The object of the book is to meet and combat false conceptions, to co-ordinate true notions, and so to furnish the reader with some general information on the old and the new scholasticism. The advantage of the book is its two-sided perspective that contains historical investigations about the ancient sources of the scholastic philosophy and the decline from it. But it contains also a systematic perspective by which the doctrines of the scholastic philosophizing are collected systematically. Therefore this book (...) is an scholarly introduction into the scholastic philosophy dedicated for undergraduate’s. (shrink)

The Cambridge History of Medieval Philosophy comprises over fifty specially commissioned essays by experts on the philosophy of this period. Starting in the late eighth century, with the renewal of learning some centuries after the fall of the Roman Empire, a sequence of chapters takes the reader through developments in many and varied fields, including logic and language, natural philosophy, ethics, metaphysics, and theology. Close attention is paid to the context of medieval philosophy, with discussions of the rise (...) of the universities and developments in the cultural and linguistic spheres. A striking feature is the continuous coverage of Islamic, Jewish, and Christian material. There are useful biographies of the philosophers, and a comprehensive bibliography. The volumes illuminate a rich and remarkable period in the history of philosophy and will be the authoritative source on medieval philosophy for the next generation of scholars and students alike. (shrink)

OBJECTIVE: Following two randomized controlled trials that demonstrated reduced mortality and better neurological outcome in cardiac arrest patients, mild therapeutic hypothermia was implemented in many intensive care units. Up to now, no large observational studies have confirmed the beneficial effects of mild therapeutic hypothermia. DESIGN: Internet-based survey combined with a retrospective, observational study. PATIENTS: All patients admitted to an intensive care unit in The Netherlands after cardiac arrest from January 1, 1999 until January 1, 2009. DATA SOURCE: Dutch National Intensive (...) Care Evaluation database. METHODS: The moment of implementation of mild therapeutic hypothermia for each hospital participating in the Dutch National Intensive Care Evaluation database was determined with an Internet survey. To compare mortality before and after implementation of mild therapeutic hypothermia, the odds ratio adjusted for Simplified Acute Physiology Score II score, age, gender, propensity score, and in- or out-of-hospital cardiac arrest was calculated. Patients were excluded if 1) they were admitted to an intensive care unit that did not respond to the survey, 2) they were admitted within 3 months after implementation of mild therapeutic hypothermia, 3) they had a Glasgow Coma Scale score of >8, or 4) they did not satisfy the Simplified Acute Physiology Score II inclusion criteria. INTERVENTIONS: None. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS: A total of 13,962 patients were admitted to an intensive care unit following cardiac arrest. In total 8,645 patients were excluded, 5,544 because of a Glasgow Coma Scale score of >8. Of the resultant 5,317 patients, 1,547 patients were treated before and 3,770 patients after implementation of mild therapeutic hypothermia. Patients admitted after implementation of mild therapeutic hypothermia had lower minimal and maximal temperatures (p < .0001) during the first 24 hrs on the intensive care unit compared to patients admitted before implementation of mild therapeutic hypothermia. The adjusted odds ratio of the hospital mortality of patients treated after implementation of mild therapeutic hypothermia was 0.80 (95% confidence interval of 0.65-0.98, p = .029). CONCLUSION: The results of this retrospective, observational survey suggest that implementation of mild therapeutic hypothermia in Dutch intensive care units is associated with a 20% relative reduction of hospital mortality in cardiac arrest patients. (shrink)

The most comprehensive collection of its kind, this unique anthology presents fifty-four readings--many of them not widely available--by the most important and influential Christian, Jewish, and Muslim philosophers of the Middle Ages. The text is organized topically, making it easily accessible to students, and the large selection of readings provides instructors with maximum flexiblity in choosing course material. Each thematic section is comprised of six chronologically arranged readings. This organization focuses on the major philosophical issues and allows a smooth introduction (...) to the material. The topics covered are: (1) The Existence of God, (2) Ethics and the Problem of Evil, (3) God's Foreknowledge and Free Will, (4) Theology, (5) Political Philosophy, 6) Knowledge and Sensation, (7) Universals, (8) Logic and the Philosophy of Language and (9) Physics. Each text is preceded by a biographical note on the author and a brief analytical introduction. Unlike other anthologies, which present sources as a series of truncated excerpts, this collection avoids intrusive editing and includes many selections in their entirety, thus preserving the rich flavor of the medieval mind at work. (shrink)

The central debate of natural theology among medieval Muslims and Jews concerned whether or not the world was eternal. Opinions divided sharply on this issue because the outcome bore directly on God's relationship with the world: eternity implies a deity bereft of will, while a world with a beginning leads to the contrasting picture of a deity possessed of will. In this exhaustive study of medieval Islamic and Jewish arguments for eternity, creation, and the existence of God, Herbert (...) Davidson provides a systematic classification of the proofs, analyzes and explains them, and traces their sources in Greek philosophy. Throughout the study, Davidson tries to take into account every argument of a philosophical character, disregarding only those arguments that rest entirely on religious faith or which fall below a minimal level of plausibility. (shrink)

In this innovative volume contemporary philosophers respond to classic works of Jewish philosophy. For each of twelve central topics in Jewish philosophy, Jewish philosophical readings, drawn from the medieval period through the twentieth century, appear alongside an invited contribution that engages both the readings and the contemporary philosophical literature in a constructive dialogue. The twelve topics are organized into four sections, and each section commences with an overview of the ensuing dialogue and concludes with a list of further readings. (...) The introduction to the volume assesses the current state of Jewish philosophy and argues for a deeper engagement with analytic philosophy, exemplified by the new contributions. Jewish Philosophy Past and Present: Contemporary Responses to Classical Sources is a cutting edge work of Jewish philosophy, and, at the same time, an engaging introduction to the issues that animated Jewish philosophers for centuries and to the texts that they have produced. It is designed to set the agenda in Jewish philosophy for years to come. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 41.2 (2003) 269-270 [Access article in PDF] Steven Harvey, editor. The Medieval Hebrew Encyclopedias of Science and Philosophy: Proceedings of the Bar-Ilan University Conference. Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2000. Pp. xi + 547. Cloth, $239.00. This fine volume, covering the proceedings of a conference at Bar-Ilan University (January, 1998), is the first book devoted to the medieval Hebrew encyclopedias of science and philosophy. (...) According to the editor, the talks at the conference "were arranged to fit together like a jigsaw puzzle," and that intention is also reflected in the current volume: It is extremely well-organized, the earlier essays provide useful background for the later ones, and the various parts of the book complement each other quite well. Though they contain much that is highly technical, the editor has succeeded in making the essays comprehensible to the non-specialist, as was his declared intention. [End Page 269]The editor's introductory essay draws the book together and makes it a coherent whole. The most important part of that essay raises the conceptual problem underlying the entire book, namely: what defines a medieval encyclopedia? The contributors do not always agree on how to answer this question, nor should we expect such agreement. Some of their criteria are: an encyclopedia must treat a subject comprehensively; it must be well-enough organized to facilitate retrieval; it is meant to be consulted, not read cover-to-cover; it is usually an eclectic collection of previously extant material, not an original composition, and certainly not a major source for new ideas. Finally, an important goal of the encyclopedist is popular enlightenment.The book's first two sections deal with the predecessors of the medieval Hebrew encyclopedias, the medieval Latin and Arabic works. Only the latter had heavy influence on the structure and content of later Hebrew works. Nevertherless, the Islamic author who had the greatest influence by far on Jews during the age of the encyclopedias under discussion, namely Averroes, is judged by Butterworth (as well as by Biesterfeldt) not to be an encyclopedist at all. The basis for this judgment is that Averroes had no interest whatsoever in popular enlightenment; his books are not introductory, and nowhere does he address himself to anyone but the expert.Nevertheless, when it comes to Averroes, it would be prudent to honor the editor's admonition that we not be too demanding with our criteria for what constitutes a medieval encyclopedia. Perhaps the corpus of Averroes's works does not make him an encyclopedist, as the essays contend. But we should not lose sight of how his works were actually used by later Hebrew writers: their Hebrew translations were copied and paraphrased extensively as state-of-the-art presentations of science on nearly every important topic. In other words, even if Averroes himself did not have the intentions of an encyclopedist for his works, later authors mined them for informative essays as if they were encyclopedias.Part 3 deals with Early Hebrew Encyclopedias. Despite the volume's otherwise outstanding organization, Woolf's fine article on Maimonides' Mishneh Torah seems out of place here, since it is by no means an encyclopedia of science and philosophy.Part 4 deals with the structure and organization of the three thirteenth-century encyclopedias that are the focus of the volume: Judah ben Solomon ha-Cohen's Midrash ha-Hokhmah; Shem-Tov ibn Falaquera's De'ot ha-Filosofim; and Gershom ben Solomon's Sha'ar ha-Shamayim. The descriptive essays are extremely useful for getting a balanced picture of these books, but perhaps of even greater value are the content outlines, which include pagination from the manuscripts to make them easier to consult.The most fascinating section of the book by far, and the most likely to become a productive model for future research, is part 5, which analyzes specific topics within the encyclopedias. These essays trace scientific problems from Aristotle to the medieval Aristotelians, especially Averroes, and then examine how they are dealt with in the Hebrew... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 41.3 (2003) 413-414 [Access article in PDF] Katerina Ierodiakonou, editor. Byzantine Philosophy and its Ancient Sources. New York: Oxford University Press, Clarendon Press, 2002. Pp. vii + 309. Cloth, $55.00.Talking about, let alone writing on "Byzantine Philosophy" within the English-speaking philosophical community could cause embarrassment. It is only recently that this field has gained a few notable entries in philosophical works of (...) reference like the Routledge Encyclopedia or the Oxford Dictionary—but still it cannot make its way into the histories of medieval philosophy, not to mention the general histories of philosophy. Byzantine Philosophy aims at providing good reasons for changing that tendency and seeks to "persuade [us] that Byzantine Philosophy is worth investigating" (13).The book contains eleven articles, plus Ierodiakonou's introduction and Linos Benakis's review of the current research, read in part at a Conference held in Thessaloniki, Greece in 1997, but it is more than a mere collection of conference papers. Written both by well-established and younger scholars from diverse disciplines, the volume focuses on the explicit or implicit dialogue of Byzantine thinkers with ancient Greek philosophy, one of the two ingredients of Byzantine Philosophy (the other being patristic thought).Ierodiakonou in her introduction prefers to make a few—but penetrating—remarks on the nature of Byzantine Philosophy and its proper study. Her arguments are presented in a non-conclusive form and they are intended to serve as guidelines to further research. While a longer discussion of the issues involved would be welcome by the less-specialized reader, her choice seems reasonable as long as one thinks—rightly in my opinion—that it is premature to embark on general methodological suggestions about how to investigate Byzantine Philosophy, or believes that scrutinizing the texts themselves is a more promising approach at this relatively early stage of research (as perhaps always).With one exception, each article deals at length with a special issue spanning from metaphysics to political philosophy and concentrates on individual thinkers from the patristic era to the Renaissance; the absence of philosophical theology is surprising. Expectedly the presence of Aristotle can be traced in logic: in an eleventh-century humble handbook (thoroughly analyzed by Jonathan Barnes); in Psellos's Paraphrase on Aristotle's De Interpretationeand in the anti-logical movement in the fourteenth century (Ierodiakonou); as well as in John of Damascus's discussion of will (Michael Frede). On the Christian-neoplatonic tradition are founded a nominalistic position of Basil of Caesarea concerning the semantics of proper names (Paul Kalligas); a sixth-century treatise On Political Science (Dominic O'Meara); Psellos's conception of philosophy (John Duffy); and the peculiar case of Chaldaean Oracles and their commentators (Polymnia Athanassiadi). The last article on the Renaissance controversy between Plethon and Scholarios over the primacy of Plato or Aristotle (George Karamanolis) brings the volume appropriately to an end.That Platonism and Aristotelianism nearly monopolize the contributors' concerns is justified but this must not give the simplified impression that Byzantine Philosophy can be exclusively explained against this background. Other Greek philosophical traditions, such as Stoicism, are mentioned as well, and the fourteenth-century interest in skepticism is densely discussed (Börje Bydén on Metochites). The first essay is an informative outline of the Greek-Latin Philosophical Interaction (Sten Ebbesen), whose inclusion in the volume makes a similar survey of ancient Greek-Byzantine philosophical interaction more warranted.The contributors do not confine themselves to resolving specific problems of a Quellenforschung, by identifying parallel texts or recurring arguments in order to establish the obvious dependence of Byzantine thought on Greek Philosophy. In fact, as many articles show, it is the very analysis of patristic and Byzantine texts that makes us return to their ancient sources and also makes clear how this revisiting can deepen our understanding of the texts and the philosophical problems they are trying to present or to solve. When doing philosophy, Byzantine thinkers have ancient Greek concepts in their minds, and quite often have ancient texts in their hands. Now it is up to us to evaluate... (shrink)

This is the first of a three-volume anthology intended as a companion to The Cambridge History of Later Medieval Philosophy. Volume 1 is concerned with the logic and the philosophy of language, and comprises fifteen important texts on questions of meaning and inference that formed the basis of Medieval philosophy. As far as is practicable, complete works or topically complete segments of larger works have been selected. The editors have provided a full introduction to the volume and detailed (...) introductory headnotes to each text; the volume is also indexed comprehensively. (shrink)

The second volume of Father Copleston's History of Philosophy covers the period from Augustine through Duns Scotus. Of its 51 chapters Aquinas has eleven, Augustine and Duns Scotus six each, Bonaventura five, Erigena two, and Dionysius, Anselm, William of Auvergne, and Albertus one each, while other philosophers are treated more briefly. The author's point of view is strictly and explicitly Thomist, and the book is intended primarily as a textbook for use in Catholic seminaries. But it is written with such (...) scholarship, integrity, and clarity that it should interest a much wider circle of readers. Apparently the book is based on a thorough study of the original sources. The documentation, while not detailed, is as complete as one expects in a general work of this sort. Since the Thomist concept of philosophy is accepted, little is said about mysticism or dogmatic theology. But the various rationalistic philosophies are analyzed with a critical sympathy which endeavors to appreciate their various insights into the nature of reality. (shrink)

The Cambridge History of Medieval Philosophy comprises over fifty specially commissioned essays by experts on the philosophy of this period. Starting in the late eighth century, with the renewal of learning some centuries after the fall of the Roman Empire, a sequence of chapters take the reader through developments in many and varied fields, including logic and language, natural philosophy, ethics, metaphysics, and theology. Close attention is paid to the context of medieval philosophy, with discussions of the rise (...) of the universities and developments in the cultural and linguistic spheres. A striking feature is the continuous coverage of Islamic, Jewish, and Christian material. There are useful biographies of the philosophers, and a comprehensive bibliography. The volume illuminates a rich and remarkable period in the history of philosophy and will be the authoritative source on medieval philosophy for the next generation of scholars and students alike. (shrink)

James D. Reid - The Early Heidegger and Medieval Philosophy: Phenomenology for the Godforsaken - Journal of the History of Philosophy 45:4 Journal of the History of Philosophy 45.4 673-674 Muse Search Journals This Journal Contents Reviewed by James D. Reid Metropolitan State College of Denver S. J. McGrath. The Early Heidegger and Medieval Philosophy: Phenomenology for the Godforsaken. Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2006. Pp. xx + 268. Cloth, $69.95. Taking its clues from the (...) scholarly work of Kisiel, van Buren, and others on the religious origins of early Heidegger's phenomenology, blending philosophical interpretation and biographical insight, and drawing fruitfully from a wide range of historical and philosophical sources, McGrath's The Early Heidegger and Medieval Philosophy offers a wide-ranging account of Heidegger's.. (shrink)

A peculiarity of early medieval geometrical texts was that alongside Euclid's Elements they transmitted remnants of the corpus of Roman land surveyors and metaphysical digressions extraneous to geometry proper. Rather than dismissing these additions as irrelevant, this essay attempts to elucidate the cultural grounds for the indiscriminate mixture of the three disciplines -- geometry, surveying, and metaphysics. Inquiry into the broader context of early medieval culture suggests that neither geometry nor surveying was treated as an independent discipline. Texts (...) on geometry and surveying were studied mainly because they were thought to provide good opportunities for enlarging the scope of meditation on spiritual subjects. Accordingly, the main concern of this essay is to show how Christian symbolism influenced both the composition and the study of geometrical texts. The essay is based on a wide range of sources: treatises on geometry and surveying, pictorial representations of Creation, and philosophical literature in which geometry was used in arguments about ontological doctrines. (shrink)

Medieval Jewish intellectuals living in Muslim and Christian lands were strongly concerned to recover what they regarded as a 'lost' Jewish philosophical tradition. As part of this project they transmitted and produced many philosophical and scientific works and commentaries, as well as philosophical commentary on scripture, in Judaeo-Arabic and Hebrew, the principal literary languages of medieval Jewry. This volume presents translations of seven prominent medieval Jewish rationalists: Saadia Gaon, Solomon ibn Gabirol, Moses Maimonides, Isaac Albalag, Moses of (...) Narbonne, Levi Gersonides, Hasdai Crescas and Joseph Albo - including, for the first time in English, the complete Falaquera abridgement of Gabirol's Source of Life. These works range over topics that are both theological and philosophical, but they are characterized by two overarching principles: the unity of truth, and its accessibility to human reason. (shrink)

The Cambridge History of Medieval Philosophy comprises over fifty specially commissioned essays by experts on the philosophy of this period. Starting in the late eighth century, with the renewal of learning some centuries after the fall of the Roman Empire, a sequence of chapters take the reader through developments in many and varied fields, including logic and language, natural philosophy, ethics, metaphysics, and theology. Close attention is paid to the context of medieval philosophy, with discussions of the rise (...) of the universities and developments in the cultural and linguistic spheres. A striking feature is the continuous coverage of Islamic, Jewish, and Christian material. There are useful biographies of the philosophers, and a comprehensive bibliography. The volume illuminates a rich and remarkable period in the history of philosophy and will be the authoritative source on medieval philosophy for the next generation of scholars and students alike. (shrink)

Medieval philosophy and theology are complex fields to negotiate even for specialists, not to mention beginners. Crucial texts from important figures of the period have yet to be edited, much less translated into the modern vernacular, and philosophical and theological arguments are often so highly technical and conceptually difficult as to be inscrutable to all but the most experienced scholar. Even referencing original sources can be challenging if one does not know that to find a work by, say, (...) Giles of Rome sometimes requires searching under the heading ‘Aegidius Colonna’, Solomon Ibn Gabirol under ‘Avicebron’, and Abu al-Walid Muhammad ibn Rushd under ‘Averröes’. To specialize in the field therefore frequently requires advanced training in Latin , palaeography, and—because it is very much a trans-Atlantic discipline—a reading knowledge of the major modern European languages. Still, one must learn to walk before one can run, and this volume provides a reliable and useful guide for students seeking entry into the discipline. (shrink)

The Cambridge History of Medieval Philosophy comprises over fifty specially commissioned essays by experts on the philosophy of this period. Starting in the late eighth century, with the renewal of learning some centuries after the fall of the Roman Empire, a sequence of chapters takes the reader through developments in many and varied fields, including logic and language, natural philosophy, ethics, metaphysics, and theology. Close attention is paid to the context of medieval philosophy, with discussions of the rise (...) of the universities and developments in the cultural and linguistic spheres. A striking feature is the continuous coverage of Islamic, Jewish, and Christian material. There are useful biographies of the philosophers, and a comprehensive bibliography. The volumes illuminate a rich and remarkable period in the history of philosophy and will be the authoritative source on medieval philosophy for the next generation of scholars and students alike. (shrink)

The Cambridge History of Medieval Philosophy comprises over fifty specially commissioned essays by experts on the philosophy of this period. Starting in the late eighth century, with the renewal of learning some centuries after the fall of the Roman Empire, a sequence of chapters takes the reader through developments in many and varied fields, including logic and language, natural philosophy, ethics, metaphysics, and theology. Close attention is paid to the context of medieval philosophy, with discussions of the rise (...) of the universities and developments in the cultural and linguistic spheres. A striking feature is the continuous coverage of Islamic, Jewish, and Christian material. There are useful biographies of the philosophers, and a comprehensive bibliography. The volumes illuminate a rich and remarkable period in the history of philosophy and will be the authoritative source on medieval philosophy for the next generation of scholars and students alike. (shrink)

Perception of the external world is an essential part of the animal (including human) life, both as a source of knowledge and as a way to survive. Medieval authors accepted this view, and despite general concerns about the reliability of the senses in the acquisition of certain and objective knowledge, they thought that for the most part our perceptual system gets things right when it comes to the perceptual features of things—but not always. Our article focuses on thirteenth- and (...) fourteenth-century philosophical discussions of illusions and other types of perceptual errors. Reception of incorrect information, misjudgments concerning perceptual objects, the binding problem, and similar cases that explain perceptual errors will be analyzed. We discuss what might be called medieval Aristotelian/Avicennian theories of perception and the internal senses (drawing mainly from Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas), as well as the so-called perspectivist accounts of perception, especially that by Alhacen. Finally, we take up a debate between Peter Auriol and his critics, which contains elements that can be seen as precursors of later skeptical worries. The concern here is that, just like in contemporary discussions leading to disjunctivism, the absence of a secure way to distinguish between veridical and non-veridical perception leads to a general worry about the reliability of our experience of the world. (shrink)

In The Political Animal in Medieval Philosophy Juhana Toivanen investigates what medieval philosophers meant when they argued that human beings are political animals by nature. He analyses the notion of ‘political animal’ from various perspectives and shows its relevance to philosophical discussions concerning the foundations of human sociability, ethics, and politics. -/- Medieval authors thought that social life stems from the biological and rational nature of human beings, and that collaboration with other people promotes prosperity and good (...) life. Toivanen provides a detailed philosophical interpretation of this view across wide range of authors, including unedited manuscript sources. As the first monograph length study on the topic, The Political Animal sheds new light to this significant period in western political thought. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 41.3 (2003) 413-414 [Access article in PDF] Katerina Ierodiakonou, editor. Byzantine Philosophy and its Ancient Sources. New York: Oxford University Press, Clarendon Press, 2002. Pp. vii + 309. Cloth, $55.00.Talking about, let alone writing on "Byzantine Philosophy" within the English-speaking philosophical community could cause embarrassment. It is only recently that this field has gained a few notable entries in philosophical works of (...) reference like the Routledge Encyclopedia or the Oxford Dictionary—but still it cannot make its way into the histories of medieval philosophy, not to mention the general histories of philosophy. Byzantine Philosophy aims at providing good reasons for changing that tendency and seeks to "persuade [us] that Byzantine Philosophy is worth investigating" (13).The book contains eleven articles, plus Ierodiakonou's introduction and Linos Benakis's review of the current research, read in part at a Conference held in Thessaloniki, Greece in 1997, but it is more than a mere collection of conference papers. Written both by well-established and younger scholars from diverse disciplines, the volume focuses on the explicit or implicit dialogue of Byzantine thinkers with ancient Greek philosophy, one of the two ingredients of Byzantine Philosophy (the other being patristic thought).Ierodiakonou in her introduction prefers to make a few—but penetrating—remarks on the nature of Byzantine Philosophy and its proper study. Her arguments are presented in a non-conclusive form and they are intended to serve as guidelines to further research. While a longer discussion of the issues involved would be welcome by the less-specialized reader, her choice seems reasonable as long as one thinks—rightly in my opinion—that it is premature to embark on general methodological suggestions about how to investigate Byzantine Philosophy, or believes that scrutinizing the texts themselves is a more promising approach at this relatively early stage of research (as perhaps always).With one exception, each article deals at length with a special issue spanning from metaphysics to political philosophy and concentrates on individual thinkers from the patristic era to the Renaissance; the absence of philosophical theology is surprising. Expectedly the presence of Aristotle can be traced in logic: in an eleventh-century humble handbook (thoroughly analyzed by Jonathan Barnes); in Psellos's Paraphrase on Aristotle's De Interpretationeand in the anti-logical movement in the fourteenth century (Ierodiakonou); as well as in John of Damascus's discussion of will (Michael Frede). On the Christian-neoplatonic tradition are founded a nominalistic position of Basil of Caesarea concerning the semantics of proper names (Paul Kalligas); a sixth-century treatise On Political Science (Dominic O'Meara); Psellos's conception of philosophy (John Duffy); and the peculiar case of Chaldaean Oracles and their commentators (Polymnia Athanassiadi). The last article on the Renaissance controversy between Plethon and Scholarios over the primacy of Plato or Aristotle (George Karamanolis) brings the volume appropriately to an end.That Platonism and Aristotelianism nearly monopolize the contributors' concerns is justified but this must not give the simplified impression that Byzantine Philosophy can be exclusively explained against this background. Other Greek philosophical traditions, such as Stoicism, are mentioned as well, and the fourteenth-century interest in skepticism is densely discussed (Börje Bydén on Metochites). The first essay is an informative outline of the Greek-Latin Philosophical Interaction (Sten Ebbesen), whose inclusion in the volume makes a similar survey of ancient Greek-Byzantine philosophical interaction more warranted.The contributors do not confine themselves to resolving specific problems of a Quellenforschung, by identifying parallel texts or recurring arguments in order to establish the obvious dependence of Byzantine thought on Greek Philosophy. In fact, as many articles show, it is the very analysis of patristic and Byzantine texts that makes us return to their ancient sources and also makes clear how this revisiting can deepen our understanding of the texts and the philosophical problems they are trying to present or to solve. When doing philosophy, Byzantine thinkers have ancient Greek concepts in their minds, and quite often have ancient texts in their hands. Now it is up to us to evaluate... (shrink)

Medieval Jewish intellectuals living in Muslim and Christian lands were strongly concerned to recover what they regarded as a ‘lost’ Jewish philosophical tradition. As part of this project they transmitted and produced many philosophical and scientific works and commentaries, as well as philosophical commentary on scripture, in Judaeo-Arabic and Hebrew, the principal literary languages of medieval Jewry. This volume presents new or revised translations of seven prominent medieval Jewish rationalists: Saadia Gaon, Solomon ibn Gabirol, Moses Maimonides, Isaac (...) Albalag, Moses of Narbonne, Levi Gersonides, Hasdai Crescas and Joseph Albo - including, for the first time in English, the complete Falaquera abridgement of Gabirol's Source of Life. These works range over topics that are both theological (e.g. the creation of the world) and philosophical (e.g. determinism and free choice), but they are characterized by two overarching principles: the unity of truth, and its accessibility to human reason. (shrink)

This sourcebook explores how the Middle Ages dealt with questions related to the mental life of creatures great and small. It makes accessible a wide range of key Latin texts from the fourth to the fourteenth century in fresh English translations. Specialists and non-specialists alike will find many surprising insights in this comprehensive collection of sources on the medieval philosophy of animal minds. The book’s structure follows the distinction between the different aspects of the mental. The author has (...) organized the material in three main parts: cognition, emotions, and volition. Each part contains translations of texts by different medieval thinkers. The philosophers chosen include well-known figures like Augustine, Albert the Great, and Thomas Aquinas. The collection also profiles the work of less studied thinkers like John Blund, Peter of Spain, and Peter of Abano. In addition, among those featured are several translated here into English for the first time. Each text comes with a short introduction to the philosopher, the context, and the main arguments of the text plus a section with bibliographical information and recommendations for further reading. A general introduction to the entire volume presents the basic concepts and questions of the philosophy of animal minds and explains how the medieval discussion relates to the contemporary debate. This sourcebook is valuable for anyone interested in the history of philosophy, especially medieval philosophy of mind. It will also appeal to scholars and students from other fields, such as psychology, theology, and cultural studies. (shrink)

This second volume in a series of Source Books in Asian Philosophy contains selections and in several cases complete works, from the writings of Chinese philosophers from Confucian humanism to contemporary communism. Chan maintains a balance between modern, medieval, and ancient thinkers as well as between Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism. Chan has prefaced each of the 44 chapters with a brief introduction discussing the historical background and relative influence of a school, and has interspersed interpretive comments throughout the texts. (...) Also included are chronological tables of dynasties and philosophers, an appendix on translating Chinese philosophical terms, and a glossary of Chinese characters.--K. P. F. (shrink)

“Studies on the emotions became popular in the analytically oriented philosophy of mind in the 1980s” , the author begins, but the status of emotion as reason’s rival or complement in the directing of human nature is, of course, of perennial interest to philosophy per se. True, the topic has acquired a certain prominence in recent decades, and this has led to useful historical investigations, although, as the author says, many more of them have been on emotions in ancient than (...) in medieval philosophy . In four chapters, he presents a continuous history of philosophical reflection on emotion from Plato to the fourteenth-century Franciscan Adam Wodeham, and late medieval compendia. Along the way he summarizes and comments on a large number of texts in whole or in part, regularly quotes from them in English translation, and often supplies the more significant Greek and Latin terms. For discussion of ancient theories, he acknowledges reliance on works by Martha Nussbaum and Richard Sorabji, but his scholarship extends to a wide range of primary sources and other historical studies. His recognition of the bearing of both theological and medical works on his subject is noteworthy: it is a mark of the singularity of emotion—or, as it is. (shrink)

Scholastic debates about the activity of our final end—happiness—become famously heated in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, with intellectualists claiming that the primary activity through which we are joined to God is intellective ‘vision’ and voluntarists claiming that it is love (an act of will). These conversations represent only one set of medieval views on the subject, however. If we look to contemplative sources in the same period—even just those of the Rome-based Christian tradition—we find a range of (...) views on our final end that runs the gamut from ‘self-less union with an unknowable God’ to ‘embodied fulfilment of human nature.’ In this article, I argue that these differing conceptions push their holders to develop a correspondingly wide range of attitudes toward the human faculty of reason, particularly with respect to its value (or lack thereof) in helping us achieve our ultimate end. Medieval thinking on this topic is thus much more complex—and offers more points of connection with contemporary philosophical theology—than is typically recognized. (shrink)

This article addresses the underestimation of Medieval philosophy in the contemporary curriculum by engaging its very origins in the ‘postmodern’ dislocation of philosophy. The leading question is what would be the prospects in the 21st century of reorienting Western philosophy from its idea-historical sources, which would include its ancient traditions and the Medieval exposition, as well as the Renaissance elucidation thereof. Critically engaging the works of numerous ‘postmodern’ philosophers as well as critics of the ‘postmodern’ departure from (...) traditional philosophy, this article argues for the re-establishment of the late Medieval notion of sensus communis, both as common sense and community sense. Against this backdrop, the article reappraises Medieval thought within the context of sensus communis to combat the contemporary dislocation of philosophy, by raising the possibility of the presentation of first-order judgments via sensus communis in a new pursuit for wijsbegeerte. (shrink)

An eminent historian of philosophy once suggested that the term “Byzantine philosophy” is an oxymoron. Surely, if there is an neglected stepchild of the history of Western philosophy, it is the philosophy of the medieval Greeks. Even generations of learned students of medieval philosophy have generally accepted the commonplace that little original work was produced in the medieval Greek east—certainly none that demanded the intense attention given to Latin and Arabic philosophical literature. It is hardly surprising, then, (...) that histories of Byzantine thought have been few and far between. A list of the work of Klaus Oehler, Basil Tatakis, Milton Anastos, and a few others virtually exhausts the list of available studies. Moreover, one must go to a few modern Greek centers, such as Thessaloniki or Athens, to find anything like a continuous tradition of scholarship on the subject. (shrink)

This paper highlights the corrective and complementary role that historically informed philosophy can play in contemporary discussions. What it takes for an experience to count as genuinely mystical has been the source of significant controversy; most current philosophical definitions of ‘mystical experience’ exclude embodied, non-unitive states -- but, in so doing, they exclude the majority of reported mystical experiences. I use a re- examination of the full range of reported medieval mystical experiences (both in the apophatic tradition, which excludes (...) or denigrates embodied states, and in the affective tradition, which treats such states as fully mystical) to demonstrate how a better understanding of the historical medieval mystic tradition can serve as a valuable complement to ongoing philosophical discussions of religious and mystical experience. (shrink)

The Renaissance was a period of great intellectual change and innovation as philosophers rediscovered the philosophy of classical antiquity and passed it on to the modern age. Renaissance philosophy is distinct both from the medieval scholasticism, based on revelation and authority, and from philosophers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries who transformed it into new philosophical systems. Despite the importance of the Renaissance to the development of philosophy over time, it has remained largely understudied by historians of philosophy and (...) professional philosophers. This anthology aims to correct this by providing scholars and students of philosophy with representative translations of the most important philosophers of the Renaissance. Its purpose is to help readers appreciate philosophy in the Renaissance and its importance in the history of philosophy. The anthology includes translations from philosophers from the thirteenth to the seventeenth centuries, and it ranges from works on moral and political philosophy, to metaphysics, epistemology, and natural philosophy, thereby providing historians and students of philosophy with a sense for the nature, breadth, and complexity of philosophy in the Renaissance. Each translation is accompanied by an introduction by a historian of Renaissance philosophy, as well as select secondary sources, in order to encourage further study. (shrink)

This book aims at beginning the rewriting of the history of skepticism by highlightening the medieval sources of the modern skeptical discussions.

The translation process from Arabic to Hebrew, which started in the XIth century and accelerated in the first quarter of the XIIth century, continued until the end of the XVIth century. In this period, the philosophical and theological works of prominent Muslim philosophers such as Fārābī, Avicenna, Ghazālī, and Averroes were translated directly or through intermediary languages into Hebrew. In this translation process, Jewish scholars and translators who knew Arabic, on the one hand, translated the works they chose from different (...) fields into Hebrew; on the other hand, they played a facilitating role in meeting the Jewish scholars with the heritage of Islamic thought with the Hebrew works they wrote using Arabic works. Because of the limited number of works translated into Hebrew, the prevalence and influence of Avicenna's philosophical views among Jewish scholars are more limited than that of the Latin translation process, yet his impact on Jewish scholars on different philosophical issues is undisputed. It would not be correct to limit Avicenna's influence and prevalence among Jewish scholars to only the translation of his works into Hebrew, mentioning his name directly in the works of Jewish thinkers and quoting directly from his related works. Considering the similarity of views, concepts, and styles between Jewish thinkers and Avicenna on philosophical and theological issues, it can be argued that a movement called Jewish Avicennaism emerged. However, this movement is not as strong and widespread as Latin Avicennaism. Avicenna's influence among Jewish thinkers was in the form of criticism and rejection as well as adopting the philosopher's views to their philosophical system, similar to those of the Latin thinkers. In this study, I will discuss Avicenna’s role in and contribution to the development of Jewish philosophical and theological thought between the XII-XIVth centuries, a topic that has not been sufficiently addressed in Turkish. After giving general information about the translation process of Avicenna's works into Hebrew, I will try to find the answer to why all or at least essential works of Avicenna were not translated into Hebrew. Then, I will try to determine the impact of Avicenna's intellectual legacy on Jewish thinkers by dividing them into three different periods through concrete examples. The study revealed that although Jewish scholars defend similar teachings to Avicenna's views, they do not mention Avicenna's name and works in their works due to different reasons and concerns, making it difficult to determine the source of their opinions. In addition, the wrong attribution of some Avicenna’s philosophical teachings to Aristotle, negatively affected the recognition and spread of the philosopher's views. Based on these, it is not correct to conclude that his philosophical views were not known, adopted or influenced by Jewish thinkers. On the contrary, when the course of Avicenna's thoughts among Jewish thinkers is examined, it can be said that there are two types of Avicenna understanding in general. The first of these is those who read Avicenna’s works and adopt his philosophical views and make direct references to his work. Quoting Avicenna's views directly in their works revealed that the views among Jewish thinkers, whose belonging is unknown, belong to Avicenna. Secondly, they are Jewish thinkers with eclecticist approaches, who quote and use some of Avicenna's views on issues that they see as compatible and consistent with their philosophical views. They used the arguments and doctrines of Avicenna, whose views they partially knew, as an alternative or starting point against the opinions of the scholars they wanted to criticize or reject. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:242 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY his political and religious predispositions prodded him to demonstrate that the roots of modern science were in the Christian Middle Ages. Sarton's particular foibles are best understood by referring them to his pacifist commitments and the moralistic assumption that the values of science are transferable to other human endeavors. Categories such as inductivism, conventionalism and Popperianism are of little help in gaining historical understanding. For (...) this, they are in fact Platonic ideals which have little heuristic value. I would venture that a truly historical historiography of science would aid us in spotting errors in the past and help us in the future. My guess is that a good analysis would reveal a major source of trouble to have stemmed from preconceived notions which the history of science was meant to illustrate. Surely some of them have been philosophical in character, and even Baconian or conventionalist. But until recent times, most of these preconceptions have stemmed from religious, nationalistic, or personal motivations, or from scientists who wanted support for a particular concept. I agree with Agassi only in the suggestion that a parti pris was at the root of our troubles. Why, then, substitute a Popperian preconception for a conventionalist one? Why not, on the contrary, combat their distorting influence and reduce their impact? This is in fact what has happened in recent times. As the history of science has fallen into the hands of a gradually organized profession, the blatant motivations --of any type--which colored past historical writings have slowly receded. By a constant and critical confrontation of opposing views among specialists, the purpose for examining the history of science has slowly been transformed. The older external motivations have given way to an interest in the subject for its own sake and a gradual transformation has been in the making for the last few decades. As happens in other human endeavors, professionalization has already raised the standards in the discipline and there is every reason to think it will continue to do so in the future. We need not really be as pessimistic as Agassi, nor embrace his particular salvation. ROGEa HAm~ University o] Cali]ornia, Berkeley A MEDIEVAL ANALYSIS OF INFINITY IN THE COURSEof arguing that time must have had a beginning, St. Bonaventure (1221-74) put forward a demonstration which in some ways seems to anticipate Cantor's definition of infinity.1 Bonaventure pointed out that, if the world were infinitely old, then there would have been an infinite number of annual revolutions of the sun around the ecliptic. But during each such period there occur (roughly) twelve revolutions of the moon, i.e. lunar months or lunations. Thus there would be one infinity which was twelve times another--which, says Bonaventure, is impossible. This attempted proof might be formulated as the following For other adumbrationsof this definition,see I. Thomas,"A TwelfthCentury Paradoxof the Infinite,"Journal o] Symbolic Logic, XXIII (1958), 133-134, and W. & M. Kneale, The Development of Logic (Oxford,1962),p. 440. NOTES AND DISCUSSIONS 243 reductio ad absurdum, in which a revolution of the sun is specified as the period between successive vernal equinoxes. If there could be an infinite set of past lunations, then clearly it could be put in a one-to-one correspondence with a proper sub-set of itself--viz., with the set of past lunar months during which vernal equinoxes occurred. But this consequence is preposterous; no set could be so correlated with its own sub-set. Therefore the set of past lunar months cannot be infinite, and the world must have had a beginning. The passage, which is found in Bonaventure's commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard, reads as follows :2 Si mundus est aeternus, revolutiones solis in orbe suo sunt infmitae ; rursus, pro una revolutions solis necesse est fuisse duodecim ipsius lunae: ergo plus revoluta est luna quam sol; et sol infinities: ergo infinitorum ex ea parle, qua infinita sunt, est reperire excessum. Hoe autem est impossibile : ergo etc. PA~-r~asoN BROWN Harpur College, State University o] New York Sententiarum L/b. H, Dist. I, P.I, Art. I, Quaest. II, as found in S. Bonaventurme, Opera Omnla... (shrink)

Philosophy and religion were the two important sources of knowledge for medieval Arab Muslim polymaths. Owing to the difference between the nature of philosophy and religion, the interplay between philosophy and religion often takes the form of conflict in medieval Muslim thought as exemplified by the Al-Ghazali versus Averroes (Ibn Rusd) polemic. Unlike the Al-Ghazali versus Averroes (Ibn Rushd) polemic, the interplay between philosophy and religion in the political philosophy of Abu Nasr Alfarabi takes the form of (...) harmonious co-existence. Although, for Alfarabi, religion is an inferior form of knowledge as compared to philosophy, the present article will show that philosophy and religion play equally significant roles in Alfarabi’s virtuous city and that in the absence of either philosophy or religion, the political system proposed by Alfarabi cannot exist. (shrink)

A collection of masterly 20th century commentaries on the ancient and medieval philosophers. Many of the pieces have become classics in their own right, such as the essays by Jaeger, Cornford, Crombie and Gilson, here bound together for the first time. Key doctrines in the major figures from Xenophanes to Cajetan are critically studied. This is a novel and valuable source book.--D. D. O.