 Olivi argues that this kind of cognitive attention requires a “virtual extension” toward the object. Though he accepts the traditional theory of species in medio, sensible qualities that fill the air between the senses and their objects (for details, see Demange and Kedar 2020), he denies that these species are the efficient cause of cognition. One striking consequence of this claim is that the object itself need not exert any causal influence, not on the cognitive powers nor even on the physical sense organs. The external object need only be close enough to be apprehended by the cognizer’s spiritual attention. In the cases of both perception and understanding, the efficient agent is the cognitive power. The external object is merely a kind of final cause or, more precisely, a “terminative cause” (Summa II q. 72, p. 36; Epistola, n. 12). It is merely by being the object of the cognitive power’s attention that the external object plays a role in cognition.