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Displaying: 1-9 of 9 documents


articles
1. American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly: Volume > 94 > Issue: 4
Gaston G. LeNotre Determinate and Indeterminate Dimensions: Does Thomas Aquinas Change His Mind on Individuation?
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The scholarly consensus is that Thomas Aquinas’s views about individuation changed over time. The consensus states that he wavered in his opinion about whether determinate dimensions or indeterminate dimensions serve in the individuation of corporeal substances. I argue that this consensus is mistaken. I focus on early texts of Thomas to argue that he relies on different types of dimensions to answer different problems of individuation. Determinate dimensions resolve a problem in the order of perfection, and indeterminate dimensions resolve a problem in the order of generation. I explain texts that answer the problem of individuation in the order of perfection according to questions about universals, cognition, and science. I then explain texts that answer the problem of individuation in the order of generation. My conclusion argues that, despite abandoning the language, Thomas continues later in his career to rely on indeterminate dimensions to resolve the problem of individuation in the order of generation.
2. American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly: Volume > 94 > Issue: 4
Bryan Frances The Epistemology of Theistic Philosophers’ Reactions to the Problem of Evil
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I first argue that, contrary to many atheistic philosophers, there is good reason to think the typical theistic philosopher’s retaining of her theism when faced with the Problem of Evil (PoE) is comparatively epistemically upstanding even if both atheism is true and the typical theistic philosopher has no serious criticism of the atheist’s premises in the PoE argument. However, I then argue that, contrary to many theistic philosophers, even if theism is true, the typical theistic philosopher has no good non-theistic reasons for rejecting any of the atheist’s premises, and she has good non-theistic reasons in favor of the atheist’s premises. In that respect, it’s extremely difficult for the theistic philosopher to respond to the PoE in an informative, non-question-begging way. I close by considering whether theistic philosophers should reject my second thesis.
3. American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly: Volume > 94 > Issue: 4
Matthew McWhorter Aquinas and the Moral Virtues of a Christian Person
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Aquinas teaches that the acquired moral virtues associated with the civil life are to be differentiated from the gratuitous moral virtues associated with the spiritual life. An interpretation of Aquinas will benefit from situating his various remarks on the moral virtues within the context of his teaching regarding how Christian persons develop in virtue over time. In this account, Aquinas makes a distinction between the moral virtues exercised in this life (in via) and in heaven (in patria), as well as between three stages of the Christian moral life in via (active, intermediate, and contemplative). I argue that Aquinas indicates that for Christian persons the acquired moral virtues are retained in the active life in via, but not in patria. Further, claims that Aquinas makes regarding the relationship between the contemplative moral virtues and the active moral virtues provide an analogy for understanding how infused charity might relate to the acquired moral virtues.
4. American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly: Volume > 94 > Issue: 4
Shane D. Courtland The Not-So-Prolife Leviathan
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In an article that appeared in American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly, Kody Cooper argued that “to be a Hobbesian is to be prolife.” In this essay, I will provide an argument that rebuts Cooper’s prolife interpretation of Hobbes. First, I will argue that Cooper has, without argument, committed an equivocation between a person’s personal identity and his or her organism. Resolving this ambiguity would allow for an interpretation of Hobbes that can consistently reject the notion that the life of a person “begins at conception.” Second, I will show that Cooper fails to take into account the significant costs that are placed upon prospective mothers and is therefore not able to judge whether or not aborting a fetus is within a mother’s enlightened self-interest. Third, I will, contrary to Cooper, show why it may be acceptable for a Hobbesian sovereign to construct a legal regime that is permissive of abortion.
5. American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly: Volume > 94 > Issue: 4
Brandon Dahm The Virtue of Somnience
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It’s strange that sleep doesn’t come up more when we think of virtue. In this paper, I argue that there is a virtue concerned with sleep, which I call “somnience,” and I develop an account of this virtue. My account of somnience builds on the virtue tradition of Aristotle and Aquinas and recent research about the nature of sleep. In the first section I argue that there is a need for such a virtue. Next, I argue that somnience is a form of temperance. Third, I show how somnience connects to a number of other virtues, which helps us fill out the nature of the virtue. Finally, I argue that sleep also relates to virtue by aiding virtue formation.
6. American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly: Volume > 94 > Issue: 4
Robert McNamara Edith Stein’s Conception of Human Unity and Bodily Formation: A Thomistically Informed Understanding
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The problem of human unity lies at the heart of Edith Stein’s investigation of the structure of human nature in her mature works. By examining her resolution of this problem in Der Aufbau der menschlichen Person and Endliches und ewiges Sein, I show how Stein incorporates two teachings of Thomistic anthropology—namely, the rational soul as principle both of substantial unity and of bodily formation—while reinterpreting the meaning of these teachings through performing a fresh phenomenological investigation. Although this investigation leads Stein to propose a conceptually different explanation of human unity and bodily formation than that given by Aquinas, I argue that this difference should not be understood as if Stein and Aquinas stand squarely opposed on these important anthropological questions, but rather that Stein’s proposal lies in decisive continuity with the received teachings of Aquinas even while it represents an expanded conception of these teachings that also includes some contrast and disagreement.
book reviews
7. American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly: Volume > 94 > Issue: 4
Andrew J. Jaeger In Defense of Extended Conciliar Christology: A Philosophical Essay. By Timothy Pawl
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8. American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly: Volume > 94 > Issue: 4
D. T. Sheffler Morality and Situation Ethics, by Dietrich von Hildebrand, and Graven Images, by Dietrich von Hildebrand
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9. American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly: Volume > 94 > Issue: 4
Contents of Volume 94 (2020)
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