Lam, Joseph The reception of Augustine's theology and thoughts in Thomas Aquinas's works has never been a point of serious disagreement among scholars. What divides scholars is rather the question of how to assess the weight of Aristotelian influence and Thomas's Augustinian heritage. According to Gilson, the answer is evident in itself. While acknowledging in the works of the Dominican friar a close familiarity with Augustine's theology, the French philosopher nevertheless argued for a distinct Aristotelian colour in Thomas's philosophical (...) approach to the question of natural truths. To the question of how human reasoning arrives at the truth, Gilson wrote: 'What is it to know truth? It is intellectually to grasp the essences of things such as they are and to associate them in our minds, by means of judgements, in the same way they are associated in reality'. Knowledge, therefore, is not the result of a subjective mind, but rather an outcome of a conscious judgement that concords with the objective intellection of the given objects. In this Gilson observed a basic difference between Augustine and Thomas: Both St. Thomas's philosophy and St. Augustine's philosophy are philosophies of the concrete, but their attitude toward the concrete is not the same. St. Augustine always seeks notions comprehensive enough to embrace the concrete in its complexity. Thomas always seeks notions precise enough to define the elements that constitute the concrete. In a word, the former expresses the concrete, the latter analyses it. (shrink)

Lam, Joseph Peter Fitzsimons is a competent journalist who does not shy away from expressing his personal opinion on controversial social and ethical issues. In a Sydney Morning Herald online comment published on 11 December 2016, he not only praised the courage of the premier of Victoria, Daniel Andrews, but also appealed to members of the New South Wales parliament to follow Andrews' lead to legalise euthanasia. Anticipating the eventual collapse of his own health in the future, Fitzsimons insisted (...) that lawmakers should respect his autonomy and his choice of a peaceful and dignified death. As far as I can see, however, respect for a person's autonomy is not the main problem here. Rather, the key difficulty rests with Fitzsimons's reasoning. He argued: Let's say that at the age of 80 or so, I decide that my meaningful life is over, and all that awaits me is-I know, I know, too much detail- incontinent pain for the next five years. And let's say that I don't want that, and would rather pass away peacefully, and with dignity, in a medically supervised manner. My question to the opponents of euthanasia: if I choose to do that, what business is it of yours? (shrink)

Lam, Joseph In an audience for journalists shortly after his election in 2013 Pope Francis revealed not only the reason for his choice of name, but also his vision of the church: 'Francis of Assisi. For me he is the man of poverty, the man of peace, the man who loves and safeguards creation... He is the man who gives us this spirit of peace, the poor man... Oh, how I wish for a Church that is poor and for (...) the poor!' The Pontiff in his 2014 Lenten message re-emphasised the church's commitment to the poor. The responsibility of the church is 'to bear witness to all those who live in material, moral and spiritual destitution the Gospel message of the merciful love of God our Father, who is ready to embrace everyone in Christ. We can do this to the extent that we imitate Christ who became poor and enriched us by his poverty'. Pope Francis' concern for the poor is again reechoed in his latest encyclical, Laudato Si, in which he re-emphasises the church's commitment to the poor by calling Catholics especially to be stewards God's creation. A poor church for the poor, as Pope Francis envisages, has its foundation in the poverty of Jesus Christ: 'For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich'. (shrink)

Lam, Joseph On 11 April 2015 Pope Francis called for a special of Year of Mercy, which subsequently was symbolically inaugurated with the opening of the Holy Doors of the Basilicas of St Peter and of St John in Rome on 8 December. According to the Argentinian Pontiff, upon whose episcopal ministry is placed the maxim miserendo atque eligendo, mercy is the key element leading to the rediscovery of the spiritual joy that appears to have faded away in the (...) life of the church. To counter this pessimism, Francis reminds his flock of the affectionate and tenderhearted look of God, whose merciful and loving gaze enriches and liberates the life of every Christian: 'Thanks solely to this encounter or renewed encounter with God's love, which blossoms into an enriching friendship, we are liberated from our narrowness and self-absorption'. Yet, Francis in his major teaching documents seems to caution against the concept of happiness, even though his description of the effects produced by the mercy and joy of the Gospel leads to human growth, within which human happiness is understood as a right. He has called for an integral development that includes society's most neglected members,6 and that respects and includes all forms of existence. Nonetheless, it is not a soft choice, as if mercy opens the door to all forms of pleasure as long as they make people happy. (shrink)

Lam, Joseph The resignation of Pope Benedict XVI caught the world by surprise, in spite the fact that he had earlier indicated this possibility. In a series of interviews that were published in 2011 as a book by the German journalist Peter Seewald, Benedict clearly stated: If a pope clearly realizes that he is no longer physically, psychologically and spiritually capable of handling the duties of his office, then he has a right and, under some circumstances, also an obligation (...) to resign. (shrink)

Lam, Joseph The election of Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio on the evening of 13 March 2013 stunned as many Vatican observers as had the resignation from the Chair of St Peter announced by Pope Benedict XVI during the ordinary consistory of cardinals at the Vatican on 11 February that year. While the Vaticanisti expected a younger pope, the seventy-six year old Archbishop of Buenos Aires emerged from the conclave as the 266th pope and successor of the ageing German pope. However, (...) the real surprise was Bergoglio's choice of name, which also signalled a new direction for the church's government and pastoral focus. In calling himself Francis, he evoked the way of simplicity that derives from the Gospel. While Benedict's teaching draws much from the Augustinian well, Francis, however, is more attached to Franciscan spirituality and practice. A look at Francis's first apostolic exhortation, 'The Joy of the Gospel', where he quotes Augustine only twice may cement this view. Nevertheless, in spite of these minimal references, Francis holds the Bishop of Hippo in high regard. This is very evident in his homily at the beginning of the last Augustinian general chapter held in Rome, on 28 August 2013. Reflecting on Augustine's restless heart, Francis pointed to two elements of the Augustinian heart. On the one hand, Augustine's restlessness was a craving for God's tender and forgiving love that can only be found in the encounter with Jesus Christ. On the other hand, the love Augustine found stirred in him a new unrest urging him to proclaim the Gospel of loving kindness with courage and without fear. It is not an exaggeration that Augustine was also the bearer of the honorary title, doctor caritatis. In this joyful unrest Augustine was spiritually close to St Francis, who became the disciple of God's humble love for the poor. As for Augustine, who to my knowledge was the first Latin author who designated God as humble, St Francis's love for creation is grounded in God's humility. The central theme of Pope Francis's apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium is the proclamation of God's tender love, a love that constantly renews the lives of the faithful. Therein, Francis takes up the perennial divine quality. Yet, Francis would not be himself if he had not supplemented it with his own emphasis. (shrink)

Being questioned about the nature of Christian faith, Mark Twain famously declared it as 'believing what you know ain't so'. Indeed, the role of reason for faith is a matter of dispute. Jesus, some argue, was not a philosopher or a teacher of wisdom. Rather, he is the saviour because of his unassuming sacrificial death and resurrection. Not reason, but the leap of faith is the ultimate condition of salvation. The Enlightenment however epitomises a Copernican revolution in favour of reason. (...) According to Charles Taylor, the dissemination of Jesus' message into Hellenistic culture contains within itself the risk of a secularisation of the faith. At the same time, voices opposing the overemphasis of reason have also been raised throughout the ages. Paul's speech to the Athenians was one such occasion that deals with the ambiguous relationship between faith and reason. Relying purely on divine grace and the Bible alone, Martin Luther rejected any form of speculative theology. According to the Reformer, it is a type of theology that trusts more in human reason than in God's revelation. In Luther's opinion, it also reverses the moral order because theological speculation justifies evil as good while professing as good what is evil. To such a theology of human glory, Luther prefers a theology of the cross that 'calls the thing what it actually is'. For the former Augustinian monk only God's grace is good beyond reasonable doubt. Hence true theologians are lovers of the cross while theologians of glory misuse their reason for the worst. Luther's theology of the cross, Marco Barone claims, has its root in Augustine. Hence, Luther's Augustinism appears to have decidedly broken with Aristotelian scholasticism. In this context, Thomas Aquinas was criticised for his threefold failure. First, the Dominican friar's speculative theology lacks an experiential human dimension. Secondly, it gives too much credit to Aristotle. Thirdly, Thomas is reprimanded for his serious deficiency of a theology of justification. (shrink)

Since Pope John Paul II's visit to Australia, in 1986, the face of the Australian Catholic Church has changed dramatically. The once celebrated 'comfortableness at calling themselves Catholics', has given way to shame and calamity caused by hundreds of moral and sexual misconduct cases. The Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse not only challenges the church's governance. It also questions certain practical aspects of ecclesiology, for example, the priestly celibacy or the seal of confession that might (...) have contributed to and even aggravated the abuse of minors. (shrink)

Puzzling Out the Past: Studies in Northwest Semitic Languages and Literatures in Honor of Bruce Zuckerman. Edited by Marilyn J. Lundberg; Steven Fine; and Wayne T. Pitard. Culture and History of the Ancient Near East, vol. 55. Leiden: BRill, 2012. Pp. xvi + 334, illus. $245.

Patterns of Sin in the Hebrew Bible: Metaphor, Culture, and the Making of a Religious Concept. By Joseph Lam. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016. Pp. xix + 308. $74.

Theories of quantum gravity generically presuppose or predict that the reality underlying relativistic spacetimes they are describing is significantly non-spatiotemporal. On pain of empirical incoherence, approaches to quantum gravity must establish how relativistic spacetime emerges from their non-spatiotemporal structures. We argue that in order to secure this emergence, it is sufficient to establish that only those features of relativistic spacetimes functionally relevant in producing empirical evidence must be recovered. In order to complete this task, an account must be given of (...) how the more fundamental structures instantiate these functional roles. We illustrate the general idea in the context of causal set theory and loop quantum gravity, two prominent approaches to quantum gravity. (shrink)

It’s intuitive to think that an intentional action requires that the agent knows that she’s doing so. In light of some apparent counterexamples, Setiya suggests that this intuitive insight is better captured in terms of credence: performing an intentional action requires the agent to have a higher credence that she’s doing so than she would have otherwise. I argue that there is no such thing as an agent’s credence for what she’s doing. After distinguishing this thesis from an idea some (...) defend under the slogan “deliberation crowds out prediction”, I explore the thesis’s broader epistemological implications for the belief-credence relation. (shrink)

In this chapter, the author's solution was narrative storytelling, featuring the voices of people experiencing a conflict in the world, a conflict that opened up a philosophical question. He begins with a hook story, like that of CH and his shopping for a good quality stereo system, one that requires him to make use of an obscure and counterintuitive piece of practical reasoning. The story of Dr. Shukor and the Fatwa Council presents the central conflict posed by the problem of (...) vagueness in real‐life decisions. Decisions about the meaning of central words in scripture would affect generations of Muslim astronauts in the future. The design of a piece of academic writing is to make a case for a claim using evidence and argument against an epistemically adversarial reader. One of the essential features of good narrative storytelling is change in fortune over time. (shrink)

Mengzi states that our human nature consists of our ability to feel compassion, disdain, respect, and (dis-)approval: all human beings have them. But he also states that we lose these four emotional capacities if we don’t reflect on or attend to them. There is an apparent contradiction in saying that all humans have them, but some have lost them. This essay offers a close reading of Mengzi’s phrase “to lose it” that helps explain away this appearance of contradiction. In doing (...) so, Mengzi is interpreted to be offering an ethics of attention about how we should attend to ourselves and others selectively to have a functional social life. (shrink)

An increasing number of regulations propose the notion of ‘AI audits’ as an enforcement mechanism for achieving transparency and accountability for artificial intelligence (AI) systems. Despite some converging norms around various forms of AI auditing, auditing for the purpose of compliance and assurance currently have little to no agreed upon practices, procedures, taxonomies, and standards. We propose the ‘criterion audit’ as an operationalizable compliance and assurance external audit framework. We model elements of this approach after financial auditing practices, and argue (...) that AI audits should similarly provide assurance to their stakeholders about AI organizations’ ability to govern their algorithms in ways that mitigate harms and uphold human values. We discuss the necessary conditions for the criterion audit, and provide a procedural blueprint for performing an audit engagement in practice. We illustrate how this framework can be adapted to current regulations by deriving the criteria on which ‘bias audits’ for hiring algorithms can be performed, as required by the recently effective New York City Local Law 144 of 2021. We conclude by offering critical discussion on the benefits, inherent limitations, and implementation challenges of applying practices of the more mature financial auditing industry to AI auditing where robust guardrails against quality assurance issues are only starting to emerge. Our discussion as informed by experiences in performing these audits in practice highlights the critical role that an audit ecosystem plays in ensuring the effectiveness of such methodology. (shrink)

Behavioral scientists routinely publish broad claims about human psychology and behavior in the world's top journals based on samples drawn entirely from Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic (WEIRD) societies. Researchers – often implicitly – assume that either there is little variation across human populations, or that these “standard subjects” are as representative of the species as any other population. Are these assumptions justified? Here, our review of the comparative database from across the behavioral sciences suggests both that there is (...) substantial variability in experimental results across populations and that WEIRD subjects are particularly unusual compared with the rest of the species – frequent outliers. The domains reviewed include visual perception, fairness, cooperation, spatial reasoning, categorization and inferential induction, moral reasoning, reasoning styles, self-concepts and related motivations, and the heritability of IQ. The findings suggest that members of WEIRD societies, including young children, are among the least representative populations one could find for generalizing about humans. Many of these findings involve domains that are associated with fundamental aspects of psychology, motivation, and behavior – hence, there are no obviousa priorigrounds for claiming that a particular behavioral phenomenon is universal based on sampling from a single subpopulation. Overall, these empirical patterns suggests that we need to be less cavalier in addressing questions ofhumannature on the basis of data drawn from this particularly thin, and rather unusual, slice of humanity. We close by proposing ways to structurally re-organize the behavioral sciences to best tackle these challenges. (shrink)

1. cilt. İnsan, evren, zaman -- 2. cilt. Yaradılış.

An agent’s knowledge of her own intentional actions (agential knowledge) is non-observational. Yet, intentional actions typically consist of happenings external to the agents. A theory is needed to explain how agents are warranted to form such beliefs independent of observation. This paper first argues for three desirable features of an ideal theory about agential knowledge. After showing that no existing theories possess all three, a novel theory that does is presented. According to this theory, agential knowledge is the same kind (...) of knowledge as the Kripkean contingent a priori: they are knowledge justified a priori by stipulation. (shrink)

The paper argues that there are structures rather than objects with an intrinsic identity in the domain of fundamental physics. We line out the standard metaphysics of objects with an intrinsic identity, recall the main objection against that position (section 1) and then retrace the development to epistemic structural realism (section 2) and to ontic structural realism (section 3). We elaborate on the arguments for ontic structural realism from quantum physics (section 4) and from space-time physics (section 5). Finally, we (...) claim that the main objection against the standard metaphysics of objects with an intrinsic identity is countered by structural realism only if the fundamental physical structures are conceived as causal structures (section 6). (shrink)

"First published by Oxford University Press, 1916."--Title page verso.

Does all conscious experience essentially involve self-consciousness? In his Subjectivity and Selfhood: Investigating the First-Person, Dan Zahavi answers “yes”. I criticize three core arguments offered in support of this answer—a well-known regress argument, what I call the “interview argument,” and a phenomenological argument. Drawing on Sartre, I introduce a phenomenological contrast between plain experience and self-conscious experience. The contrast challenges the thesis that conscious experience entails self-consciousness.

Since the very beginning, Confucianism has been troubled by a serious gap between its political ideals and the reality of societal circumstances. Contemporary Confucians must develop a viable method of governance that can retain the spirit of the Confucian ideal while tackling problems arising from nonideal modern situations. The best way to meet this challenge, Joseph Chan argues, is to adopt liberal democratic institutions that are shaped by the Confucian conception of the good rather than the liberal conception of (...) the right.Confucian Perfectionism examines and reconstructs both Confucian political thought and liberal democratic institutions, blending them to form a new Confucian political philosophy. Chan decouples liberal democratic institutions from their popular liberal philosophical foundations in fundamental moral rights, such as popular sovereignty, political equality, and individual sovereignty. Instead, he grounds them on Confucian principles and redefines their roles and functions, thus mixing Confucianism with liberal democratic institutions in a way that strengthens both. Then he explores the implications of this new yet traditional political philosophy for fundamental issues in modern politics, including authority, democracy, human rights, civil liberties, and social justice.Confucian Perfectionism critically reconfigures the Confucian political philosophy of the classical period for the contemporary era. (shrink)

Joseph J. Fins calls for a reconsideration of severe brain injury treatment, including discussion of public policy and physician advocacy.

This book explores and elaborates three theories of public reason, drawn from Rawlsian political liberalism, natural law theory, and Confucianism. Drawing together academics from these separate approaches, the volume explores how the three theories critique each other, as well as how each one brings its theoretical arsenal to bear on the urgent contemporary debate of medical assistance in dying. The volume is structured in two parts: an exploration of the three traditions, followed by an in-depth overview of the conceptual and (...) historical background. In Part I, the three comprehensive opening chapters are supplemented by six dynamic chapters in dialogue with each other, each author responding to the other two traditions, and subsequently reflecting on the possible deficiencies of their own theories. The chapters in Part II cover a broad range of subjects, from an overview of the history of bioethics to the nature of autonomy and its status as a moral and political value. In its entirety, the volume provides a vibrant and exemplary collaborative resource to scholars interested in the role of public reason and its relevance in bioethical debate. (shrink)

On conduct of life and ethics of Islamic seminarians.