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Single Idea 23906

[filed under theme 15. Nature of Minds / C. Capacities of Minds / 1. Faculties ]

Full Idea

The courage of spirit is the most natural kind; for spirit is unconquerable, which is why the young are the best fighters.

Gist of Idea

Courage from spirit is natural and unconquerable, as seen in the young

Source

Aristotle (Eudemian Ethics [c.333 BCE], 1229a27)

Book Ref

Aristotle: 'Eudemian Ethics', ed/tr. Reeve, C.D.C. [Hackett 2021], p.38


A Reaction

[thumos, presumably, as in Plato] I suppose Aristotle knows better than me, but I suspect the young are just the quickest and strongest. I'd rather be led by someone with experience than by someone who is young.


The 20 ideas with the same theme [theory that each distinct capacity has a specific source]:

If we divide the mind up according to its capacities, there are a lot of them [Aristotle]
Whether the mind has parts is irrelevant, since it obviously has distinct capacities [Aristotle]
Courage from spirit is natural and unconquerable, as seen in the young [Aristotle]
Our conceptions arise from experience, similarity, analogy, transposition, composition and opposition [Stoic school, by Diog. Laertius]
We just use the word 'faculty' when we don't know the psychological cause [Galen]
Philosophers think faculties are in substances, and invent a faculty for every activity [Galen]
Sensations are transmitted to 'internal senses' in the brain, chiefly to 'phantasia' and 'imagination' [Aquinas, by Kretzmann/Stump]
Our four knowledge faculties are intelligence, imagination, the senses, and memory [Descartes]
Descartes mentions many cognitive faculties, but reduces them to will and intellect [Descartes, by Schmid]
Faculties are either fictions, or the abstract universals of ideas [Spinoza]
Kant's only answer as to how synthetic a priori judgements are possible was that we have a 'faculty'! [Nietzsche on Kant]
Judgements which are essentially and strictly universal reveal our faculty of a priori cognition [Kant]
Reason has logical and transcendental faculties [Kant]
Mind is a mechanism of abstraction and simplification, aimed at control [Nietzsche]
Minds have an excluding drive to scare things off, and a selecting one to filter facts [Nietzsche]
Our primary faculty is perception of structure, as when looking in a mirror [Nietzsche]
Distinguishing reason from passion is based on an archaic 'faculty' theory [Solomon]
Mental modules for language, social, action, theory, space, emotion [McGinn]
There are 23 core brain functions, with known circuit, transmitters, genes and behaviour [Watson]
Our concepts can never fully capture reality, but simplification does not falsify [Boulter]