Lecture 6B Memory and Knowledge

1. Lecture 6BMemory and Knowledge Dr. Ann T. Orlando

2. Outline • Memory • Knowledge • Relation to Imago Dei

3. Memory in Plato and Aristotle • Plato and Reminiscences (Meno and Phaedo) • Sense perceptions lead to ‘remembering’ what is eternal (good, beautiful, truth) • Learning is really remembering • Aristotle and Memory (On Memory and Reminiscence) • Memory stores images of sense images (tabula rasa) • Reminiscence orders and processes the sense images held in memory • No connection to eternal ideas

4. Augustine and Memory • Memory: the interior ’place’ where ‘time’ is recalled • Memory is the ‘place’ of knowledge • Platonic understanding of ‘remembering’ knowledge as learning • How to ‘remember’ God who is eternal? • This is necessary for the Happy Life

5. Confessions X • What is memory • How is human memory different from an animal’s memory • Memory of sin • What is forgetfulness • Jesus Christ human and divine as Mediator between eternal and the time-bound • Forms bridge into Book XI, the meditation on time

6. De Trinitate • Written 399-410; most likely written for himself • Serialized (as was much of his work) • Some of it published before he was ready for distribution • Primary adversary: Arians • Tripartite Division • Books I-IV How to interpret Scripture • Books V – VII Catholic doctrine argued against Arians • Books VIII – XV How we think about God • Augustine’s most speculative work

7. De TrinitateThe Imago Dei • Note in De Trinitate Augustine traces the inner life of man (anthropology): origins, development, ends • Book X.17-18 introduce concept of Memory, Intellect and Will: the imago Dei • Book XIV.1-11 how the image becomes perfected

8. Aquinas on MemoryST IIa IIae Q49 • First note that for Aquinas, following Aristotle, we know through the senses • Memory, again following Aristotle, in Aquinas becomes a part of prudence (a. 1) • Memory is based solely on experience in time • Understanding is also an aspect of prudence (a. 2) • For Aquinas prudence is by far the most important acquired virtue • Note who is completely missing from this discussion

9. John CalvinImago Dei • The Fall completely destroyed the imago Dei in man • Only Jesus Christ and His grace can restore it • No analogy between human attributes and God • Note arguments against philosophers • An example of where Calvin differs from Augustine • Institutes I.15, available at http://www.ccel.org/ccel/calvin/institutes.iii.xvi.html?highlight=memory#highlight

10. John Locke • Essay Concerning Understanding • Tabula Rasa • Strong empiricism • Role of memory • Place where we store observed data • Read Essay, Book II, Ch 1, “Of Ideas” • Available at http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/locke/locke1/Book2a.html

11. Gottfried Leibniz (1646-1716) • Contemporary of Locke and Newton • Lutheran mathematician and philosopher • But also sees great value in Scholasticism • Wanted to provide philosophical framework to reunite Lutherans and Catholics • Discoverer/inventor of calculus • Simultaneous with but independent of Newton • Highly disputed then and to this day who was ‘first’

12. Leibniz Opposition to Locke • New Essay Concerning Understanding • Opposed to Locke • Based on Plato and Augustine • “His has more relation to Aristotle, and mine to Plato, although we diverge in many things from the doctrines of these two ancients.” 9

13. Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) • One of the most influential philosophers of 20th C • Early work as a Catholic theologian • Breaks with Catholic (scholastic) in 1919; becomes a student of Husserl • Augustine Lectures, 1921 • Being and Time, 1927 • Becomes as Nazi in 1933; but eventually sent to dig ditches by Nazis in 1944 • Heidegger’s relation to Nazism still very disputed • Along the way he does reject Christianity, or at least accuses Christianity of distorting philosophy, and Greek philosophy of distorting Biblical Christianity

14. Heidegger, Augustine Lectures • Augustine Lectures written as a commentary on Confessions Book X • Heidegger attempts of ‘deconstruct’ the Neoplatonic elements of Book X, to retrieve the phenomenology of lived Christianity • Heidegger wanted to reconstruct the original lived experience of Biblical Christianity • Specific objections by Heidegger • God as highest good, beauty is not biblical but Neoplatonic • God as experienced in the world is not one of enjoyment, but is found in struggle • The work is preceded by Heidegger’s reading of the analysis of Augustine by Troeltsch, Harnack and Dilthey • Heidegger says all three tried to “objectify” and historically distance Augustine as an object so study • He wants to see Augustine as relevant to today, as an example of what we are living • Read Heidegger, The Phenomenology of Religious Life, Trans. Matthais Fritsch and Jennifer Gosetti-Ferencei, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2004) pp121-148

15. Benedict XVI, Regensburgh Speech, 12 Sept. 2006 • This is the ‘infamous’ speech that led to consternation and confrontation in Muslim world • Really about religion and science • Really, really about opposing dehellenization (retrieval of Platonism) in Christianity • Need for cultural memory • Read (optional) http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/speeches/2006/september/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20060912_university-regensburg_en.html

16. Assignments • Memory • Augustine, • Confessions, X, • De Trinitate 1.1, X.17-18, XIV.1-11 • Aquinas on Memory, ST IIa IIae Q49 • Calvin on Memory, Institutes I.15, available at http://www.ccel.org/ccel/calvin/institutes.iii.xvi.html?highlight=memory#highlight • Heidegger, The Phenomenology of Religious Life, pp 121-148