Aristotle on the Problem of Common Sensibles

Professor Anna Marmodoro (Oxford University)

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Abstract

Aristotle draws a distinction between qualities that are perceptible via a single sense only, the special sensibles, and qualities that are perceptible by more than one sense at once, the common sensibles. What are the ontology and the epistemology of the common sensibles, in light of Aristotle’s assumption that each sense organ is sensitive to only its own special sensibles? Does the problem of common sensibles give us reasons for giving up a ‘separatist’ view of sense experiences? Or rather can it be solved by postulating extra perceptual powers for the senses? Are more ‘parsimonious’ options viable? In this paper I engage with these and related questions, which have attracted the interest of Aristotelian scholars (Gregoric 2007, Johansen 2012) and philosophers of the mind (Tye 2007) alike. I offer my own reading of Aristotle’s account and examine its philosophical viability.

Anna Marmodoro was elected Official Fellow in Corpus Christi College, Oxford in 2011. She directs a large-scale research group supported by the European Research Council and based in the Faculty of Philosophy, with the title Power Structuralism in Ancient Ontologies. The project investigates the nature of the fundamental building blocks of reality: what the ancients thought they were, and how those ancient philosophical views compare or contrast with the most recent developments in metaphysics and philosophy of physics. The driving research hypothesis is that for the ancients, as well as for us, powers are the sole type of fundamental entities. She joined Corpus in 2007; she was first as a lecturer (2007/08); she was then elected Junior Research Fellow (2008/11) and contemporaneously held a British Academy Post-Doctoral Fellowship in Faculty of Philosophy. Before coming to Oxford, Anna earned her Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Edinburgh and a Laurea in Philosophy from the University of Pisa, Italy. She has held visiting fellowships in Germany, Italy, the US, and Australia. She published The Metaphysics of Powers: Their Grounding and Their Manifestations, Routledge, 2010 (edited volume);The Metaphysics of the Incarnation, OUP, 2011 (co-edited with Jonathan Hill); The Author's Voice in Classical and Late Antiquity, OUP, 2013, (co-edited with Jonathan Hill). 
She is currently completing a monograph provisionally titled: Aristotle on Perceiving Objects., for OUP.