But how is is that thought (viz., sense, imagination, and thought proper) is sometimes followed by action, sometimes not; sometimes by movement, sometimes not? What happens seems parallel to the case of thinking and inferring about the immovable objects of science. There the end is the truth seen (for, when one conceives the two premises, one at once conceives and comprehends the conclusion), but here the two premises result in a conclusion which is an action…Now that the action is the (...) conclusion is clear. But the premises of action are of two kinds, of the good and of the possible. Aristotle, De Motu Animalium, 701a, 6–10, 23–25. (shrink)

A textbook intended for undergraduates. Develops an overview of approaches to the philosophy of man (human beings) by presenting representative examples of major areas of emphasis. Drawing on the social sciences as well as philosophical works, the book presents the human phenomenon as a product of both heredity and environment (the "facticity" of man) and a source of new realities (the "transcendence" of man). Considered under the heading of man's facticity are aspects of corporeality and consciousness; under the heading of (...) man's transcendence, aspects of personal and societal development. Multicultural bibliographies provided. Regrettably, writing style of book is dated by use of male-only terminology. (shrink)

Timelines is an inquiry into the nature of time, both as an apparent feature of the external physical world and as a fundamental feature of our experience of ourselves in the world. The principal argument of Timelines is that our coventional ideas about time are largely mistaken and that what we think of as independent physical time is actually our calibration of a certain relation between events. Namely, the relation between time-keeping events and the causal sequential differences of physical processes (...) which are real and independent of us. (shrink)

This short article responds to, and interprets, two epistemic claims made by Mark Wynn concerning truth and Christian ethics. The first claim concerns how the body knows something prior to an operation of reason. The second claim concerns the relationship between narrative and metaphysics, particularly when considering the eucharist. The article interprets these claims by drawing upon Wynn's previous work in religious epistemology, and it points to its moral and doctrinal relevance for Christian ethicists today.

A key concern of global ethics is the equitable distribution of benefits and burdens amongst persons belonging to different populations. Until recently, the philosophical literature on global distribution was dominated by the question of how benefits and burdens should be divided amongst contemporaries. Recent years, however, have seen an increase in research on the scope and content of our duties to future generations. This has led to a number of innovative attempts to extend principles of distribution across time while retaining (...) a focus on the entitlements of the existing poor. In this article, I examine a key aspect of intergenerational justice, namely, the appropriate 'pattern' of well-being that should be obtained across generations. With the aid of research into the impacts of global climate change, I evaluate a number of rival accounts of the pattern of justice and go on to explore the merits of a 'global sufficientarian' ethic, which holds that as many persons as possible should enjoy a satisfactory level of well-being regardless of when or where they live. (shrink)

Schelling is best known in the Anglo-American philosophical community for work he did in his twenties, between 1797 and 1803. During this time, he appropriated Fichte’s standpoint of transcendental idealism and developed some of its implications for the philosophies of nature, history, and art. Schelling did not claim at this stage to be formulating an original standpoint of his own, but simply to be extending the Fichtean principles in new directions. In this endeavor he was quite successful, and for a (...) brief period he was lionized as philosophy’s youngest and brightest hope. He has been recognized since then as an important pioneer in the post-Kantian German idealist movement. (shrink)