Aristotle on the Soul

Introduction

Aristotle's view of the soul is materialist, which differs from Plato's. Plato was interested in the best ways to run society and the importance of philosophical reasoning for gaining wisdom. Aristotle was more interested in the physical world and the things that could be learned about it by scientific, empirical observation. When Aristotle considered the nature of the soul, it was in the context of trying to discover the essence of things. What is it, that makes us human? What distinguishes a living person from a dead person? It could be argued that reason, thinking, feeling, breathing and having a heartbeat creates this distinction, but Aristotle believed it was the soul itself.

The Materialist View

According to Aristotle, the soul is a 'substance,' which is a term he used to mean the 'essence' or 'real thing.' He saw the problem that a newborn baby, a toddler, a child, an adolescent, an adult and an elderly man were fundamentally different, but could be considered to be the same person. This progression through different stages is what he argued showed that the physical body was in a continual state of change, but the 'substance' remains the same. This continuing identity or 'essence' is what Aristotle considered to be the soul, which he called the 'psyche.'He considered the soul not to just an invisible part of the person, but included in the matter and structure of the body along with its functions and capabilities - its 'form' (formal cause). The soul is what gives living beings their essence, so it is not just matter but has all the capabilities and characteristics it needs in order to be what it is. Aristotle's starting point for thinking about the soul is derived from the knowledge that characteristics of living things involve their capabilities; feeding, moving, breathing, growing, excreting, reproducing and being sensitive to their environment. Hence, Aristotle defined the soul in terms of these capabilities.In De Anima ('On the Soul'), he began by stating 'the soul is in some sense the principle of animal life.' He believed the soul distinguishes a living thing from a dead thing, and that there are three different types of soul. Plants have a vegetative or 'nutritive' soul as they have capabilities to get nourishment for themselves and to ensure the reproduction of the species, but have no ability to reason or make plans. Animals have 'perceptive' souls, because they have senses to experience the world around them, and they react to different stimuli. They have enough intelligence to distinguish between pleasure and pain. Humans have a higher degree of soul because they have the ability to reason and tell right from wrong. For Aristotle, the soul is not a separate entity, distinct from the body, but the soul is merely the capacities the body has, to do whatever it is meant to do. Aristotle's ideas about the soul is linked to his ideas about causality; the soul is what gives matter its form, its efficiency and final purpose (telos).

Aristotle tried to explain what he meant by giving examples. He uses the analogy of wax with a stamp in it to illustrate his idea that the soul could not be separated from the body, as the wax cannot be taken away, leaving the stamp design behind. The two are inseparable."Suppose that a tool, e.g. an axe, were a natural body, then being an axe would be its essence, and so its psyche [soul]; if this disappeared from it, it would have ceased to be an axe, except in name..."- Aristotle, De AnimaIn The Cambridge Companion to Aristotle, ed. Johnathan Barnes, 1995, p.172The soul of an axe, if we can imagine it to be a living thing, would be its capacity to chop. A toy axe is not a real axe, because it does not have the capacity to chop wood, so it is just called an axe for the purposes of a child's imagination; it is only an axe in name.]Aristotle also gives the example of an eye, where, if it were an animal, its soul would be its capacity to see. If the eye is unable to see then it is nothing but matter, 'no more than the eye of a statue or painted figure.' (He did not think inanimate objects actually had souls, but he used non-living examples to clarify what he meant.)The capacity to chop or capacity to see could not exist independently of the axe or the eye, and so neither can the soul exist without the body. Therefore, Aristotle's view does not allow for the soul to survive the death of the body in any way. However, as his view developed, Aristotle began to wonder if perhaps reason might be able to survive even if the body had died. His writings on the nature of human reason and the extent to which the reason requires a physical body are among the most difficult and obscure of his works. He did not seem to think that reason could continue in the sense of it still being an individual personality, and it is not likely that he believed that people could live after death in any personal sense."To attain any knowledge of the soul is one of the most difficult things in the world."- Aristotle, Book 1, De Anima