Aristotle's Dissection Of The Soul Essay

Dissection of the Soul Aristotle’s taxonomy of the soul classifies things by state of being, potentiality and actuality, and level of the soul. His classifications distinguish matter and substance, matter with form. It also splits up souls into two separate types of potentiality and two separate types of actuality in order to determine what a substance does merely existing, what it is able to know, or what it does with the knowledge it is able to learn. Aristotle also split up the souls in a hierarchy by the level of function that each could perform. The hierarchy is split up into three rankings the nutritive, sensitive, and the rational, all of which are living organisms.

The beginning of Book II on the souls Aristotle distinguishes between matter and form. Form is the combination of matter and form is substance, and in this combination the potential of matter is actualized by the form creating living thing. “ Now matter is potentiality and form is actuality”(On the Soul 412a11). The form in this living substance is called the soul. So to keep the distinction clear, matter can exist by

Nutritive organisms are the lowest in the hierarchy because the functions of their souls are the most basic of the three types of organisms; they merely grow, reproduce, and gain nutrition. All three classifications of the soul perform these functions. The second classification is the sensitive. It is in the middle because although they can perceive and move, they cannot think logically. The rational is the highest on the scale because they can think logically. For example, a human being would fit the criteria for all these distinctions. We are nutritive beings in the sense that we exist to grow and reproduce, and we fit into the sensitive beings because we have the five senses, and finally we are rational because we can intellectually make decisions and