IDEAS AND TERMS
IDEAS AND TERMS
A. Etymology
Greek word, ‘eidos’ which means image
Our mind contains ideas which are formed through our encounter with reality – with everything knowable through the human mind.
Definition
IDEA is defined as the representation of the essence of a thing in the mind.
Expressed differently, an idea is a mental (intellectual) image or a picture of the object of the mind which is the result of comparison, reflection or abstraction.
Being a representation of the essence of a thing in the mind, ideas always exist with due reference to reality.
This means that the mind does not ‘invent’, ‘set up’, or ‘make up’ ideas as if they exist on their own so that they are independent of any reality.
Ideas do not float in thin air; they are always conceived by the mind with due reference to reality.
B. How Are Ideas Formed?
It is exactly through simple apprehension that the mind forms ideas.
Simple apprehension refers to the act of the mind as it apprehends or grasps a particular entity or reality.
Enables the mind to know the essence (or that which makes a thing a thing) of such thing, entity or reality.
As the mind apprehends, grasps, or knows the thing, it produces an idea constituting the essence of the thing (because the idea of the thing represents the thing as a thing).
But how does the mind form ideas?
It is, however, a settled conviction among philosophers, specifically the Scholastics, that human knowledge begins with the senses.
It was the progenitor of Scholasticism, i.e., Aristotle, who pioneered to spawn the dogma that it is through the senses that all human knowledge begins.
This made the Scholastics declare with confidence: ‘Nothing can come to the intellect without passing through the senses.’
But how do the senses help the intellect form ideas?
If ideas are formed through simple apprehension, asking the question: “How do the senses provide the intellect with idea” is to raise the same question, thus: How is simple apprehension is formed?
A. Etymology
Greek word, ‘eidos’ which means image
Our mind contains ideas which are formed through our encounter with reality – with everything knowable through the human mind.
Definition
IDEA is defined as the representation of the essence of a thing in the mind.
Expressed differently, an idea is a mental (intellectual) image or a picture of the object of the mind which is the result of comparison, reflection or abstraction.
Being a representation of the essence of a thing in the mind, ideas always exist with due reference to reality.
This means that the mind does not ‘invent’, ‘set up’, or ‘make up’ ideas as if they exist on their own so that they are independent of any reality.
Ideas do not float in thin air; they are always conceived by the mind with due reference to reality.
B. How Are Ideas Formed?
It is exactly through simple apprehension that the mind forms ideas.
Simple apprehension refers to the act of the mind as it apprehends or grasps a particular entity or reality.
Enables the mind to know the essence (or that which makes a thing a thing) of such thing, entity or reality.
As the mind apprehends, grasps, or knows the thing, it produces an idea constituting the essence of the thing (because the idea of the thing represents the thing as a thing).
But how does the mind form ideas?
It is, however, a settled conviction among philosophers, specifically the Scholastics, that human knowledge begins with the senses.
It was the progenitor of Scholasticism, i.e., Aristotle, who pioneered to spawn the dogma that it is through the senses that all human knowledge begins.
This made the Scholastics declare with confidence: ‘Nothing can come to the intellect without passing through the senses.’
But how do the senses help the intellect form ideas?
If ideas are formed through simple apprehension, asking the question: “How do the senses provide the intellect with idea” is to raise the same question, thus: How is simple apprehension is formed?