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On the Soul: And Other Psychological Works
What is the nature of the soul? It is this question that Aristotle sought to answer in De Anima (On the Soul). In doing so he offers a psychological theory that encompasses not only human beings but all living beings. Its basic thesis, that the soul is the form of an organic body, sets it in sharp contrast with both Pre-Socratic physicalism and Platonic dualism. On the Soul contains Aristotle's definition of the soul, and his explanations of nutrition, perception, cognition, and animal self-motion.
The general theory in De Anima is augmented in the shorter works of Parva Naturalia, which deal with perception, memory and recollection, sleep and dreams, longevity, life-cycles, and psycho-physiology.
This new translation brings together all of Aristotle's extant and complementary psychological works, and adds as a supplement ancient testimony concerning his lost writings dealing with the soul. The introduction by Fred D. Miller, Jr. explains the central place of the soul in Aristotle's natural science, the unifying themes of his psychological theory, and his continuing relevance for modern philosophy and psychology.
The general theory in De Anima is augmented in the shorter works of Parva Naturalia, which deal with perception, memory and recollection, sleep and dreams, longevity, life-cycles, and psycho-physiology.
This new translation brings together all of Aristotle's extant and complementary psychological works, and adds as a supplement ancient testimony concerning his lost writings dealing with the soul. The introduction by Fred D. Miller, Jr. explains the central place of the soul in Aristotle's natural science, the unifying themes of his psychological theory, and his continuing relevance for modern philosophy and psychology.
352 pages, Paperback
Published July 24, 2018
20 people are currently reading
126 people want to read
About the author
Aristotle
4,358 books5,623 followersAristotle (Greek: Αριστοτέλης; 384–322 BC) was an Ancient Greek philosopher and polymath. His writings cover a broad range of subjects spanning the natural sciences, philosophy, linguistics, economics, politics, psychology, and the arts. As the founder of the Peripatetic school of philosophy in the Lyceum in Athens, he began the wider Aristotelian tradition that followed, which set the groundwork for the development of modern science.
Little is known about Aristotle's life. He was born in the city of Stagira in northern Greece during the Classical period. His father, Nicomachus, died when Aristotle was a child, and he was brought up by a guardian. At 17 or 18, he joined Plato's Academy in Athens and remained there until the age of 37 (c. 347 BC). Shortly after Plato died, Aristotle left Athens and, at the request of Philip II of Macedon, tutored his son Alexander the Great beginning in 343 BC. He established a library in the Lyceum, which helped him to produce many of his hundreds of books on papyrus scrolls.
Though Aristotle wrote many treatises and dialogues for publication, only around a third of his original output has survived, none of it intended for publication. Aristotle provided a complex synthesis of the various philosophies existing prior to him. His teachings and methods of inquiry have had a significant impact across the world, and remain a subject of contemporary philosophical discussion.
Aristotle's views profoundly shaped medieval scholarship. The influence of his physical science extended from late antiquity and the Early Middle Ages into the Renaissance, and was not replaced systematically until the Enlightenment and theories such as classical mechanics were developed. He influenced Judeo-Islamic philosophies during the Middle Ages, as well as Christian theology, especially the Neoplatonism of the Early Church and the scholastic tradition of the Catholic Church.
Aristotle was revered among medieval Muslim scholars as "The First Teacher", and among medieval Christians like Thomas Aquinas as simply "The Philosopher", while the poet Dante Alighieri called him "the master of those who know". His works contain the earliest known formal study of logic, and were studied by medieval scholars such as Pierre Abélard and Jean Buridan. Aristotle's influence on logic continued well into the 19th century. In addition, his ethics, although always influential, gained renewed interest with the modern advent of virtue ethics.
Little is known about Aristotle's life. He was born in the city of Stagira in northern Greece during the Classical period. His father, Nicomachus, died when Aristotle was a child, and he was brought up by a guardian. At 17 or 18, he joined Plato's Academy in Athens and remained there until the age of 37 (c. 347 BC). Shortly after Plato died, Aristotle left Athens and, at the request of Philip II of Macedon, tutored his son Alexander the Great beginning in 343 BC. He established a library in the Lyceum, which helped him to produce many of his hundreds of books on papyrus scrolls.
Though Aristotle wrote many treatises and dialogues for publication, only around a third of his original output has survived, none of it intended for publication. Aristotle provided a complex synthesis of the various philosophies existing prior to him. His teachings and methods of inquiry have had a significant impact across the world, and remain a subject of contemporary philosophical discussion.
Aristotle's views profoundly shaped medieval scholarship. The influence of his physical science extended from late antiquity and the Early Middle Ages into the Renaissance, and was not replaced systematically until the Enlightenment and theories such as classical mechanics were developed. He influenced Judeo-Islamic philosophies during the Middle Ages, as well as Christian theology, especially the Neoplatonism of the Early Church and the scholastic tradition of the Catholic Church.
Aristotle was revered among medieval Muslim scholars as "The First Teacher", and among medieval Christians like Thomas Aquinas as simply "The Philosopher", while the poet Dante Alighieri called him "the master of those who know". His works contain the earliest known formal study of logic, and were studied by medieval scholars such as Pierre Abélard and Jean Buridan. Aristotle's influence on logic continued well into the 19th century. In addition, his ethics, although always influential, gained renewed interest with the modern advent of virtue ethics.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
July 22, 2019
*3.5 stars. This is one I’d like to re-read with a highlighter and something to take notes with. Aristotle ponders questions that I didn’t even think to ask. I really enjoyed reading this.
November 15, 2024
Make sure you have your Big Boy Philospher pants on for this one. You're about to embark on an attempt to disentagle epistemology, psychology and (pre-scientific) biology all wadded up in a ball of lecture notes composed originally in Classical Greek.
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February 14, 2021BRUTAL read.
August 8, 2021
"... it is, in every respect and every way, one of the most difficult things to reach any conviction concerning the soul."
So starts Aristotle in De Anima, one of the first attempts to scientifically investigate psychological phenomena. We should be wary that even the "master of those who know" is genuinely perplexed at how to investigate the mind, and temper our expectations accordingly - the insights in this work, though sometimes dazzling, are often of a lesser order than those seen in more comprehensive tomes such as the Nichomachean Ethics or Metaphysics.
One issue I personally had was that many concepts central to properly understanding this work are poorly defined. For instance, Book II is mostly dedicated to investigating the five kinds of sense-perceptions, namely sight, hearing, touch, taste, and smell. He investigates the relationship between each type of sense-perception and how it relates to a corresponding organ, such as the eyes and ears. Then, in the start of Book III, he concludes that there are no more than five senses because we don't appear to have any additional sense-organs. But wait a minute, how do we know that we only have five sense-organs? How are they defined, and what constitutes them? Is not our sense of balance a type of sense? And why does our sense of touch seem to encompass so many distinct elements, such as temperature and pressure, which appear to be distinct percepts? Aristotle touches on some of these questions, but does not seem to answer them definitively. As a consequence, Aristotle's general conclusions in De Anima are, as noted in the introduction, some of the most hotly debated interpretational issues in his entire corpus.
Things are not all doom and gloom, however, as a weaker work of Aristotle can still contain remarkable insights. For instance, he correctly deduces that the medium of sound is air, that the medium for smell was still unidentified (chemicals giving rise to odours were not discovered until millennia later), and that a similar force underlies moving towards appetitive and away from aversive stimuli (motivation). These insights lead me to believe that if Aristotle treated De Anima as rigourously as, say, his Physics, then psychology would have emerged as a scientific discipline much sooner than it actually did.
An additional point of consternation for me was due to the specific copy of De Anima I received. Although Oxford World's Classics is generally exceptional in terms of printing, pages 5 - 20 are notably absent (the book appears to have been printed and bound fine, but these pages are just not there). The missing section in question was a survey of previous theories on the soul, which would have been helpful contextual information, as Aristotle continues to reference previous thinkers throughout the work.
So starts Aristotle in De Anima, one of the first attempts to scientifically investigate psychological phenomena. We should be wary that even the "master of those who know" is genuinely perplexed at how to investigate the mind, and temper our expectations accordingly - the insights in this work, though sometimes dazzling, are often of a lesser order than those seen in more comprehensive tomes such as the Nichomachean Ethics or Metaphysics.
One issue I personally had was that many concepts central to properly understanding this work are poorly defined. For instance, Book II is mostly dedicated to investigating the five kinds of sense-perceptions, namely sight, hearing, touch, taste, and smell. He investigates the relationship between each type of sense-perception and how it relates to a corresponding organ, such as the eyes and ears. Then, in the start of Book III, he concludes that there are no more than five senses because we don't appear to have any additional sense-organs. But wait a minute, how do we know that we only have five sense-organs? How are they defined, and what constitutes them? Is not our sense of balance a type of sense? And why does our sense of touch seem to encompass so many distinct elements, such as temperature and pressure, which appear to be distinct percepts? Aristotle touches on some of these questions, but does not seem to answer them definitively. As a consequence, Aristotle's general conclusions in De Anima are, as noted in the introduction, some of the most hotly debated interpretational issues in his entire corpus.
Things are not all doom and gloom, however, as a weaker work of Aristotle can still contain remarkable insights. For instance, he correctly deduces that the medium of sound is air, that the medium for smell was still unidentified (chemicals giving rise to odours were not discovered until millennia later), and that a similar force underlies moving towards appetitive and away from aversive stimuli (motivation). These insights lead me to believe that if Aristotle treated De Anima as rigourously as, say, his Physics, then psychology would have emerged as a scientific discipline much sooner than it actually did.
An additional point of consternation for me was due to the specific copy of De Anima I received. Although Oxford World's Classics is generally exceptional in terms of printing, pages 5 - 20 are notably absent (the book appears to have been printed and bound fine, but these pages are just not there). The missing section in question was a survey of previous theories on the soul, which would have been helpful contextual information, as Aristotle continues to reference previous thinkers throughout the work.
December 28, 2024
Q1. How did I find this book?
A1. I was browsing the parapsychology aisle in my local library. The keyword, soul, caught my attention, so I grabbed it to see if I could find any content related to lucid dreaming or sleep (which I did).
Q2. What's my quick take?
A2. First, I gather that translating Ancient Greek to English is a very difficult task. Reading this book was a grind; it felt like my brain was wrung like a wet towel on every single sentence. Super hard to absorb anything, so after a while, I only scanned the text.
However, the questions and a few statements about sleep and dreaming were thought-provoking. I appreciated that Aristotle was asking deep questions about these topics, and he reminded me that questioning (the soul and everything else around us) will continue throughout history as long as philosophy stays alive.
Q3. How many quotes did I document?
A3. Only 6 about sleep and dreaming.
Q4. Would I re-read this book?
A4. Definitely not in the waking state (see Q2), but I'd be open to doing so in the dream world.
A1. I was browsing the parapsychology aisle in my local library. The keyword, soul, caught my attention, so I grabbed it to see if I could find any content related to lucid dreaming or sleep (which I did).
Q2. What's my quick take?
A2. First, I gather that translating Ancient Greek to English is a very difficult task. Reading this book was a grind; it felt like my brain was wrung like a wet towel on every single sentence. Super hard to absorb anything, so after a while, I only scanned the text.
However, the questions and a few statements about sleep and dreaming were thought-provoking. I appreciated that Aristotle was asking deep questions about these topics, and he reminded me that questioning (the soul and everything else around us) will continue throughout history as long as philosophy stays alive.
Q3. How many quotes did I document?
A3. Only 6 about sleep and dreaming.
Q4. Would I re-read this book?
A4. Definitely not in the waking state (see Q2), but I'd be open to doing so in the dream world.
January 6, 2021
For those who think they will find something profound in this book...they will not. I'm not sure if it's Aristotle's fault or the fault of the translator, but some sentences are just incomprehensible. I'm sure it was useful 2,200 years ago but for this day and age I didn't really benefit from this.
October 2, 2024
This should be part of a series where scholars comb through the works of multiple people to provide a coherent introductory chapter summarizing their psychological insights and then the original texts.
July 12, 2022
Very interesting but very difficult to follow.
October 16, 2023
Again good stuff just not a fun read.
February 5, 2023
It is about soul.
Alike is known by the like
The name Timaeus is boy's name of Greek, Latin origin meaning "honor". Timaeus is an ancient name that appears in both Plato's Dialogues and in the New Testament.
The Animal Self comprehends with itself all intelligible animals, just as the cosmos is made up of us and all other the visible creatures.
Aristotle initial summary indicates that the Animal Itself is composed of mathematical forms.That form of one together with the primary length, breadth and depth.
The summary goes on to identify four stages of the soul.
-Thought
-Knowledge
-Opinion
-Perception
Respectively with
1 one(monad, a single unit; the number one.)
2 dyiad(number of the line)
3 three (number of a plane scape/area )
4 four (number of solid)
Soul can be moved in four ways:
-locomotion
-alternation
-diminution
-growth
We say that the soul -feels pain -enjoys -is bold -is afraid, that is angry, preserves and cogitates. All of these are believed to be kinds of movements.
If there is perception, there is also pain and pleasure, whenever they are present there must be appetite.
Soul is capable of knowing, in another of the think capable of healthy. The soul, further is primary that which we live and perceive and recognize. Hence the soul is sort of arrangement and form, but not the matter and underline subject.
Three factors are involved:
-That which is nourished (nourishment)
-That by which is nourished (body which poses the soul)
- That that does nourishing (primary soul)
To grow and exist are virtues of the soul
Virtues of the human soul are Purity, Peace, Love, Joy, Bliss, Powers, and Knowledge. Soul virtues are growth and existence.
Domestic animals are domestic because they can be taught according to your own virtues of Christian/believer.
According to Aristotle Soul is Heart, from Greek to Latin and vice versa
1) gives life to a tree,
2) the animal gives life and feelings,
3) Man gives life, and feelings, and to be reasonable-logical-wise.
According to Socrates (by Plato) Immortal Soul is consciousness,, thinking.
Many people see me not as a historian but as philosophy and I do prefer historians identify, and knowledge. Although I do enjoy to think about wisdom of thought, that others artistically figured out.
Alike is known by the like
The name Timaeus is boy's name of Greek, Latin origin meaning "honor". Timaeus is an ancient name that appears in both Plato's Dialogues and in the New Testament.
The Animal Self comprehends with itself all intelligible animals, just as the cosmos is made up of us and all other the visible creatures.
Aristotle initial summary indicates that the Animal Itself is composed of mathematical forms.That form of one together with the primary length, breadth and depth.
The summary goes on to identify four stages of the soul.
-Thought
-Knowledge
-Opinion
-Perception
Respectively with
1 one(monad, a single unit; the number one.)
2 dyiad(number of the line)
3 three (number of a plane scape/area )
4 four (number of solid)
Soul can be moved in four ways:
-locomotion
-alternation
-diminution
-growth
We say that the soul -feels pain -enjoys -is bold -is afraid, that is angry, preserves and cogitates. All of these are believed to be kinds of movements.
If there is perception, there is also pain and pleasure, whenever they are present there must be appetite.
Soul is capable of knowing, in another of the think capable of healthy. The soul, further is primary that which we live and perceive and recognize. Hence the soul is sort of arrangement and form, but not the matter and underline subject.
Three factors are involved:
-That which is nourished (nourishment)
-That by which is nourished (body which poses the soul)
- That that does nourishing (primary soul)
To grow and exist are virtues of the soul
Virtues of the human soul are Purity, Peace, Love, Joy, Bliss, Powers, and Knowledge. Soul virtues are growth and existence.
Domestic animals are domestic because they can be taught according to your own virtues of Christian/believer.
According to Aristotle Soul is Heart, from Greek to Latin and vice versa
1) gives life to a tree,
2) the animal gives life and feelings,
3) Man gives life, and feelings, and to be reasonable-logical-wise.
According to Socrates (by Plato) Immortal Soul is consciousness,, thinking.
Many people see me not as a historian but as philosophy and I do prefer historians identify, and knowledge. Although I do enjoy to think about wisdom of thought, that others artistically figured out.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews