ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses two sixteenth-century authors who describe the powers of the soul as more or less independent causal agents really distinct from the soul itself. It argues that sensitive powers are homogeneous parts of the sensitive soul that command specific parts of the body, where certain dispositions are found. The chapter explores the power of touch is in fact identical with the sensitive soul as a whole because human beings are able to have tactile sensations by means of any part of their bodies where the dispositions necessary for touch are found. The cognitive powers of human beings (including sense perception and imagination, which the Aristotelians attributed to the sensitive soul) at least partly survived early modern criticism and, embedded in new metaphysical frameworks, became the focus of intense discussions in seventeenth-century philosophy. The chapter examines the accounts given by a physician (Thomas Del Garbo), a theologian (Gregory of Rimini) and a philosopher (John Buridan) to illustrate Ockham's influence.
