SOURCE: "Intuitive Cognition, Certainty, and Scepticism in William Ockham," Traditio, Vol. XXVI, 1970, pp. 389-98.

[In the following essay, Adams summarizes Ockham's doctrine of intuitive cognition, explains why it does not lead to scepticism, and explores some problems in its logic resulting from particular admissions of Ockham.]

Ockham's doctrine of intuitive cognition lies at the heart of his epistemology. As Philotheus Boehner¹ and Sebastian Day² have quite rightly observed, one of the central aims of this doctrine is to answer the question how the intellect can have certain knowledge of contingent states of affairs (including the existence or nonexistence of material particulars). A number of scholars, including Etienne Gilson³ and Anton Pegis,⁴ have charged, however, that far from achieving this goal, Ockham's doctrine (and especially what he says about the logical possibility of intuitive cognition of nonexistents) leads to scepticism. Coming to Ockham's defense, Boehner⁵ and Day⁶have rejected these criticisms as resting on misinterpretations of Ockham. I believe Boehner and Day have done much to clarify what Ockham actually meant. I should like to reopen the discussion, however, because I believe not all the consequences of Ockham's doctrine have been accurately drawn.

In the first part of this paper, I shall summarize as much of Ockham's doctrine of intuitive cognition as is relevant for our purposes, and briefly indicate why I think Boehner and Day are right in rejecting earlier attempts to draw sceptical consequences from Ockham's claims about intuitive cognition of non-existents. In the second part, I shall argue, in a different way, that Ockham was mistaken in thinking he could ground certain knowledge of contingent states of affairs in intuitive cognition. Finally, in the third part, I shall maintain that certain remarks of Ockham in Quodlibeta V q. 5 do indeed have sceptical consequences, although he did not draw them himself.

I

The principal texts in which Ockham elaborates his doctrine of intuitive cognition are Ordinatio, Prologus q. 1; Reportatio II q. 15; and Quodlibeta V q. 5.⁷ The main points of his doctrine relevant here may be summarized as follows.

Ockham distinguishes those acts of intellect (or the senses) by which we apprehend something—whether non-complex (i.e., something that can be a term of a proposition), a proposition, or a series of propositions in arguments—from those acts of intellect by which we judge a proposition to be true or false. An act of judgment presupposes an act of apprehending the proposition itself which in turn presupposes a non-complex apprehension of the terms of the proposition (Prologus pp. 16-22). He defines an 'evident cognition' as a cognition of a true complex of terms (a proposition), a sufficient mediate or immediate cause for which is a non-complex cognition of its terms (Prologus p. 5). For example, we have evident cognition of simple analytic propositions since we know them to be true simply by virtue of knowing the meanings of their words. Ockham thinks, however, that there is a kind of non-complex apprehension of terms by virtue of which contingent propositions can be evidently known, viz., intuitive cognition. By contrast, abstractive cognition is a non-complex apprehension of terms by virtue of which it is not possible to know whether or not a contingent proposition is true. (Prologus pp. 31-32; see also II Rep. q. 15 E).

Ockham makes it clear that virtute, 'by virtue of which,' (or mediante qua in II Rep. q. 15 E) expresses a causal notion. Ockham thinks, as a matter of fact, the causal relations in this world are so ordered that the existing and present object is the mediate or immediate cause both of the existence and the conservation of an intuitive cognition (Prologus p. 38; see also II Rep. q. 15 E). Further, the causal relations are so ordered that an intuitive cognition, taken in conjunction with the existing and present object, suffices to cause the intellect to judge that the object exists. Ockham thinks that all the intuitive cognitions we actually have are caused by the existing and present objects of those cognitions, and that, therefore, in every actual case of intuitive cognition we are caused to judge that the object exists.

Nevertheless, God, as omnipotent, could suspend the causal order regarding the conservation of acts of intuitive cognition. Ockham suggests, for example, that God could conserve one's intuitive cognition of a star, while bringing it about that the star no longer existed. But he thinks the intuitive cognition, taken by itself, has causal efficacy only to produce judgments of nonexistence. In such a case one would be caused by one's intuitive cognition of the star to judge that the star did not exist. Further, Ockham says that if God suspended the causal order regarding the production of intuitive cognition, He could cause one to have an intuitive cognition of an existing, but absent, object. In that case one would be caused to judge that the object existed (II Rep. q. 15 E). It is clear that an intuitive cognition of an existing, but absent, object would necessarily result in a judgment of existence, since any judgment of which an intuitive cognition is a partial (or total) cause is an evident judgment. But the intuitive cognition alone suffices only to cause judgments of non-existence, not judgments of existence. Ockham does not specify what it is that would act together with the intuitive cognition to produce the judgment of existence in this case, but most probably he is thinking of God Himself. Finally, Ockham says that God could suspend the causal order in such a way as to prohibit an intuitive cognition from causing any judgment of existence at all (Prologus p. 70; see also Quodlibeta V q. 5).

In sum, then, Ockham thinks that according to the natural order of causes which God has established, an intuitive cognition is produced only by the present and existing object, and that the intuitive cognition, together with the present and existing object, suffices to produce a judgment of existence. Further, he thinks that according to the natural order of causes the intuitive cognition alone suffices only to produce a judgment of non-existence. Thus, intuitive cognitions are acts of apprehension which have the causal efficacy to produce an evident judgment of existence when the object exists, and of non-existence when the object does not exist. That an act of apprehension cause a judgment is not, according to Ockham, a logically necessary condition for that apprehension to be intuitive. Rather, the logically necessary condition for an intuitive act of apprehension is that any judgment regarding the existence or non-existence of the object (or more broadly, regarding the truth or falsity of a contingent proposition), caused by that act of apprehension, be evident, and, therefore, that that judgment be true. An abstractive cognition is an act of apprehension that does not meet this condition.⁸

Ockham thinks the objects of such acts of apprehension are particulars, and maintains that both the intellect and the senses are capable of intuitive and abstractive cognition. Indeed, he insists that in such acts of apprehension the intellect apprehends the object under the same aspect (sub eadem ratione) as the senses (Prologus pp. 63-65), and that such intellective acts of apprehension are required if the intellect is to form and pass judgment on propositions such as 'Socrates is a man' (ibid.).

Etienne Gilson and Anton Pegis have argued that Ockham's assertion of the logical possibility of intuitive cognition of non-existents leads to scepticism. By 'scepticism' I understand them to mean the doctrine that it is logically possible for our experience to be just as it is now, even though no mind-independent material things exist, and that, therefore, we cannot be certain that any mind-independent material things exist. According to Gilson, Ockham could not assert that an all-powerful God could conserve in us an intuitive cognition of a non-existent thing

without endangering what was, according to his own principles, the only type of evident knowledge: the intuition of that which is. If God can conserve in us the intuition of something that is not actually existing, how shall we ever be sure that what we are perceiving as real is an actually existing thing? In other words, if it is possible for God to make us perceive as real an object that does not really exist, have we any proof that this world of ours is not a vast phantasmagoria behind which there is no reality to be found?⁹

Pegis defends Gilson with regard to the case of God's conservation of an intuitive cognition of a now nonexistent star:

Certainly Ockham thinks that he sees the star when the star no longer exists. Is Gilson wrong in attributing such a view to Ockham? If texts such as this mean anything there is surely no way of avoiding Gilson's conclusion.¹⁰

It is not hard to see from the above summary of Ockham's doctrine that Boehner and Day are fully justified when they reject these particular charges as resting on a misunderstanding of Ockham. According to Ockham, it is true by the definition of 'intuitive cognition' that any judgment caused by an intuitive cognition is evident, and therefore true. Ockham explicitly asserts that if God ever did conserve in us an intuitive cognition of a non-existent object, any judgment caused by that cognition would have to be a judgment that the object did not exist. Thus Pegis is mistaken in attributing to Ockham the view that if he had an intuitive cognition of a non-existent star, he would continue to think the star existed. Again, if God conserved in us all the intuitive cognitions we now have, while bringing it about that no mind-independent material things exist, our experience would—contrary to Gilson's understanding—be considerably different from what it is now. For we would judge not to exist many objects we now judge to exist. So long as we are sure that the cognitions we have are intuitive, there can be no reasonable doubt about the truth of the judgments we are caused by them to make.

II

The success of Ockham's attempt to ground certain knowledge of contingent states of affairs in intuitive cognition may, however, be challenged in another way.

It seems clear that Ockham never doubted that we have and can recognize both intuitive and abstractive cognitions. In his criticisms of Scotus, for example, Ockham appears to take for granted that he can identify in his own experience the kinds of cognition Scotus labels 'intuitive' and 'abstractive.' His disagreement with Scotus concerns the question how best to formulate the distinction between the two kinds of acts of which they both profess to be introspectively aware (Prologus pp. 33-38). Confident that we have intuitive cognitions and can identify them introspectively, Ockham appears to give us the strongest possible assurance that judgments caused by such cognitions are true, viz., he makes them true by definition.

I think it can be shown, however, that where certain knowledge of the material world is concerned, Ockham defeats his purpose by defining 'intuitive cognition' in this way. According to Ockham's definition, that any judgment caused by a cognition be true is a logically necessary condition for it to be intuitive. In particular, any cognition on which we base a judgment about the material world will count as intuitive, only if the judgment it causes is a true one. Since Ockham is not a phenomenalist, but thinks any real material thing is mind-independent, it will not be possible to determine by introspection alone whether or not a judgment about the material world is true. Instead, before one can be certain whether or not such a judgment is true, one must first establish whether or not some mind-independent (and therefore non-introspectable) state of affairs obtains. It follows on Ockham's definitions that it will not be possible, after all, to determine whether or not any cognition of the material world is intuitive on the basis of introspection alone. Before one can be certain that any such cognition is intuitive, one must first determine whether or not some mind-independent state of affairs obtains. But, generally speaking, one can use one's certainty about p as a basis for one's certainty about q, only if one can be certain about p, without first being certain about q. Thus, it will not be possible, after all, to use one's certainty that a cognition of the material world is intuitive as a basis for one's certainty that some mind-independent state of affairs in the material world obtains. For the latter will be epistemologically prior to the former, and not vice versa.

III

So far I have argued only that Ockham was mistaken in thinking he had found, in intuitive cognition, a ground of certain knowledge of contingent states of affairs in the material world. Obviously, to maintain this conclusion is not to maintain that Ockham's epistemology has sceptical consequences. For all I have said so far, Ockham's philosophy might be consistent with some other account of how one can be certain that one's judgments regarding contingent states of affairs in the material world are true (and thereby sometimes certain that one's act of apprehension of a material thing is an intuitive cognition). I want now to argue that Ockham's remarks in Quodlibeta V q. 5 do entail scepticism in the sense defined above.

Ockham explains there in reply to two objections that God cannot cause in us evident assent that this thing is present or that this whiteness exists, when the thing is absent, or when the whiteness does not exist, respectively. The reason is, that evident judgments are, by definition, true judgments. It is a contradiction to speak of an evident judgment that what is not the case is the case. But Ockham proceeds immediately to allow that God can cause us to assent to the propositions 'This thing is present,' or 'This whiteness exists,' when the thing is not present, or when the whiteness does not exist. He refers to the assent involved in these cases as actum creditivum, and emphasizes that it is not evident assent. Any acts of apprehension on which they are based would be abstractive, not intuitive cognitions.¹¹

Clearly, by admitting in these passages that it is logically possible that God should cause us to believe what is false, Ockham is allowing that it is logically possible that God should deceive us. But, the sceptic may wonder, if it is logically possible that God should deceive us once, is it not also logically possible that He should deceive us all the time? In that case it would be logically possible that none of the cognitions we take to be intuitive really are intuitive, so that it would be logically possible that our experience be just what it is now, even though no mind-independent material things exist. Ockham's admission that it is logically possible that God should deceive us thus seems to lead to scepticism in the sense defined above.¹²

The fact that Ockham never formulated this problem, even in the context in which he asserts the logical possibility that God should deceive us, is strong evidence that he 'did not suffer under the philosophical experience of scepticism.'¹³ It is not surprising, therefore, that we find in his works no explicit attempt to deal with the problem. Nevertheless, it will be useful at this point to examine two suggested ways out of this apparent difficulty. I will argue that neither of them could have been used successfully by Ockham to show that his theory does not have sceptical consequences.

(1) One might argue that Ockham's admission that it is logically possible that God should cause in us an actum creditivum, by which we believe an absent thing is present, or that a nonexistent thing exists, does not really lead to scepticism. This is what Boehner contends in his earlier article in the discussion of Quodlibeta V q. 5. After concluding that 'Every knowledge, therefore, which is based on intuitive knowledge, is safe from any intrusion of natural or supernatural scepticism,' he proceeds to remark:

Not, however, any assent. It is a fact, that we sometimes give our assent to propositions which appear to us as evident, as if they were given to us in intuitive knowledge. The history of human science knows many examples of this kind. Hence Ockham concedes that God can make an assent of that kind which is given to a proposition based on intuitive knowledge (Ockham most likely thinks of deception of the devil or of cases of excaecatio), even if the proposition to which this assent is given does not correspond with the fact. But this assent is not an evident one by definition; it is only an assent of belief or conviction…

But he does not think this admission causes any serious theoretical problem for Ockham. He asserts that:

the epistemological distinction between these two kinds of assent can be easily drawn, for the one is based on intuitive knowledge, which, if natural, implies the existence or presence of the object; and the other is based on abstractive knowledge which does not imply the existence or presence of its object. Hence the assent given to a proposition in intuitive knowledge, if existence is affirmed, cannot be caused by God alone without the existence of the thing as a second cause, as it is likewise impossible for God alone to cause a meritorious act, because the former connotes the existence of a thing, the latter connotes the cooperation of the free will.

Our only problem is 'the practical task' of being accurate about 'the psychological distinction' between intuitive and abstractive acts of apprehension:

The psychological distinclion of these two acts is not so easily drawn. How do we know practically that our assent is given to intuitive knowledge and not to abstract knowledge, and is therefore an evi-dent assent and not an assent of conviction only? Ockham has not given a direct answer to this question, as far as I know, but it seems in accordance with his teachings to say that in intuitive knowledge the reality is seen (or evidently not seen), and the assent is given to factual evidence, hence cannot fail. Our practical task, therefore, would be to test our conviction as regards contingent facts and to find out by experience whether factual evidence is really given or not. In any case, according to Ockham, if factual evidence is given, it is known by the intellect.¹⁴

Boehner's suggestion is that we can distinguish evident assents from mere acts of belief by determining whether the assent was based on an intuitive or an abstractive cognition. He assumes that it is in principle possible (and therefore only a practical task) to draw a 'psychological distinction' between intuitive and abstractive cognitions, i.e., to isolate a set of introspective characteristics on the basis of which we can distinguish the two types of cognitions with certainty. Presumably, his thought is that if we could identify intuitive cognitions of material things with certainty on the basis of introspection alone, we could thereby identify evident assents to propositions about the material world with certainty on the basis of introspection alone (and thus without first determining whether or not some mind-independent state of affairs obtains). Then, since evident assents are infallible, we could use our certainty that some of our assents to propositions about the material world are evident, as a basis for knowing that the logical possibility that God should always deceive us (and in particular that He should always deceive us about the existence and character of a material world) is not actualized. He could further claim that if this logical possibility were actualized, our experience would be quite different from what it is now, because none of our assents would display the characteristics of clear intuitive evidence which they in fact display.

Boehner's suggestion would be plausible if Ockham could consistently claim that intuitive cognitions of material things were identifiable, with certainty, on the basis of introspection alone. But, as I argued in Part II above, Ockham cannot consistently claim this. Given his definitions, no matter what introspective characteristics a cognition of a material thing displays, it will not count as intuitive unless the judgment it causes is true. And whether or not the judgment it causes is true depends upon whether or not some mind-independent (and therefore non-introspectable) state of affairs obtains.

In fact, the same form of argument that I used in Part II to show (a) that intuitive cognitions of material things are not identifiable with certainty on the basis of introspection alone, and (b) that one cannot use one's certainty that such a cognition is intuitive as a basis for one's certainty that a proposition about the material world is true, can be used to show (c) that evident assents to propositions about the material world cannot be identified with certainty on the basis of introspection alone, and (d) that one cannot use one's certainty that an assent to a proposition about the material world is evident as a basis for one's certainty that the logical possibility that God should always deceive us (and in particular the logical possibility that. God should always deceive us about the existence and character of a material world) is not actualized.

With regard to (c), according to Ockham's definitions, no assent is evident unless the proposition to which assent is made is true. But, since Ockham thinks real material things exist independently of the mind, no proposition about the material world can be known with certainty to be true, unless one first determines whether or not some mind-independent (and therefore non-introspectable) state of affairs obtains. Therefore, no assent to a proposition about the material world can be known with certainty to be evident on the basis of introspection alone. Instead, before one can be certain that such an assent is evident, one must first determine whether or not some mind-independent state of affairs obtains.

With regard to (d), given the conclusion just reached in (c), it can be shown that one cannot use one's certainty that an assent to a proposition about the material world is evident as a basis for one's certainty that the logical possibility that God should always deceive us (and in particular, the logical possibility that God should always deceive us about the existence and character of a material world) is not actualized. Before one can be certain that an assent to a proposition about the material world is evident, one must first determine whether or not some mind-independent state of affairs obtains. To be certain whether or not some mind-independent state of affairs obtains, it is necessary to determine whether or not the logical possibility that God should always deceive us about the existence and character of a material world, is actualized. Consequently, before one can be certain that an assent to a proposition about the material world is evident, one must first determine whether or not the logical possibility that God should always deceive us about the existence and character of the material world is actualized. But the principle cited in Part II above states that one can use one's certainty that p as a basis for one's certainty that q, only if one can be certain that p without first being certain that q. It follows that one cannot use one's certainty that one's assent to a proposition about the material world is evident, as a basis for one's certainty that the logical possibility that God should always deceive us about the existence and character of a material world is not actualized. Certainty about the latter is epistemologically prior to certainty about the former, and not vice versa.

I conclude, therefore, that Boehner's reasoning fails to show that Ockham's admission of the logical possibility that God should deceive us, does not really lead to scepticism.

(2)Everyone will recognize this problem of how to certify our knowledge in the face of the apparent logical possibility that God is a deceiver as one that occupies Descartes in the Meditations. Descartes' approach was to try to prove that it is not really logically possible for an omnipotent, but perfectly good God to deceive us. His reasoning seems to be based on what he takes to be a clear and distinct perception of standards any being would have to meet to count as good, and, therefore, of standards God would have to meet to count as perfectly good. It is worth noting that if we were to look in Ockham's philosophy for an answer to the problem he did not raise, we would find the Cartesian solution unavailable. For—quite apart from whether or not Ockham thinks we can have logically conclusive evidence that God exists, and is omni-potent, and perfectly good—Ockham's assertion of the divine liberty, together with his grounding of ethical distinctions in the concept of obligation, rule out any a priori demonstration that God is no deceiver. Briefly, on Ockham's view, one can be said to act wrongly (sin), only if one can be under obligation to someone to do something.¹⁵ Rational creatures have an obligation to do whatever God freely commands, deriving from the fact that He created them.¹⁶ God, however, cannot be under obligation to anyone to do anything.¹⁷ Therefore, He cannot act wrongly (sin). In that case, God cannot be said to act wrongly (sin), even if He is a deceiver. On Ockham's view, then, it does not seem that God would fall short of perfect goodness, even if He deceived us constantly. So far as I can see, Ockham cannot consistently allow that we can be certain in the sense of having logically conclusive evidence, that any of our acts of apprehension of material things are intuitive cognitions or that any of our assents to propositions about the material world are evident.

I have already said that Ockham never formulated Descartes' problem. It is equally clear that Ockham would have regarded it as part of 'the truth of faith' that God is no deceiver. But this fact goes no way towards making the problem less severe for Ockham's philosophy. Descartes himself insisted that the problem he poses is a theoretical one, not to be taken seriously for practical purposes. I submit that any theory of knowledge that allows this problem to arise, but does not afford a theoretical solution to it, is seriously defective.

Notes

¹ P. Boehner, O.F.M., 'The Notitia Intuitiva of Non-Existents according to William Ockham,' Traditio 1 (1943) 223-275, especially 223.

² S. Day, O.F.M., Intuitive Cognition: A Key to the Significance of the Later Scholastics (St. Bonaventure, N. Y. 1947) especially 145.

³ E. Gilson, 'The Road to Scepticism,' in The Unity of Philosophical Experience (New York 1937) 61-91.

⁴ A. C. Pegis, 'Concerning William of Ockham,' Traditio 2 (1944) 465-480.

⁵Art. cit. (supra n. 1) 231-240. See also P. Boehner, O.F.M., 'In propria causa: a Reply to Professor Pegis,' Franciscan Studies 5 (1945) 37-54.

⁶Op. cit. (supra n. 2) 174-179.

⁷ The Ordinatio is published in Guillelmi de Ockham Scriptum in librum primum Sententiarum I (ed. G. Gal and S. Brown; St. Bonaventure, N. Y. 1967); the questions 14-15 of the Reportatio II by P. Boehner in art. cit. (supra n. 1) 245-275; the Quodlibeta V q. 15 in Quodlibeta septem; Tractatus de sacramento altaris et de corpore Christi (Strasbourg 1491; repr. Louvain 1962). Page references are to these editions. Other citations of Ockham's Sentence-commentary are to Opera plurima III-IV (Lyons 1494-96; repr. Westmead 1962).

⁸ Thus Ockham's remark in Prologus p. 38: 'Ideo dico quod notitia intuitiva et abstractiva se ipsis differunt et non penes objecta nec causas suas quascumque,' can be misleading, if the se ipsis is stressed out of context (as it appears to be in Gilson's discussion in his History of Christian Philosophy in the Middle Ages [New York 1955] 490 and 784 note 8). For five pages prior to the above remark (Prologus pp. 33-38) Ockham has been attacking Scotus' attempt to distinguish intuitive from abstractive cognition. Ockham thinks that Scotus is mistaken in making it a logically necessary condition of a cognition being intuitive that its object is existing and present, and that its cause is its existing and present object; and in defining abstractive cognition as one that fails to meet one or both of these conditions. When Ockham says in the above remarks that intuitive and abstractive cognitions differ 'in themselves,' this claim is to be contrasted with the claim that they differ as regards their objects and what causes them. He does not mean that there is no difference between intuitive and abstractive cognitions as regards the causal relations into which they can enter. For, on Ockham's full account, intuitive cognitions differ from abstractive cognitions precisely in the fact they cannot be the cause of any false judgments, while abstractive cognitions can.

⁹Op. cit. (supra n. 3) at 80-81.

¹⁰Art. cit. (supra n. 4) 476.

¹¹ The crucial passages are Ockham's replies to two objections in Quodlibeta V q. 5. The reply to the first objection is as follows: 'Ad primum istorum dico, quod Deus non potest causare in nobis cognitionem talem, per quam evidenter appareat nobis res esse presens, quando est absens. Quia hoc includit contradictionem, quia cognitio talis evidens importat, quod ita sit in re, sicut denotatur per propositionem, cui fit assensus. Et per consequens, cum cognitio evidens huius propositionis: 'Res est presens,' importat rem esse presentem, oportet, quod sit presens. Aliter non esset cognitio evidens. Et tu ponis, quod sit absens. Et ita ex illa positione, cum cognitione evidenti, sequitur manifesta contractio, scilicet quod res sit presens et quod non sit presens. Et ideo Deus non potest causare talem cognitionem evidentem. Tamen Deus potest causare actum creditivum, per quam credo rem esse presentem, quae est absens. Et dico, quod illa notitia creditiva erit abstractiva, non intuitiva. Per talem actum fidei potest apparere res esse presens, quando est absens; non tamen per actum evidentem.' The reply to the fourth objection is as follows: 'Ad ultimum dico, quod Deus non potest facere assensum evidentem huius contingentis: 'Hec albedo est,' quando albedo non est, propter contradictionem que sequitur. Quia assensus evidens denotat sic esse in re, sicut denotatur per propositionem, cui fit assensus. Sed per istam propositionem: 'Hec albedo est,' importatur, quod albedo sit. Et per consequens, si sit assensus evidens: 'Hec albedo est,' et positum est, quod hec albedo non sit. Et sic illa hypothesis, cum notitia evidenti [text: evidente], includit manifeste contradictionem, scilicet quod albedo sit et non sit. Et concedo tamen, quod Deus potest facere assensum eiusdem speciei cum illo assensu evidenti [text: evidente] respectu illius contingentis: 'Hec albedo est,' quando non est. Sed ille assensus non est evidens, quia non est ita in re, sicut importatur per propositionem, cui fit assensus.'

¹² Gilson, op. cit. (supra n. 3) 82, fixes on this passage, too. But he confuses, among other things, the claim that it is logically impossible that God should cause in me an intuitive cognition of a non-existent object, and bring it about that I judge the object to exist, with the claim that it is logically possible that God should cause in me an act of (abstractive) apprehension of a nonexistent object, and bring it about that I judge the object to exist. Accordingly, he mistakenly takes the passage as evidence that Ockham's assertion of the logical possibility of intuitive cognition of non-existents leads to scepticism. But, as argued by Boehner and Day and pointed out in Part I above, that part of Ockham's doctrine cannot have sceptical consequences.

¹³ Boehner, art. cit. (supra n. 1) 244.

¹⁴Ibid. 234-235.

¹⁵ II Sent. q. 5 H: '… quia malum nihil aliud est quam facere aliquid cuius oppositum faciendum aliquis obligatur.'

¹⁶ II Sent. q. 19 0; III Sent. q. 12 AAA; IV Sent. q. 9 E-F.

¹⁷ II Sent. q. 5 H.