Wednesday, December 15, 2010

Bodies, Animals, and Minds 13 --- Quote from Ockham

From Quod. 2.11 (Freddoso/Kelley translation, p. 137):

"When a human being or a brute animal dies, numerically the same accidents remain as were there previously; therefore, they have numerically the same subject. The consequence is evident from the fact that an accident does not naturally migrate from subject to subject. But the subject in this case is not primary matter, since if it were, then primary matter would be the immediate recipient of absolute accidents --- which does not seem true. Therefore, some form that was there previously remains, and this form is not the sentient soul. Therefore, it is the [form of] corporeity.

The assumption, viz., that numerically the same accidents are in the living animal and the dead animal, I prove from the fact that if the accidents [of the dead animal] were different, they would at least be the same in species as the accidents of the living animal. This is evident from the fact that they are so similar that a human being is not able to discriminate between them."

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