Analysis Of Thomas Aquinas 'Involuntariness'
Aquinas is a well-known philosopher and theologian of all time. In the Summa question 6, article 8 talks about whether ignorance is voluntary. Involuntariness is to act against one’s will. Also, ignorance is the lack of knowledge. Aquinas questions how voluntary ignorance can be; he spends most or all of the eighth article explaining this. Ignorance can occur when one does not realize their ignorance, but their efforts to obtain the knowledge are of no advantage to them. In article two, objection two claims that sins imply ignorance and ignorance causes involuntariness. This leads to the idea that that every sin is involuntary. The second objection claims that sin infers ignorance, which causes involuntariness.
Ignorance does not excuse one …show more content…
Ignorance is not the cause of the act of will, but is, as it were, accidental to it. So someone wishes, indeed, to kill his enemy, but ignorantly shoots him while aiming at a deer. Such ignorance produces not the involuntary, but the not-voluntary. That is, the act is neither voluntary nor involuntary. Consequently is when the ignorance itself is voluntary in one of two ways: when the ignorance is directly willed, or when there is voluntary ignorance of that which one can and ought to know. In this way, one does not actually consider what he can and ought to consider. Lastly, antecedently is when the ignorance is not voluntary, and yet it is the cause of willing what would not otherwise have been willed. One may be ignorant of something connected with one’s act, which one was not bound to know, and consequently they may do what they would not have done if they had known that circumstance. For example, a man is firing his rifle with all requisite precautions, and shoots another man. Such ignorance causes the simply involuntary. Accordingly, if in either of these ways, ignorance is voluntary, it cannot cause simple involuntariness. Nevertheless, it causes involuntariness in a certain respect, in as much as it precedes the movement of the will towards the act, which movement would not be, if there were knowledge. Ignorance is "antecedent" to the act
Ignorance does not excuse one …show more content…
Ignorance is not the cause of the act of will, but is, as it were, accidental to it. So someone wishes, indeed, to kill his enemy, but ignorantly shoots him while aiming at a deer. Such ignorance produces not the involuntary, but the not-voluntary. That is, the act is neither voluntary nor involuntary. Consequently is when the ignorance itself is voluntary in one of two ways: when the ignorance is directly willed, or when there is voluntary ignorance of that which one can and ought to know. In this way, one does not actually consider what he can and ought to consider. Lastly, antecedently is when the ignorance is not voluntary, and yet it is the cause of willing what would not otherwise have been willed. One may be ignorant of something connected with one’s act, which one was not bound to know, and consequently they may do what they would not have done if they had known that circumstance. For example, a man is firing his rifle with all requisite precautions, and shoots another man. Such ignorance causes the simply involuntary. Accordingly, if in either of these ways, ignorance is voluntary, it cannot cause simple involuntariness. Nevertheless, it causes involuntariness in a certain respect, in as much as it precedes the movement of the will towards the act, which movement would not be, if there were knowledge. Ignorance is "antecedent" to the act