In the study of scholastic philosophy, I'm struggling with this question for a while:
It seems like dogs do know what dogs are. Aquinas states that animals have perception, capable of complex cognition:
By definition, the living things that we call animals are those that have the power of perception. Aquinas accepts the conventional list of the five senses [..] Beyond these five external senses are the four internal senses that use the brain as their organ.[..] the common sense; imagination (or phantasia); the estimative (or cogitative) power; memory. [..] Aquinas thinks that a great deal of complex cognition occurs within the internal senses of the brain, but that those material powers are incapable of abstract thought. To be more precise, he thinks that material cognitive powers can represent things only as particulars, and that universal concepts can be formed only within the immaterial intellect.
My question is: How does scholastic philosophy separatedeal with animal and human capacitiesperception so that, for apprehending universalsexample, a dog that has been abused by human beings avoids any other human? And how is this compared with human intelectual capacities for apprehending universals?
I heard that animals live in a stimulity instead of a reality (according to Xavier Zubiri), but I would like to understand a little better how this would fit in the distinction between animal perception and human perceptionintellect.
