Bernard Lonergan’s Puzzling Comment About the Vis Cogitativa

William Zanardi

This essay is a demonstration of the first functional specialty, Research. As I understand it, the principle aim of the specialty is to assemble materials relevant to understanding some puzzling issue. The short text from Lonergan’s correspondence that I found puzzling associated the vis cogitativa with the Freudian superego. My task, therefore, is rather straightforward, namely, to gather in one place all the available relevant comments that Lonergan made on the vis cogitativa and the Freudian superego. However, I do include some supplementary materials that provide both background to Lonergan’s comments and an updating of how contemporary neurosciences speak about the traditional function of the vis cogitativa.

Methodology, Functional Research, Philosophical Psychology vis cogitativa, superego, binding problem