I. Placement of the Concept (2)

2. The concept
2.1. Notion

a) Description

When the intelligence intuits a simple object, like 'man' or 'horse', at the same time it expresses internally its object, making of it a likeness. This is how St Thomas describes this process:

Quandocumque autem actu intelligit, quoddam intelligibile format, quod est quasi quaedam proles ipsius, unde et mentis conceptus nominatur.
De rationibus fidei 3, n. 958

One gathers the analogy implicit in the text: as a fecund woman conceives her son, so also the intellegence, as fertilized by abstraction, forms in itself a concept, or a similitudine of the quiddity actually taken in.

The process of conceptualization in its terminal phase consists of two poles: the concept itself generated in the mind, the object, normally outside the mind, of the likeness of which the concept is conceived.

b) Analysis

Being a likeness of the object which makes the object known, the concept is therefore a sign of the object. This is how St Thomas defines sign:

communiter possumus signum dicere quodcumque notum in quo aliquid cognoscatur.
QDV 9, 4, 4m.

(A complete theory of the sign from a thomist perspective can be found in John of St Thomas, Ars logica II, qq. 21 to 23.)

So that will be a sign, in the full sense of the word, the knowledge of which brings one to know some thing. For example, smoke is a sign of fire; a green light is a sign that the road is clear.

The notion of sign is doubly divided:

1) with regard to the origin of the sign:
α - natural
β - articifical or by agreement

α = a sign which is inserted into nature itself, vg smoke with respect to fire, crying with respect to pain
β = a sign depends on human choice, vg the various languages with respect to thought, street or highway signs with respect to circumstances of the street or highway

2) with regard to the relation itself of signification
x - formale seu in quo
y - intrumentale seu ex quo

x = a sign which makes known its meaning without the need to know first the sign itself; it is therefore a sign in which knowing the meaning happens in an immediate way.

y = a sign which makes known it meaning after the knower has first come to know the sign itself; it is therefore a sign by the knowing of which one comes to know the signified. For example, smoke is an instrumental sign, because the perception of smoke precedes the conclusion that there is a fire.

From this brief analysis, it can be seen that a concept is a natural formal sign of the quiddity which it expresses. It is natural because it does not depend on human institution; and it is formal because it refers to the quiddity without the need to first know the sign as such. The written or spoken word on the other hand is an artificial sign, because it is arbitrary and without natural relation to its ultimate meaning (with the exception in some sense of onomatopoeia), and it is an instrumental sign because one must first decipher the sign to access its meaning (as is apparent when one arrives in a foreign country).

c) Semantics of the notion

The notion itself of concept is expressed by various terms which have the same essential sense, but are distinguished by their connotations. Let us give a brief lexicon of the most common synonyms of 'concept'.

- intentio: this already encountered term signifies the concept as it is the product of the 'tension' from intelligence towards reality.

- verbum or verbum mentis (= mental word): this expression signifies the concept as it is like an 'internal word' in which the intellect says to itself the quiddity which it is understanding*.

- ratio: this term, as with the Greek λογος, has subtleties not translatable by the English word 'reason'; in the use under consideration here, it signifies either the object of the concept insofar as an intelligible notion**, or the concept itself as grasping this intelligible unity***.

- species expressa: a detailed study of this locution doesn't pertain to logic, but rather to theory of knowledge; we limit ourselves to noting that it signifies the concept as ideal expression of the quiddity****.

* - Cf In Io. 1, lect. 1, n. 25: Istud ergo sic expressum, scilicet formatum in anima, dicitur verbum interius; et ideo comparatur ad intellectum, non sicut quo intellectus intelligit, sed sicut in quo intelligit; quia in ipso expresso et formato videt naturam rei intellectae.
** - Cf Sn 1, 2, 1, 3, c: ratio, prout hic sumitur, nihil aliud est quam id quod apprehendit intellectus de significatione alicujus nominis
*** - Cf CG 1, 53, n. 443: intellectus, per speciem rei formatus, intelligendo format in seipso quandam intentionem rei intellectae, quae est ratio ipsius, quam significat definitio.
**** - Cf John of St Thomas, Naturalis Philosophiae, IV pars: De ente mobili animato, q. 11, a. 1, 345 b 12-19: "In sententia S. Thomae quatuor sunt ponenda in intellectu nostro ad intelligendum requisita, scilicet potentia seu virtus (ad quam etiam pertinet habitus seu lumen), species intelligibilis, actus intelligendi et verbum seu conceptus aut species expressa." At this juncture the synonymy invoked by the commentator of St Thomas interests us. The analytic study of the four instants highlighted here pertains to theory of knowledge.