Han Thomas Adriaenssen, Rijksuniversiteit Groningen: “Memory as a Cognitive Habit in Olivi, Auriol and Ockham”
According to the Franciscan thinker Peter Auriol, the concept of habit provides a key to analyzing human recordative cognition. Memory, he explains in his Scriptum, is essentially a habit or disposition to cognitively engage with objects that, at an earlier moment of time, were objects of sense perception (Scriptum 3.14). In laying out and refining this idea, Auriol provides brief critical discussions of contemporary analyses of mnemonic cognition. Although he does not name his opponents here, I show that Peter John Olivi is a plausible target for Auriol’s critique. Also, I argue that Auriol’s understanding of what a habit is, is a driving force behind his disagreement with Olivi.
Cognitive habits, Auriol maintains, pertain to the exact same objects as the acts of perception that caused them. The cognitive habit that allows me to recall my father to mind, for example, pertains to the exact same object as the perceptual engagement with my father that engendered this habit. But this Olivi cannot say. For whereas acts of perception pertain to external objects, Olivi holds that acts of memory are directed at inner images or species. On Olivi’s species theory of recordative cognition, therefore, the analysis of memory as a cognitive habit collapses. Otherwise put, what Auriol objects to Olivi, is that with his analysis of recollection in terms of species, he cannot do justice to what recollection essentially is: a cognitive habit.
In the final part of the paper, I show that strikingly similar considerations are at work in the younger Ockham’s theory of memory. The early Ockham’s account of memory as a cognitive habit needs to be understood in the light of his discussion of God’s understanding of his creatures before the act of creating. This discussion has not always been understood properly, but once it is given due attention, we see that Ockham’s analysis of memory as a cognitive habit looks uncannily similar to Auriol’s. Also, we will see how this analysis leads Ockham to critically engage with species theories of recollection much in the way in which Auriol had. Looking at their respective analyses of recollection as a cognitive habit will thus reveal similarities between Auriol and the younger Ockham that have hitherto gone unnoticed.
Pascale Bermon, Laboratoire d’Etudes sur les Monothéismes : "Conceptions médiévales de la science. L'habitus de science d'Henri de Gand à Grégoire de Rimini"
Isabelle Bochet, Laboratoire d’Etudes sur les Monothéismes (Institut d'études augustiniennes) : “Habitus selon Augustin: tradition philosophique et exégèse biblique”
Augustin désigne par le terme habitus des caractères durables, qui ne sont pas donnés d’emblée mais acquis, et qui relèvent de la catégorie des « accidents ». Il établit explicitement la correspondance entre habitus et ἕξις : ἕξις habitus est, ab eo quod est habere (In Ps. 118, s. 11, 6; cf. diu. qu. 73). Le terme est employé par Augustin avec des nuances diverses : état, apparaître extérieur, capacité, comportement, habitude.
Dans le De diuersis quaestionibus 83 (qu. 73), Augustin distingue trois sortes d’habitus : habitus animi (dans le cas de l’acquisition d’un savoir, par exemple), habitus corporis (par exemple, la robustesse), habitus eorum quae membris nostris accommodantur extrinsecus (dans le cas des vêtements, des chaussures, d’une armure, etc.) ; il examine en chaque cas ce qui est ou non sujet à modification dans l’acquisition d’un habitus. Le but d’Augustin est de pouvoir interpréter de façon satisfaisante l’expression de Ph 2, 7 qui est appliquée au Christ : et habitu inuentus ut homo. Il s’agit d’exclure toute altération de la divinité du Christ dans son incarnation. Il note qu’en ce cas, habitus correspond non à ἕξις, mais à σχῆμα (diu. qu. 73, 2).
Le but de l’étude sera de rechercher, de façon précise, les sources philosophiques d’Augustin et la manière dont les questions exégétiques et théologiques le conduisent à infléchir l’usage du terme habitus ou à en faire un emploi spécifique.
Olivier Boulnois, Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes-Laboratoire d'Etudes sur les Monothéismes : "Habitus et liberté"
Si l’on définit la liberté comme le pouvoir d’accomplir ou de ne pas accomplir une action, l’existence des habitus pose un problème. En effet, si un acte est causé par autre chose que mon choix, je n’en suis pas responsable. Mais si l’habitus est le principe de mon action, en quoi ai-je le contrôle de celle-ci ? Suis-je prisonnier de mes habitus ?
Rolf Darge, Universität Salzburg: “As one is disposed, so the goal appears to him: On the Function of Moral Habits according to Thomas Aquinas”
My paper examines a fundamental part of Aquinas’ doctrine of the function of moral habits in the constitution of action. This part includes the following basic thoughts:
1. Moral habits (habitus) are not “habits” in the common sense (consuetudo), which entail an automated, unthoughtful behaviour. Rather they are impressions in the area of the rational striving forces, which dispose the acting person to a special type of action without relieving her/him from the judgment and deliberate decision about the purpose and the concrete design of the activity which has to be performed. The type of action to which a moral habit disposes the person corresponds to the proper objective of the respective habit.
2. The first and specific effect of moral habits relates to the action orientation. Moral habits significantly influence the action orientation by directing the practical judgment about the goal of the respective action. This influence takes place in two ways, which do not exclude each other: (a) Indirectly and negatively moral habits influence the action orientation, insofar as they turn off tendencies or urges of the striving forces which draw the judgment in a direction opposed to the objective of the habitus. (b) Directly and positively they influence the action orientation, insofar as they convey to the actor a constant quasi-natural inclination in virtue of which a certain form of practice appears to him as something which is simply and in itself good.
3. The practical judgment about the goal, which is subjected to the first and typical effect of the moral habit, determines the specific goal of the action, by which the action receives its specificity within the genus moris. By its influence on the specific goal of action the moral habit also has an impact on the evaluation of the concrete situational goal of action, which immediately guides the deliberation on the means (operations), which have to be applied here and now in order to achieve the goal.
4. The moral habit affects not only the content of the judgment about the specific goal of ac-tion, but also its mode. (a) It affects its content in so far as this judgment under the impact of the habit determines that, upon which the moral habit is ordained as to its proper an immedi-ate goal, as the target, which has to be pursued in the action simpliciter and for its own sake. (b) It affects its mode in that the judgment does not emerge from a rational discourse (iudicium per modum cognitionis), but is given spontaneously or intuitively per modum inclinationis.
Tarek Dika, University of Michigan: "Descartes, Method, and the Habitual Unity of Science"
In Regulae ad directionem ingenii, Descartes famously asserted that all sciences are interconnected and can be learned together by one method as parts of one, all-embracing science. Many commentators on the Regulae have argued that Descartes's method and concept of scientific unity are fundamentally at odds with scholastic theories of science, including the theory of scientific habitus. I will argue that Descartes transformed, and did not abandon, the theory of scientific habitus. Descartes’s method in the Regulae is ultimately a tool by which a habituated cognitive ability, or habitus, for solving problems in the sciences may be brought about in a human ingenium––an ability, which, by embracing all sciences, constitutes their unity.
Bonnie Kent, University of California Irvine: “Speaking Theologically: The Concept of Habitus in Peter Lombard and his Followers”
An early Latin commentary on the Nicomachean Ethics, probably composed by a member of the Paris arts faculty around 1235-1240, reports no conflict between philosophers and theologians about whether virtues should be understood as habitus. It focuses instead on their disagreement about the relation between virtuous habitus and morally good actions. According to philosophers, we acquire virtuous habitus by performing morally good acts, so that the acts must precede the habitus; but “speaking theologically,” the habitus, infused by God, necessarily precedes all morally good acts.
The conflict reported by this commentary raises a puzzle: why did theologians not protest the very idea of virtue as a habitus? Modern scholars usually appeal to the influence of ancient philosophers in general and Aristotle in particular. I argue that this is a mistake. Peter Lombard and his followers embraced the conception of a habitus they found in Augustine’s work: that by which something is done when there is a need. Understood in this way, a habitus need not be acquired by acting, nor need it ever be manifest in the agent’s behavior, because the need for it might never arise.
This conception of a habitus was wide enough to encompass both naturally acquired and God-given dispositions. Although a virtuous habitus must be God-given, “speaking theologically,” the same does not hold for habitus in general. A habitus, in contrast to the (now) common notion of a habit, was defined without reference to what produced it. Thus it might be acquired by exercising one’s natural capacities, but it might equally be infused by God’s grace. Since this is the position defended by Thomas Aquinas, no one familiar with his work should find it surprising—unless, perhaps, they have been
Henrik Lagerlund, University of Western Ontario: “Dispositions in Buridan’s Metaphysics”
In the Summulae, Buridan indicates a very general reading of dispositions that includes all qualities and furthermore that any natural change is the production of a disposition. He hence does not only seem to extend a disposition to all qualities, which can perhaps be seen as an extension of Aristotle, but also any form whether it is a quality or a quantity. This suggest a metaphysics where dispositions are at the core and all change is to be seen as some kind of disposition. In this paper, I will develop this view into a general interpretation of Buridan’s metaphysics and natural philosophy. I will also put this view in the context of the 14th century as well as some later early modern figures.
Can Laurens Loewe, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven: “Thomas Aquinas on Acting Against One’s Habits”
Some recent studies of Thomas Aquinas’s moral psychology have argued that Aquinas is a psychological determinist (Bowlin 1998, Pasnau 2002). It is claimed that, according to Aquinas, the conjunction of certain circumstances and our motivational set compel us to act in one and only one way. The key conduct-determining role in our motivational set is assigned to habits. For instance, if an agent, to use Bowlin’s example, habitually loves his children he will, due to this love, necessarily try to save them from a burning house, should he be able to do so. In this paper, I argue, on the basis of the Prima Secundae and the De Malo, that these commentators overstate the causal relevance of habits in Aquinas. For, Aquinas thinks that agents can freely choose not to act according to their habits. However, I will suggest that, for Aquinas, this freedom is difficult to attain because it presupposes quidditative knowledge of one's own habits.
Monika Michałowska, Uniwersytet Medyczny w Łodzi: “The Concept of Habit and Disposition in Richard Kilvington’s Ethics”
The fourteenth century English formation called the ‘Oxford Calculators’ gathered most prominent and innovative philosophers and theologians of that time. It has been commonly acknowledged that the ‘Oxford Calculators’ have influenced extensively the development of new methods in logic and natural philosophy and had a significant impact not only on later medieval philosophy, but also early modern science. One of its most influential masters was Richard Kilvington whose logical and physical works became an inspiration for other masters in England and on the Continent. Kilvington’s logical and mathematical concepts have already gained much attention among the historians of philosophy and science, and his innovations in logic and mathematical physics have been thoroughly examined. However, his focus on ethical and theological problems as well as his original way of providing arguments and conducting his analyses in the field of practical philosophy and theology have not yet been sufficiently investigated. It seems important for the history of philosophy to analyze how the novel methodology invented by the ‘Calculators’ influenced not only logical and physical analyses, but also the considerations on ethical and theological dilemmas. Therefore, to shed light on Calculators’ ethical and theological ideas, in this paper I analyze Kilvington’s ethical concept of habit. First, I focus on Kilvington’s notions of habit and disposition pointing out an interesting understanding of these ethical constructs. Secondly, I investigate the relationship between habit and will in Kilvington’s considerations. Then, I make an enquiry into the nature of virtue and vice in reference to development of a moral habit. Finally, I examine the interplay between prudence, right reasoning and habit in Kilvington’s analyses. I conclude that: 1) Kilvington’s concept of habit and disposition offers an interesting balance between two diverse theories of habit, namely the habit understood as innate condition of man’s soul and the habit understood as an acquired trait of man’s character; 2) in Kilvington’s view not only habit, but also, to some extent, disposition play an active role in the process of moral development and becoming virtuous or vicious.
Dominik Perler, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin: “Suárez on the Metaphysics of Habits”
Suárez takes a habit to be “a stable and permanent quality” that exists in a subject and that enables it to produce mental activities with ease (DM XLIV.1.6). This definition gives rise to a number of questions. What kind of quality is at stake? How does it differ from other types of qualities? How can it be acquired? And how does it support a sub-ject in its activities? This paper examines these questions, paying particular attention to Suárez’ fundamental claim that a habit is a particular type of quality that should not be conflated with other types (e.g. passions) that also exist in a subject.
Suàrez’ account of the habit as a quality is part of an all-embracing metaphysical pro-ject that aims at indicating an entity for each feature of the mind: if a habit is real, it must be a real thing (res), and it is the metaphysician’s task to explain to what category of thing it belongs. Moreover, he should explain how a habit is related to other kinds of things (faculties, acts, passions, etc.) and how all these things form together the mind. This leads Suárez to a “mapping of the mind” that presents it as a complex system of interrelated entities. It will be argued that it is precisely this mapping that was criticized by early modern authors (e.g. Locke, Hobbes) who accused Suárez and other late scho-lastic authors of reifying features of the mind: mere dispositional features were turned into real things. The paper closely examines this critique and analyzes (i) in what sense habits and other features of the mind are taken to be real things, (ii) what kind of caus-al power is attributed to each thing, (iii) and how all the things form together a unity. The analysis of habits will therefore shed light on Suárez’ entire metaphysics of the mind and uncover some of his basic assumptions.
Martin Pickavé, University of Toronto: “Peter Auriol on Habits and Virtues”
Peter Auriol is a good example of the debate over the nature of habits, and moral habits (i.e., virtues and vices) in particular, that raged at the University of Paris in the early 14th century. In his commentary on the Sentences, and also his quodlibetal questions, he demonstrates particular interest in two fundamental questions: (1) what is the ontological status of habits? (2) what contribution do habits make in action? In answering the first question Auriol pays particular attention to the feature that habits relate us to acts. Yet he denies, like many of his contemporaries, that despite their essential directedness habits are not themselves relations. In dealing with the second concern Auriol argues, against Aquinas and Scotus, that habits do not have any direct causal role. My contribution will be a careful examination of the reasons behind Auriol’s responses to these two important questions on habits. Doing so will also lead me to talk about other participates in the debate on habits, most notably Thomas Wylton and John Duns Scotus.
Jean-Luc Solère, Laboratoire d’Études sur les Monothéismes-Boston College: “Thomas of Sutton and Habitus as the Criterion for Mental Reality”
Sutton holds that intellectual cognition is entirely passive. In particular, he rejects Henry of Ghent's opinion that the intellect, after receiving an intelligible species, still has to "elicit" the operation of intellection. For Sutton, the act of intellection just consists in the species being received in the possible intellect and placing it in ultimate actuality. Exactly as becoming fire is nothing else than the informing of prime matter by the form of fire, becoming a cognizing intellect is nothing else than the informing of the intellect by an intelligible species. The only difference with physical processes is that in material things a form is either in full potency or in full actuality. It does not have the kind of intermediary actuality that species have in intellective memory, namely, the “esse habituale”. Therefore, for Sutton, rather than intentionality or self-causation, habitus is the criterion that distinguishes mental reality from physical reality.
Hamid Taieb, Université de Genève-Université de Lausanne: “Intellection in Aquinas: from Habit to Operation”
The aim of my paper is to study the links between the habit and the operation of intellection in Aquinas. I will provide a detailed description of the passage from habitual to actual intellection, by defining the distinct stages of this process, and by listing its different protagonists. I will start with a presentation of the notion of intellectual habit in Aquinas. Then, I will describe the way the “stored” intelligible species, constitutive of the habit, is reactivated in the possible intellect. This reactivation, for Aquinas, is not yet the act of intellection. Indeed, an additional step is required in order for intellection to be achieved, namely an “operation”. As G. Pini underscored, there are two kinds of intellectual operations in Aquinas: in Aquinas’ early texts, the intellectual operation is a non-productive immanent action, based on the species, in accordance with Aristotle’s theory of intellection; in Aquinas’ mature work, another type of operation makes its appearance, namely a productive immanent action, which entails the creation of a supplementary cognitive means, the famous “word”, following Augustine’s theory of intellection. A difficult question that I will try to answer is whether Aquinas, in his mature work, abandons the first type of intellectual operation or whether he maintains both operations in parallel. If it should turn out that both operations are maintained, an explanation should be given as to why Aquinas admits two distinct types of acts of intellection. Would the word provide a type of cognition that the species does not provide? But if the species and the word give two distinct types of cognition, wouldn’t Aquinas be committed to admit two parts in the intellectual habit, one part constituted of Aristotelian species, and one part constituted of Augustinian words?
Juhana Toivanen, University of Jyväskylä-Academy of Finland: “Habitual Perception in Peter Olivi”
My presentation concentrates on Peter Olivi’s (ca. 1248–98) understanding of the psychological role of dispositions or habits (habitus) of the soul. The main aim is to discuss the ways in which they figure in his theory of sense perception. Olivi uses the concept of habitus in order to account for two interrelated phenomenon. (1) First, he explains the ability to perceive external things as useful or harmful by appealing to innate or learned dispositions of the perceptual powers of the soul. Similarly, learned dispositions enrich perceptual contents in many other ways. For instance, our ability to read—even though it is an intellectual operation—is partially achieved by a habituation of sight. (2) The second phenomenon, which Olivi explains by appealing to dispositions of the senses, is related to pain and pleasure that sometimes accompanies perception of various external objects. For instance, bad tastes and loud noises may cause distress and even pain, while beautiful music gives us pleasure. Olivi thinks that these and similar phenomena cannot be accounted for by appealing only to the effect that a particular object of perception has on us. Different people react differently to one and the same object, and various species of animals find different foods appealing or repulsive. Olivi accounts these differences as part of the perceptual process, which is caused by differences in the habituation of the perceptual system. Dispositions of perceptual powers of the soul play therefore a central role in his psychology of perception, and my presentation will treat their role in detail.
Kristell Trego, Université Clermont-Ferrand II Blaise Pascal: “La volonté et son orientation. Augustin, Anselme et Duns Scot sur l’habitus”
L’habitus est un concept central de l’éthique d’Aristote. La présente étude veut s’interroger sur la manière dont une doctrine de la volonté libre peut faire droit à l’habitus, en envisageant successivement trois auteurs majeurs de la tradition « augustinienne » : s. Augustin, s. Anselme et Jean Duns Scot.
According to the Franciscan thinker Peter Auriol, the concept of habit provides a key to analyzing human recordative cognition. Memory, he explains in his Scriptum, is essentially a habit or disposition to cognitively engage with objects that, at an earlier moment of time, were objects of sense perception (Scriptum 3.14). In laying out and refining this idea, Auriol provides brief critical discussions of contemporary analyses of mnemonic cognition. Although he does not name his opponents here, I show that Peter John Olivi is a plausible target for Auriol’s critique. Also, I argue that Auriol’s understanding of what a habit is, is a driving force behind his disagreement with Olivi.
Cognitive habits, Auriol maintains, pertain to the exact same objects as the acts of perception that caused them. The cognitive habit that allows me to recall my father to mind, for example, pertains to the exact same object as the perceptual engagement with my father that engendered this habit. But this Olivi cannot say. For whereas acts of perception pertain to external objects, Olivi holds that acts of memory are directed at inner images or species. On Olivi’s species theory of recordative cognition, therefore, the analysis of memory as a cognitive habit collapses. Otherwise put, what Auriol objects to Olivi, is that with his analysis of recollection in terms of species, he cannot do justice to what recollection essentially is: a cognitive habit.
In the final part of the paper, I show that strikingly similar considerations are at work in the younger Ockham’s theory of memory. The early Ockham’s account of memory as a cognitive habit needs to be understood in the light of his discussion of God’s understanding of his creatures before the act of creating. This discussion has not always been understood properly, but once it is given due attention, we see that Ockham’s analysis of memory as a cognitive habit looks uncannily similar to Auriol’s. Also, we will see how this analysis leads Ockham to critically engage with species theories of recollection much in the way in which Auriol had. Looking at their respective analyses of recollection as a cognitive habit will thus reveal similarities between Auriol and the younger Ockham that have hitherto gone unnoticed.
Pascale Bermon, Laboratoire d’Etudes sur les Monothéismes : "Conceptions médiévales de la science. L'habitus de science d'Henri de Gand à Grégoire de Rimini"
Isabelle Bochet, Laboratoire d’Etudes sur les Monothéismes (Institut d'études augustiniennes) : “Habitus selon Augustin: tradition philosophique et exégèse biblique”
Augustin désigne par le terme habitus des caractères durables, qui ne sont pas donnés d’emblée mais acquis, et qui relèvent de la catégorie des « accidents ». Il établit explicitement la correspondance entre habitus et ἕξις : ἕξις habitus est, ab eo quod est habere (In Ps. 118, s. 11, 6; cf. diu. qu. 73). Le terme est employé par Augustin avec des nuances diverses : état, apparaître extérieur, capacité, comportement, habitude.
Dans le De diuersis quaestionibus 83 (qu. 73), Augustin distingue trois sortes d’habitus : habitus animi (dans le cas de l’acquisition d’un savoir, par exemple), habitus corporis (par exemple, la robustesse), habitus eorum quae membris nostris accommodantur extrinsecus (dans le cas des vêtements, des chaussures, d’une armure, etc.) ; il examine en chaque cas ce qui est ou non sujet à modification dans l’acquisition d’un habitus. Le but d’Augustin est de pouvoir interpréter de façon satisfaisante l’expression de Ph 2, 7 qui est appliquée au Christ : et habitu inuentus ut homo. Il s’agit d’exclure toute altération de la divinité du Christ dans son incarnation. Il note qu’en ce cas, habitus correspond non à ἕξις, mais à σχῆμα (diu. qu. 73, 2).
Le but de l’étude sera de rechercher, de façon précise, les sources philosophiques d’Augustin et la manière dont les questions exégétiques et théologiques le conduisent à infléchir l’usage du terme habitus ou à en faire un emploi spécifique.
Olivier Boulnois, Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes-Laboratoire d'Etudes sur les Monothéismes : "Habitus et liberté"
Si l’on définit la liberté comme le pouvoir d’accomplir ou de ne pas accomplir une action, l’existence des habitus pose un problème. En effet, si un acte est causé par autre chose que mon choix, je n’en suis pas responsable. Mais si l’habitus est le principe de mon action, en quoi ai-je le contrôle de celle-ci ? Suis-je prisonnier de mes habitus ?
Rolf Darge, Universität Salzburg: “As one is disposed, so the goal appears to him: On the Function of Moral Habits according to Thomas Aquinas”
My paper examines a fundamental part of Aquinas’ doctrine of the function of moral habits in the constitution of action. This part includes the following basic thoughts:
1. Moral habits (habitus) are not “habits” in the common sense (consuetudo), which entail an automated, unthoughtful behaviour. Rather they are impressions in the area of the rational striving forces, which dispose the acting person to a special type of action without relieving her/him from the judgment and deliberate decision about the purpose and the concrete design of the activity which has to be performed. The type of action to which a moral habit disposes the person corresponds to the proper objective of the respective habit.
2. The first and specific effect of moral habits relates to the action orientation. Moral habits significantly influence the action orientation by directing the practical judgment about the goal of the respective action. This influence takes place in two ways, which do not exclude each other: (a) Indirectly and negatively moral habits influence the action orientation, insofar as they turn off tendencies or urges of the striving forces which draw the judgment in a direction opposed to the objective of the habitus. (b) Directly and positively they influence the action orientation, insofar as they convey to the actor a constant quasi-natural inclination in virtue of which a certain form of practice appears to him as something which is simply and in itself good.
3. The practical judgment about the goal, which is subjected to the first and typical effect of the moral habit, determines the specific goal of the action, by which the action receives its specificity within the genus moris. By its influence on the specific goal of action the moral habit also has an impact on the evaluation of the concrete situational goal of action, which immediately guides the deliberation on the means (operations), which have to be applied here and now in order to achieve the goal.
4. The moral habit affects not only the content of the judgment about the specific goal of ac-tion, but also its mode. (a) It affects its content in so far as this judgment under the impact of the habit determines that, upon which the moral habit is ordained as to its proper an immedi-ate goal, as the target, which has to be pursued in the action simpliciter and for its own sake. (b) It affects its mode in that the judgment does not emerge from a rational discourse (iudicium per modum cognitionis), but is given spontaneously or intuitively per modum inclinationis.
Tarek Dika, University of Michigan: "Descartes, Method, and the Habitual Unity of Science"
In Regulae ad directionem ingenii, Descartes famously asserted that all sciences are interconnected and can be learned together by one method as parts of one, all-embracing science. Many commentators on the Regulae have argued that Descartes's method and concept of scientific unity are fundamentally at odds with scholastic theories of science, including the theory of scientific habitus. I will argue that Descartes transformed, and did not abandon, the theory of scientific habitus. Descartes’s method in the Regulae is ultimately a tool by which a habituated cognitive ability, or habitus, for solving problems in the sciences may be brought about in a human ingenium––an ability, which, by embracing all sciences, constitutes their unity.
Bonnie Kent, University of California Irvine: “Speaking Theologically: The Concept of Habitus in Peter Lombard and his Followers”
An early Latin commentary on the Nicomachean Ethics, probably composed by a member of the Paris arts faculty around 1235-1240, reports no conflict between philosophers and theologians about whether virtues should be understood as habitus. It focuses instead on their disagreement about the relation between virtuous habitus and morally good actions. According to philosophers, we acquire virtuous habitus by performing morally good acts, so that the acts must precede the habitus; but “speaking theologically,” the habitus, infused by God, necessarily precedes all morally good acts.
The conflict reported by this commentary raises a puzzle: why did theologians not protest the very idea of virtue as a habitus? Modern scholars usually appeal to the influence of ancient philosophers in general and Aristotle in particular. I argue that this is a mistake. Peter Lombard and his followers embraced the conception of a habitus they found in Augustine’s work: that by which something is done when there is a need. Understood in this way, a habitus need not be acquired by acting, nor need it ever be manifest in the agent’s behavior, because the need for it might never arise.
This conception of a habitus was wide enough to encompass both naturally acquired and God-given dispositions. Although a virtuous habitus must be God-given, “speaking theologically,” the same does not hold for habitus in general. A habitus, in contrast to the (now) common notion of a habit, was defined without reference to what produced it. Thus it might be acquired by exercising one’s natural capacities, but it might equally be infused by God’s grace. Since this is the position defended by Thomas Aquinas, no one familiar with his work should find it surprising—unless, perhaps, they have been
Henrik Lagerlund, University of Western Ontario: “Dispositions in Buridan’s Metaphysics”
In the Summulae, Buridan indicates a very general reading of dispositions that includes all qualities and furthermore that any natural change is the production of a disposition. He hence does not only seem to extend a disposition to all qualities, which can perhaps be seen as an extension of Aristotle, but also any form whether it is a quality or a quantity. This suggest a metaphysics where dispositions are at the core and all change is to be seen as some kind of disposition. In this paper, I will develop this view into a general interpretation of Buridan’s metaphysics and natural philosophy. I will also put this view in the context of the 14th century as well as some later early modern figures.
Can Laurens Loewe, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven: “Thomas Aquinas on Acting Against One’s Habits”
Some recent studies of Thomas Aquinas’s moral psychology have argued that Aquinas is a psychological determinist (Bowlin 1998, Pasnau 2002). It is claimed that, according to Aquinas, the conjunction of certain circumstances and our motivational set compel us to act in one and only one way. The key conduct-determining role in our motivational set is assigned to habits. For instance, if an agent, to use Bowlin’s example, habitually loves his children he will, due to this love, necessarily try to save them from a burning house, should he be able to do so. In this paper, I argue, on the basis of the Prima Secundae and the De Malo, that these commentators overstate the causal relevance of habits in Aquinas. For, Aquinas thinks that agents can freely choose not to act according to their habits. However, I will suggest that, for Aquinas, this freedom is difficult to attain because it presupposes quidditative knowledge of one's own habits.
Monika Michałowska, Uniwersytet Medyczny w Łodzi: “The Concept of Habit and Disposition in Richard Kilvington’s Ethics”
The fourteenth century English formation called the ‘Oxford Calculators’ gathered most prominent and innovative philosophers and theologians of that time. It has been commonly acknowledged that the ‘Oxford Calculators’ have influenced extensively the development of new methods in logic and natural philosophy and had a significant impact not only on later medieval philosophy, but also early modern science. One of its most influential masters was Richard Kilvington whose logical and physical works became an inspiration for other masters in England and on the Continent. Kilvington’s logical and mathematical concepts have already gained much attention among the historians of philosophy and science, and his innovations in logic and mathematical physics have been thoroughly examined. However, his focus on ethical and theological problems as well as his original way of providing arguments and conducting his analyses in the field of practical philosophy and theology have not yet been sufficiently investigated. It seems important for the history of philosophy to analyze how the novel methodology invented by the ‘Calculators’ influenced not only logical and physical analyses, but also the considerations on ethical and theological dilemmas. Therefore, to shed light on Calculators’ ethical and theological ideas, in this paper I analyze Kilvington’s ethical concept of habit. First, I focus on Kilvington’s notions of habit and disposition pointing out an interesting understanding of these ethical constructs. Secondly, I investigate the relationship between habit and will in Kilvington’s considerations. Then, I make an enquiry into the nature of virtue and vice in reference to development of a moral habit. Finally, I examine the interplay between prudence, right reasoning and habit in Kilvington’s analyses. I conclude that: 1) Kilvington’s concept of habit and disposition offers an interesting balance between two diverse theories of habit, namely the habit understood as innate condition of man’s soul and the habit understood as an acquired trait of man’s character; 2) in Kilvington’s view not only habit, but also, to some extent, disposition play an active role in the process of moral development and becoming virtuous or vicious.
Dominik Perler, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin: “Suárez on the Metaphysics of Habits”
Suárez takes a habit to be “a stable and permanent quality” that exists in a subject and that enables it to produce mental activities with ease (DM XLIV.1.6). This definition gives rise to a number of questions. What kind of quality is at stake? How does it differ from other types of qualities? How can it be acquired? And how does it support a sub-ject in its activities? This paper examines these questions, paying particular attention to Suárez’ fundamental claim that a habit is a particular type of quality that should not be conflated with other types (e.g. passions) that also exist in a subject.
Suàrez’ account of the habit as a quality is part of an all-embracing metaphysical pro-ject that aims at indicating an entity for each feature of the mind: if a habit is real, it must be a real thing (res), and it is the metaphysician’s task to explain to what category of thing it belongs. Moreover, he should explain how a habit is related to other kinds of things (faculties, acts, passions, etc.) and how all these things form together the mind. This leads Suárez to a “mapping of the mind” that presents it as a complex system of interrelated entities. It will be argued that it is precisely this mapping that was criticized by early modern authors (e.g. Locke, Hobbes) who accused Suárez and other late scho-lastic authors of reifying features of the mind: mere dispositional features were turned into real things. The paper closely examines this critique and analyzes (i) in what sense habits and other features of the mind are taken to be real things, (ii) what kind of caus-al power is attributed to each thing, (iii) and how all the things form together a unity. The analysis of habits will therefore shed light on Suárez’ entire metaphysics of the mind and uncover some of his basic assumptions.
Martin Pickavé, University of Toronto: “Peter Auriol on Habits and Virtues”
Peter Auriol is a good example of the debate over the nature of habits, and moral habits (i.e., virtues and vices) in particular, that raged at the University of Paris in the early 14th century. In his commentary on the Sentences, and also his quodlibetal questions, he demonstrates particular interest in two fundamental questions: (1) what is the ontological status of habits? (2) what contribution do habits make in action? In answering the first question Auriol pays particular attention to the feature that habits relate us to acts. Yet he denies, like many of his contemporaries, that despite their essential directedness habits are not themselves relations. In dealing with the second concern Auriol argues, against Aquinas and Scotus, that habits do not have any direct causal role. My contribution will be a careful examination of the reasons behind Auriol’s responses to these two important questions on habits. Doing so will also lead me to talk about other participates in the debate on habits, most notably Thomas Wylton and John Duns Scotus.
Jean-Luc Solère, Laboratoire d’Études sur les Monothéismes-Boston College: “Thomas of Sutton and Habitus as the Criterion for Mental Reality”
Sutton holds that intellectual cognition is entirely passive. In particular, he rejects Henry of Ghent's opinion that the intellect, after receiving an intelligible species, still has to "elicit" the operation of intellection. For Sutton, the act of intellection just consists in the species being received in the possible intellect and placing it in ultimate actuality. Exactly as becoming fire is nothing else than the informing of prime matter by the form of fire, becoming a cognizing intellect is nothing else than the informing of the intellect by an intelligible species. The only difference with physical processes is that in material things a form is either in full potency or in full actuality. It does not have the kind of intermediary actuality that species have in intellective memory, namely, the “esse habituale”. Therefore, for Sutton, rather than intentionality or self-causation, habitus is the criterion that distinguishes mental reality from physical reality.
Hamid Taieb, Université de Genève-Université de Lausanne: “Intellection in Aquinas: from Habit to Operation”
The aim of my paper is to study the links between the habit and the operation of intellection in Aquinas. I will provide a detailed description of the passage from habitual to actual intellection, by defining the distinct stages of this process, and by listing its different protagonists. I will start with a presentation of the notion of intellectual habit in Aquinas. Then, I will describe the way the “stored” intelligible species, constitutive of the habit, is reactivated in the possible intellect. This reactivation, for Aquinas, is not yet the act of intellection. Indeed, an additional step is required in order for intellection to be achieved, namely an “operation”. As G. Pini underscored, there are two kinds of intellectual operations in Aquinas: in Aquinas’ early texts, the intellectual operation is a non-productive immanent action, based on the species, in accordance with Aristotle’s theory of intellection; in Aquinas’ mature work, another type of operation makes its appearance, namely a productive immanent action, which entails the creation of a supplementary cognitive means, the famous “word”, following Augustine’s theory of intellection. A difficult question that I will try to answer is whether Aquinas, in his mature work, abandons the first type of intellectual operation or whether he maintains both operations in parallel. If it should turn out that both operations are maintained, an explanation should be given as to why Aquinas admits two distinct types of acts of intellection. Would the word provide a type of cognition that the species does not provide? But if the species and the word give two distinct types of cognition, wouldn’t Aquinas be committed to admit two parts in the intellectual habit, one part constituted of Aristotelian species, and one part constituted of Augustinian words?
Juhana Toivanen, University of Jyväskylä-Academy of Finland: “Habitual Perception in Peter Olivi”
My presentation concentrates on Peter Olivi’s (ca. 1248–98) understanding of the psychological role of dispositions or habits (habitus) of the soul. The main aim is to discuss the ways in which they figure in his theory of sense perception. Olivi uses the concept of habitus in order to account for two interrelated phenomenon. (1) First, he explains the ability to perceive external things as useful or harmful by appealing to innate or learned dispositions of the perceptual powers of the soul. Similarly, learned dispositions enrich perceptual contents in many other ways. For instance, our ability to read—even though it is an intellectual operation—is partially achieved by a habituation of sight. (2) The second phenomenon, which Olivi explains by appealing to dispositions of the senses, is related to pain and pleasure that sometimes accompanies perception of various external objects. For instance, bad tastes and loud noises may cause distress and even pain, while beautiful music gives us pleasure. Olivi thinks that these and similar phenomena cannot be accounted for by appealing only to the effect that a particular object of perception has on us. Different people react differently to one and the same object, and various species of animals find different foods appealing or repulsive. Olivi accounts these differences as part of the perceptual process, which is caused by differences in the habituation of the perceptual system. Dispositions of perceptual powers of the soul play therefore a central role in his psychology of perception, and my presentation will treat their role in detail.
Kristell Trego, Université Clermont-Ferrand II Blaise Pascal: “La volonté et son orientation. Augustin, Anselme et Duns Scot sur l’habitus”
L’habitus est un concept central de l’éthique d’Aristote. La présente étude veut s’interroger sur la manière dont une doctrine de la volonté libre peut faire droit à l’habitus, en envisageant successivement trois auteurs majeurs de la tradition « augustinienne » : s. Augustin, s. Anselme et Jean Duns Scot.