Anthony Kenny concludes The God of the Philosophers by saying that ‘If the argument of the previous chapters has been correct then there is no such being as the God of traditional natural theology … There cannot, if our argument has been sound, be a timeless, immutable, omniscient, omnipotent all-good being’ . According to Kenny.

Jorge Luis Borges is working for decades now on the execution of the nightmare. Perhaps his most celebrated instance is "Tlon, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius ". It would take much work to sift the fabricated references in Borges' works from the ones deliberately misread from the over-emphasis on an author's casual remark, etc.

The comments focus on a presumed circular reasoning in the operator hierarchy and the necessity of understanding life’s origin for defining life. Below it is shown that its layered structure prevents the operator hierarchy from circular definitions. It is argued that the origin of life is an insufficient basis for a definition of life that includes multicellular and neural network organisms.

Prompted by questions raised in the public arena concerning the validity of arguments for the existence of God based on “design” in the universe, I explore a traditional teleological argument for the existence of God. Using the arguments offered by Thomas Aquinas as fairly representative of this classical line of argumentation going back to Aristotle, I attempt to uncover the hidden premises and construct arguments for the existence of God which are deductive in nature. To justify the premises of Aquinas’s (...) argument, I begin by presenting an argument to justify the existence of “final causes,” with a focus on answering questions about the biological implications of these causes for evolutionary theory. Then, I attempt to construct two teleological proofs for the existence of God. Finally, I offer some implications of this reasoning for the contemporary disputes over ID/evolution in education. (shrink)

A presentation of one of the most important Thomistic institutions, the Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas, founded by Pope Leo XIII in 1879, and renewed in 1999 by John Paul II. The article covers the origins of the project, its long history, and its recent reform.

The problems with grace and free will have prompted long-standing theological conflicts, chiefly revolving around certain disagreements over the nature of divine causality in respect to the free will's of creatures and His foreknowledge of free acts. Eleonore Stump offers a new interpretation of divine action on the will that holds God only acts by way of formal causality and that human cooperation with grace is only by way of "quiescence." I argue that this account lacks coherence in certain important (...) respects, especially in how human beings freely decide upon conversion - a process impossible on this model. I also argue that any model of divine causality cannot escape the dichotomy of holding a Molinist or a Banezian model of efficacious grace. In response, I offer a new interpretation of classical Thomist models of grace that preserves human freedom and divine sovereignty in grace. (shrink)

A historical and systematic introduction to what the medieval philosopher and theologian Thomas Aquinas wrote about the Trinity. By focusing on the thought of one of the greatest defenders of the doctrine of the Trinity, Gilles Emery OP elucidates the classical Christian understanding of God.

It has been shown that the thirteenth-century Dominican friar, St Thomas Aquinas, was an important theological influence on John Owen, the seventeenth-century English puritan theologian, chaplain to Oliver Cromwell, and Vice-Chancellor of Oxford University, especially in the areas of the divine being, grace and Chalcedonian Christology. Suzanne McDonald has argued that, while Aquinas is unmistakably a source for Owen's doctrine of the beatific vision, Owen surpassed Aquinas's doctrine in a manner she judges to be correct, theologically speaking, and which exposes (...) the deficiency of Aquinas's account. Owen achieved this particular ‘Reforming’ or rather ‘re-forming’ of Aquinas's doctrine, she argues, by way of a ‘Christological re-orientation of the doctrine’ in terms of what is seen in the beatific vision and how it is seen, that is, its content and means. This article replies to McDonald from a Catholic and Thomist perspective, in response to her suggestion that Owen's account of the beatific vision opens up possibilities for ecumenical dialogue. The article attempts to achieve this first by reassessing the Christological contrasts McDonald draws between Owen and Aquinas in terms of content and means, and then by offering several suggestions as to why one might want to prefer Aquinas's account over Owen's. (shrink)

It is widely assumed by scholars that Christ was in error on such matters as an expectation that the final judgement and its accompanying events would occur within the timeframe of a generation. While accepting that Christ did indeed prophesy his return within this timeframe, a recent co-authored work When the Son of Man Didn't Come aims to defend the veracity of his prophecy by drawing on the same historical-critical method that has given rise to doubts about it. The authors (...) propose a distinction between Mosaic and Jeremianic prophecy, arguing that Christ's was of the latter kind, which was present in the Ancient Near East, the Old and New Testaments, and other Jewish and Christian authors. Their argument, however, is at risk of reducing the truthfulness of a prophecy to its success. Hence this article explores a further distinction between two kinds of prophecy made in Thomas Aquinas's account of the truthfulness of prophecy, mapping it onto the Mosaic-Jeremianic distinction, and arguing that, in view of this linking of Aquinas's understanding of prophecy to the argument of the book, the book certainly adds to the set of proposed theological explanations of how Christ's prophecy of his return was true. (shrink)

It is widely assumed by scholars that Christ was in error on such matters as an expectation that the final judgement and its accompanying events would occur within the timeframe of a generation. While accepting that Christ did indeed prophesy his return within this timeframe, a recent co-authored work When the Son of Man Didn't Come aims to defend the veracity of his prophecy by drawing on the same historical-critical method that has given rise to doubts about it. The authors (...) propose a distinction between Mosaic and Jeremianic prophecy, arguing that Christ's was of the latter kind, which was present in the Ancient Near East, the Old and New Testaments, and other Jewish and Christian authors. Their argument, however, is at risk of reducing the truthfulness of a prophecy to its success. Hence this article explores a further distinction between two kinds of prophecy made in Thomas Aquinas's account of the truthfulness of prophecy, mapping it onto the Mosaic-Jeremianic distinction, and arguing that, in view of this linking of Aquinas's understanding of prophecy to the argument of the book, the book certainly adds to the set of proposed theological explanations of how Christ's prophecy of his return was true. (shrink)

The article offers a critical biography, description and characteristic of method, fonts and doctrine of Master Paul of Soncino († 5 August 1495), friar of the Dominican Order, in particular his Acutissimae Quaestiones Metaphysicales. The life and work of this philosopher falls within the ambit of Italian Thomism of the 15th century. Between his masters we commemorate Peter Maldura of Bergamo and Dominic of Flanders. His exposition of Aristotle’s Metaphysic proceeds from a peculiar synthesis of Arabic Commentator Averroes and Thomas (...) Aquinas. Soncinas’ work and position was frequently discussed up to the 15th century. (shrink)

Nos livros impressos, nem sempre as imagens estão de acordo com os textos que deveriam ilus­trar. Neste artigo, o autor analisa algumas estampas xilográficas que estão em desacordo com os textos que 'ilustram', em O Flos Sanctorum em linguagem português, impresso em Lisboa, por Hermão de Campos & Roberto Rabelo, em 1513.

The origin, historical development and current projects of the Leonine Commission, which is in charge of the critical edition of the complete works of St. Thomas Aquinas.

This article provides a critical appraisal of the case for healthcare being rationed away from older patients to those who are younger. After sketching a metaphysics of elderliness and reviewing clinical and economic cases for healthcare rationing, the article looks in depth at the most challenging case for age rationing known as the ‘fair innings’ case. This article rejects that case and makes an alternative case that fairness actually dictates against age rationing in favour of allocation on the basis of (...) need. It concludes with a call for a renewed ‘covenant between generations’, founded on the virtue of pietas. (shrink)

In his commentary on the Elementatio theologica of Proclus, Berthold von Moosburg claims that the Proclean supersapientia is superior to Aristotelian metaphysics because it has a cognitive principle that is superior to the intellect. This unum in nobis also establishes a cognitive habitus, which consists in the union with the divine. This article shows how Proclean science leads to deification and to what extent it is the expression and conscious realization of deification. Examining the relationship between the “one in us” (...) and the intellect, it becomes clear that Berthold does not equate them with each other. Nevertheless, the intellectus adeptus, in whose conception Berthold is more oriented to Albertus Magnus than to Dietrich von Freiberg, is a necessary and never fully obsolete precursor for the union with the divine. With this view, Berthold integrates the Arabic-Peripatetic doctrine of the acquired intellect into the Proclean doctrine of the five modes of knowledge, thus returning them to their historical and systematic origin. (shrink)

The article offers a critical biography, description and characteristic of method, fonts and doctrine of Master Paul of Soncino († 5 August 1495), friar of the Dominican Order, in particular his Acutissimae Quaestiones Metaphysicales. The life and work of this philosopher falls within the ambit of Italian Thomism of the 15th century. Between his masters we commemorate Peter Maldura of Bergamo and Dominic of Flanders. His exposition of Aristotle’s Metaphysic proceeds from a peculiar synthesis of Arabic Commentator Averroes and Thomas (...) Aquinas. Soncinas’ work and position was frequently discussed up to the 15th century. (shrink)

Andrey Bely was an important member of the Russian symbolist movement of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. This essay presents a summary of the development of his ideas regarding the origins of image and symbol in poetic language. For Bely language organizes chaos. The poet finds images in the internal world of dreams. Music has an organizing power beyond that of language, which language attempts to imitate. Under the influence of Vladimir Solovyov he looked to the union of (...) Divine Wisdom or Sophia with the Eternal Logos as the principle behind symbolic images. Later, under the spell of Rudolf Steiner, he found the source of inspiration in the eternal dwelling of the Logos from which the human ego descends into flesh. The task of the poet is to recover the memory of the time before he left the realm of the Logos and to return to that realm by participating in Christ's ascent to the Cross. The autobiographical novel Kotik Letaev gives an account of recovering memory from before birth and the need to be joined with Christ crucified. (shrink)

It is possible to predict future life forms? In this paper it is argued that the answer to this question may well be positive. As a basis for predictions a rationale is used that is derived from historical data, e.g. from a hierarchical classification that ranks all building block systems, that have evolved so far. This classification is based on specific emergent properties that allow stepwise transitions, from low level building blocks to higher level ones. This paper shows how this (...) hierarchy can be used for predicting future life forms.The extrapolations suggest several future neural network organisms. Major aspects of the structures of these organisms are predicted. The results can be considered of fundamental importance for several reasons. Firstly, assuming that the operator hierarchy is a proper basis for predictions, the result yields insight into the structure of future organisms. Secondly, the predictions are not extrapolations of presently observed trends, but are fully integrated with all historical system transitions in evolution. Thirdly, the extrapolations suggest the structures of intelligences that, one day, will possess more powerful brains than human beings.This study ends with a discussion of possibilities for falsification of the present theory, the implications of the present predictions in relation to recent developments in artificial intelligence and the philosophical implications of the role of humanity in evolution with regard to the creation of future neural network organisms. (shrink)

Deep neural networks (DNNs) provide a unique opportunity to move towards a generic modelling framework in psychology. The high representational capacity of these models combined with the possibility for further extensions has already allowed us to investigate the forest, namely the complex landscape of representations and processes that underlie human cognition, without forgetting about the trees, which include individual psychological phenomena.