Alongside a revival of interest in Thomism in philosophy, scholars have realised its relevance when addressing certain contemporary issues in bioethics. This book offers a rigorous interpretation of Aquinas's metaphysics and ethical thought, and highlights its significance to questions in bioethics. Jason T. Eberl applies Aquinas’s views on the seminal topics of human nature and morality to key questions in bioethics at the margins of human life – questions which are currently contested in the academia, politics and the media such (...) as: When does a human person’s life begin? How should we define and clinically determine a person’s death? Is abortion ever morally permissible? How should we resolve the conflict between the potential benefits of embryonic stem cell research and the lives of human embryos? Does cloning involve a misuse of human ingenuity and technology? What forms of treatment are appropriate for irreversibly comatose patients? How should we care for patients who experience unbearable suffering as they approach the end of life? _Thomistic Principles and Bioethics_ presents a significant philosophical viewpoint which will motivate further dialogue amongst religious and secular arenas of inquiry concerning such complex issues of both individual and public concern. (shrink)

This project is guided and motivated by the question concerning the nature of the phantasm as that which mediates between sensation and intellection in John Duns Scotus' account of cognition. Scotus embraces Aristotle's claim that the intellect cannot think without the phantasm. The phantasm is in a corporeal organ, yet the immaterial intellect must act with it to produce an intelligible species. In this project I examine the critical elements of Scotus' cognitive theory in order to understand the nature of (...) the phantasm. In the first chapter I discuss key elements of Aristotle's metaphysics and give a close, textual reading of De Anima guided by his claim that the relationship of the body and soul is highly specific. I then focus on his claim in De Anima 2.12 that sensation involves the reception of the sensible form without the matter. In the second chapter, I discuss Scotus' key theological notions that guide and inform his cognitive project. The beatific vision requires the presence of the divine essence in its own existence to the intellect. As the highest cognitive experience, the beatific vision is definitive of all cognitive experience making the presence of the object to the cognitive faculty of central importance. The discussion of the incarnation shows that the world is sacralized and thus, is a worthy object of cognitive attention in itself. In the third chapter, I discuss Scotus' understanding of the body-soul relationship focusing on his notion of person to both secure the unity of the human being and to ground the mediation between sensation and intellection. In the fourth chapter, I first discuss Aquinas' claim that sensation requires a spiritual change. While Scotus's account is in many respects the same as Aquinas', Scotus does not maintain that sensation is primarily passive and is thus, able to account for cognitive attention by way of his understanding of the unity of the sense organ, immanent actions, and sensation as intuitive cognition. What emerges in this discussion is Scotus' particular understanding of an intentio by which the nature of the phantasm can be understood. (shrink)