Abstract

In this paper, I survey one of the key arguments used in Latin medieval psychology in favour of active views of cognition, from Peter John Olivi to Durand of St. Pourҁain. In broad terms, these ‘attribution arguments’, based on some appeal to other causal events or how we speak of them, argue that passive views of cognition have the absurd consequence that they misattribute our cognitive acts to things ultimately external to our intrinsic cognitive powers (viz., external objects or sensible/intelligible species). In the secondary literature, these arguments tend to get overshadowed by arguments with more distinctly Augustinian roots, based on the nobility of cognition or the experience of active attention. However, in this paper I argue that these ‘attribution arguments’ are distinctly interesting, especially insofar as they speak to hot debates concerning so-called ‘immanent acts’ and how to read Aristotle on such actions in Metaphysics Θ.