The concept of active intellect in Aristotle

• Grant number: 14/07827-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Master
• Start date: August 01, 2014
• End date: September 30, 2016
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Philosophy - History of Philosophy
• Principal Investigator: Marco Antônio de Ávila Zingano
• Grantee: Fernanda de Araujo Izidório
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated research grant: 09/16877-3 - Greek classical philosophy: Plato, Aristotle and their influence in Antiquity, AP.TEM
• Associated scholarship(s): 15/13683-4 - Aristotelian noetic in the work of Alexander of Aphrodisias, BE.EP.MS

Abstract

This research intends to circumscribe the problems around the concept of active intellect in Aristotle's De Anima, searching for how, in the whole treatise, it is related to the other faculties, what are the reasons why the author choosed for dividing the intellect in two, what kind of interaction the is between them and how could the particular nature of this active side be. Our goal is to point out the roots of this debate, that already lasts for more than two millenniums, between those who believe that this intellect is strictly linked to human nature, as Theophrastus did, and those who think it is independent and separated of this nature and even identified to the divine one, as Alexander of Aphrodisias did. In order to do it, we have to not only analyze the De Anima's text, purposing our own translation of the chapters 4 to 8 of the book III, but we need also to look for cross references, to the comparison and to the complementarity between this treatise and other works of Aristotle, like Metaphysics, Posterior Analytics, Physics and De Memoria et Reminiscentia.

Academic Publications

(References retrieved automatically from State of São Paulo Research Institutions)

IZIDÓRIO, Fernanda de Araujo. The concept of productive nous in Aristotle. 2017. Master's Dissertation - Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH/SBD) São Paulo.