Psychology and Philosophy of Human Intelligence

Introduction to the Psychology of Intelligence

Thought is considered an overall psychological phenomenon of intelligence. It has historically been poorly studied due to several factors:

• Difficulties in experimenting: This is due to the separation of its physical substrate and a lack of necessary dependence on its psychological precedents.
• Difficulties in isolating it from words: There are no guarantees that you know what you are saying.
• Difficulties in isolating it from philosophy.

Biological Perspective

From a biological point of view, intelligence is characterized by the following:

• It is a necessary requirement for life.
• It is a necessary consequence of life: a natural and innate activity (similar to instincts).
• All individuals of a species are intelligent.
• It is infallible.

The Object of Intelligence

Material and Formal Objects

• Material object: This is considered irrelevant to the core definition.
• Formal object: The trait or feature by which things are intelligible. One must distinguish between:

1. Intelligence as Such

The common object of intelligence is being.

• Things are intelligible inasmuch as they are.
• Nothingness can only be thought of as a denial of being.
• There is nothing absolutely inaccessible to human intelligence.

2. Human Intelligence: Proper Object

• Direct: The quiddity of material things represented by imagination as abstract and universal.
  • Quiddity: The blurry essence of something.
  • Essence: What makes something what it is and not something else.
• Indirect: The intelligence itself; particular things (by reflection); and immaterial things (by analogy).

Human intelligence is incarnate (within a body), whereas angelic intelligence is spiritual and does not require a body to exist.

The Nature of Human Intelligence

Human intelligence is a spiritual capability; that is to say, it is intrinsically independent of the body.

Core Operations of the Intelligence

A. Simple Apprehension

Definition: The act of understanding something without affirming or denying anything about it (in or by a concept).

Existence of the Concept

• Concept and image
• Concept and word

Formation of the Concept

The concept is abstracted from sensible experience. There are various types and degrees of abstraction.

B. Judgment

Definition: The act by which we affirm or deny a feature of a subject. In judgments, truth appears explicitly.

C. Reasoning

Definition: A chain of sentences, logically connected, such that starting from known truthful sentences, we arrive at another truthful sentence previously unknown.

Two Ways to Intellectually Reach the Truth

• Immediate way: Direct understanding.
• Discursive way: Step-by-step logical progression.