The matter of mind: Aristotle on the biology of ‘psychic’ processes and the bodily aspects of thinking

Abstract

PSYCHOLOGY, BIOLOGY, AND VARIATIONS IN COGNITIVE PERFORMANCES Although Aristotle's On the Soul ( De anima ) has for centuries been regarded as a ‘metaphysical’ rather than a ‘physical’, or as a ‘philosophical’ rather than a ‘scientific’, work, there seems nowadays to be a consensus among students of his psychology as to the thoroughly biological status of the theory set forth there. This may have to do with recent developments in the philosophy of mind, but it is probably also related to a reassessment of the importance of Aristotle's zoological writings (i.e. History of Animals (Hist. an.), Parts of Animals (Part. an.), Generation of Animals (Gen. an.), Progression of Animals (De incessu animalium, IA ) and Movement of Animals (De motu an. )) and to a growing conviction among students of Aristotle's biology concerning the interrelatedness of what were traditionally called the ‘psychological writings’ of Aristotle (i.e. On the Soul and parts of the Parva naturalia ) and the zoological works. There also seems to be a general agreement as to the basic consistency of Aristotle's psychological theory, or at least a tendency to explain apparent contradictions between On the Soul and the Parva naturalia on the one hand, and statements related to the soul in the zoological writings on the other (or between On the Soul and the Parva naturalia , or between different sections of the Parva naturalia ) as the result of differences of method, approach, or argumentative strategy of particular treatises or contexts rather than in terms of a development in Aristotle's psychological ideas.