The concept of nous and its relation with the concept of dianoia in Aristotle's philosophy

Abstract

In Aristotle’s De anima, besides presenting an intriguing theory about the intellect (nous) that gives rise to a bipartite understanding of it as active intellect (nous poiētikos) and passive intellect (nous pathetikós), the philosopher states that the affections of the intellect are distinct from the affections of who possesses it. One of these affections, according to Aristotle, is the reasoning. Furthermore, Aristotle says that the latter is perishable while the former is impassive and eternal. In this way, far from clarifying, he makes it even harder to understand the concept of intellect, as well the understanding of what the rational activity (dianoia) would be. Thus, the present work aims to clarify the concept of nous and dianoia in order to obtain, in an Aristotelian perspective, a greater understanding of our knowing process in general.