A study of problems, all revolving around the subject of intellect in the philosophies of Alfarabi, Avicenna, and Averroes, this book starts by reviewing discussions in Greek and early Arabic philosophy which served as the background for the three Arabic thinkers. Davidson examines the cosmologies and theories of human and active intellect in the three philosophers and covers such subjects as: the emanation of the supernal realm from the First Cause; the emanation of the lower world from the transcendent active (...) intellect; stages of human intellect; illumination of the human intellect by the transcendent active intellect; conjunction of the human intellect with the transcendent active intellect; prophecy; and human immortality. Davidson shows that medieval Jewish philosophers and the Latin Scholastics had differing perceptions of Averroes because they happened to use works belonging to different periods of his philosophic career. (shrink)

From lectures over the BBC by a Cambridge professor on answers to our problems on the meaning of life.

The problem of evil throws up many awkward questions for theologians. McCabe handles the many contradictory twists and turns with dexterity and skill.>.

"The Problem of Truth" is a philosophical book by Herbert Wilson Carr, who was a British philosopher, and a Professor of Philosophy. This book focused on unanalyzed experience as opposed to science. It focuses on the problems of truth which is simply regarded as the problem of philosophy.

Dans les tentatives pour donner à la philosophie un fondement nouveau, le concept d’essence constitue le point central de la discussion, La phénoménologie de Husserl aussi bien que Feidétique de Scheler et de ses successeurs avait pour but de fonder, grâce à la doctrine de l’essence, une connaissance absolument certaine des vérités intemporelles. Cette prétention montre que la doctrine moderne de l’essence est la dernière étape de la pensée bourgeoise dont l’origine est la philosophie de Descartes. L’article se propose d’interpréter (...) les différentes conceptions de l’essence en tant que moments de l’évolution historique de cette pensée bourgeoise. La bourgeoisie dans sa période ascendante exigeait des vérités essentielles qu’elles fussent capables de se justifier devant la raison critique autonome de l’individu : au contraire la philosophie moderne fait de l’essence l’objet d’une intuition que la raison doit accepter telle quelle. Les tendances rationnelles de la doctrine de l’essence sont refoulées : la raison devient réceptrice, hétéronome. Cette démission de la raison critique reflète l’adaptation de la philosophie à l’idéologie antirationaliste des systèmes nouveaux d’autorité : dans la dernière phase de l’évolution, la doctrine de l’essence devient mythologie politique. Le positivisme représente l’opposition non dialectique à cette doctrine de l’essence : il veut entièrement chasser de la science le concept d’essence, mais du même coup il tombe dans le défaut de rabaisser tous les faits sur le même plan, sans établir entre eux de différences. Dans l’idée d’essence opposée au phénomène sont contenus des éléments positifs, critique de la réalité « mauvaise », processus de réalisation des possibilités aflxthentiques de l’homme et des choses. Ces éléments positifs, la doctrine dialectique de l’essence les conserve. — La deuxième partie du travail cherche à montrer la formation du concept d’essence dans la philosophie dialectique qui, grâce à ce concept, surmonte le relativisme sans retomber dans la métaphysique dogmatique. L’opposition de l’essence et du phénomène est conçue ici comme une relation historique, et dans la constitution de celle-ci les intérêts sociaux de la théorie pénètrent à titre d’élément constitutif. La praxis historique à laquelle la théorie est liée et qui doit supprimer (aufheben) l’opposition, rend les intérêts particuliers vraiment généraux et fonde un type nouveau de vérité universelle. Le concept d'essence qui est au centre de la doctrine dialectique et qui détermine tous les autres concepts est le concept de l’homme. Le souci d’atteindre l’homme véritable remplace le souci de connaissance absolument certaine qui caractérise la philosophie idéaliste. De même que les formes phénoménales de l’henime et des choses ont leur origine dans la structure sociale présente, ainsi cette structure dessine à l’avance l’image de l’essence et des possibilités humaines que l’homme doit comprendre comme des tâches historiques, dont la voie de réalisation est marquée par la réalité elle-même.During the last decades the concept of essence has been widely discussed in the various attempts to seek a new foundation for philosophy. Both the phenomenology of E. Husserl and the theory of essence of M. Scheler and his followers were devoted to discovering through their theories of reality the unconditioned and exact knowledge of eternal verities. This attempt characterizes modern theory of reality as the last stage of bourgeois thought which began with Descartes. — The article endeavors to interpret the various conceptions of essence as specific stages of the historical development of that thought. With the rise of modern society the demand was made that the essential verities justify themselves before the critical and autonomous reason of the individual, whereas contemporary theory regards them as objects of an intuition and believes that reason has to accept them in the way in which they manifest themselves. The critical and rational tendencies in the theory of reality are abandoned, reason becomes receptive and heteronomous. This abdication of autonomous critical reason mirrors the adjustment of philosophy to the anti-rational ideology of the new form of authoritarian state. In the last phase of development the theory of reality turns out to be political mythology. — Positivism represents the undialectical opposition to this theory of reality. It wishes to remove completely the concept of essence from science, but thereby arrives only at an indifferent levelling of all facts. The idea of reality as opposed to appearance contains the positive elements of a critique of reality and of the process of realization of the essential potentialities of man and things. They are preserved in the dialectical conception of reality. — The second part of the essay attempts to point out the function of the concept of reality in dialectical philosophy, with the help of which it overcomes relativism. The opposition between appearance and reality is here conceived as a historical relationship, in the determination of which enter as integral elements the social interests of the theory. In the course of the historical trend, with which the theory is bound up and which is supposed to abolish the opposition between appearance and reality, the particular interests become truly general, and a new kind of universally valid truth arises. Reality which stands at the center of the dialectical theory and determines all other concepts, refers primarily to the essence of man. Concern about concrete man is taking the place of concern about the unconditioned exact truth of idealist philosophy. In the same way as man’s (and thing’s) forms of appearance is grounded in the present social structure, likewise the idea of his essence and the process of its realization arise out of this structure, and its realization must be conceived as a historical task. (shrink)

Inspired both in the biblical witness of God's call to persons throughout salvation history and in St. Ignatius Loyola's own personal experience of God-as-God under God's own pedagogical training and the subsequent transposition of this his personal experience into his book of the Spiritual Exercises , this article aims at drawing on Ignatius as a master pedagogue of genuine spiritual experience, as evidenced in the profound dynamics of his Exercises, to show how, in the light of Spiritual Theology, such a (...) genuine experience of God-as-God can be an effective channel of God's Spirit for interreligious dialogue. (shrink)

Over the past decade numerous philosophers have devoted considerable effort to explicating and defending the claim that narrative can be a satisfactory form of explanation. Much of this interest in narrative has taken the form of a reaction against the covering-law model of explanation-particularly against the claim that that model is applicable to history and to what W. B. Gallie has called “the genetic sciences.” What has been lacking from most of this discussion of narrative is any very clear indication (...) of just what narrative is or any extended attempt to delineate its logical features. The philosophical yield of introducing the concept “narrative” into discussions of explanation has frequently appeared to be very small.In a recent paper Michael Ruse has argued that the logical structure of explanations relating to the theory of evolution can be examined more helpfully by using the covering-law model than by using a narrative model of explanation. (shrink)

A consideration of the unity of a class or kind as including its member or instances.

This Introduction describes the approach and rules applied when translating a 25-page excerpt from Marx’s Manuscript of 1867–68, as published in the MEGA, Volume II/4.3. The draft status and terseness of the text required that the translation proceed along with a working-out of its mathematical content. The translation’s main guideline was to translate the draft such as it stood, while correcting figures and formulas wherever possible. Remaining major deficiencies and inconsistencies are discussed in depth, showing also what an outstanding level (...) of acuity Marx had already achieved in a manuscript at first-draft stage. (shrink)