali, non autem species eius

quae est in intellectu alterius Angeli, sed habet ibi esse intelligibile tantum.

Sicut etiam et forma coloris in pariete habet esse naturale, in medio autem

deferente habet esse intentionale tantimi. ST1.56.2 ad3.

An angel, however, since it is immaterial, is a certain subsisting form,

and in virtue of this it is actually intelligible. Hence it follows that an angelunderstands itself by its own form, which is its substance. (ngelus autem,

cum sit immaterialis, est quaedam forma subsistens, et per hoc intelligibilis

actu. Unde sequitur quod per suam formam, quae est sua substantia, seipsum

intelligat.)

ST

1.56.1. See also

Summ a contra Gentites,

in

S. Thomae

Aquinatis Opera Om nia, Leonine edition (Rome, 1926), 2.98: separate

substances are according to their own nature actually existing as intelligible

being. (Substantiae autem separatae sunt secundum suam naturam ut actu

ex isten tes in esse intelligibili.) Hereafter, this text cited asSCG See also V

8.6.

The comparative example Thomas gives suggests that he is making the

intentional/natural distinction also to serve as the distinction between

cognizance and non-cognizance: he likens the situation of the distinction

between angel and species to the difference between the form of color


6/27

7 8 ROBBIE MOSER

from the natural being of the angel in virtue of the species' being

representational or about some thing. The angel itself is immaterial

and actually intelligible,'^ but it is not, in virtue of these features,

about anything else. In this way, Thomas seems to appeal toesse

intentionale over and aboveesse irnmaterialewhen here introducing

this special feature of knowledge being about some other thing.

This text is not the only place where Thomas can be seen to speak

of esse intentionale specifically in terms of the distinction between

cognizance and noncognizance. For example, in his commentary on

De aniyna he contrasts esse intentionale vdth esse naturale in

sensation. He says:

The senses receive

the

form without matter, which form

in the

sensehas a different modeof being from that whichit has in the

thing sensed.

For in the

sensible thing

it has a

natural mode

of

being (esse naturale),but in the senseit has an intentionaland

spiritual mode of being (esse intentionale

et

spirituale).'^

Again the question is the difference between a knower and a

nonknower, and this distinction is explained in terms of intentional

and natural being.'* Once again the introduction of cognizance seems

to require the mention ofesse intentionale.

existing naturally

in a

wall

and the

form

of

color existing intentionally

in the

medium. See a parallel text at Quaestio disputata de spiritualibus

creaturis ed. L. W.

Keeler (Rome, 1946),

1, ad

11:

The

intelligible species

which

is in the

intellect

of the

understanding angel differs from

the

angel

understood notaccordingto abstraction from matterand concrete material

conditions,

but

rather jus t as intentional being differs from an entity that has

a

fixed beinginnature; justas thespeciesofcolourin the eyediffers fromthe

colour that

is in a

wall. (Species intelligibilis quae

est in

intellectu Angeli

intelligentis, differt

ab

Angelo intellecto

non

secundum abstractum

a

materia

et materiae concretum,

sed

sicut

ens

intentionale

ab

ente quod habet esse

ratum

in

natura; sicut differt species coloris

in

oculo

a

colore

qui est in

pariete.)

5^1 .56 .1

Sensus recipit formam sine materia, quia alterius modi esse hab et

forma

in

sensu,

et in re

sensibili. Nam

in re

sensibili habet esse naturale,

in

sensu autem habet esse intentionaleetspirituale. Sentencia libri De anima

in

O pera omnia.

Leonine edition. Vol. 45: (Com missio Leonina-J. Vrin, Roma-

Paris, 1984) 2, lect. 24 ;hereafter/nDA .

*

I

notice that Foster

and

Hum phries render esse naturale here

as a

material mode

of

being, which

I

think

is

misleading. Translating esse

naturale as material being makes itseemas if the distinction Thomasis

highlighting here

is the

distinction between immateriality

and

materiality.


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ESSE INTENTIONALE AN D THE COGN ITIVE 7 9

It is little wonder, then, that John Haldane and others treat

esse

intentionale as the defining feature of knowledge as such. Thom as

uses the term in places where he is distinguishing knowledge as such

from something that cannot know, and the distinction seems to

highlight precisely wh at goes by the name intentionality today: the

represe ntational feature of being about. So it is tha t

esse

intentionate is viewed as tantam oun t to aboutness ; and since the

represe ntat ional feature of aboutness is the mirk of the cognitive,

esse intentionale

is treated as its special mode of being.

II

As presented above, the view th atesse intentionale is tantamount

to cognition depends on treating the term

esse intentionale

as

synonym ous Avith represen tational. Thomas, how ever, does no t

always do this. Haldane, for one, indicates that he thinks Thomas

equates

esse intentionale

and represe ntationa l or cognitional being,

evidenced in Haldane's presenting and translating De veritate 8.4 as

follows (the brackete d insertion is Haldane's own):

The intelligible species [concept] is a similitude of a thing's

essential nature, and is in some fashion the very essence and nature

of it but ex isting intentionally and not physically. ^

In fact, this passage is not in De Veritatebut rather in Quaestiones de

quolibet,

where Thomas is addressing a question on created nature, an

article on the natu re of bod ies. A bet ter translation of the passag e, it

seem s to me, is the following:

Thomas, however, has already discussed the distinction between materiality

and immateriality leading up to this passage, and now he is introducing the

new distinction between natu ral and intentional modes of being. Moreover,

Thomas uses this distinction here in the same way as he does in the passage

on angelic cognition, where the em phasis is on intentionality. SeeAristotte's

DeAnima in the version of William ofMo erbeke and the Com mentary of St.

Thomas Aquinas,

trans . K. Fos ter and S. Hum phries (New Haven: Yale

University Press, 1954). By way of contrast, Pasnau trans lates

esse

naturale

as natural being. See his translation of Aquinas,

A Com mentary on

Aristotle's De anima, trans. Robert Pasnau (New Haven and London: Yale

University Press, 1999), 283.

John Haldane, Mind-Worid Identity Theory , at 22.


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77 ROBBIE MOSER

The intelligible species is a likeness ofthevery essence of the thing,

and is in a way the same quiddity and nature, [but] according to

intelligible being esse intelligibile),not according to natural being

(esse naturale), which latteristhe being it has in the thing.'

What Haldane transla tes as existing intentionally is Thom as's esse

intelligibile.' His translation supposes that w hat Thomas m eans here

by esse intelligibile is the inten tional-rep resenta tional. From this,

Haldane concludes that esse intentionale is the intrinsically

represen tational mode of being that defines the cognitive.

But Haldane's translation elides a distinction between two ways

the term esse intelligibile is used . Recall Thom as's definition of

knowledge as being able to possess the form of another, where the

dual role of the species is its presence in the knower and its

representational content (what it is about).'^ Thomas explains formal

presen ce in term s of the imm aterial being or perfection of the form in

the knower, while the representational role is described as the

informational content of the knowledge. ' Thom as uses esse

intelligibile to highlight either of the se features of the intelligible

species, the feature of representation or the feature of immateriality.

When he specifically deals with the distinction between mind and

world, he uses esse intelligibile to highlight imm ateriality as that

which marks the distinction between the cognizant and the

noncognizant. For example, in the above Cuodlibetal questions

passage, Thomas seems not to be highlighting the intentionality of the

being, but rather the cognizance of the being, and contrasting it with

the noncognizant. This is to say that w hat Thom as is highlighting is

' Unde species intelligibilis est similitudo ipsius essentiae rei, et est

quodammodo ipsa quidditas et natura rei secundum esse intelligibile, non

secundum esse naturale, prout esse in rebus.

Quaestiones de quolibet

(Marietti, Taurini-Romae,1956),8.2.2.

ST1 14 1

'* Thomas makes this distinction explicit elsewhere, highlighting

presence and content as the two features required of a species causing

knowledge, for example, DV3.1, ad 2: For a species to be a means of

knowledge there are two requirements. Namely, it must represent the thing

known, which belongs to the species insofar as it has a relationship to the

thing known. And, it must have spiritual or immaterial being, which belongs

to a species insofar as it has its being in the knower. (ad speciem quae est

medium cognoscendi duo requiruntur: scilicet repraesentatio rei cognitae,quae competit ei secundum propinquitatem ad cognoscibile; et esse spirituale,

vel immateriale, quod ei competit secundum quod habet esse in cognoscente.)


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INTENTIONALE AN D THE OOGNITIVE 77

not the intentionality or aboutness of cognizance, but rather its

immateriality as it exists or is present in the knower.

It is normal for Thomas to speak of the distinction between the

cognizant and noncognizant in terms of the material and immaterial.

Take for exam ple this very similar passage:

For it is quite true that the mode of understanding, in one who

understands (in intelligendo), is not the same as the mode ofathing

existing (in existendo): since the thing understood is immaterially

in the one who vinderstands, according to the mode oftheintellect,

and not materially, according to the mode ofamaterial thing.'

As Thomas here presents the distinction between forms in thought and

forms in world, the em phasis is not onesse intentionale, but rather on

esse immateriale. Cognizance per se is prese nted not in term s of

intentionality but in terms of its immateriality, as distinct from the

materiality of noncognizant nature. Indeed, the question of the

cognizant form's having existence in esse intentionali does not enter

into the p icture at all.

Now, in the text on angelic cognition usually cited in favor of the

natural/intentional distinction, the term esse intentionale seem s to be

put to a specific use: the question is how the immaterial species

causing knowledge differs from the immaterial nature of the known

angel. It might seem tha t Thomas uses esse intelligibile

interchangeably with esse intentionale, insofiir as to be intelligible

jus t is to be intentional or represen tational. It might further seem th at

esse intelligibile highlights intentionality that the thought is

of

or

about something whereas the imm aterial and natural being of the

angel itself is not ab out anything. So, it might seem that the re ason

Thomas features

esse intentionale

in the text is that the problem is

how an imm aterial mode of being about

esse intentionale)

is

distinguished from an imm aterial mode of being such

esse

naturale). Thus, Thom as is seen as highlighting the represen tational

feature of knowledge, as opposed to its status as present in and to the

knower.

However, I do not think this is how esse intentionale features in

this text; I villcome to this point in the next section. Presently, I note

that even if it we re used this way (that is, as equivalent to esse

5^1.85.1,

ad 1.


10/27

77 ROBBIE MOSER

intelliligibile ), we still could not conclude from this usage that

esse

intentionale as such is the criterion of cognizance, since in the case of

the angel the

esse intentionale

in question exists at the same time in

esse immateriali.

In other words, the angel text does not show tha t

esse intentionale as such, is the mark the cognitive. Rather, at most it

shows that the mark of the cognitive could be esse intentionale

existing in

esse immateriali

(which is the best bet available in Aquinas

for wh at might be the proper criterion of cognition). So even though

it is representation that distinguishes the cognitive from the

noncognitive, nothing in the angel text permits us to conclude that

Thomas equates representation withesse intentionale as such.

Furihermore, Thomas do es not as a rule equate

esse intentionale

and esse intelligibile. This is clear from his doctrine that the esse

intentionale in the noncognizant medium is not also esse intelligibile:

in the noncognizant medium no being is actually intelligible, only

potentia lly intelligible.^' Intelligible being is simply being in an

intellect , being actually intelligible ; it is a mode of being pro pe r to

an intellectual knower as such, and is a feature of Thomas's doctrine

that the thing known is in the know er according to the mode of the

In what I take to be a classic exchange, Mortimer Adler and John Deely

disagreed on precisely this point. In his The Difference of Man and the

Difference It M akes

(New York: Holt, Rinehart and W inston, 1967), Adler said

that Aquinas does not try to establish the imm ateriality of the intentional as

such, but only the immateriality of intentionality which is to be found in the

mental acts of conception, judgment, and inference. (217) Deely disagreed,

and said that St. Thom as ske tches the nature and extent of the intentional

order as such precisely on the basis of immateriality , which point Deely

takes to be clearly manifest in the

InDA

text on the medium grade of

immateriality in the senses (see my note 13). I do not take this point to be

illustrated in tha t text. There, Thom as is concerned with the distinction

between immaterial and material, and the question of

esse intentionale

is not

addressed (see my note 14). Thomas does precisely what Adler says he does:

seeks to establish only the immateriality of the

cognitionat

intentional order.

See John Deely, The Immateriality of the Intentional As Such, The New

Scholasticism 42 (Spring 1968): 293-306. Fo r Adler's reply to Deely, see

Mortimer Adler, Sense Cognition: Aristotle vs. Aquinas,

The New

Scholasticism 42 (Autumn 1968):578-91.

See InDA 2 lect. 14, where Thomas says the medium can receive

intentional being, and InDA 2 lect. 24, where he says that despite this

presence of intentional form, the medium is not sentient or cognitive.


11/27

ESSE INTENTION LE ND THE COGN ITIVE

77

knower. Any existence in an intellect is existence in esse

intelligibili. The mode of the knower, for Thomas, seems just to

mean a cognitive mode of being or being in a cognitive power.

^

As

Thomas tells us, the presence of a cognitive species, intelUgible or

sensible, just is a case of knowledge.^ Intentiones in the medium, on

the other hand, are in no way actually cognitive, and so they have no

esse intelligibile. Esse intentionale then, cannot be the equivalent of

cognitive being considered as such.^^

If this is correct, then the esse intentionale/esse naturale

distinction does not properly distinguish cognizant from noncognizant

modes of being. We may not conclude thatesse intentionale as such

is representational, and so we may not conclude thatesse intentionale

distinguishes the cognizant from the noncognizant. In fact, the angel

Knowledgeisaccordingto themodeof the one whoknows,for the

thing known

is in

the knower according

to the

mode of the knower. (scientia

est secundum modum cognoscentis, scitum enim est in sciente secundum

modum scientis.)

ST

1.14.1,

ad

3 .

See John F. Wippel, Thomas Aquinas and the Axiom 'What

is

Received

is Received According

to the

Mode

of the

Receiver,'

in his

Metaphysical

Themes in Thomas Aquinas II

(Washington,

D.C:

Catholic University

of

Am erica Press, 2007), 113-22. Wippel places due emphasis on the

immateriality

of

cognition.

'^For example, ST 1.14.1. Elsewhe re, Thom as spea ks of esse

intelligibile andesse sensibile as

those m odes

of

being

to

which intellect

and

sense standinpotentiality. Thom as writes: As potentialitytosensible being

belongsto corporeal matter,sopotentiality to intellectual being belongsto

the possible intellect. (sicut potentia

ad

esse sensibile convenit materiae

corporali, ita potentiaadesse intelligibile convenit intellectui possibili.) ST

I-

2.50.4,

ad 2.

Sensible being pertain s

to

sense

in

virtue

of the

sensory

association with matter, whereas intelligible being pertains only

to

intellect

in

virtue

of

intellect's immateriality.

See Claude Panaccio's reading

of a

passage

in

Thomas's

Compendium

Theologiae, chapter

41:

oportet quod verbumin nostro intellectu conceptum,

quod habet esse intelligibile tantum,

alterius naturae

sit

quam intellectus

noster, qui habet esse naturale. Compendium theologiae in S. Thomae

Aquinatis Opera Om nia,

Leonine edition.

Vol. 42

(Rome, 1979). Panaccio

says:

the

mental word

is

sometimes explicitly attributed

a

purely intentional

modeofexistence withinthemind. (194)The emphasison quod habet esse

intelligibile tantum is

Panaccio's, indicating that

he

takes this passage

to

permithisclaim thattheverbum has intentional beingas contrasted with

natural being. See Claude Panaccio, Aquinas

on

Intellectual Representation

in Ancient

and

Medieval Theories

of

Intentionality,

ed.

Dominik Perler

(Leiden, Boston, Kln: Brill, 2001),

185-201.


12/27

77 ROBBIE MOSER

text further suggests that what also seems to be needed to distinguish

cognition is immateriality.

Accordingly, in the next section, I present

esse intentionale

as a

mode of being that can come to have representational being through

immateriality: represen tational being can happen to

esse

intentionale. This reading take s into account Thom as's teaching tha t

esse intentionale has being both mentally and extramentally, suggests

what the angel text also seems to suggest in its presentation of the

intersections of modes of being, and shows itself to be consistent with

other related lines of Thomais's thought.

Il l

My preferred reading of the angel text highlights the role of

esse

intentionale as operating within the domain of esse immateriale,

while ruling it out as the criterion of the cognitive as such . This

reading begins from noticing that the text shows that the

natural/intentional distinction cuts across the material/imm aterial

distinction.^ This me ans that either

esse naturale

or

esse intentionale

can be the mode of being of either a material or an immaterial entity.

So, for example, a stone has material existence in esse naturali; an

angel has immaterial existence in

esse naturali;

an intentio in the

medium has material existence in esse intentionalif and, a cognitive

species ha s (grades of) im material existence in

esse intentionali.

^^

This is Robert Pasnau's turn of phrase, in his A Commentary on

Aristotte s De

anima:

the intentional-natural distinction is orthogonal to the

physical-nonphysical distinction. (85, n. 4) Robert Pasnau,

Theories of

Cognition in theLater MiddleAges(Cambridge, 1997), 38.

Perh aps another example of the material-intentional is the intentione

as it exists in the sense organ: Thomas teaches that the intentione exists in

the sensible species in a downgraded mode of immateriality, but is

neve rtheless in a way ma terial insofar as it is not apprehended or cognized

by the external senses themselves. SeeInDA2, lect. 24, and see Anthony J.

Lisska, who discusses this in terms of the notion of an

intentio non-

sensata, in his A Look at Inner Sense in Aquinas: A Long-Neglected Faculty

Psychology ,

Inteltigence and the Phitosophy ofMind

Proceedings of the

American Catholic Philosophical Association 80, ed. Michael Baur (Virginia:

Philosophy Documen tation C enter, 2006), 1-19. In any case, the exam ples as

I have listed them show the distinction of concern, that is, between

intentional being in cognizant and non-cognizant modes. This reading of


13/27

INTENTION LE

AND THE

COGN ITIVE

77

In the angel text, Thomas is using esse intentionale as part of a

distinction within esse immateriale namely, between natural and

intentional modes of immaterial being. He presents esse intentionale

as a mode of being withinesse immateriale to distinguish the likeness

of the thing knovsTi in the knower from the natural being of the known

angel. In the previous section, I said it might seem like what Thomas is

highlighting here is the representational role of knowledge. Though

this usage would still not secure esse intentionale as the mark of the

cognitive, it might explain his use of the term esse intentionale.

When placed in line with another of Thomeis's doctrines, however, it

can be seen that Thomas's use ofesse intentionale here has nothing to

do with representation. Rather, Thomas is presenting how esse

intentionale features within his doctrine that the being in a knower

attains a certain immaterial perfection of its being. In this section, I

present this doctrine and its significance.

In the Summa contra Gentiles Thomas presents the notion of

grades of perfection. He writes:

The forms of sensible things have a more perfect mode of existence

in the intellect than in sensible things, for in the intellect they are

simpler and extend to morethings;thus, through the one intelligible

form of man, the intellect knows all men. Now, a form existing

perfectly in matter makes a thing to be actually such, such as to be

fire, or colored: if, however, the form does not have that effect, then

the form is in that thing imperfectly, as the form of color in the air

carrying

it.**

In the above text, Thomas presents the form of color existing in the air

as an example of esse intentionale existing in an imperfect mode of

Aquinas shows why he would endorse a mode of being that is both material

and intentional, contra, for example, Peter Sheehan, Aquinas on

Intentionality,

in Aquinas: A Collectionof Critical Essays ed.

Anthony

Kenny (Garden City, N.Y: Anchor Books, 1969),307-21.

Formae rerum sensibilium perfectius esse habentinintellectu quamin

rebus sensibilibus: sunt enim simpliciores et ad plura se extendentes;per

unam enim formam hominis intelligibilem omnes hominis intellectus

cognoscit. Forma autem perfecte in materia existens facit esse actu tale,

scilicet vel ignem,velcoloratum: si autem non faciat aliquid esse tale,est

imperfecte in illo, sicut forma colorisinaereut indeferente . . . .

SCG

2.50.

Dewan has pointed out to me that although the Leonine text has printed

'caloris' (that

is,

heat ), this seem s

to be a

typographical error, since

the

autograph has 'coloris' (thatis,color).


14/27

77 ROBBIE MOSER

This is con trasted with the form existing in m atter that makes

a thing to be such, tha t is, esse naturale. If the form does not exist

naturally, then it exists intentionally. The text further adds tha t

intentional form can exist extramentally, as when the form of color

exists in the medium. This intentional form of color in the m edium,

Thomas says, is a kind of imperfect existence, while the intentional

form of color in the knower is, for esse intentionale a kind of perfect

existence. That is, it is prop er for

esse intentionale

to exist as

represe ntation al within a know er. The notion of perfection used

here is the same as that which we find Thomas often using to discuss

the perfection of a noncognitive being (for example, an acorn) and a

cognitive being (a knower): there is a fullness of being proper to any

thing, and to attain this fullness of being is to attain a perfection.

As Thomas presents the doctrine, then, the distinction between

perfect and imperfect cuts across the distinction between esse

naturale

and

esse intentionale.

So

esse intentionale

may exist

extramentally, and as such, it is said to be imperfect. On the othe r

hand,

esse intentionale

is brough t to its proper full com pletion and

perfection of being in cognition. This is likewise the perfection of the

mod e of being of the knower as such. What we see here is that in

Thomas's presentation,

esse intentionale

itself admits of grad es of

being.

Thomas teaches that there are diverse grades of immaterial being

in the ascent from sensory to intellectual cognition, although a full

^ Esse intentionate is the targe t of our attention in this discussion, to be

sure,

as Thom as uses that term in precisely this same con text in the angel text

and also in Sentencia libri De sensu et sensato cuius secundus tractatus est

De mem oria et reminiscencia in S. Thomae Aquinatis Opera omnia.

Leonine edition. Vol. 45 (Commissio Leonina-J. Vrin, Rom a-Paris, 1984) 1.1.5 n

4:

Sed propter aliam rationem diaphaneitatis in med io persp icuo, sequitur

quod medium recipiat alio modo speciem coloris quam sit in corpore

colorato, in quo est diaphanum terminatum, ut infra dicetur. Actus enim sunt

in susceptivis secundum modum ipsorum:

et ideo

olor

est quidem in corpore

colorato sicut qualitas completa in suo esse naturali; in med io autem

incompteta secundum quoddam esse intentionate; alioquin non posset

secundum idem medium videri album et nigrum. Albedo autem et nigredo,

prout sunt formae completae in esse naturali, non possunt simul esse in

eodem: sed secundum praedictum esse incompletum sunt in eodem, quia iste

modus essendi propter suam imperfectionem appropinquat ad modum quo

aliquid est in aliquo in poten tia (my emphasis).

For example,

DV2.2

and 8.6;

ST 1 14 4


15/27

ESSE INTENTIONALE AND THE OOGNITIVE

discussion of this is not possible here. Thom as thinks tha t there is a

middle grade ( medium in Latin) betw een com plete immaterialify and

materiality, where Thomas locates esse sensibile.^ The higher grade is

existence without matter and individuating material conditions, where

Thomas situates

esse intelligibile.

This higher grade of imm aterial

being is called com plete or perfect (penitus). The imm ateriality of

intellect, then, in

esse intelligibili,

is presen ted as having attained a

higher degree of perfection, com pleten ess, or fullness of being. This

teaching is consonant with Thomas's discussion of the different

intensities of being, wh ere he teache s that for a form to exist in an

extram ental thing is for it to exist with a different intensity than th at of

a form existing in cognition.''^

What I wish to highlight here is that this perfected mode of being

is something that happens to esse intentionale insofar as the latter

com es to have the imm aterial being of cognition. Thus, we find

Thomas saying that a thing is better known the more it is immaterial:

the mo re im material, the m ore perfected.^^

The perfect/imperfect distinction is clearly serving as the

distinction between the cognizant and noncognizant, to the extent that

we can locate one with precision in Thom as's work. Moreover, the

perfection of extramental

esse intentionale

is achieved jus t insofar as

it attains immateriahfy, and so the distinction between the perfect

being of the cognizant and the imperfect being of the noncognizant

hinges entirely on imm ateriality. Thus, the distinction betwe en

cognizance and noncognizance is not given according to the presence

of

esse intentionale

as such. Rather, Thom as gives the distinction

between mind and world as the distinction between modes or grades

of immaterial being.

SeeInD 2,

lect. 5.

' ' S r 1.84.1. See alsoDV 2.2 and 8.6.

* For example, the immateriality of a thing is the reason why it is

cognitive; and according to the mode of immateriality is the mode of

knowledge. (immaterialitas alicuius rei est ratio quod sit cognoscitiva; et

secundum modum immaterialitatis est modus cognitionis.) ST 1.14.1. A

thing is known better by means of an intellectual species than by means of a

species in the sense, because the former is more immaterial. (Unde per

speciem quae est in intellectu, melius cognoscitur aliquid quam per speciem

quae est in sensu, quia est immaterialior.) DV3.1,ad2.


16/27

8 ROBBIE MOSER

The perfection of

esse intentionale

in a knower, then, is

tantamount to the representational character of cognition. Esse

intentionale

achieves this perfection only wh en rendered immaterial.''*

We could now speak of another mode of being, "cognitive being,"

which is a perfected and representational grade ofesse

intentionale. '^

I agree that Thom as envisions the cognitive as such to be a

sui generis

mode of being representational; bu t, if my prese ntation here is c orrect,

then Thomas cannot have meant the term esse intentionale to be

synonym ous with the cognitive cis such. That is, the cognitive as such

is distinct from intentional being as such, sinceesse intentionale is not

"intrinsically representational," but rather becomes representational in

esse immateriali. For Thom as, immateriality rema ins the

commanding notion involved in distinguishing the cognitive from the

noncognitive.''"

From here we can survey the present reading:

esse intentionale

exists outside of cognizance in an imperfect mode, and achieves a

representational mode of being when existing in esse imm ateriali.

This reading (i) stays plausibly con sistent wdth Thom as's teaching th at

esse intentionale has being both m entally and extramentally, (ii) pays

attention to the intersection of the distinctions of modes of being

Thomas makes in the oft-cited angel text, and (iii) makes full use of

Thomas's central teaching tha t knowledge is a perfection of imm aterial

being. It seems to me this entire picture is precisely why Thom as

teaches in hisex professo discussion of the criterion of the cognizant

that the immateriality of a thing is the reason it is cognitive, and that

^*

See Lawrence Dewan, "St Thomas, Metaphysics and Human Dignity",

in his Wisdom, Law and Virtue (New York: Fordham University Pre ss, 2007),

58-67. Here Dewan laments: "How often have we heard a would-be Thomist

speak of knowledge in terms of 'intentionality', yet how seldom in terms of

'immateriality' " (67)

'^''

Thomas does not have a term (at least not one that he uses with any

regularity) that would correspond to "cognitive being," such as, perhaps, esse

cognoscibile, which would cover both esse sensibile and esse intelligibile.

Thomas does sometimes speak of

essein

cognoscente, see D F

3.1,

ad 2.

As such, says Dewan, the

SCG

2.50 text "warns us against using the

notion of

esse intentionale

as the primary focus for St. Thomas's ontology of

knowing. The notion obviously has an appropriate use , but it should be

subordinated to

esse immateriale.

See his "St. Thomas and the Integration of

Knowledge into Being," International Philosophical Quarterly 24 (1984):

383-93,

at 384.


17/27

ESSE INTENTIONALE AN D THE COGNITIVE 9

the grade of immateriality determines the grade of cognizance.**' The

highest perfection, for Thomas, is to be free from the limiting

constraints of material existence.^** At the same time, the case of the

angel, which creature has natural and immaterial existence, shows that

imm ateriality alone is no t sufficient for cognizance. Rathe r, to eiyoy

the representational mode of being unique to cognizance, esse

intentionale mu st be rendered imm aterial.

If this reading is correct, then Haldane's and others' esse

intentionale/esse naturale distinction does not properly distinguish

cognizant from noncognizant modes of being. From the tex ts

presented, we may not conclude thatesse intentionale is intrinsically

representational, and so we may not conclude that esse intentionale is

a mode of being vmique to cognizance. Thomas's picture is rather th at

cognizance is a special mode of being, an immaterial appropriation of

forms of the things know n.

To close this section, I suggest that apart from this distinction

between perfect/imperfect modes of esse intentionale there is no

further principled distinction between the cognizant and noncognizant

in Aquinas. His resorting to distinguishing grades of perfection is

most understandable if we can shrug off any remaining inkling of

Cartesianism and catch sight of Aquinas's broader metaphysical

picture in which he is not working with a mind-matter dualism.

Aquinas is not a dualist, not because he has answered the dualist

problem, but because the problem cannot arise within his approach.

The Cartesian skeptic starts with a distinction between mind and body

and self-awareness as most evident. Thom as starts with mind and

body intact and graded hierarchy in natu re as most evident. As is

evident from his treatment of the grades of soul, following Aristotle,

the question of what is cognitive (as opposed to what is not) is only

intelligible for Thomas by drawing on graded comparisons of other

beings with ourselves, since we and other humans are the most

evident case of cognitive creatu res. That is, in recognizing degrees of

cognition, we must begin by recognizing base cases according to

which we can even speak about other cases as being upgrades or

^ Immaterialitas alicuius rei est ratio quod sit cognoscitiva; et secundum

modum immaterialitatis est modus cognitionis. ST 1.14.1.

** SeeS r 1.7.1.


18/27

78 ROBBIE MOSER

downgrades, as it we re. Starting with a notion of cognition is to start

not with an abstra ct m ethodology for finding the criterion of cognition.

It is to start investigations from v^dthin the world as embodied beings:

the procedure is Aristotelian and not Cartesian. Our embodied and

percipient grasp of substances in our engagements with nature is, as

Dewan says, the starting point of metaphysics,' ** and this metaphysics

will reveal to us in part what we already know insofar as it returns to

illuminate the principles with which we began. We learn about the

nature of cognition itself by natural investigation and c ons tant analogy

to our own nature, which nature we learn about in turn by way of

analogy with the most evident and basic encounters with the world.

This line of thought needs far more discussion, particularly with an

end to adopting terms mutually agreeable to all sides of recent debate

on cognition as such. ' In the rema inder of the paper, I turn attention

to clarifying an imporiant corollary of the present reading:

noncognitive intentional being.

IV

Nonrepresentational intentiones existing in extram ental reality

may well be troubleso me to some philosophical sensibilities. One

might say that, even if it follows from Thomas's presentation, perhaps

we should not follow T hom as. We wan t an account of exactly what is

esse intentionale

existing extramentally. I certainly do not provide

this account in the rem ainder of the paper. Rather, in wh at follows, I

Lawrence Dewan, The Imp ortance of Substance, in his Eorm and

Being (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2006),

96-130, a t 109.

See Dewan: The work of the metaphysician, as regards those first

principles, can consist only in a technique of invitation to look again at what

we do, after all, know, in his Laurence Fos s and the Existence of

Substances,

Lavalthologique etphilosophique

44 (1988): 77-84, at 80.

' I have in mind the debate be tween John O'Callaghan and Robert

Pasnau on the criterion of cognition. See John O'Callaghan, Aquinas,

Cognitive Theory, and Analogy: A Propos of Robert Pasnau's Theories of

Cognition in the Later Middle Ages, American Catholic Philosophical

Quarterly

76 (2002): 451-82, and Robert Pasnau's reply in the same volimie,

What is Cognition? A Reply to Some Critics, American Catholic

Philosophical Q uarterly

76 (2002): 483-90 .


19/27

ESSE INTENTIONALE AN D THE OOG NITIVE 78

offer a picture of nonrepresentational intentiones existing in

extram ental reality. The picture is consistent both w ith the reading of

Thomas I have presented here, and with the most general feature

Haldane and others wish to preserve about cognition: that thought

represents the world. I presentesse intentionale as an informational

or contentful mode of being that becomes representational when it is

rendered immaterial by achieving existence in a know er. This

continues the presentation of informational being already developed,

and stays consistent with Thomas's and Haldane's view that

represe ntation or intentionality as such defines the cognitive.

We have seen tha t Thom as spea ks of an intentio as a sensory

feature received in the estimative pow er. I suggest that Thom as

speaks of extramentalintentiones a s informational asp ects of things

that lend themselves to be cognized, and when realized in a cognitive

mode, these aspe cts become representational.

This is perhaps an imconventional rendering or treatment of

intentio. Intentio is the Latin translation of Avicenna's Arabic term

ma'na, the connotation of which is, broadly, meaning or to mean

to say. *^ Hence, in con tem pora ry philosophy, intentionality often

concerns itself with wh at a though t means or with wh at a thought is

about. We get a further sense of this notion of directedness in the

Latin infinitive intendere, wh ich means more literally to reach (or

tend ) tow ard or to direct into.

However, with respect to the relationship of the mind and the

world, it is acceptab le to tran slate intentio as message or signal. *

For a brief statement on the difficulties of translating ma'na even

simply as meaning, see Jon McGinnis and David Reisman, ed..Classical

Arabic Philosophy: An Anthotogy of Sources (Indianapolis: Haekett, 2007),

xi-xn.

A note on my rendering intentio, when said of the extramental, as

informational aspect : the interpretation ofesse intentionate in the medium

as message or signal is consisten t with the conn otations discussed above.

For example, Fr. Dewan writes: 'Intentio'was the word selected by the Latin

translators of Avicenna to translate the Arabicma'na;the fundamental Arabic

verb involved here, ana', they translated velle dicere (see French vouloir

dire), that is, 'to mean' or 'tointend to say.' Thus,'intentio' is best rendered

by such English words as 'mean ing' or 'notion.' In [the presen t] contex t of

sensibles and sense,['intentio']means the m essage sent from the sensible to

the sen se. It is misleading to put emphasis on the notion of tendency in the

etymology of 'intentio'. See Lawrence Dewan, St. Albert, the Sensibles, and

Spiritual Being ,

n

Albertus Magnus and the Sciences,ed. Jam es A. Weisheipl


20/27

78 ROBBIE MOSER

The connotation in this context is information or knowability, and

the interpretation of

esse intentionale

in the medium as message or

signal is consistent with these connotations. Accordingly, I render

intentio, when said of the extramental, as informational aspect,

and I treat the esse intentionale of cognition as informational or

representational content.

Thus,

Thomas's doctrine is that anintentio when received in the

requisite and functional cognitive power, is intrinsically contentful or

informational. Thomas even uses the term informatio to describe the

assimilation by which the knower achieves the known. * In this way,

the intentio represents the thing: it is an informational signal present

in things and realized in a knower, which realization is just a

redescription of the claim that the knower knows the thing.

(Toronto: Pontifical InstituteofMediaeval Studies, 1980), 291-320,at293,n.

6. ForAvicenna's Arabicand the Latin translation, Dewan citesthelexicon

contained

inAvicenna Latinus. Liber de Anima seuSextus de naturalibus

I-II-III, ed. Simone Van Riet (Louvain: Pee ters, 1972), 346, 536. Also, Deborah

Black writes:

In the

technical terminology

of the

Arabic philosophers,

an

'intention' (ma'nan)literally

a

'meaning'

or an

'idea'is

a

form

or

essence

insofar

as it is

apprehended

by any

cognitive faculty

and

serves

as an

object

for that faculty.

See her

Psychology: sou l

and

intellect,

in

Peter Adamson

and Richard C. Taylor, ed..The Cambridge Com panion t Arabic Phitosophy

(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 308-336,

at311.

Finally, this

treatment of intentional being is a pillar of Eleonore Stump's cognitive

science-styled reading

and

treatment

of

Thomas's theory

of

cognition.

See

especiallyherAquinas (Londonand New York: Routledge, 2003), especially

chapters 6 cind 7. Also, see her very useful Aquinas's Account of the

Mechanisms

of

Intellective Cognition,

Revue intemationate de philosophie

52 (1998), 287-307.

I

notice that treating intention

as

aspec t aligns with

the

third

generaluse of

intention

(after the notions pertaining to attention and

willing respec tively) given in DeFerrari's massive Lexicon; it can be

rendered

as

aspect, notion,

or

relation,

and it is

this meaning

of

intention as Thomas uses it that I am concerned with here. See Roy J.

DeFerrari

and

Sister M. Inviolata Barry, with Ignatius McGuiness,

A Lexicon

of St. Thomas Aquinas (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America

Press,

1948), 584.

^ For

example, omnis cognitio

est per

speciem aliquam,

per

cujus

informationem fit assimilatio cognoscentisad remcognitam. . . . Estetiam

quaedam assimilatioperinformationem, quae requirituradcognitionem. See

Scriptum super Sententiis Petri Lombardi, inS. Thomae Opera Omnia

(Parma: Typis Petri Fiaccadori, 1858), book

1,

distinction

34,

question

3,

article

1

response

to

ob jection

4.

Hereafter

InSent.


21/27

ESSE INTENTION LE ND THE COGNITIVE

78

This rendering ofintentio as informational content fits well with

Haldane's view that the world is intrinsically intelligible, or able to be

known. Esse intentionale exists outside a cognitive power and

contains information that is not actually known.* Thought is

intrinsically representational, then, because esse intentionale

becomes actually knowable insofar as it becomes cognitive.

Construing intentio as an informational aspect of things

somewhat naturalizes esse intentionale Calling esse intentionale

information does not by itself unpack the notion, but my goal is to

shift the use of the term toward cognate notions in the idiom of

current cognitive studies. Thomas was no cognitive scientist, but it is

not a stretch to find easy comparisons between his teaching Eind

contemporary talk of information transfer. When discussing the

animal estimative power, Thomas says that a sheep perceives this

colored object under the content or formal aspect of natural enemy.

Here is the passage in full:

[I]f an animal were m oved by pleasinganddisagreeable things only

as affecting thesense, there w ouldbe noneedto suppose thatan

animal hasapow er besidestheapprehensionofthose forms which

the senses perceive,and in which the animal takes pleasure,or

from which

it

shrinks with horror. But the animal needs

to

seek

or

to avoid certain things, not only because they are pleasing or

otherwiseto thesenses,butalsoonaccount of other advantages

and uses, or disadvantages: justas the sheep runs away whenit

seesa wolf, not onaccountofits colororshape, but,as itwere,as

a natural enemy:andsimilarly,abird gathers together straws,not

because theyarepleasantto thesense,butbecause theyareuseful

for building its nest. Animals, therefore, need to perceive such

intentions, whichtheexterior sense doesnotperceive. Andsome

distinct principle is necessary for this; since the perception of

sensible forms comes by a modification caused by the sensible

thing, which is not the case with the perception of those

intentions.

* This view also pays heed to Thomas's teaching that thenaturesof

material thingsare potentially intelligible; see forexample,ST 1.79.3,ad 3:

The intelligible in act is not something existing in the nature of things,

speaking aboutthenatureofsensible things, whichdo notsubsist outsideof

matter. (Intelligibile autem inactunon estaliquid existensinrerum natura,

qucintum ad naturam rerum sensibilium, quae non subsistunt praeter

materiam.)

si

animal moveretur solum propter delectabile

et

contristabile

secundum sensum, non esset necessarium poner in animali nisi


22/27

78 ROBBIE MOSER

The presentation of

intentiones

in sensory cognition seem s to me

to suggest the following sort of picture: A certain material thing, in

virtue of its formal structure, transmits or contains a particular and

accessible signal. The various receptive cognitive powers among

various cognitive beings, however, are not all the same kind of

receiver. Because animals are of different kinds, and because

cognitive powers are of different formal configurations, various

powers in various animals are differently suited (or not) to receive

specific information from any given material thing. The sheep, in

Thomas's example, unlike certain species of bird, passes over a great

deal of straw, never perceiving it imder the informational aspect of

nest building material. A sheep perceives othe r different

informational aspects of its environment, such as the presence and

danger of wolves. A sheep n m s from awolf however, not because of

the wo lfs color or shape, but because of a further aspect of the w olfs

being in relation to the sheep: the aspect or intentio of natural

enemy. *

Since the estimative pow er is suited to receive signals of precisely

this sort, and since it is thoroughly a sensory power, this claim does

not comm it us to any sort of view that animals use con cepts. The

intentio of natural enemy is not a concept in the shee p, bu t is

known, in a way, by instinct. Robert Pasnau s tress es that thequasi in

apprehensionem formarum quas percipit sensus, in quibus delectatur aut

horret. Sed necessarium est animali ut quaerat aliqua vel fugiat, non solimi

quia sunt convenientiavelnon convenientia ad sentiendum, sed etiam propter

aliquas alias commoditates et utilitates, sive nocumenta, sicut ovis videns

lupum venientem fugit, non propter indecentiam coloris velfigurae sed quasi

inimicum naturae; et similiter avis colligit paleam, non quia delectet sensimi,

sed quia est utilis ad nidificandum. Necessarium est ergo animali quod

percipiat huiusmodi intentiones, quas non percipit sensus exterior. Et huius

perceptionis oportet esse aliquod aliud principium, cum perceptio formarum

sensibilium sit ex immutatione sensibilis, non autem perceptio intentionum

praedictarum. T1.78.4.

See Stephen Theron's remark that this shows that the apprehension of

intentionesis not, therefore, a matter of mechanical causality. Nofeature of

the wolfs image on its retina automatically makes a sheep's feet itch; we are

offered the doctrine of the

vis aestimativa

as armal approximation to

prudence. See his Intentionality, Immateriality and Understanding in

Aquinas, Heythrop Journal3 (1989):

150-9,

at

151.


23/27

ESSE INTENTION LE

AND THE

COG NITIVE

78

quasi inimicum naturae

is

crucial.

It is a

manner

of

speaking that

the sheep perceives enemy

in the wolf,

since

the

sheep behaves

as

i f quasi)

the

wolf

is its

enemy,

and so

perceives natural enemy

as

it were. This terminology

is

indeed

due to our

description

of

what

the sheep does in the presence of the wolf. Along the same line,

Thom as himself is cautious

not to

say that the intentio

in the

sense

is a

concept;

it is,

after

all, in the

sense

and not the

intellect. Still,

in his

discussionof the estimative/cogitative power,it is clear that Thomas

thinks

of

intentiones

as

high-level sensory inform ation. Being

inimical

is

information really present

in the wolf, but not

actualized

(actually sensed) until brought into sensible beingby contact witha

sensory power equipped

to

exploit

it. An ant, for

example, does

not

run froma wolf, andthisisbecausethe ant is notequippedorsuitedto

receive this information from

the wolf, and

this

is in

turn expressed

as

saying that this

is

because

the

wolf

is not the

ant's natural enemy:

the

ant doesnotperceivetheintentio of natural enemy in the wolf. The

information present

in the

wolf vis--vis

the

sheep, however,

is,

realizedin thesheep with informative con tent: enemy.

The sheep

and ant

cases

are, it

seems

to me,

just instances

of

Thomas's more general view that only ceriain aspects

of our

natural

environmentareaccessibletoceriain cognitive powers. Forexample,

the

eye, but not the ear,

perceives color. This again

is an

instance

of

his more general view tha t knowledgeisaccordingto themodeofthe

knower,

and the

receiving-transmitting analogy seems like

a

fruitful,

albeit anachronistic, point

of

view

to

help understand this doctrine.

Consider T hom as saying the following:

Knowledge

is

regulated according

as the

thing known

is in the

knower.

But the

thing known

is in the

knower according

to the

See Robert Pasnau's translation

of

Thomas Aquinas, TheTreatise

o

Human Nature,trans. Robert Pasnau (Indianapolis: Hackett,

2002),283.

I am

grateful

to

Graeme Hunter

for

drawing this part

of

Pasnau's text

to my

attention.

^See Pasnau commenting onInDA2, lect.13: The sheep does

not

even

recognizeitsoffspringassuchit lackstheconcept

offspring

utmerely

recognizes

it

as something to be nursed. And

this,

moreover, is not to say that

the sheep

has the

concept

of

nursing,

but

only

to say

that

the

appropriate

sensory input triggers a desire to nurse, and consequently triggers the

appropriate action. Robert Pasnau, Thomas Aquinas

o

Human Nature

(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002),

271.

See also,

for

example,InDA

2,

lect. 13.


24/27

78 ROBBIE MOSER

mode of the knower. Hence the knowledge of every knower is

according to the know er's own nature. If therefore the mode of

anything's being exceeds the mode of the knower, it must be that

the knowledge of the object is above the natu re of the ^

We might describe what Thomas is saying like so: If there are

signals sent out from a transmitter that go beyond the capacity of a

certain receiver to exploit (decode, acknowledge, and so on), then

those signals go unheeded; the receiver is indifferent to them, and they

are, as it we re, beyond the receiver or above the nature of the

know er. On the othe r hand, whatever is received in the cognitive

pow er is precisely fit to be so received: as Thomas says, The pow er of

knowledge is proportioned to knowable object , ' or put another way,

the object of knowledge is proportio nate to th e po wer of

knowledge.' * As such, humans only receive what their cognitive

power is suited (as it were, hard-wired) to receive.''^ Thus certain

aspects of a thing's nature will pass by our unaided sensory powers,

jus t as wolves pass by ants unnoticed.

I am not here giving an account of how and in what precise way

the form in the mind is a representational likeness of the form in the

world, as if we were looking for a pictorial-relational mapping or

isomorphism . While such attem pts exist offered mainly in response

to and in keeping with Haldane's general contention that mind and

world are isomorphic in representation' I am intereste d only in

Cognitio enim contingit secundum quod cognitum est in cognoscente.

Cognitum autem est in cognoscente secundum modum cognoscentis. Unde

cuiuslibet cognoscentis cognitio est secundum m odum sua e naturae. Si igitur

modus essendi alicuius rei cognitae excdt modimi naturae cognoscentis,

oportet quod cognitio illius rei sit supra naturam illius cognoscentis. ST

1.12.4.

Potentia cognoscitiva proportionatur cognoscibili. ST

1.84.7.

Obiectum cognoscibile pro portio natu r virtuti cognoscitivae.

ST

1.85.1.

See Gerard Casey: the (passive) pow ers embodied in physical energy

interchanges can be realised only in their assimilation by the (active) powers

of the app ropria te receivers. See his Immateriality and Intentionality (109).

^ See especially Stephen Pim entel, Formal Identity as Isomorphism in

Thomistic Philosophy of Mind, ntelligence and the Phitosophy of

Mind

Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association 80 (Virginia:

Philosophy Documentation Center, 2006), 115-26; See also Jonathan Jacobs

and John Zeis, Form and C ognition: How to Go Out of Your

Mind,

Monist 80

(1997): 539-57.


25/27

ESSE INTENTIONALE AN D THE OOGNITIVE 8

displaying howesse intentionale might plausibly exist as a feature of

extramental reality, and further, how it can be construed in Thomistic

terms as an informational mode of being that becomes

represen tational when exploited by the cognitive agent.

I think H aldane, for one, could agree to the foregoing pictu re. He

says thought is the exercise of a cognitive capacity of the person as he

or she absorbs intelligible aspects of their material and social

environmen t. As I see it, Thom as holds that a cognitive capacity is

exercised when esse intentionale existing in esse materiali is

rendered immaterial, and the informational aspects in things become

representations in the knower. Intentional being und erstood as

informational can be presented (i) in a knower as a

sui generis

intrinsic mode of represen tation, and (ii) in extram ental reality as an

informational and accessible aspe ct that can be exp loited by cognizant

beings. This seem s like a perspic uou s way to describe and present

Thomas's and Haldane's shared insight that the world is intelligible

and that thought, in turn, is representation al.

V

My purpose in this paper was to explain why esse intentionale

cannot be the defining mark of cognition, and thus to offer a

correction to John Haldane's and others' distinction between mind and

world in their prese ntation s of a Thom istic theory of cognition. I

suggested that if we follow Thomas in the view that the

representational is the mark of the cognitive, then we must present

this with Thomas as esse intentionale existing in its imm aterial and

perfec ted m ode of being. Looking for any more of a hard break

between the cognitive and noncognitive situates us squarely in a

Cartesian problem atic. I then offered a picture of extramental

intentions as informational aspects of things detectable by knowers.

This picture seems amenable with Haldane's general and broader

commitments to the intelligibility of the world and the intrinsic

representation or intentionality of the cognitive as such.

Haldane, Whose Theory? Which Representations?

acific

hilosophical Qu arterly74 (1993): 254.


26/27

88 ROBBIE MOSER

Before closing, I want to note that I do not take Thomas to be a

Platonist about the entities and features involved in human cognition.

While I am talking of informational aspects of extramental being that

are cognitively accessed, I am not saying that for Thomas the

intentional is a realm of being entirely separate from things that

som ehow enables cognition of things. I take it that Thom as would

reject the idea that there is an entirely separate intentional or

informational realm for the same reasons as he rejects Platonism,

namely, because then science would be not about bodies but about

separate intentional species, and because, since the immaterial

substances are of an altogether different nature from material things,

such knowledge would in no way entail or guarantee knowledge of

material things.'^ Thomas's rejection of Platonism can be seen, in part,

as an affirmation thatesse intentionale is an aspec t of the being of real

things, an aspect that becomes representational when exploited by a

cognitive pow er.

Most importantly, though, is that this presentation squares with

Thomas's texts and with more current ambitions to present Thomism

as anything like a viable option in defending a realist philosophy of

mind. By the latter, I have in mind a broad project t o describe the

world as being intrinsically intelligible and the mind as being

intrinsically represen tation al. By the former, I have in mind

Thomas's distinction between grades of esse intentionale and his

teaching that esse intentionale may exist in the noncognizant medium

in a potentially intelligible mode of being: it is potentially intelligible

for the same reason that any other feature of the extramental is

potentially intelligible, namely, that it is to some degree material.

CanisiusCollege

'^^SeeST 1.84.1, wh ere he disagrees with P lato's view that th e soul k now s

only through its knowledge of separate imm aterial and intelligible substcmces.

^ I am indebted to Antoine Ct, Lawrence Dewan, Paul Forster, and

Graeme Hunter for thoughtful and thorough comments on previous drafts. I

would also like to extend thanks to the judges of the Philosophy Education

Society's 2009 Dissertation Competition and to the editors of the Review of

Metaphysicsfor their many useful suggestions and amendments.


27/27

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