This work is an attempt to elaborate an understanding of the nature and meaning of ontology, and on that basis, to construct it. The starting-point and clue for the construction of ontology is language, and language's power to express what is. The understanding of ontology which is secured in this essay is one which sees ontology as the linguistically conditioned account of what is and of the existence of what is, an account which becomes, coordinately and equally, onto-theology and onto-anthropology, (...) in which latter, the nature of person is adumbrated as transcendence towards Being as value and value as Being. (shrink)

"Translated with an uncanny sense for the overall point of Augustine's doctrine. In short, a very good translation. The Introduction is admirably clear." --Paul Vincent Spade, Indiana University.

Ecological developmental biology (eco‐devo) explores the mechanistic relationships between the processes of individual development and environmental factors. Recent studies imply that some of these relationships have deep evolutionary origins, and may even pre‐date the divergences of the simplest extant animals, including cnidarians and sponges. Development of these early diverging metazoans is often sensitive to environmental factors, and these interactions occur in the context of conserved signaling pathways and mechanisms of tissue homeostasis whose detailed molecular logic remain elusive. Efficient methods for (...) transgenesis in cnidarians together with the ease of experimental manipulation in cnidarians and sponges make them ideal models for understanding causal relationships between environmental factors and developmental mechanisms. Here, we identify major questions at the interface between animal evolution and development and outline a road map for research aimed at identifying the mechanisms that link environmental factors to developmental mechanisms in early diverging metazoans.Also watch the Video Abstract. (shrink)

This festschrift for Teddy Seidenfeld is a collection of newly commissioned essays on imprecise probability by leading experts in the field. Each contribution touches on Teddy’s seminal contributions to the field of imprecise probability, and gives an up-to-date state of the field that cannot be found elsewhere. The title, “a reflection on the foundations of probability and statistics”, calls back to Teddy’s seminal book, “Rethinking the Foundations of Probability and Statistics”, bookends to a career that has made fundamental contributions to (...) the foundations of probability and statistics, and shaped the field of imprecise probability. It is aimed at scholars engaged in probability and statistics. (shrink)

Volume XVII Part 1: Phenomenology, Idealism, and Intersubjectivity: A Festschrift in Celebration of Dermot Moran's Sixty-Fifth Birthday Part 2: The Imagination: Kant's Phenomenological Legacy Aim and Scope: The New Yearbook for Phenomenology and Phenomenological Philosophy provides an annual international forum for phenomenological research in the spirit of Husserl's groundbreaking work and the extension of this work by such figures as Scheler, Heidegger, Sartre, Levinas, Merleau-Ponty and Gadamer. Contributors: Andreea Smaranda Aldea, Lilian Alweiss, Timothy Burns, Steven Crowell, Maxime Doyon, Augustin (...) Dumont, Richard Kearney, Mette Lebech, Samantha Matherne, Timothy Mooney, Thomas Nenon, Matthew Ratcliffe, Alessandro Salice, Daniele De Santis, Andrea Staiti, Anthony J. Steinbock, Michela Summa, Thomas Szanto, Emiliano Trizio, and Nicolas de Warren. Submissions: Manuscripts, prepared for blind review, should be submitted to the Editors ([email protected] and [email protected]) electronically via e-mail attachments. (shrink)

Alexis de Tocqueville asserted that America had no truly great literature, and that American writers merely mimicked the British and European traditions of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. This new edited collection masterfully refutes Tocqueville's monocultural myopia and reveals the distinctive role American poetry and prose have played in reflecting and passing judgment upon the core values of American democracy. The essays, profiling the work of Mark Twain, F. Scott Fitzgerald, John Updike, Edith Wharton, Walt Whitman, Henry James, Willa Cather, (...) Walker Percy, and Tom Wolfe, reveal how America's greatest writers have acted as society's most ardent cheerleaders and its most penetrating critics. Christine Dunn Henderson's exciting new work offers literature as a portal through which to view the philosophical principles that animate America's political order and the mores which either reinforce or undermine them. (shrink)

This book is a collection of secondary essays on America's most important philosophic thinkers—statesmen, judges, writers, educators, and activists—from the colonial period to the present. Each essay is a comprehensive introduction to the thought of a noted American on the fundamental meaning of the American regime.

This rich and varied collection of essays addresses some of the most fundamental human questions through the lenses of philosophy, literature, religion, politics, and theology. Peter Augustine Lawler and Dale McConkey have fashioned an interdisciplinary consideration of such perennial and enduring issues as the relationship between nature and history, nature and grace, reason and revelation, classical philosophy and Christianity, modernity and postmodernity, repentance and self-limitation, and philosophy and politics.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Incomprehensible Certainty: Metaphysics and Hermeneutics of the Image by Thomas PfauThomas ZingelmannPFAU, Thomas. Incomprehensible Certainty: Metaphysics and Hermeneutics of the Image. Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 2022. xxiii + 785 pp. Cloth, $80.00Thomas Pfau reconstructs one of the most traditional and possibly most decisive philosophical debates, [End Page 559] namely, the one about the form and function of appearance (Schein). This debate is (...) taken up on the basis of the concept of image. This means that Pfau concentrates historically as well as systematically on a specific topic within this debate. The book is divided into two major sections.In the first section, Pfau examines how the history of the metaphysics and theology of the image develops, starting with Plato in the first chapter. The basic idea in this section is that the image has a crucial epistemic role in the metaphysical and theological systems of the authors addressed. Here Pfau shows that Plato, at the latest in the Sophist, develops a theory of images that revalues appearance contrary to the assumptions in the Republic. Chapter 1 is about the mediation of unity and multiplicity, as it is also shown in Plotinus. Chapter 2 attempts to show how the Byzantine icon embodies the conviction that the invisible truth of the visual world can be revealed only through images. Pfau's demonstration of various epistemic dimensions of the image then begins with chapter 3: the eschatological vision from Augustine to Bonaventure to Julian of Norwich. Chapter 4, the last of the first section, reconstructs Nicholas of Cusa's position, which attempts to understand mystical visions mediated by images of Christ.The second section examines how the metaphysics of the image—in the sense of an epistemology, which tries to establish ultimate justifications—nevertheless persists and even evolves despite two crucial switches in philosophy. On the one hand, this concerns philosophy that subordinates the visual to the abstract (for example, Hegel) and, on the other, the supposedly nonmetaphysical status of the image in the developing natural sciences. Chapter 5 then attempts to show, through Goethe's botanical investigations and reflections, how, despite the establishment of the natural sciences, Goethe attempts to defend intuition as a scientific method and appearance as a scientific object of investigation. This position is then pursued historically in chapter 6, through the work of Lyell, Darwin, and Ruskin, where the visible is understood as the connecting point of the sciences in general. Gerard Manley Hopkins is then identified in chapter 7 as representing a position that combines theological with proto-phenomenological arguments to highlight the epistemic value of images. The last chapter then deals with decisive developments at the beginning of the twentieth century. In phenomenology (Husserl), painting (Cézanne), and poetry (Rilke), a conception develops that epistemically valorizes sensual and intuitive experience.Generally speaking, Pfau attempts to trace historically what arguments and positions have been developed on the relationship between image and knowledge. His work is based on the conviction that the image is the basis for human orientation in the world and is therefore of great epistemological value. Of outstanding importance for his question is that the epistemological value of images is not to be located in the properties of images, that is, an ontology of the image; rather, Pfau is interested in those positions that reflect on the relationship between knowledge and [End Page 560] experience of images. While clarifying the ontological status of images remains important, the epistemological status of images—what role the experience and usage of images has for humans—is in the foreground. Pfau reconstructs positions that hold that the pictorial is a medium of knowledge. He puts forward the thesis that there is a tradition that is of the opinion that in and through the medium of the image—and this closes the arc to the Schein-debate—being can be experienced by man. In other words, the invisible is to become recognizable through the visible. Of particular importance is his reading of the late Platonic dialogues: While appearance and being are still thought of as distinct in these dialogues, they are not opposed, in the sense of an epistemic opposition. Plato's... (shrink)

I first became interested in De dialectica in 1966, while I was doing re search on Augustine's knowledge of logic. At the time I made a transla tion of the Maurist text and included it as an appendix to my doctoral dissertation (Yale, 1967). In 1971 I thoroughly revised the translation on the basis of the critical text of Wilhelm Crecelius (1857) and I have re cently revised it again to conform to Professor Jan Pinborg's new edition. The only previously (...) published translation of the whole of De dialectica. is N. H. Barreau's French translation in the Oeuvres completes de Saint Augustin (1873). Thomas Stanley translated parts of Chapters Six and Nine into English as part of the account of Stoic logic in his History of Philosophy (Pt. VIII, 1656). I offer De dialectica in English in the hope that it will be of some interest to historians of logic and of the liberal arts tradition and to students of the thought of Augustine. In translating I have for the most part been as literal as is consistent with English usage. Although inclusion of the Latin text might have justified a freer translation, for example, the use of modern technical terms, it seemed better to stay close to the Latin. One of the. values in studying a work such as De dialectica is to see familiar topics discussed in a terminology not so familiar. In the translation I follow these conventions. (shrink)

Michel Foucault's analysis of the constitution of the modern subject poses provocative philosophical and theological questions about the relationship between structures of power, practices of domination, and the subjects that they discipline. His problematization of the self proposes to illuminate Christianity's transmission, if not invention, of forms of self-knowledge and reflexive acts of truth that leave Christian subjects (understood in both senses of the term) open to the panoptical disciplines of the state, market, and other structures that dominate through normalization. (...) Even if one disagrees with his thesis that the teachings and practices of early Christianity are integral to the…. (shrink)

Review of Brian Dobell, Augustine's Intellectual Conversion.

I start with a story to convey what I think is the essence of the Platonic outlook that Augustine adopts. Then I’ll show you how various Platonists put the insights that this story encapsulates to work in three different aspects of philosophy. After I’ve laid all that out, I’ll talk about how Augustine transforms this Platonic picture in the light of his Christian faith..

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Virtue and Grace in the Theology of Thomas Aquinas by Justin M. AndersonThomas V. BergVirtue and Grace in the Theology of Thomas Aquinas by Justin M. Anderson (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020), xiii + 327 pp.To ignore Aquinas's theological backstory to his account of the virtues—namely, his account of grace in its relation to human action—is to distort his account of the virtues. This is the (...) very valid thesis explored by Justin Anderson in Virtue and Grace in the Theology of Thomas Aquinas. Anderson critiques the tendency among contemporary Anglophone virtue ethicists to quietly bracket his account of grace even as they admire his account the virtues. More pointedly, Anderson holds that Aquinas's account of virtue is inseparable from his account of sin, grace, "and God's presence in human life and action." He endeavors to evidence Aquinas's authentic account of virtue and its "inner reliance on the theological categories of grace, sin, and divine providence" (1).Anderson thus proposes a reading of Aquinas that is diachronic, analytical and systematic, and text-based, and which follows the logic inherent in Aquinas's own reasoning.And he delivers.After a brief overview of Aquinas's understanding of virtue in chapter 1, in chapter 2, Anderson explores the Thomistic distinction that will largely serve as a heuristic for most of the study: the distinction between virtue secundum quid (pagan virtue) and virtue simpliciter, virtue infused in us by God—virtue in the truest sense of the term.In chapter 3, Anderson traces the historical evolution in Aquinas's understanding of grace as this impacts his understanding of the conditions under which a person can possess or embody virtue. He bases this exploration in part on the work of both Henri Bouillard and Bernard Lonergan. First Anderson explores how that evolution came about in the context of the emergence of two powerful categories of thought: the Aristotelian concept of nature in the twelfth century and the category of the supernatural in the thirteenth. According to Bouillard, Aquinas's understanding of grace would [End Page 1421] have been further shaped by two sets of discoveries during his sojourn in Italy in the early 1260s, the first being two anti-Pelagian tracts of St. Augustine, and the second being the Liber de bona fortuna, a Latin compilation, possibly translated by William of Moerbeke, consisting of two chapters on good fortune, one taken from Aristotle's Magna Moralia, and the other from the Eudemian Ethics.Aquinas discovers in Augustine's anti-Pelagian works the contention that the beginning of faith is from God and not from the individual. As with the grace of final perseverance, both initiation and perdurance in faith are gratuitous gifts of God. In his encounter with the Liber (and particularly his consideration therein of the "problem of the first deliberation"), like other medievals, Aquinas "[was] presented Aristotelian investigations regarding the possibility of a divine movement, even unacknowledged by the agent, at the very roots of human action" (98). And, in Thomas's evolved understanding, this divine influence would constitute an inner movement within the human agent apart from those external circumstances ordained by providence.Anderson embraces the thesis that, in this context, and under these influences, Aquinas's understanding of grace underwent a "revolution," that a mature Aquinas—and this is the thesis of Lonergan—moves beyond a consideration of grace merely as habitus (gratia gratum faciens) to a notion of operative grace, of grace as a movement, utilizing "the unique idea of a 'moving grace', a movement of God in, and in some cases with, the human soul" (105).And—Anderson is emphatic—this revolution in thought quickly steers Aquinas clear of what centuries later will be termed semi-Pelagianism, and toward a firmly anti-Pelagian conception of the human capacity for virtue.Chapters 4–9 comprise the second and third parts of the book. It is here that Anderson masterfully and exhaustively engages in the heavy lifting of evincing just how, in fact, Aquinas's account of virtue is inseparable from his theology of grace. On the supposition that Aquinas's mature theology of grace understands the latter to... (shrink)

Every reader creates a personal version of what is read....This is often the very opposite of what might at first blush be expected: but on consideration it is exactly the way in which a writer of genius should — we perhaps suddenly realise — respond. It is, in short, creative rather than passively parallel, and a matter of unobtrusive decisive omissions followed by the flow of new matter, of demarcation rather than of imitation.

"This paper investigates musical relationships in the case of the early mother-infant dyadic interactions. To accomplish this task, it is first needed to come back to some important authors from the tradition of both phenomenology and psychoanalysis. The theories of Husserl, Schutz and Taipale will prove themselves to be useful. Secondly, I shall deepen the investigation of the early mother-infant interactions through the prism of theories coming from Winnicott, Stern and Thomas Fuchs. My main task will be to demonstrate (...) that these early interactions have a musical quality, similar to Colwyn Trevarthen’s thematization of communicative musicality. To prove my point, I have to first establish the features that make these early interactions be musical-like. Winnicott’s potential space and the example of babbling will follow my argumentation. I will also stress on the importance of the face-to-face interaction through affect attunement and mutual tuning-in. All these interactions are modes of being-with-another (Stern). An example will be found throughout this paper, namely a specific mode of being-with-another, which was called by Winnicott the primary maternal preoccupation. Keywords: musical relationships, babbling, potential space, face-to-face interaction, mutual tuning-in, affect attunement, primary maternal preoccupation, synchronization, rhythm, being-with. ". (shrink)

Augustine’s important work De uera religione has been frequently read for its Neoplatonic resonances. However, there is much in the work that cannot be reduced to this reading. Themes such as the importance of the common and public dimension of uera religio, the significance of history, and the function of ‘true religion’ toward the training and renewal of the whole human, are topoi that reveal the dynamic structure of the work. A consideration of these themes in uera rel. brings into (...) full relief Augustine’s answer to why God acted in time and through history for the whole human race and helps to explain Augustine’s complex articulation of Christianity in the work. (shrink)

The first complete introduction to the subject ever published, A History of Irish Thought presents an inclusive survey of Irish thought and the history of Irish ideas against the backdrop of current political and social change in Ireland. Clearly written and engaging, the survey introduces an array of philosophers, polemicists, ideologists, satirists, scientists, poets and political and social reformers, from the anonymous seventh-century monk, the Irish Augustine, and John Scottus Eriugena, to the twentieth century and W.B. Yeats and Iris Murdoch. (...) Thomas Duddy rediscovers the liveliest and most contested issues in the Irish past, and brings the history of Irish thought up to date. This volume will be of great value to anyone interested in Irish culture and its intellectual history. (shrink)

The first complete introduction to the subject ever published, _A History of Irish Thought_ presents an inclusive survey of Irish thought and the history of Irish ideas against the backdrop of current political and social change in Ireland. Clearly written and engaging, the survey introduces an array of philosophers, polemicists, ideologists, satirists, scientists, poets and political and social reformers, from the anonymous seventh-century monk, the Irish Augustine, and John Scottus Eriugena, to the twentieth century and W.B. Yeats and Iris Murdoch. (...) Thomas Duddy rediscovers the liveliest and most contested issues in the Irish past, and brings the history of Irish thought up to date. This volume will be of great value to anyone interested in Irish culture and its intellectual history. (shrink)

According to a long theological tradition that stretches back at least as far as St Augustine, God's justice and mercy are distinct, and in many ways quite different, character traits. In his great epic poem, Paradise Lost, for example, John Milton goes so far as to suggest a conflict, perhaps even a contradiction, in the very being of God; he thus describes Christ's offer of himself as an atonement this way.

Peter Sloterdijk turns his keen eye to the history of western thought, conducting colorful readings of the lives and ideas of the world's most influential intellectuals. Featuring nineteen vignettes rich in personal characterizations and theoretical analysis, Sloterdijk's companionable volume casts the development of philosophical thinking not as a buildup of compelling books and arguments but as a lifelong, intimate struggle with intellectual and spiritual movements, filled with as many pitfalls and derailments as transcendent breakthroughs. Sloterdijk delves into the work and (...) times of Aristotle, Augustine, Bruno, Descartes, Foucault, Fichte, Hegel, Husserl, Kant, Kierkegaard, Leibniz, Marx, Nietzsche, Pascal, Plato, Sartre, Schelling, Schopenhauer, and Wittgenstein. He provocatively juxtaposes Plato against shamanism and Marx against Gnosticism, revealing both the vital external influences shaping these intellectuals' thought and the excitement and wonder generated by the application of their thinking in the real world. The philosophical "temperament" as conceived by Sloterdijk represents the uniquely creative encounter between the mind and a diverse array of cultures. It marks these philosophers' singular achievements and the special dynamic at play in philosophy as a whole. Creston Davis's introduction details Sloterdijk's own temperament, surveying the celebrated thinker's intellectual context, rhetorical style, and philosophical persona. (shrink)

This article examines Augustine’s early anthropology, particularly through De Genesi aduersus Manichaeos. The most thorough treatment of this topic is found in the enduring work of Robert J. O’Connell, SJ. O’Connell argues that Augustine drew directly from the Enneads in De Genesi aduersus Manichaeos to formulate his anthropology. This article evaluates and critiques the evidence and implications of O’Connell’s position concerning Augustine’s articulation of the “fall of the soul.” I argue that an attentive text-based reading of De Genesi aduersus Manichaeos (...) reveals the shortcomings of O’Connell’s “Plotinian” rendering of Augustine’s anthropology. More importantly, I show that De Genesi aduersus Manichaeos illuminates dimensions of Augustine’s anthropology often overlooked. These include the human’s transformation to spiritalis through Christ and the eschatological configuration of the caeleste corpus. In contrast to O’Connell’s theory, which emphasizes the necessary “circularity” of Augustine’s anthropological framework (that is, the soul “returns” to a condition identical to the aboriginal state), I argue that in De Genesi aduersus Manichaeos Augustine advances an anthropology that is not merely “circular.”. (shrink)

Originally published in 1967 Medieval Minds looks at the Middle Ages as a period with changing attitudes towards mental health and its treatment. The book argues that it was a period that that bridged the ancient with the modern, ignorance with knowledge and superstition with science. The Middle Ages spanned almost a millennium in the history of the humanities and provided the people of this period with the benefit of this knowledge. The book looks at the promise and progress which (...) was reflected by thinkers such as Augustin and Aurelianus, Alexander of Tralles and Paul of Aegina. The book also looks at martyrs like Valentine and Dympna, and the patrons of those afflicted with illnesses such as epilepsy and insanity. Written by the psychologist Thomas Francis Graham, this book provides a distinct and unique insight into the mind of those living in the medieval period and will be of interest to academics of history and literature alike. (shrink)

The central positoin of St. Thomas Aquinas in the pantheon of Catholic thinkers along with St. Augustine of Hippo more than justifies ongoing attention to his thought and contributions to philosophy, theology, and medieval culture. This volume is an anthology of the passages of his Summa Theologia on human nature or the "human constitution.".

What is the will? And what is its relation to human action? Throughout history, philosophers have been fascinated by the idea of 'the will': the source of the drive that motivates human beings to act. However, there has never been a clear consensus as to what the will is and how it relates to human action. Some philosophers have taken the will to be based firmly in reason and rational choice, and some have seen it as purely self-determined. Others have (...) replaced the idea of the human will with a more general drive uniting humans and the rest of nature, living and non-living. This collection of nine specially commissioned papers trace the formulation and treatment of the problem of the will from ancient philosophy through the scholastic theologians of the Middle Ages, to modern philosophy, and right up to contemporary theories. Philosophers discussed include Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Aquinas, Bonaventure, Hobbes, Kant, Schopenhauer and Nietzsche. (shrink)

En explorant plus avant le projet des ouvrages théologiques précédents, Au lieu de soi ne distingue pas simplement la pensée de la création de l’onto-théologie mais la sépare aussi de son dépassement heideggérien, qui demeure pour Marion aussi idolâtrique que la métaphysique elle-même. L’ouvrage se concentre ici autour de l’interprétation de l’adonné comme créature par excellence, ou créature iconique – dont le privilège tient à sa temporalité et à sa mutabilité. Indispensable à l’interprétation de saint Augustin comme penseur non (...) métaphysique, l’analyse de la temporalité de l’homme iconique, en démontrant la manière dont la pensée de la création reste hors de l’ontothéologie et de la causa et de l’ego, suggère en même temps que saint Augustin n’affirme le devenir de l’homme qu’en lui enlevant toute innocence et, corrélativement, ne trouve pas de bonheur véritable dans l’amour du mortel comme tel. (shrink)

When we love a place: world's end with Cormac McCarthy -- Mourning places and time in Augustine -- The conversion of time to the time of conversion: Augustine with Marion -- The time of his syllables: dying together with Derrida and Augustine -- Thinking love and mortality with Heidegger -- World loss or heart failure: pedagogies of estrangement in Harrison and Nancy -- Ages of learning . . . the secular today with Emerson and Nietzsche.

This chapter contains sections titled: The Traditional Notion of Providence Problems with the Tradition Reactions to these Problems Applications to Predestination Evaluating the Four Pictures Works cited.