Three Conceptions of Soul

Plato’s Soul:

Soul and Body of two distinct natures.  The soul is immortal and distinct, not unique to the mortal body.  It is a tripartite model:

Rational (Highest) part of Soul:                          

Concerns Logos, Reason and Speech (The Charioteer)

Spirited (Middle) Part of Soul:                                                

Concerns Behavior  (The Noble Horse)

Appetitive (Lowest) Part of Soul:                                    

Concerns Eros, Desires(The Ignoble Horse)

     

      

Aristotle’s Soul:

Three definitions of soul:

1. “…the soul must be a substance in the sense of the form of a natural body having life potentially within it” (De Anima, 412a20-1).

2. “The soul is the first actuality of a natural body that is potentially alive” (De Anima, 412a27).

3. “[Soul is] an actuality of the first kind of a natural organized body” (De Anima, 412b4-5).

  

Akin to the Platonic, Aristotle’s conception posits soul as tripartite:

Vegetative/Nutritive:  governs growth and reproduction: Found alone in

Plants, but presupposed in the higher levels of soul.  Non-Rational

Sensitive:  exercises (1) sense-perception, (2) desire, and (3) locomotion

{imagination and memory follow here}:  Found in Animals/Brutes with

Nutritive; presupposed in highest soul.  In Between Rational and Non-Rational

Rational:  exercises all lower powers of soul plus Nous (mind, understanding,

or active intellect and passive intellect): Found only in Humans, who also have

Sensitive and Nutritive.  Rational

Aristotle’s soul is the form of the body; intimately related to the body, so that it is likely inseparable and may die when the body dies, or, at least, all but Nous will die with the body, freeing Nous back to the unknown.

St. Thomas Aquinas’ Soul:

(closely representative of general Christian schema of soul)

           (I) Vegetative Level of Life                      Nutrition

                                      Growth

                                      Reproduction

Human

as union

of body &

rational soul

           (II) Sensitive Level of Life         Exterior senses

                                                                                                   (sight, hearing, taste

                                                                                                           touch, smell)

                                     Interior senses

                                                                                                             (Sensus Communis, Imagination,                                                

                                                                                                                                          Visaestimativa, Memory)

                                     Locomotion

                                     Sensitive appetite

            (III) Rational Level of Life       Active Intellect

                                     Passive Intellect

                                     Will

Aquinas’ soul is similar to Aristotle’s except that while the body and soul are united in one, the soul is immortal.

Augustine’s conception of soul is predominately Platonic, but with reference to the Aristotelian, notably, Augustine’s version makes the soul personal.