PHIL 25101/35101 Aristotle’s De Anima with Aquinas’s Commentary
There is perhaps no better introduction to Thomas Aquinas’s philosophy of human nature than his still influential commentary on Aristotle’s classic treatment of soul and its powers, the De anima. Writing the commentary was in fact part of Thomas’s preparation for the section on man in the Summa theologiae. Naturally he also had other sources, but he drew much of his method and many of his terms and principles from Aristotle’s work. Our default text consists of English translations of the commentary and of the nearly word-for-word Latin rendering of the De anima that Thomas used. We will work through the entire text; our main goal will be simply to understand it. (B) (IV)
If possible, our classroom will be screen-free. Undergraduates should either be Philosophy majors or obtain the consent of the Professor.