Survey and Critique of Avicenna's Ontological Theory on Rational Perception

Perception has various kinds, and most important of it is the rational perception. One of the important issues in philosophy is the knowing the identity and understanding how to achieve to it. From the perspective of Avicenna, there are two approaches in this topic. The first one is the theory of abstraction of quiddity from separable accidents. Avicenna believes that perception is the resulting of abstraction from external object and infusion it in the soul. In other word, the soul abstracts sensory forms from their matter and then makes them immaterial. When this abstraction is completed, rational perception will occur. The second one is the theory of the soul's connection with active intellect. There is non-material substance in the universe and it consist the intelligible realities. When the soul is connected to the intellectual substance, the special rational forms designed on the soul. In this article, both approaches are studied and reviewed.