For pathological body rigidity described with the same word, see Catalepsy.
Katalepsis (Greek: κατάληψις, "grasping") is a term in Stoic philosophy for a concept roughly equivalent to modern comprehension.[1] To the Stoic philosophers, katalepsis was an important premise regarding one's state of mind as it relates to grasping fundamental philosophical concepts.
According to the Stoics, the mind is constantly being bombarded with impressions (phantasiai).[2] Some of these impressions are true and some false. Impressions are true when they are truly affirmed, false if they are wrongly affirmed. Cicero relates that Zeno would illustrate katalepsis as follows:
He would display his hand in front of one with the fingers stretched out and say "A visual appearance is like this"; next he closed his fingers a little and said, "An act of assent is like this"; then he pressed his fingers closely together and made a fist, and said that that was comprehension (and from this illustration he gave to that process the actual name of katalepsis, which it had not had before); but then he used to apply his left hand to his right fist and squeeze it tightly and forcibly, and then say that such was knowledge, which was within the power of nobody save the wise man.[3]
Katalepsis was the main point of contention between the Stoics and the two schools of philosophical skepticism during the Hellenistic period: the Pyrrhonists and the Academic Skeptics of Plato's Academy. These Skeptics, who chose the Stoics as their natural philosophical opposites, eschewed much of what the Stoics believed regarding the human mind and one's methods of understanding greater meanings.[4] To the Skeptics, all perceptions were acataleptic, i.e. bore no conformity to the objects perceived, or, if they did bear any conformity, it could never be known.[5]
^Charles Porterfield Krauth, William Fleming, Henry Calderwood, (1878), A vocabulary of the philosophical sciences, p. 589
^
Diogenes Laërtius (2000). Lives of eminent philosophers. Vol. VII: 49. Transl. R D Hicks. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
^
Cicero (1967). Academica. Vol. II: 144. Transl. H Rackham. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
^See Ancient Greek Skepticism at the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy for information about katalepsis and the Skeptics' attack on it.
^George Henry Lewes (1863), The biographical history of philosophy, Volume 1, p. 297
Katalepsis (Greek: κατάληψις, "grasping") is a term in Stoic philosophy for a concept roughly equivalent to modern comprehension. To the Stoic philosophers...
Catalepsy (from Ancient Greek katálēpsis, κατάληψις, "seizing, grasping") is a neurological condition characterized by muscular rigidity and fixity of...
is the antithesis of the Stoic doctrine of katalepsis or Apprehension. According to the Stoics, katalepsis was true perception, but to the Skeptics, all...
epistêmê ἐπιστήμη: certain and true knowledge, over and above that of katalêpsis. eudaimonia εὐδαιμονία: happiness, well-being. eupatheia εὐπάθεια: good...
of fossil hymenocarine arthropod, known only by one species, Tokummia katalepsis, from the middle Cambrian (508 million years old) Burgess Shale as found...
mind could distinguish true from false, following the Stoic doctrine of katalepsis. In doing so, he claimed to be reviving the doctrines of the Old Academy...
to the position of dogmatists such as the Stoics and their doctrine of katalepsis. In this Sextus was repeating or building upon earlier Pyrrhonist arguments...
only through reason that we gain clear comprehension and conviction (katalepsis). Certain and true knowledge (episteme), achievable by the Stoic sage...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Comprehension. From which simile he also gave that state a new name, calling it katalepsis (κατάληψις). But when he brought his left hand against his right, and...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...
Good Theory of forms Mind Anamnesis Ataraxia Apatheia Episteme Epoché Katalepsis Logos Nous Phronesis Soul Anima mundi Metempsychosis Henosis Plato's theory...