Varieties of consciousness in classical Arabic thought: Avicenna, Averroes, and the mutakallimūn, 2023
By: Deborah L. Black
Title Varieties of consciousness in classical Arabic thought: Avicenna, Averroes, and the mutakallimūn
Type Article
Language English
Date 2023
Journal British journal for the history of philosophy
Volume ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print)
Pages 1-22
Categories Psychology
Author(s) Deborah L. Black
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)
In classical Arabic philosophy, the topic of consciousness is commonly associated with Avicenna's ‘Flying Man’ thought experiment. But Avicenna's explorations of the nature of consciousness are not confined to the Flying Man, and he is by no means the only classical Islamic thinker to deem consciousness an important feature of our experience. Consciousness also plays a important role in the epistemology and moral psychology of Avicenna's intellectual rivals, the theologians (mutakallumūn), who represent important sources for Avicenna's own theorizing about consciousness. And while Avicenna's philosophical successor and critic, Averroes, seems to banish consciousness from the core of his cognitive psychology, in doing so he seems to anticipate contemporary efforts to expand the scope of consciousness through the notion of the ‘extended’ mind. This paper examines the varieties of consciousness recognized by Avicenna and several other classical Islamic thinkers with a view to understanding the extent to which their accounts can be mapped on to some of the concepts of consciousness delineated by contemporary philosophers of mind.

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Intentionality in Medieval Arabic Philosophy, 2010
By: Deborah L. Black
Title Intentionality in Medieval Arabic Philosophy
Type Article
Language English
Date 2010
Journal Quaestio
Volume 10
Pages 65-81
Categories Avicenna, Psychology, Metaphysics, Linguistics
Author(s) Deborah L. Black
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)
It has long been a truism of the history of philosophy that intentionality is an invention of the medieval period, and within this standard narrative, the central place of Arabic philosophy has always been acknowledged. Yet there are many misconceptions surrounding the theories of intentionality advanced by the two main Arabic thinkers whose works were available to the West, Avicenna and Averroes. In the first part of this paper I offer an overview of the general accounts of intentionality and intentional being found in the linguistic, psychological, and metaphysical writings of Avicenna and Averroes, and I trace the terminology of “intentions” to a neglected passage from Avicenna’s logic. In the second part of the paper I examine the way that Avicenna and Averroes apply their general theories of intentionality to the realm of sense perception. I offer an explanation of why Avicenna might have chosen to denominate the objects of the internal sense faculty of estimation as “intentions”, and I explore the implications of Averroes’s decision to attribute intentionality to the external senses and the media of perception.

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Models of the Mind. Metaphysical Presuppositions of the Averroist and Thomistic Accounts of Intellection, 2004
By: Deborah Louise Black
Title Models of the Mind. Metaphysical Presuppositions of the Averroist and Thomistic Accounts of Intellection
Type Article
Language English
Date 2004
Journal Documenti e studi sulla tradizione filosofica medievale
Volume 15
Pages 319–352
Categories Psychology, Aquinas
Author(s) Deborah Louise Black
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)

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Imagination and Estimation. Arabic Paradigms and Western Transformations, 2000
By: Deborah Louise Black
Title Imagination and Estimation. Arabic Paradigms and Western Transformations
Type Article
Language English
Date 2000
Journal Topoi
Volume 19
Pages 59–75
Categories Psychology
Author(s) Deborah Louise Black
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)

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Conjunction and the Identity of Knower and Known in Averroes, 1999
By: Deborah Louise Black
Title Conjunction and the Identity of Knower and Known in Averroes
Type Article
Language English
Date 1999
Journal American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly
Volume 73
Pages 159–184
Categories Psychology
Author(s) Deborah Louise Black
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)

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Memory, Individuals, and the Past in Averroes's Psychology, 1996
By: Deborah Louise Black
Title Memory, Individuals, and the Past in Averroes's Psychology
Type Article
Language English
Date 1996
Journal Medieval Philosophy and Theology
Volume 5
Issue 2
Pages 161–187
Categories Psychology
Author(s) Deborah Louise Black
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)

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Consciousness and Self-Knowledge in Aquinas's Critique of Averroes's Psychology, 1993
By: Deborah Louise Black
Title Consciousness and Self-Knowledge in Aquinas's Critique of Averroes's Psychology
Type Article
Language English
Date 1993
Journal Journal of the History of Philosophy
Volume 31
Pages 349–385
Categories Psychology, Aquinas
Author(s) Deborah Louise Black
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)

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Conjunction and the Identity of Knower and Known in Averroes, 1999
By: Deborah Louise Black
Title Conjunction and the Identity of Knower and Known in Averroes
Type Article
Language English
Date 1999
Journal American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly
Volume 73
Pages 159–184
Categories Psychology
Author(s) Deborah Louise Black
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)

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Consciousness and Self-Knowledge in Aquinas's Critique of Averroes's Psychology, 1993
By: Deborah Louise Black
Title Consciousness and Self-Knowledge in Aquinas's Critique of Averroes's Psychology
Type Article
Language English
Date 1993
Journal Journal of the History of Philosophy
Volume 31
Pages 349–385
Categories Psychology, Aquinas
Author(s) Deborah Louise Black
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)

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Imagination and Estimation. Arabic Paradigms and Western Transformations, 2000
By: Deborah Louise Black
Title Imagination and Estimation. Arabic Paradigms and Western Transformations
Type Article
Language English
Date 2000
Journal Topoi
Volume 19
Pages 59–75
Categories Psychology
Author(s) Deborah Louise Black
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)

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Intentionality in Medieval Arabic Philosophy, 2010
By: Deborah L. Black
Title Intentionality in Medieval Arabic Philosophy
Type Article
Language English
Date 2010
Journal Quaestio
Volume 10
Pages 65-81
Categories Avicenna, Psychology, Metaphysics, Linguistics
Author(s) Deborah L. Black
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)
It has long been a truism of the history of philosophy that intentionality is an invention of the medieval period, and within this standard narrative, the central place of Arabic philosophy has always been acknowledged. Yet there are many misconceptions surrounding the theories of intentionality advanced by the two main Arabic thinkers whose works were available to the West, Avicenna and Averroes. In the first part of this paper I offer an overview of the general accounts of intentionality and intentional being found in the linguistic, psychological, and metaphysical writings of Avicenna and Averroes, and I trace the terminology of “intentions” to a neglected passage from Avicenna’s logic. In the second part of the paper I examine the way that Avicenna and Averroes apply their general theories of intentionality to the realm of sense perception. I offer an explanation of why Avicenna might have chosen to denominate the objects of the internal sense faculty of estimation as “intentions”, and I explore the implications of Averroes’s decision to attribute intentionality to the external senses and the media of perception.

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Memory, Individuals, and the Past in Averroes's Psychology, 1996
By: Deborah Louise Black
Title Memory, Individuals, and the Past in Averroes's Psychology
Type Article
Language English
Date 1996
Journal Medieval Philosophy and Theology
Volume 5
Issue 2
Pages 161–187
Categories Psychology
Author(s) Deborah Louise Black
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)

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Models of the Mind. Metaphysical Presuppositions of the Averroist and Thomistic Accounts of Intellection, 2004
By: Deborah Louise Black
Title Models of the Mind. Metaphysical Presuppositions of the Averroist and Thomistic Accounts of Intellection
Type Article
Language English
Date 2004
Journal Documenti e studi sulla tradizione filosofica medievale
Volume 15
Pages 319–352
Categories Psychology, Aquinas
Author(s) Deborah Louise Black
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)

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Varieties of consciousness in classical Arabic thought: Avicenna, Averroes, and the mutakallimūn, 2023
By: Deborah L. Black
Title Varieties of consciousness in classical Arabic thought: Avicenna, Averroes, and the mutakallimūn
Type Article
Language English
Date 2023
Journal British journal for the history of philosophy
Volume ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print)
Pages 1-22
Categories Psychology
Author(s) Deborah L. Black
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)
In classical Arabic philosophy, the topic of consciousness is commonly associated with Avicenna's ‘Flying Man’ thought experiment. But Avicenna's explorations of the nature of consciousness are not confined to the Flying Man, and he is by no means the only classical Islamic thinker to deem consciousness an important feature of our experience. Consciousness also plays a important role in the epistemology and moral psychology of Avicenna's intellectual rivals, the theologians (mutakallumūn), who represent important sources for Avicenna's own theorizing about consciousness. And while Avicenna's philosophical successor and critic, Averroes, seems to banish consciousness from the core of his cognitive psychology, in doing so he seems to anticipate contemporary efforts to expand the scope of consciousness through the notion of the ‘extended’ mind. This paper examines the varieties of consciousness recognized by Avicenna and several other classical Islamic thinkers with a view to understanding the extent to which their accounts can be mapped on to some of the concepts of consciousness delineated by contemporary philosophers of mind.

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