«Scientia est assimilatio scientis ad rem scitam»: Knowledge as a Relative and the Relation of «Sameness» in Thomas Aquinas

Abstract

The theory of knowledge in Thomas Aquinas is one of the main controversial among the medievalists in the last years due to the interpretation of scholastic theories in the contemporary cognitive models. In this debates, the idea of «sameness» is a central topic, despite its status as a relation is not highlighted enough. In this paper I approach the problem of knowledge in Thomas Aquinas as a «relative» term. First I presente how the autor includes knowledge in this category as an «assimetric relation» by exposing the criteria that distinguish this kind of relative and arguing how knowledge meets them. Then I feature the importance of the term «sameness» in Thomas’s epistemology and I analize it from the point of view of «relation», showing same problems and ambiguities in Thomas Aquinas’s presentation.