Aristotle: On the Soul (D e A n i m a )
According to Aristotle a living creature consists of
Body = matter
Soul = form
The soul (psyche) is the structure of the body – its function and organization. This was the word
Greeks gave to the animator, the living force in a living being. For Aristotle the psyche controlled
reproduction, movement and perception.
Aristotle thought that the soul is the Form of the body. The soul is the sum total of the operations of
a human being.
Aristotle believed that there exists a hierarchy of living things – plants only have a vegetative soul,
animals are above plants because they have appetites, humans are above animals because it has the
power of reason.
Image source: http://gakuran.com/aristotles-moral-philosophy/
Aristotle tries to explain his understanding of the distinction between the body and the soul using the
analogy of an axe. If an axe were a living thing then its body would be made of wood and metal.
However, its soul would be the thing which made it an axe i.e. its capacity to chop. If it lost its ability
to chop it would cease to be an axe – it would simply be wood and metal.
Another illustration he uses is the eye. If the eye were an animal, sight would have to be its soul.
When the eye no longer sees then it is an eye in name only.
Likewise, a dead animal is only an animal in name only – it has the same body but it has lost its soul.
What is important for Aristotle is the end purpose of something – an axe chops, an eye sees, an
animal is animated…etc. This is what is meant by ‘teleology,’ from the Greek telos meaning
end/goal/aim.
For Aristotle, the body and soul are not two separate elements but one thing. The body and the soul
are not, as Plato would have it, two distinct entities, but are different parts or aspects of the same
thing.
Aristotle does not allow for the possibility of the immortality of the soul. The soul is simply the
Form of the body, and is not capable of existing without the body. The soul is that which makes a
person a person, rather than just a lump of meat. Without the body the soul cannot exist. The soul
dies along with the body.
Criticisms of Aristotle
Aristotle dismisses Plato’s Realms of Ideas, saying there is no clear evidence for them. Instead he
appeals to our senses, claiming that it is through them that we experience reality. However, we are
still left with the problem that there is no clear evidence that our senses are reliable.
Text adapted from: http://www.scandalon.co.uk/philosophy/aristotle_body_soul.htm
Does art imitate life? Can life imitate art? What is Mimesis?
Below are several definitions of mimesis. Watch/read them in order and then write your own
definition based on what you understood. Don’t write a summary of these definitions. Bring any
questions to class.
1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHNNgygzgUI
2. Mimesis, basic theoretical principle in the creation of art. The word is Greek and means
“imitation” (though in the sense of “re-presentation” rather than of “copying”). Plato and Aristotle
spoke of mimesis as the re-presentation of nature. According to Plato, all artistic creation is a form of
imitation: that which really exists (in the “world of ideas”) is a type created by God; the concrete
things man perceives in his existence are shadowy representations of this ideal type. Therefore, the
painter, the tragedian, and the musician are imitators of an imitation, twice removed from the
truth. Aristotle, speaking of tragedy, stressed the point that it was an “imitation of an action”—that
of a man falling from a higher to a lower estate. Shakespeare, in Hamlet’s speech to the actors,
referred to the purpose of playing as being “…to hold, as ’twere, the mirror up to nature.” Thus, an
artist, by skillfully selecting and presenting his material, may purposefully seek to “imitate” the action
of life. (http://www.britannica.com/art/mimesis)
3. More information on Mimesis according to Plato and Aristotle
In his theory of Mimesis, Plato says that all art is mimetic by nature; art is an imitation of life. He
believed that ‘ideas’ are the ultimate reality (if you forgot about the world of ideas/forms, review last week’s
Plato handout). Art imitates an idea and so it is imitation of reality. He gives an example of a carpenter
and a chair. The idea of ‘chair’ first came in the mind of carpenter. He gave physical shape to his idea
out of wood and created a chair. A painter imitated the chair of the carpenter in his picture of chair.
Thus, painter’s chair is twice removed from reality. Hence, Plato believed that art is twice removed
from reality. He gives first importance to philosophy as philosophy deals with ideas whereas poetry
(poiesis means ‘making’ in Greek, so it means art in general) deals with illusion – things which are twice
removed from reality. So to Plato, philosophy is superior to poetry. Plato rejected poetry because it is
mimetic in nature on moral and philosophical grounds (i.e. for being too far removed from reality and the
truth/for being an illusion). On the contrary, Aristotle advocated for poetry because it is mimetic in
nature. According to him, poetry is an imitation of an action and his tool of inquiry is neither
philosophical nor moral. He examines poetry as a piece of art and not as a book of preaching or
teaching. (https://sites.google.com/site/nmeictproject/home/plato-s-theory-of-mimesis-and-
aristotle-s-defence)
Aristotle thinks that imitation is a deeply ingrained human proclivity. Like political association, he
contends, mimêsis is natural. We engage in imitation from an early age, already in language learning by
aping competent speakers as we learn, and then also later, in the acquisition of character by treating
others as role models. In both these ways, we imitate because we learn and grow by imitation, and for
humans, learning is both natural and a delight (Poet. 1148b4–24). This same tendency, in more
sophisticated and complex ways, leads us into the practice of drama. As we engage in more advanced
forms of mimêsis, imitation gives way to representation and depiction, where we need not be regarded as
attempting to copy anyone or anything in any narrow sense of the term. For tragedy does not set out
merely to copy what is the case, but rather, as we have seen in Aristotle’s differentiation of tragedy
from history, to speak of what might be, to engage universal themes in a philosophical manner, and
to enlighten an audience by their depiction. So, although mimêsis is at root simple imitation, as it
comes to serve the goals of tragedy, it grows more sophisticated and powerful, especially in the hands
of those poets able to deploy it to good effect. (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle/)
4. Mimesis (imitation)
Greek for “imitation.” In aesthetic theory, mimesis can also connote “representation,” and has
typically meant the reproduction of an external reality, such as nature, through artistic expression.
Plato disparaged mimesis for merely providing inferior copies of original forms; Aristotle, in
his Poetics, recuperated the idea, alleging that mimesis is “natural” to humans. For Aristotle, mimesis
in part both recreates the objects of reality and improves them; it provides humans with a special
kind of symbolic order. In the 17th and 18th centuries, thinkers and writers such as Rousseau and
Lessing began to emphasize the relationship between mimesis and inner experiences and emotions,
not just objective reality or nature.
By the 20th century, the term housed a number of theories, theorists, and schools of thought. Erich
Auerbach’s highly influential book Mimesis: The Representation of Reality in Western Literature (1953)
attempted to chart the history of culture through representational practices in literature. Thinkers
such as Walter Benjamin and Theodore Adorno, on the other hand, described mimesis as
fundamental to human experience, a practice that precedes language but is suppressed or distorted by
society. Rather than mimesis as the process of reproducing copies of nature, reality, or experience,
these theorists suggested that mimesis has to do with social practices and inter-subjective
relationships. Jacques Derrida also claimed mimesis for deconstruction, focusing on texts as
“doubled” objects, which can never refer to an original source.
(http://www.poetryfoundation.org/learning/glossary-term/mimesis (imitation))
1. Please read the two PDFs about mimesis and the soul. Follow the instructions in the Mimesis PDF and post your results here.
2. Look at the following examples:
· Haeckel’s Art Forms of Nature:
wiki introduction with image gallery
·
Tomita’s taxidermy art on tumblr
· Steiff, Hänschens Soldaten (Little Hans’ Soldiers; in it, it says, “Sein Traum” = His Dream):
first stop motion film
(advertisement for Steiff toys)
· Shakespeare’s sonnet 55 (see PDF)
Think about how art imitates life or life imitates art in the given examples, and also how art perhaps animates, brings and keeps someone/something alive (also think back to Dorian Gray). How does this relate to the idea of a soul (both in the sense of an essence and the Aristotelian sense of a Form/structure)? Post your notes here.
