On Anaxagoras’ Nous

Abstract

Aristotle’s theory of νοῦς is not only one of the most important parts of De Anima’s project but also the one entailing more challenges. For, the way in which νοῦς is to be understood in the general frame of the hylomorphic model is everything but obvious. Furthermore, this is a case in which Aristotle’s positive developments remained attached to one of the opinions discussed in Book I: Anaxagoras’s early conception of νοῦς as a principle.

            In this paper, I aim to present a case study that reveals the significance of the dialectical procedure of Book I in the whole project of De Anima. My target will be the concept of νοῦς that Aristotle exhumes from Anaxagoras’s obscure reports and that he appropriates. I am interested in explaining how Aristotle did so and the philosophical consequences of such a recovery of an early concept. By these consequences, I mean the role that Anaxagoras’s opinion played in the reception of Aristotle’s own theory.