8 - Cognitive Powers

Summary

This chapter traces the development of the psychology John of La Rochelle presents in his Tractatus and Summa de anima in the section on the rational soul in the Summa Halensis, which was not authored by John himself but clearly draws heavily on his thought. This work has often been said to offer a typically Augustinian theory of cognition, but the close examination of it in light of John’s writings suggests an at best tangential relationship with merely pseudo-Augustinian works, which were invoked as a means to legitimizing the use of Avicenna’s psychology.