El artículo examina la visión de Santo Tomás de Aquino sobre la contemplación interpersonal, destacando su integración en la filosofía y teología. Inicia con el concepto del fin último, sosteniendo que la contemplación es esencial para alcanzar la verdadera felicidad y el propósito final de la vida. Distingue entre contemplación intelectual, enfocada en las verdades divinas, y contemplación amorosa, que busca una relación afectiva con lo divino. También explora las cuatro fases del amor de amistad y cómo contribuyen a una (...) experiencia contemplativa más profunda. Además, analiza los diferentes grados de contemplación, desde la comunión y convivencia hasta la identidad personal, y diferencia la contemplación sobrenatural de la natural, destacando el papel de la gracia divina. Concluye con un análisis de la contemplación conyugal, mostrando cómo refleja y profundiza el amor en las relaciones personales. (shrink)

Esta deslumbrante biografía de Santo Tomás de Aquino perfila la vida y la obra del filósofo y fraile dominico del siglo XIII, cuyo pensamiento, después de más de siete siglos, continua vigente. Eudaldo Forment, uno de los grandes especialistas en la figura de Santo Tomás, recrea sus años de formación, sus viajes, la evolución de su pensamiento filosófico, su carrera académica, los grandes hitos de su vida... El autor ha estudiado las fuentes primarias y las biografías posteriores, para (...) ofrecer un completo retrato del pensador y santo napolitano, situándolo en el contexto religioso, político y cultural de su época.. El riguroso trabajo de documentación le ha permitido clarificar tres grandes misterios de la vida de fray Tomás: el del cese repentino, sin motivo confesado, de sus actividades académicas y literarias, el 6 de diciembre de 1273; el de su última enfermedad; y el de la causa de su muerte. Trabajando siempre sobre los datos documentados, tanto los referidos a hechos naturales como a los que no lo son, el autor deja al lector que se forme su propio juicio sobre Santo Tomás. Una biografía novedosa y admirablemente documentada de un personaje esencial en la historia de Europa. (shrink)

RESUMENEn este trabajo se glosa la conocida exposición tomista de los trascendentales en De veritate I, 1, y se matizan las posiciones del aquinate en referencia a distintos desarrollos de su pensamiento.PALABRAS CLAVETRASCENDENTALES – SANTO TOMAS DE AQUINOABSTRACTThe paper comments the famous Thomistic exposition of transcedentals in De veritate I, 1, by discussing Aquina’s ideas as regards some of their notes.KEYWORDSTRANSCENDENTALS – AQUINAS.

This paper compares two approaches that attempt to explain the origin of life, or biogenesis. The more established approach is one based on chemical principles, whereas a new, yet not widely known approach begins from a physical perspective. According to the first approach, life would have begun with—often organic—compounds. After having developed to a certain level of complexity and mutual dependence within a non-compartmentalised organic soup, they would have assembled into a functioning cell. In contrast, the second, physical type of (...) approach has life developing within tiny compartments from the beginning. It emphasises the importance of redox reactions between inorganic elements and compounds found on two sides of a compartmental boundary. Without this boundary, “life” would not have begun, nor have been maintained; this boundary—and the complex cell membrane that evolved from it—forms the essence of life. (shrink)

Introduction: In The Netherlands, physicians have to be convinced that the patient suffers unbearably and hopelessly before granting a request for euthanasia. The extent to which general practitioners (GPs), consulted physicians and members of the euthanasia review committees judge this criterion similarly was evaluated. Methods: 300 GPs, 150 consultants and 27 members of review committees were sent a questionnaire with patient descriptions. Besides a “standard case” of a patient with physical suffering and limited life expectancy, the descriptions included cases in (...) which the request was mainly rooted in psychosocial or existential suffering, such as fear of future suffering or dependency. For each case, respondents were asked whether they recognised the case from their own practice and whether they considered the suffering to be unbearable. Results: The cases were recognisable for almost all respondents. For the “standard case” nearly all respondents were convinced that the patient suffered unbearably. For the other cases, GPs thought the suffering was unbearable less often (2–49%) than consultants (25–79%) and members of the euthanasia review committees (24–88%). In each group, the suffering of patients with early dementia and patients who were “tired of living” was least often considered to be unbearable. Conclusions: When non-physical aspects of suffering are central in a euthanasia request, there is variance between and within GPs, consultants and members of the euthanasia committees in their judgement of the patient’s suffering. Possible explanations could be differences in their roles in the decision-making process, differences in experience with evaluating a euthanasia request, or differences in views regarding the permissibility of euthanasia. (shrink)

This essay considers the intricate relationship between the thought of William James and the political theory of Harold J. Laski mainly in the years 1915 to 1930. I suggest James's arguments and vocabulary have a greater presence in Laski's work than has been previously detailed. The links between James's and Laski's thought are apparent in Laski's accounts of the self and his descriptions of the nature and structure of social experience; each of these in some way derives from James's psychology, (...) empiricist metaphysics and pragmatic method. The links are demonstrated by Laski's explicit references to James's ideas in his books and letters as well as in his adoption of Jamesian terms, phrases and motifs. This essay also shows that in applying James's ideas to political life Laski brought to light the equivocal nature of James's philosophy. Equally however, reading Laski against the background of James's intellectual legacy helps us understand more clearly some of the ambiguities and tensions in Laski's work; for instance how he could move with apparent ease from advocating political pluralism to supporting centralized planning. Finally, this paper illustrates the complex relationship between political theory and metaphysics. (shrink)

In the end of XIX century, the Spanish neon-scholastic mainly in her ethical-social and political direction, came near to the main problems of this time. This paper analyze the thought of Catalan priest Torras i Bages and his contribution with his regionalistic doctrine inspired by neon-tomismo, to the configuration of the traditional and catholic catalanism of beginnings of century XX.

"Interplanetary travel is very tempting and exciting because the sky is filled with unlimited globes of varying qualities. the desire to travel to other planets can be fulfilled by the process of yoga, which serves as a means by which one can transfer oneself to whatever planet one likes - possibly to planets where life is not only eternal and blissful but where there are multiple varieties of enjoyable energies. Anyone who can attain the freedom of the spiritual planets need (...) never return to this miserable land of birth, old age, disease and death." --Back cover. (shrink)

This book originated as a Festschrift to mark the publication of Volume 50 of the journal `Acta Biotheoretica' in 2002 and the journal's 70th anniversary in ...

In this collection of historic talks on the yoga process set forth by Lord Sri Krsna in the Sixth and Eighth Chapters of the Bhagavad-Gita, Srila Prabhupada deeply probes the nature of consciousness, meditation, karma, death, and reincarnation. Ultimately he describes in detail the process of bhakti-yoga, by which one can easily purify the mind and elevate the consciousness to a state of ultimate peace and happiness.

Reduction and reductionism have been central philosophical topics in analytic philosophy of science for more than six decades. Together they encompass a diversity of issues from metaphysics and epistemology. This article provides an introduction to the topic that illuminates how contemporary epistemological discussions took their shape historically and limns the contours of concrete cases of reduction in specific natural sciences. The unity of science and the impulse to accomplish compositional reduction in accord with a layer-cake vision of the sciences, the (...) seminal contributions of Ernest Nagel on theory reduction and how they strongly conditioned subsequent philosophical discussions, and the detailed issues pertaining to different accounts of reduction that arise in both physical and biological science (e.g., limit-case and part-whole reduction in physics, the difference-making principle in genetics, and mechanisms in molecular biology) are explored. The conclusion argues that the epistemological heterogeneity and patchwork organization of the natural sciences encourages a pluralist stance about reduction. (shrink)

INTRODUCTION This volume of essays is meant as a tribute to Alistair Crombie by some of those who have studied with him. The occasion of its publication is ...

Este artículo se ocupa de dos grandes problemas filosóficos: el del mal y el de la persona. El mal moral se aborda desde la situación del hombre en el origen, así como en la actualidad, y desde las consideraciones de la naturaleza humana regenerada. La persona es presentada desde su incomunicabilidad o individualidad metafísica, la significación de la individualidad, la referencia al ser personal, la conciencia del ser personal, y la dignidad de la personalidad.

The Bhagavad-gita is the main source-book on yoga and a concise summary of India's Vedic wisdom. Yet remarkably, the setting for this classic of spiritual literature is an ancient Indian battlefield. At the last moment, the great warrior Arjuna begins to wonder about the real meaning of his life. In the Bhagavadgita, Lord Krsna brings His disciple from perplexity to spiritual enlightenment. Bhagavad-gita As It Is is the largest-selling, most widely used edition of the Gita in the world.