Date of Award

1-1-1982

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Teaching & Learning

Abstract

The research problem is to investigate and analyze perception as an epistemological concept in the writings of Aristotle, using De Anima as the focus for the study.The purpose is to identify and analyze the epistemological premises in Aristotle's theory of perception with particular reference to the intellective process. The Aristotelian concepts utilized as the framework are perception, empiricism, imagination, memory, Aristotle's doctrine of potentiality and actuality and his theory of nous.Aristotle held that perception implies both conception and sense perception. He says that in sense perception the sense organ receives the form without its matter and the object actualizes the organ's potentiality for receiving forms. The 'forms' or 'similitudes' apprehended by the senses act as phantasms which by conversion become intelligible species. The intelligible species are to the intellect what the sensible forms are to the senses.Five educational principles for the teacher as a learning theorist evolve from Aristotle's epistemological premises. The principles derived for learning theory are: (1) The teacher as a learning theorist should encourage and impart the empirical methodology in learning as a means of scientific inquiry. (2) The teacher should recognize the mind's ability to act as a totality, reflecting, questioning and envisioning errors. Through the mind's self projection comes intellectual growth. (3) The teacher should focus upon imagination as a pivotal and ultimate facet of the intellective process. Learning theory should recognize the importance of the image as a means of instruction. (4) The teacher should recognize the importance of the vitality of memory as a crucial aspect to learning. Memory acts as a priori and as a factor in intellectual cognition. (5) The teacher should recognize the fact that the noetic faculty or the rational intellect is almost a pure potency actualized only by thinking. The true nature of the faculty of cognition is that of potentiality and actuality.

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