The author of the paper critically analyzes a quasi-theory of future contingents (PFC) given by Marcin Tkaczyk and proposes his own explication of its theses and terms. The author makes it by introducing operational definitions of temporal and modal concepts, distinguishing between the causal and functional determination, discussing the status of the principle of bivalence, and replacing Tkaczyk’s theses by their new formulations. As a result, the author states, among other things, that (contrary to Tkaczyk) there is no contradiction between the thesis about the opened future and the thesis about divine omniscience, because it requires the causal (but not functional as it is a case) determination between a true proposition and its determined fact. The author also shows that Tkaczyk’s examples of the retroactive causes are not an accurate solution of the antinomy because they are, at most, the examples of the factors which change the picture of the past but not the past itself.

The paper is a comment on the formalization of the antinomy of futura contigentia in the form of a (inconsistent) theory formulated by Marcin Tkaczyk in the language of classical predicate calculus. I argue that some features of the formalization in question are controversial from the viewpoint of formal semantics and ontology, and suggest two ways of removing some of those controversies.

This paper discusses the main lines of medieval Latin approaches to future contingents with some remarks on Marcin Tkaczyk’s paper “The antinomy of future contingent events.” Tkaczyk’s theory shows some similarity with the general frame of the views of Ockham and Scotus, the difference being that while medieval authors argued for the temporal necessity of the past, Tkaczyk is sceptical of the general validity of this necessity. Ockham’s theological view was that God eternally has an intuitive and immutable knowledge of all possibilities as well as whether they are ever actualized or not (PANACCIO & PICHÉ 2010). The content of God’s past knowledge attitude remains contingent before the free choice takes place because God’s knowledge could be different similarly as the truth-value of the proposition. While Ockham held that no past or present thing follows from future things as an effect follows from its cause, this causal link is defended by Tkaczyk. Later thinkers thought that the doctrine of the scientia media sheds light on this question; perhaps it is easier to understand than the retroactive model which is not contradictory but difficult to imagine, as Tkaczyk concludes his paper.

In the first part of this article, we point out and discuss these the contained in Marcin Tkaczyk’s book, Futura Contingentia, with which we agree completely or at least partially. In the second part of the paper, we seek to consider whether the solution of the futura contingentia problem, rooted in the basic intuitions of William of Ockham, is the only one possible and available for us. We argue that there is another possible approach to the problem of how to reconcile divine omniscience with contingent events rather than the Ockhamist solution. The alternative view, which we suggest, is “eternalism”, meaning that God is timeless, and that temporal necessity is compatible with contingent events and free decisions.

In this brief reply I discuss Fr. Marcin Tkaczyk’s excellent article, “The Antinomy of Future Contingent Events.” I first raise some concerns about his understanding of representation. I then raise three concerns about his preferred solution to the antinomy: first, that a part of his theory of representation itself motivates a rejection of proposition 1 of the antinomy; second, that one needn’t employ retroactive causal connections to weaken 1 as he does; and third, that it is difficult to make sense of the sort of backward efficient causation that Tkaczyk requires for his solution to work.

This essay examines Marcin Tkaczyk’s “The antinomy of future contingent events,” with an eye towards clarifying the roles played by philosophical notions of propositions, events, the present, the relativity of time, and Tkaczyk’s notion of a “sphere of culture.” The essay concludes by examining what support might be offered for Tkaczyk’s claim that people can to some degree change the past.

This paper is inspired by Marcin Tkaczyk’s works and discusses the problem of the necessity of the past (is the past determined?) and its role in the analysis of future contingents. The discussion centers on the statements (accepted by Tkaczyk, but slightly paraphrased)) firstly, that every past state of affairs is determined, and, secondly, that at least some some future states of affairs are contingent. The paper argues that because the first assertion is not justified, the antinomy of future contingents does not arise. The argument uses modal and metalogical devices.

In the current paper, I enter into debate with Marcin Tkaczyk and the chosen Anglo-Saxon analytic philosophers of religion to discuss the theological version of the problem of future contingents. I take into consideration some varieties of Ockhamism (retroactivism)—the position denying the temporal necessity (non-determination) of all past events and allowing some form of retroactivity. Strong Ockhamism postulates real retroactive causation, moderate Ockhamism limits it to the meanings of physical and psychical events, and weak Ockhamism replaces the notion of retroactive causation with that of retroactive dependence. I compare different forms of retroactivism with eternalism (of Boethius, St. Anselm of Canterbury, and St. Thomas Aquinas) to show that the latter has significant advantage. At the same time, I point out that eternalism in its presentist and relativist version (proposed by Brian Leftow) avoids the objections put forward against it, and that, within such eternalism, the problem of future contingents does not arise.

In this paper I account for some of the topics raised by the Authors of the papers included in the debate I focus mainly on the following topics: the concept of representation and reliability of my formal analysis of the future contingent antinomy, the concept of causation with an emphasis put on backword causation, the idea of timeless eternity and the position of religious beliefs in philosophical theories. Furthermore I shortly address topics of Ockhamism, Molinism, soft and hard facts, fragmentism and the concept of necessity.

The aim of the paper is to demonstrate that Gilbert Keith Chesterton possessed the genuine intuition of being as defined by the French Thomist, Jacques Maritain, albeit almost without the proper metaphysical habitus. It opens with some explanations of the terms used, and with a short extrapolation of the theory of the intuition of being. Next it proceeds to proving the thesis assumed by the means of demonstrating that Chesterton exhibited the intuition of being as to three most important elements: its proper object (with the principle of identity included), the principle of sufficient reason and the principle of finality. Next it attempts to demonstrate that despite that understanding, he never spoke in a properly metaphysical manner, the fact that points to the lack of metaphysical habitus, and to establish certain consequences of this state of things. The text ends with a list of practical conclusions that could be drawn from an analysis such as this.

The article seeks to show that E.A. Milne’s philosophy of science has its roots in the philosophy of Aristotle and it could be an inspiration for Popper’s philosophy. The similarities with Aristotle’s concept are as follows: 1) the aim of science is to explain phenomena by discovering general principles; 2) the mind is responsible for discovering them, although experience guides the search; 3) deducing detailed statements from general assumptions is the most important element of research. On the other hand, Milne’s proposal is consistent with Popper’s main ideas: 1) criticism of the principle of induction; 2) preference for the hypothetical-deductive method (assumptions should be bold hypotheses that require empirical testing to be accepted); 3) appreciation of falsification and confidence in the effectiveness of deductive logic.

This paper is not going to offer any criticism of the way Gaven Kerr treats Aquinas’ argument. Instead, it offers an alternative way of reconstructing Aquinas’ argument, intending to strengthen especially those controversial aspects of it that Kerr’s reconstruction left untreated or in relative obscurity. Accordingly, although the paper’s treatment will have to have some overlaps with Kerr’s (such as the critique of Kenny’s critique of Aquinas), it will deal with issues essential to adequate replies to certain competent criticisms of his argument untreated by Kerr (such as Buridan’s critique). For the sake of the “formally inclined” reader, the paper’s treatment will also include an Appendix offering a formal reconstruction of both the main argument and its subarguments to demonstrate the formal rigor of Aquinas’ original.

In this article, the author notes that Thomas Aquinas, in his brief work entitled De Ente et Essentia, proved that at the base of understanding the world, the human being, and God in particular, there is our understanding of being and its essence. When we make a small mistake at the beginning (parvus error in principio) in our understanding of being and its essence, it will turn to be a big one in the end (magnus in fine). And what is “at the end” of our knowledge is the discovery of the First and Ultimate Cause of all things, known as: Ipsum Esse, God, the Absolute, The Most Perfect Substance, on whom everything depends, and who depends not on anything else. These present inquiries about the proper understanding of being and its essence are aimed at formulating proof of the necessity of existence of a Being that is the First Cause, and which, existing as Ipsum Esse, is the source and reason of existence of all beings. Without these inquiries, the proof itself would be incomprehensible, and more importantly it would be a purely a priori one (i.e., ontological). Furthermore, without the existential conception of being, which Thomas first formulated, one could not discover the First Cause which, as Ipsum Esse, is the source of the existence of every being. This issue seems to have escaped the attention of the author of the book Aquinas’s Way to God. The Proof in “De Ente et Essentia.”

In this paper, I present main theses of Aquinas Way to God: The Proof in the De Ente et Essentia by Gaven Kerr. The book in question is a contemporary interpretation and defence of Thomas Aquinas’s argument for the existence of God, based on the real distinction between the essence of the thing and its act of being. I stress the fact that Kerr underlines the metaphysical character of Thomas’s argument and the role of participation in Aquinas’s understanding of the act of being. In the last part of the article, I discuss Kerr’s interpretation of Aquinas’s argument for the real distinction between essence and an act of being, as well as Kerr’s own argument. These arguments are of particular importance since they provide metaphysical presuppositions for the argument for God’s existence considered in Kerr’s book. As for the first argument, I argue that the first part of Aquinas’s argumentation (the so-called Intellectus Essentiae Argument) pertains to the real order rather than conceptual. Concerning the second argument, I attempt to highlight the difficulties of Kerr’s understanding of Thomist esse as a principle of the existence of a thing.

My article critically evaluates five key claims in Kerr’s interpretation of Aquinas’s De Ente et Essentia, ch. 4, proof for God. The claims are: (1) the absolutely considered essence is a second intention, or cognitional being; (2) à la John Wippel, the real distinction between essence and existence is known before the proof; (3) contra David Twetten, Aristotelian form is not self-actuating and so requires actus essendi; (4) the De Ente proof for God uses the Principle of Sufficient Reason; (5) an infinite regress must be eliminated before concluding to God. This author wonders if these questionable claims are traceable to the mindset of analytic philosophy which values precision and discreteness and so can fail to appreciate crucial paradoxes in Aquinas’s metaphysics.

In this paper, I discuss, as carried out by Gaven Kerr, a reconstruction of Aquinas’s argument for the existence of God from his work De Ente et Essentia. My analysis leads to complementing Kerr’s proposal with the following elements: (i) a summarization of the presented argument in a more formal manner; (ii) a specification of the main presuppositions of the Thomistic conception of existence; (iii) a drawing of attention to the fact that the essence–esse composition is a borderline case of the array of potency–act compositions; (iv) a distinguishing of the empirical (connected with the problem of the regress) and speculative (deprived of such a problem) interpretations or versions of Aquinas’s argument; (v) a clarification of what is the Divine exception from the essence–esse composition; (vi) a distinguishing of the three models of participation and a defence of the moderate model. I regard the following two issues to be of key importance for the argument under discussion: the relation between the Aristotelian compositional model and the Platonic model of participation as well as the defence of the Thomistic conception of the essence–esse composition.

In this paper, I examine the debate about existence between deflationist analytic accounts and the ‘thicker’ conception used by Aquinas when speaking of esse. I argue that the way one evaluates the debate will depend on background philosophical assumptions and that reflection on those assumptions could constitute an account of theoretical wisdom.

Aquinas’ so-called “Intellectus essentiae Argument” for the distinction between being and essence is notoriously suspect, including among defenders of Aquinas’ distinction. For the paper in this volume, I take as my starting point the recent defense of the argument by Fr. Lawrence Dewan, O.P. Fr. Dewan’s project is unsuccessful. Pointing out some shortcomings in his readings allows me to take up his call to highlight the “formal” or “quidditative side” of Aquinas’ metaphysics, in this case in regards to the proofs of the “real distinction.” Accordingly, the second half of this paper sets forth a way in which the famous “Intellectus essentiae Argument” of De Ente et Essentia 4 can succeed as a proof of the real distinction. Aquinas’ argument presupposes the prior real distinction between essence and supposit or individual substance. Esse is the ontological component that makes true our judgments that substances actually are: Obama exists. By contrast, this “truth-maker” cannot be predicated of humanity, although it is in Obama as really distinct from him. If Aquinas’ reasoning in this most contentious of his proofs can be saved, so, perhaps, can most of his other proofs.

One of the most important theses of Existential Thomism is that contingent things are composed of essence and existence. The thesis is immediately supplemented by a proviso that these components are not parts in the regular sense of the word. Essence and existence are not extended pieces of the thing which can be detached from it. They are inseparable aspects of the thing wherein inseparability is understood as a sort of dependence. In my paper I analyze the thesis of the inseparability of existence. For me this is untenable. I argue that this inseparability blocks up the essential function ascribed by Thomists to existence: the function of making the thing real. Thus to save this function we are forced to export existence to outside the thing. It contradicts our deep belief that existence is the most intimate aspect of the thing. Therefore the Thomistic analysis of existence seems to be invalid.

Author endorses the study by Gaven Kerr, O.P., for the way it shows the centrality of Aquinas’ metaphysics of creation: showcasing the ‘real distinction’ between esse and essentia, followed by Aquinas’ unique treatment of each, as well as a deep consideration of esse tantum. At the end he states the ‘proof’ which Gaven Kerr has articulated so deftly reflects the manner in which the Creator ‘appears’ in creation, thereby ‘showing’ what cannot be ‘said’ (Wittgenstein).