Topoi’s Mapping Body and Soul Group will host Resemary Twomey (City University of New York) this Thursday, the 11th Novermber, 4 – 8 pm, for the workshop ‘Aristotle on Perceptual Consciousness’. Fortunately, Prof. Henry Mendell (California State University, Los Angeles & Topoi) agreed to additionally enrich the discussion by giving a short comment on Rosie’s Paper.
III 2 is one of the most enigmatic, but also most interesting parts of Aristotle’s De Anima. Here Aristotle is taken to address crucial issues like perceptual awareness, self-awareness, and the unity of the subject of perception. Rosie will present us a new, contextualized reading of Aristotle’s account.
Abstract: It is my contention that Aristotle gives a formal account of the activity of the common-sense, which I will call “common-sensing, ’ at 425b12. The reference to perceiving that we see and hear that opens DA III.2 is not generally interpreted in this way. Rather, most commentators take Aristotle’s talk of metaperceiving as a way of describing the fact that we are perceptually conscious. Commentators split on the question of what conscious state is here being explained, but all understand the passage as having to do with some form of awareness or other. My reading where the focus of his discussion here is on common-sensing rather than consciousness will be defended by showing that my account allows for heightened continuity both throughout this chapter and with the one preceding it.