more on this theme | more from this thinker | more from this text
Full Idea
The intellect is in a way potentially the object of thought, but nothing in actuality before it thinks, and the potentiality is like that of the tablet on which there is nothing actually written.
Gist of Idea
The intellect has potential to think, like a tablet on which nothing has yet been written
Source
Aristotle (De Anima [c.329 BCE], 429b31)
Book Ref
Aristotle: 'De Anima (On the Soul)', ed/tr. Lawson-Tancred,H.C. [Penguin 1986], p.203
A Reaction
This passage is referred to by Leibniz, and is the origin of the concept of the 'tabula rasa'. Aristotle need not be denying innate ideas, but merely describing the phenomenology of the moment before a train of thought begins.