Lam, Joseph The reception of Augustine's theology and thoughts in Thomas Aquinas's works has never been a point of serious disagreement among scholars. What divides scholars is rather the question of how to assess the weight of Aristotelian influence and Thomas's Augustinian heritage. According to Gilson, the answer is evident in itself. While acknowledging in the works of the Dominican friar a close familiarity with Augustine's theology, the French philosopher nevertheless argued for a distinct Aristotelian colour in Thomas's philosophical (...) approach to the question of natural truths. To the question of how human reasoning arrives at the truth, Gilson wrote: 'What is it to know truth? It is intellectually to grasp the essences of things such as they are and to associate them in our minds, by means of judgements, in the same way they are associated in reality'. Knowledge, therefore, is not the result of a subjective mind, but rather an outcome of a conscious judgement that concords with the objective intellection of the given objects. In this Gilson observed a basic difference between Augustine and Thomas: Both St. Thomas's philosophy and St. Augustine's philosophy are philosophies of the concrete, but their attitude toward the concrete is not the same. St. Augustine always seeks notions comprehensive enough to embrace the concrete in its complexity. Thomas always seeks notions precise enough to define the elements that constitute the concrete. In a word, the former expresses the concrete, the latter analyses it. (shrink)

Lam, Joseph Peter Fitzsimons is a competent journalist who does not shy away from expressing his personal opinion on controversial social and ethical issues. In a Sydney Morning Herald online comment published on 11 December 2016, he not only praised the courage of the premier of Victoria, Daniel Andrews, but also appealed to members of the New South Wales parliament to follow Andrews' lead to legalise euthanasia. Anticipating the eventual collapse of his own health in the future, Fitzsimons insisted (...) that lawmakers should respect his autonomy and his choice of a peaceful and dignified death. As far as I can see, however, respect for a person's autonomy is not the main problem here. Rather, the key difficulty rests with Fitzsimons's reasoning. He argued: Let's say that at the age of 80 or so, I decide that my meaningful life is over, and all that awaits me is-I know, I know, too much detail- incontinent pain for the next five years. And let's say that I don't want that, and would rather pass away peacefully, and with dignity, in a medically supervised manner. My question to the opponents of euthanasia: if I choose to do that, what business is it of yours? (shrink)

Lam, Joseph In an audience for journalists shortly after his election in 2013 Pope Francis revealed not only the reason for his choice of name, but also his vision of the church: 'Francis of Assisi. For me he is the man of poverty, the man of peace, the man who loves and safeguards creation... He is the man who gives us this spirit of peace, the poor man... Oh, how I wish for a Church that is poor and for (...) the poor!' The Pontiff in his 2014 Lenten message re-emphasised the church's commitment to the poor. The responsibility of the church is 'to bear witness to all those who live in material, moral and spiritual destitution the Gospel message of the merciful love of God our Father, who is ready to embrace everyone in Christ. We can do this to the extent that we imitate Christ who became poor and enriched us by his poverty'. Pope Francis' concern for the poor is again reechoed in his latest encyclical, Laudato Si, in which he re-emphasises the church's commitment to the poor by calling Catholics especially to be stewards God's creation. A poor church for the poor, as Pope Francis envisages, has its foundation in the poverty of Jesus Christ: 'For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich'. (shrink)

Lam, Joseph On 11 April 2015 Pope Francis called for a special of Year of Mercy, which subsequently was symbolically inaugurated with the opening of the Holy Doors of the Basilicas of St Peter and of St John in Rome on 8 December. According to the Argentinian Pontiff, upon whose episcopal ministry is placed the maxim miserendo atque eligendo, mercy is the key element leading to the rediscovery of the spiritual joy that appears to have faded away in the (...) life of the church. To counter this pessimism, Francis reminds his flock of the affectionate and tenderhearted look of God, whose merciful and loving gaze enriches and liberates the life of every Christian: 'Thanks solely to this encounter or renewed encounter with God's love, which blossoms into an enriching friendship, we are liberated from our narrowness and self-absorption'. Yet, Francis in his major teaching documents seems to caution against the concept of happiness, even though his description of the effects produced by the mercy and joy of the Gospel leads to human growth, within which human happiness is understood as a right. He has called for an integral development that includes society's most neglected members,6 and that respects and includes all forms of existence. Nonetheless, it is not a soft choice, as if mercy opens the door to all forms of pleasure as long as they make people happy. (shrink)

Lam, Joseph The resignation of Pope Benedict XVI caught the world by surprise, in spite the fact that he had earlier indicated this possibility. In a series of interviews that were published in 2011 as a book by the German journalist Peter Seewald, Benedict clearly stated: If a pope clearly realizes that he is no longer physically, psychologically and spiritually capable of handling the duties of his office, then he has a right and, under some circumstances, also an obligation (...) to resign. (shrink)

Lam, Joseph The election of Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio on the evening of 13 March 2013 stunned as many Vatican observers as had the resignation from the Chair of St Peter announced by Pope Benedict XVI during the ordinary consistory of cardinals at the Vatican on 11 February that year. While the Vaticanisti expected a younger pope, the seventy-six year old Archbishop of Buenos Aires emerged from the conclave as the 266th pope and successor of the ageing German pope. However, (...) the real surprise was Bergoglio's choice of name, which also signalled a new direction for the church's government and pastoral focus. In calling himself Francis, he evoked the way of simplicity that derives from the Gospel. While Benedict's teaching draws much from the Augustinian well, Francis, however, is more attached to Franciscan spirituality and practice. A look at Francis's first apostolic exhortation, 'The Joy of the Gospel', where he quotes Augustine only twice may cement this view. Nevertheless, in spite of these minimal references, Francis holds the Bishop of Hippo in high regard. This is very evident in his homily at the beginning of the last Augustinian general chapter held in Rome, on 28 August 2013. Reflecting on Augustine's restless heart, Francis pointed to two elements of the Augustinian heart. On the one hand, Augustine's restlessness was a craving for God's tender and forgiving love that can only be found in the encounter with Jesus Christ. On the other hand, the love Augustine found stirred in him a new unrest urging him to proclaim the Gospel of loving kindness with courage and without fear. It is not an exaggeration that Augustine was also the bearer of the honorary title, doctor caritatis. In this joyful unrest Augustine was spiritually close to St Francis, who became the disciple of God's humble love for the poor. As for Augustine, who to my knowledge was the first Latin author who designated God as humble, St Francis's love for creation is grounded in God's humility. The central theme of Pope Francis's apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium is the proclamation of God's tender love, a love that constantly renews the lives of the faithful. Therein, Francis takes up the perennial divine quality. Yet, Francis would not be himself if he had not supplemented it with his own emphasis. (shrink)

Being questioned about the nature of Christian faith, Mark Twain famously declared it as 'believing what you know ain't so'. Indeed, the role of reason for faith is a matter of dispute. Jesus, some argue, was not a philosopher or a teacher of wisdom. Rather, he is the saviour because of his unassuming sacrificial death and resurrection. Not reason, but the leap of faith is the ultimate condition of salvation. The Enlightenment however epitomises a Copernican revolution in favour of reason. (...) According to Charles Taylor, the dissemination of Jesus' message into Hellenistic culture contains within itself the risk of a secularisation of the faith. At the same time, voices opposing the overemphasis of reason have also been raised throughout the ages. Paul's speech to the Athenians was one such occasion that deals with the ambiguous relationship between faith and reason. Relying purely on divine grace and the Bible alone, Martin Luther rejected any form of speculative theology. According to the Reformer, it is a type of theology that trusts more in human reason than in God's revelation. In Luther's opinion, it also reverses the moral order because theological speculation justifies evil as good while professing as good what is evil. To such a theology of human glory, Luther prefers a theology of the cross that 'calls the thing what it actually is'. For the former Augustinian monk only God's grace is good beyond reasonable doubt. Hence true theologians are lovers of the cross while theologians of glory misuse their reason for the worst. Luther's theology of the cross, Marco Barone claims, has its root in Augustine. Hence, Luther's Augustinism appears to have decidedly broken with Aristotelian scholasticism. In this context, Thomas Aquinas was criticised for his threefold failure. First, the Dominican friar's speculative theology lacks an experiential human dimension. Secondly, it gives too much credit to Aristotle. Thirdly, Thomas is reprimanded for his serious deficiency of a theology of justification. (shrink)

Since Pope John Paul II's visit to Australia, in 1986, the face of the Australian Catholic Church has changed dramatically. The once celebrated 'comfortableness at calling themselves Catholics', has given way to shame and calamity caused by hundreds of moral and sexual misconduct cases. The Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse not only challenges the church's governance. It also questions certain practical aspects of ecclesiology, for example, the priestly celibacy or the seal of confession that might (...) have contributed to and even aggravated the abuse of minors. (shrink)

Puzzling Out the Past: Studies in Northwest Semitic Languages and Literatures in Honor of Bruce Zuckerman. Edited by Marilyn J. Lundberg; Steven Fine; and Wayne T. Pitard. Culture and History of the Ancient Near East, vol. 55. Leiden: BRill, 2012. Pp. xvi + 334, illus. $245.

Patterns of Sin in the Hebrew Bible: Metaphor, Culture, and the Making of a Religious Concept. By Joseph Lam. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016. Pp. xix + 308. $74.

Theories of discourse bring to realism new ideas about how knowledge develops and how representations of reality are influenced. We gain an understanding of the conceptual aspect of social life and the processes by which meaning is produced. This collection reflects the growing interest realist critics have shown towards forms of discourse theory and deconstruction. The diverse range of contributions address such issues as the work of Derrida and deconstruction, discourse theory, Eurocentrism and poststructuralism. What unites all of the contributions (...) is a sense that it is essential to provide a realist alternative to the hitherto dominance of social constructionism, hermeneutics and postmodernism, over many of the issues discussed. By developing a realist perspective the different authors attempt to embed discourse within the structured nature of the reality of the world. Realism can situate language, discourse and ideology within context specific, or 'causally efficacious' circumstances. Realism can help to uncover issues of power, representation, and subjectivity and how discursive and other social practices produce real effects. This can help us understand the manner in which social structures are reproduced through various forms of ideology and discourse. And by knowing this, we can start to address questions concerning human emancipation and how the world is to be transformed. (shrink)

Topics covered in Discrete Mathematics have become essential tools in many areas of studies in recent years. This is primarily due to the revolution in technology, communications, and cyber security. The book treats major themes in a typical introductory modern Discrete Mathematics course: Propositional and predicate logic, proof techniques, set theory (including Boolean algebra, functions and relations), introduction to number theory, combinatorics and graph theory. An accessible, precise, and comprehensive approach is adopted in the treatment of each topic. The ability (...) of abstract thinking and the art of writing valid arguments are emphasized through detailed proof of (almost) every result. Developing the ability to think abstractly and roguishly is key in any areas of science, information technology and engineering. Every result presented in the book is followed by examples and applications to consolidate its comprehension. The hope is that the reader ends up developing both the abstract reasoning as well as acquiring practical skills. All efforts are made to write the book at a level accessible to first-year students and to present each topic in a way that facilitates self-directed learning. Each chapter starts with basic concepts of the subject at hand and progresses gradually to cover more ground on the subject. Chapters are divided into sections and subsections to facilitate readings. Each section ends with its own carefully chosen set of practice exercises to reenforce comprehension and to challenge and stimulate readers. As an introduction to Discrete Mathematics, the book is written with the smallest set of prerequisites possible. Familiarity with basic mathematical concepts (usually acquired in high school) is sufficient for most chapters. However, some mathematical maturity comes in handy to grasp some harder concepts presented in the book. (shrink)

It’s intuitive to think that an intentional action requires that the agent knows that she’s doing so. In light of some apparent counterexamples, Setiya suggests that this intuitive insight is better captured in terms of credence: performing an intentional action requires the agent to have a higher credence that she’s doing so than she would have otherwise. I argue that there is no such thing as an agent’s credence for what she’s doing. After distinguishing this thesis from an idea some (...) defend under the slogan “deliberation crowds out prediction”, I explore the thesis’s broader epistemological implications for the belief-credence relation. (shrink)

1. cilt. İnsan, evren, zaman -- 2. cilt. Yaradılış.

To attribute confusion to someone is to take up a paternalistic stance in evaluating his reasoning.

An agent’s knowledge of her own intentional actions (agential knowledge) is non-observational. Yet, intentional actions typically consist of happenings external to the agents. A theory is needed to explain how agents are warranted to form such beliefs independent of observation. This paper first argues for three desirable features of an ideal theory about agential knowledge. After showing that no existing theories possess all three, a novel theory that does is presented. According to this theory, agential knowledge is the same kind (...) of knowledge as the Kripkean contingent a priori: they are knowledge justified a priori by stipulation. (shrink)

The paper argues that there are structures rather than objects with an intrinsic identity in the domain of fundamental physics. We line out the standard metaphysics of objects with an intrinsic identity, recall the main objection against that position (section 1) and then retrace the development to epistemic structural realism (section 2) and to ontic structural realism (section 3). We elaborate on the arguments for ontic structural realism from quantum physics (section 4) and from space-time physics (section 5). Finally, we (...) claim that the main objection against the standard metaphysics of objects with an intrinsic identity is countered by structural realism only if the fundamental physical structures are conceived as causal structures (section 6). (shrink)

On conduct of life and ethics of Islamic seminarians.

This paper sets out a moderate version of metaphysical structural realism that stands in contrast to both the epistemic structural realism of Worrall and the—radical—ontic structural realism of French and Ladyman. According to moderate structural realism, objects and relations (structure) are on the same ontological footing, with the objects being characterized only by the relations in which they stand. We show how this position fares well as regards philosophical arguments, avoiding the objections against the other two versions of structural realism. (...) In particular, we set out how this position can be applied to space-time, providing for a convincing understanding of space-time points in the standard tensor formulation of general relativity as well as in the fibre bundle formulation. (shrink)

CONTEMPORARY ISSUES IN BUSINESS ETHICS, 6E introduces readers to business ethics by focusing on the influence of market mechanisms and social values on workplace norms. And because business is increasingly a global enterprise, this edition emphasizes the role of ethics both at home and abroad.

The point of Hegel's dissatisfaction with Kant -- Rethinking Peirce's fallibilism -- Pragmatism's future : a touch of prophecy.

The article sets out a primitive ontology of the natural world in terms of primitive stuff—that is, stuff that has as such no physical properties at all—but that is not a bare substratum either, being individuated by metrical relations. We focus on quantum physics and employ identity-based Bohmian mechanics to illustrate this view, but point out that it applies all over physics. Properties then enter into the picture exclusively through the role that they play for the dynamics of the primitive (...) stuff. We show that such properties can be local, as well as holistic, and discuss two metaphysical options to conceive them, namely, Humeanism and modal realism in the guise of dispositionalism. 1 Introduction2 Primitive Ontology: Primitive Stuff3 The Physics of Matter as Primitive Stuff4 The Humean Best System Analysis of the Dynamical Variables5 Modal Realism about the Dynamical Variables6 Conclusion. (shrink)