AQUINAS’ ETHICS:

RIGHT OR WRONG

RANDY B. BLANZA
Master of Laws student
 THE ROLE OF INTELLECT IN ETHICS

Aquinas makes the role of intellect crucial for ethics.

“Ethics is a matter of reason from beginning to end.
He means by reason not just logical consistency plus
knowledge of empirical facts, but knowledge of
values, an understanding of what is really and truly
good.
 THE POWERS OF INTELLECT

1. SYNDERESIS
2. CONSCIENCE

For Aquinas, we have no special, distinct moral power,

or moral sense, as some modern philosophers say. The
power is called the intellect.
 SYNDERESIS AND CONSCIENCE ARE NOT MERE
FEELINGS, BUT SEEINGS, UNDERSTANDINGS. THEY
TELL US THE OBJECTIVE TRUTH.

Aquinas calls ethics as science, in the ancient, broad sense of the word.
If you look at the word “conscience” you can see the word “science” in it.
Its root word “scio” means “I know” . As Aquinas says, “conscience”,
according to the very nature of the word, implies the relation of
knowledge to something”.
He doesn’t deny that there’s also an emotional dimension to
conscience. In fact, he says: “Conscience is said to bind, to
incite and also to accuse, torment, or rebuke, and all these
follow the application of knowledge to what we do”. He’s
saying that these moral feelings are there only because the
moral knowledge is there.
 THE POWER AQUINAS CALLS SYNDERESIS
IS INTUITIVE, OR DIRECT SEEING
It parallel to the mind seeing intellectual first principles like 2 + 2= 4 or
the whole is greater than the part, or X does not equal non-X.

In synderesis, the mind sees the goodness or badness, the rightness or

wrongness, of an act, not a concrete particular act but a species or kind
of act, a virtue or vice like greed or justice. That’s the first part of moral
knowledge.
Then comes the second part, which he calls conscience, where
the mind applies these values to situation. Then because of
this rational judgment of conscience, comes the emotional
force of feelings of obligation or guilt.
 DISPUTATION GUIDED BY THE APPROACH OF
THOMAS AQUINAS
Method
Formulate a reasoned assumption
State the assumption as a question
Propose a negative response to the question
Example
the existence of an active intellectual
principle, which Aquinas denominates as
the agent intellect.
Is there exist an active intellectual principle,
which Aquinas denominates as the agent
intellect?
It seem that there is no active intellectual
principle existing
State 3–5 objections in support of the Objection No. 1. since the intellect is in
negative response to the question potentiality to intelligible things, and since that
potentiality becomes act through
understanding, there is only a passive intellect.

Objection No. 2. if the active component of

sensory perception aids in making the medium
luminous, then analogously, the active
component of the intellect should also
influence the medium to make understanding
possible. However, since there is no apparent
medium required for understanding to occur,
there is no need for an agent intellect to alter
the medium
Objection No. 3. since forms are allegedly
immaterial, once they are received by the
intellect, no further effort is needed by an
active component to make them intelligible.
Make a statement contrary to the objections reviewing the definition of a form of intellect,
(a positive response to the question)
Plato viewed that forms are immaterial and
completely independent of matter. However,
Aristotle reviewed this theory by establishing a
connection between matter and form which is
based on the concepts of actuality and
potentiality (Aristotle, 412a). Therefore, some
power is required to break this connection and
extract the form from individual matter. This
power to abstract is called the agent intellect
(Aquinas, 128).
State your own reasoned I respond that:
response to the question as a
concise discussion
Reply to each objection explaining why it is
incorrect or inadequate.
Reply to objection 1: since the intellect needs
to perform two actions, namely abstraction and
understanding, there needs to be an active
constituent to the intellect as well as a passive
one, unlike the nutritive and sensitive parts of
the soul
Reply to objection 2: in Aristotle’s analogy of
the active intellect as light: for the Philosopher,
light is needed so that the medium becomes
illuminated, but the agent intellect is required
for understanding for a different reason since
no medium is involved.
Reply to objection no. 3: in order to
comprehend the intelligible, abstraction is
required to extract the form from the matter, a
function performed by the agent intellect.