Aquinas,[Third Article]

ARTICLE III

In the third article we ask:

Do ideas belong to speculative or only to practical knowledge?

[Parallel readings: S.T., I, 14, 16; 15, 3; I Sent., 36, 2, 3; De div. nom., c. 5, lect. 3 (P. 15:352a seq.); De pot., 1, 5, ad 10-11; 3, 1, ad 13.]

Difficulties

It seems that they belong only to practical knowledge, for

1. According to Augustine: “Ideas are the principal forms of things, according to which everything is formed that has a beginning or an end.” But, since nothing is formed by reason of speculative knowledge, ideas do not belong to this type of knowledge.

2. It was said, however, that ideas are related not only to those things which have a beginning or an end, but also to those which can have a beginning or end, as Augustine says in the same passage. Consequently, ideas are related to those things which do not exist, will not exist, and never have existed, but nevertheless can exist. Of these, God has speculative knowledge.—On the contrary, practical knowledge is said to be that knowledge according to which one knows how a thing is done, even if he never intends to do it. This is why part of medical study is called practical. Now, God knows how the things which He can make are to be made, even though He does not intend to make them. Therefore, God has practical knowledge of them. Hence, in both ways, ideas pertain to practical knowledge.

3. An idea is nothing but the exemplary form. Now, one can speak of the exemplary form only in connection with practical knowledge, because an exemplar is that upon which a thing else is modeled. Therefore, ideas pertain only to practical knowledge.

4. According to the Philosopher, the practical intellect pertains to those things whose principles are within us. But the ideas existing in the divine intellect are principles of the things that are modeled on the ideas. Therefore, they belong to the practical intellect.

5. All the forms in the intellect either are from things or have a relation to things. The latter type of forms belongs to the practical intellect; the former, to the speculative. But no forms in the divine intellect are from things, since it receives nothing from things. Therefore, the forms in the divine intellect have a relation to things, and thus belong to the practical intellect.

6. If in God an idea of the practical intellect were other than an idea of the speculative intellect, this diversity could not be based on something absolute in Him; for everything of this kind in God is one and one only; nor could it be based on a relation of identity such as exists when a thing is said to be identical with itself, because such a relation involves no plurality. Finally, it could not be based on a relation of diversity, since a cause is not multiplied even when its effects are multiple. Therefore, there is no possible way of distinguishing an idea of speculative knowledge from an idea of practical knowledge.

7. But it was said that these ideas are distinguished because a practical idea is a principle of being, while a speculative idea is a principle of knowing.—On the contrary, principles of being and of knowing are the same. Therefore, a speculative idea cannot be distinguished from a practical idea on the basis suggested.

8. God’s speculative knowledge seems to be the same as His simple knowledge. God’s simple knowledge, however, is nothing other than bare knowledge. Now, since an idea adds a relation to things, it seems that an idea does not belong to His speculative knowledge but only to His practical knowledge.

9. The end of the practical intellect is the good. Now, the reference of an idea can be determined only to a good; for, if evil occurs, that is outside of God’s intention. Consequently, an idea pertains only to the practical intellect.

To the Contrary

1. Practical knowledge extends only to those things which are to be made. But by His ideas God knows not only what things are to be made, but also those things that are made and have been made. Therefore, ideas are not restricted merely to practical knowledge.

2. God knows creatures more perfectly than an artist knows the products of his craftsmanship. But by means of the forms through which he acts, an artist, who is merely a creature, has speculative knowledge of his handicraft. How much more must this be true of God!

3. Speculative knowledge is that which considers the principles and causes of things, as well as their properties. But by ideas God knows all that can be known of things. Therefore, the divine ideas pertain not only to practical, but also to speculative knowledge.

REPLY

As is said in The Soul: “Practical knowledge differs from speculative knowledge in its end.” For the end of speculative knowledge is simply truth, but the end of practical knowledge, as we read in the Metaphysics, is action. Now, some knowledge is called practical because it is directed to a work. This happens in two ways. In the first way, it is directed in act—that is, when it is actually directed to a certain work, as the form is which an artist preconceives and intends to introduce into matter. This is called actual practical knowledge and is the form by which knowledge takes place. At other times, however, there is a type of knowledge that is capable of being ordered to an act, but this ordering is not actual. For example, an artist thinks out a form for his work, knows how it can be made, yet does not intend to make it. This is practical knowledge, not actual, but habitual or virtual. At still other times, knowledge is utterly incapable of being ordered to execution. Such knowledge is purely speculative. This also happens in two ways. First, the knowledge is about those things whose natures are such that they cannot be produced by the knowledge of the knower, as is true for example, when we think about natural things. Second, it may happen that the thing known is something that is producible through knowledge but is not considered as producible; for a thing is given existence through a productive operation, and there are certain realities that can be separated in understanding although they cannot exist separately. Therefore, when we consider a thing which is capable of production through the intellect and distinguish from each other realities that cannot exist separately, this knowledge is not practical knowledge, either actual or habitual, but only speculative. This is the kind of knowledge a craftsman has when he thinks about a house by reflecting only on its genus, differences, properties, and other things of this sort which have no separate existence in the thing itseif. But a thing is considered as something capable of execution when there are considered in its regard all the things that are simultaneously required for its existence.

God’s knowledge is related to things in these four ways. Since His knowledge causes things, He knows some things by ordaining by a decree of His will that they come into existence at a certain time. Of these things He has actual practical knowledge. Moreover, He knows other things which He never intends to make, for He knows those things which do not exist, have not existed, and never will exist, as we said in the preceding question. Of these things He has actual knowledge, not actually practical knowledge, however, but merely virtually practical. Again, since He knows the things which He makes or is able to make, not only as they exist in their own act of existence, but also according to all the notes which the human intellect can find in them by analysis, He knows things that He can make even under an aspect in which they are incapable of execution. Finally, He knows certain things of which His knowledge cannot be the cause—evils, for example. Therefore, it is very true to say that there is both practical and speculative knowledge in God.

Now we must see which of the preceding ways is proper to the ideas which must be attributed to God’s knowledge. As Augustine says if we consider the proper meaning of the word itself, an idea is a form; but if we consider what the thing itself is, then an idea is an intelligible character or likeness of a thing. We find, moreover, in certain forms, a double relation: one relation to that which is informed by these forms, and this is the kind of relation that knowledge has to the knower; another to that which is outside, and this is the kind of a relation that knowledge has to what is known. This latter relationship, however, is not common to all forms, as the first is. Therefore, the word form implies only the first relation. This is why a form always has the nature of a cause, for a form is, in a sense, the cause of that which it informs—whether this informing takes place by inherence, as it does in the case of intrinsic forms, or by imitation, as it does in the case of exemplary forms. But an intelligible character and a likeness also have the second relationship, which does not give them the nature of a cause. If we speak, therefore, of an idea, considering only the notion that is properly conveyed by that word, then an idea includes only that kind of knowledge according to which a thing can be made. This is knowledge that is actually practical, or merely virtually practical, which, in some way, is speculative. On the other hand, if we call an idea an intelligible character or likeness in a wide sense, then an idea can also pertain to purely speculative knowledge. Or, if we wish to speak more formally, we should say that an idea belongs to knowledge that is practical, either actually or virtually; but an intelligible character or likeness belongs to both practical and speculative knowledge.

Answers to Difficulties

1. Augustine is referring the formative action of ideas not only to those things which are made but also to those which can be made. For, even if these latter never exist, they are, in a certain sense, known, speculatively, as is clear from what has been said.

2. This argument refers only to knowledge which is practical virtually, not actually. Nothing prevents us from calling this speculative in some sense in so far as it falls short of actual execution.

3. Although an exemplar implies a relation to something outside, it is related as a cause to that extrinsic thing. Therefore, properly speaking, it belongs to knowledge that is practical, either habitually or virtually. But an exemplar is not necessarily restricted to that which is actually practical, because a thing can be called an exemplar merely if something else can be made in imitation of it—even though this other thing is never made. The same is true of ideas.

4. The practical intellect pertains to those things whose principles are within us not in any manner whatsoever, but as being capable of being executed by us, Hence, as is evident from what we have said, we can also have speculative knowledge of those things whose causes are within us.

5. The speculative intellect is not differentiated from the practical because one has its forms from things, and the other, forms related to things, because our practical intellect, at times, also receives its forms from things, as happens, for example, when an artist, having seen some work of art, conceives a form according to which he intends to make something. Therefore, it is not necessary, either, that all the forms which pertain to the speculative intellect be received from things.

6. God’s practical and speculative ideas should not be distinguished as though they were two kinds of ideas. They are distinguished because, according to our way of understanding, to the speculative idea the practical adds a relation to an operation. It is just as we say that man adds rational to animal, even though man and animal are not two things.

7. Principles of being and principles of knowing are said to be the same, because whatever is a principle of being is also a principle of knowing. The opposite, however, is not true, since effects are not infrequently principles of knowing causes. Consequently, there is no reason why the forms of the speculative intellect should not be merely principles of knowing, while the forms of the practical intellect are principles both of knowing and of being.

8. We speak of God’s simple knowledge, not to exclude the relation which His knowledge has to what He knows, for such a relation is inseparably joined to all knowledge, but to exclude from it things that are outside the genus of knowledge. Such things are the existence of things (which is added by His knowledge of vision) and the relation of His will to the things that He knows and will produce (which is added by His knowledge of approval). It is just as we call fire a simple body, not to deny that it has essential parts, but rather to exclude foreign elements from its definition.

9. The true and the good include each other, since the true is a good and every good is true. Therefore, the good can be considered speculatively when only its truth is considered. For example, we can define the good and show what its nature is. But the good can also be considered practically if it is considered as a good, that is, as an end of a motion or operation. Consequently, it clearly does not follow that the ideas or likenesses or intelligible characters in the divine intellect belong only to practical knowledge simply because they have a relation terminating in a good.

Answers to Contrary Difficulties

1. Time has no ebb or flow in God, because His eternity, which is entirely simultaneous, includes all time. Hence, He knows the past, present, and future in the same way. This is precisely what Sirach (2 3:2 9) says: “For all things were known to the Lord God, before they were created: so also after they were perfected he beholdeth all things.” Hence, it is not necessary that an idea properly so called should exceed the limits of practical knowledge merely because the past is known by means of it.

2. If the knowledge of his handicraft which an artist, who is a creature, has by means of forms referred to action is a knowledge of his work as it can be produced, although he does not intend to produce it, then that knowledge is not speculative in all respects but is habitually practical. But that knowledge by which the artist knows, works, not, however, as he can produce them, is purely speculative. It does not contain ideas corresponding to the work, although it might possibly contain likenesses or intelligible characters of it.

3. Both speculative and practical knowledge are had by means of principles and causes. Consequently, this argument cannot prove that a science is speculative or that it is practical.

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