Abstract
The commentary on Aristotle’s zoological works by Pseudo-Peter of Spain is one of the few texts in which a late-medieval author develops an innovative account of universal cognition. This capacity was usually taken to be a prerogative of the intellect of humans, angels, and God. However, according to Pseudo-Peter, there are good arguments to claim that nonhuman animals cognise universally insofar as they do, for instance, identify individuals on the basis of what he calls ‘common forms’ (formae communes). Moreover, he argues that the kind of intentions they grasp (e.g. the hostility of a wolf) are some sort of intermediary between individual and universal intentions. For this reason, he suggests calling them ‘elevated intentions’ (intentiones elevatas). Thus, he revises the traditional concept of intentions and broadens the rather narrow concept of universal cognition such that it can accommodate the various cognitive achievements of nonhuman animals. This is something rarely seen in the medieval discussion of animal cognition.
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Notes
- 1.
- 2.
For the latest critical edition, see Peter of Spain, Questiones super libro ‘De Animalibus’ Aristotelis, ed. Navarro Sánchez (2015).
- 3.
See Köhler (2000), 255; (2008), 24–26; (2014), 361. According to Köhler (2008), 25n64, there are two versions of the text, a Venetian and a Florentine redaction. However, both of them are based on the same questions by the same master. The present selection is taken from the former. A transcription was kindly provided by Theodor W. Köhler.
- 4.
- 5.
On the medieval notion of intentions, see texts 3, 4, 5 and 11.
- 6.
On this ‘aspectus mutuus,’ see Köhler (2014), 306.
- 7.
E.g. the ‘species’ of patients with particular symptoms such as fever.
- 8.
Literally, ‘adamans’ means ‘diamond’ or ‘steel’. However, it was commonly applied to the magnetic material that separates, for instance, iron from gold; see Sander (2020), 26–28.
- 9.
I.e. the individual substance or simply the individual.
- 10.
Avicenna Latinus, Liber de anima I.5, ed. Van Riet (1972), 94 f.
- 11.
This might refer to Algazel, Metaphysica IV.5, ed. Muckle (1933), 173–175.
- 12.
Averroes, Commentarium magnum in Aristotelis De anima II.65, ed. Crawford (1953), 227–229.
- 13.
The basic idea here is that, from one model of a net, a spider builds many particular nets.
- 14.
What Ps.-Peter possibly has in mind here is Porphyry’s definition of an individual as unique collection of properties; see Porphyry, Isagoge 7.22–24, ed. Minio-Paluello (1966), 13f.
- 15.
See note 12.
- 16.
See note 10.
- 17.
See note 11.
- 18.
It was common to interpret Aristotle’s theory of the intellect in this way, but there is no passage in his writings in which he clearly makes such a claim.
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Oelze, A. (2021). Universal Cognition (Pseudo-Peterof Spain, Commentum super libros De animalibus VIII). In: Animal Minds in Medieval Latin Philosophy. Studies in the History of Philosophy of Mind, vol 27. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-67012-2_9
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