Online research in philosophy

Noting the apparent strangeness of looking to Nietzsche for insight on friendship has become a topos of recent scholarship. Ruth Abbey remarks: "The idea that Nietzsche could contribute to an understanding of friendship seems odd, if not misguided."1 In a similar vein, Richard Avramenko writes: "To ask of Nietzsche sage wisdom regarding friendship seems somehow misguided, like turning to Henry VIII for marriage advice or to Jean-Jacques Rousseau for tips on parenting."2 The appearance that Nietzsche has nothing to say about (...) friendship, and was not interested in friendship, has survived Kaufmann's observation that "few philosophers have written more eloquently in praise of friendship than Nietzsche; and while he .. (shrink)

Truth in the Making represents a sophisticated effort to map the complex relations between human knowledge and creative power, as reflected across more than half a millennium of philosophical enquiry. Showing the intimacy of this problematic to the work of Nicholas of Cusa, Bacon, Galileo, Descartes, Hobbes, Leibniz, Vico and David Lachterman, the book reveals how questions about creation apparently diluted by secularism in fact retain much of their potency today. If science could counterfeit or synthesize nature precisely from its (...) smallest nuts and bolts, as Descartes and Hobbes implied and as modern science increasingly suggests, would it create an identical world to that we live in now Robert C. Miner offers a precise genealogy of modern thought on truth and creation: from medieval theology's identification of human creativity with divine initiative to the radical Leibnizian contention that human ideas are 'not little copies of God's', and may at once exceed mimesis and produce things new, unpredictable and unseen. He considers how the theological importance given to creation interacts historically with the secularisation and instrumentalisation of modes of discovery and method, and asks how knowledge is understood between different disciplines, from the allegorical discipline of poetry to the constructible field of mathematics. The book is an eloquent reminder of the ways in which theology continues to fling a wild card at philosophical understandings of reality, countering theories of metaphysical equivalence of the 'real' and 'artificial' with theologies in which human making is always fallible, and strives only for approximate participation in divine truth. As a strenuous and informative breakdown of leading theories of knowledge, Truth in the Making shows the continuing influence of theological questions upon philosophical, scientific and aesthetic disciplines, whilst raising topical questions about the ultimate nature of our reality and our freedom to modify and define it. (shrink)

Can God be the efficient cause of himself (causa sui,)? It is well known that Descartes answers this question in the affirmative, but it is considerably less clear why. The main contention of the essay is that Descartes advances the causa sui doctrine because he came to think that the ontological proof of Meditation V required it. We argue these contentions through a close analysis of Descartes' initial articulation of causa sui in response to Caterus, followed by attention to the (...) reformulation of the doctrine in response to the logical objections posed by Arnauld. Our understanding of causa sui as a move made within the horizon of the ontological proof not only illuminates why Descartes would have defended a doctrine as conceptually problematic as causa sui, but also provides an alternative to Jean-Luc Marion's view that causa sui constitutes a third, distinct proof for the existence of God. /// Pode Deus ser a causa eficiente de si mesmo (causa sui,)? É bem sabido que Descartes responde aflrmativamente a esta questão, mas é consideravelmente menos claro porquê. O principal conteúdo do ensaio é que Descartes apresenta a doutrina da causa sui porque pensou que a prova ontológica da Meditação V precisava dela. Demonstramos estas afirmações através de uma análise rigorosa da articulação inicial de Descartes da causa sui em resposta a Caterus, seguida de uma atenção à reformulação da doutrina em resposta às objecções logicas apresentadas por Arnauld. A nossa compreensão da causa sui como proposta feita no horizonte da prova ontológica não ilumina apenas porque é que Descartes teria defendido uma doutrina conceptualmente tão problemática como a causa sui, mas também providencia uma alternativa ao ponto de vista de Jean-Luc Marion de que a causa sui constitui a terceira, prova distintapara a existência de Deus. (shrink)