The Fideism of Bishop Pierre Daniel Huet
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John Spencer and the Perils of Sacred Philology*
JOHN SPENCER AND THE PERILS OF SACRED PHILOLOGY* In 1650 the Bible’s status as infallible revelation — unique guide to salvation and universal history of mankind’s origins — Downloaded from appeared secure to most educated Europeans. True, more than a century of confessional struggle and theological debate had exposed scripture to unprecedented scrutiny and proliferating interpretations. Yet, amid the wrangling, scarcely any author questioned its divine authorship or historical reliability. Mean- http://past.oxfordjournals.org/ while, biblical scholars were at work shoring up the foundations of scriptural authority with the tools of Renaissance philology. But appearances were deceptive. The following decades witnessed scandalous publications by Thomas Hobbes, Isaac La Peyre`re and Baruch Spinoza, which openly challenged established as- sumptions about the Bible, setting the stage for Enlightenment polemicists such as John Toland and Voltaire. Historical scholar- ship was a major arena for these debates, with orthodoxy chal- at University of California, Davis on January 7, 2014 lenged, not only by evidence extending the age of the world beyond the confines of biblical chronology, but also by arguments displacing the Hebrew nation from its privileged historical role. Enlightenment critics of Judaeo-Christian revelation, from Toland at the beginning of the eighteenth century to Friedrich Schiller at the end, turned sacred history on its head by arguing that, long before the Jews, the ancient Egyptians possessed a monotheistic religion, which -
Questioning Divination: the Young Augustine and Friends Divination Is Not an Art One Ordinarily Associates with Augustine Of
Questioning divination: the young Augustine and friends Divination is not an art one ordinarily associates with Augustine of Hippo. His preaching, like that of any other late antique bishop, decisively rejected all forms of magic, and he offered detailed critiques of astrology across many works (e.g., City of God 5). However, Augustine is also an author who gives exceptional—if incomplete—insight into times in his life where he thought differently (see esp. O’Loughlin 1992). In his Confessions and the early dialogue Against the Academics, Augustine paints a series of portraits, of himself but also of lofty and learned associates, who questioned the practical limits of divinatory power. The aim of this paper is to trace out the social context of Augustine’s early and growing skepticism towards divination. The first of the learned men, and the most studied, is the learned Vindicianus, proconsul and sometime court-physician for Valentinian I (Fiorucci 2008). Augustine, who had rejected the help of a haruspex in a poetry contest, did take up astrology. After crowning him the victor, Vindicianus tried to dissuade him, pointing to his own experiences as a young man who had once prepared to become a professional astrologer (Confessions 4.2.3-3.5). Of his reasoning, we hear comparatively little, though Augustine elsewhere lauds him for his medical expertise, whose methods he was able rationally to explain to those who had assumed them sorcerous (Ep. 138.3). The next example is more richly documented. In Contra Academicos 1.6.17-8.23, Augustine’s student Licentius describes a series of divinatory feats performed by Albicerius, a hariolus from Carthage. -
Skepticism and Pluralism Ways of Living a Life Of
SKEPTICISM AND PLURALISM WAYS OF LIVING A LIFE OF AWARENESS AS RECOMMENDED BY THE ZHUANGZI #±r A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE DIVISION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF HAWAI'I IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN PHILOSOPHY AUGUST 2004 By John Trowbridge Dissertation Committee: Roger T. Ames, Chairperson Tamara Albertini Chung-ying Cheng James E. Tiles David R. McCraw © Copyright 2004 by John Trowbridge iii Dedicated to my wife, Jill iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS In completing this research, I would like to express my appreciation first and foremost to my wife, Jill, and our three children, James, Holly, and Henry for their support during this process. I would also like to express my gratitude to my entire dissertation committee for their insight and understanding ofthe topics at hand. Studying under Roger Ames has been a transformative experience. In particular, his commitment to taking the Chinese tradition on its own terms and avoiding the tendency among Western interpreters to overwrite traditional Chinese thought with the preoccupations ofWestern philosophy has enabled me to broaden my conception ofphilosophy itself. Roger's seminars on Confucianism and Daoism, and especially a seminar on writing a philosophical translation ofthe Zhongyong r:pJm (Achieving Equilibrium in the Everyday), have greatly influenced my own initial attempts to translate and interpret the seminal philosophical texts ofancient China. Tamara Albertini's expertise in ancient Greek philosophy was indispensable to this project, and a seminar I audited with her, comparing early Greek and ancient Chinese philosophy, was part ofthe inspiration for my choice ofresearch topic. I particularly valued the opportunity to study Daoism and the Yijing ~*~ with Chung-ying Cheng g\Gr:p~ and benefited greatly from his theory ofonto-cosmology as a means of understanding classical Chinese philosophy. -
Beyond Skepticism Foundationalism and the New Fuzziness: the Role of Wide Reflective Equilibrium in Legal Theory Robert Justin Lipkin
Cornell Law Review Volume 75 Article 2 Issue 4 May 1990 Beyond Skepticism Foundationalism and the New Fuzziness: The Role of Wide Reflective Equilibrium in Legal Theory Robert Justin Lipkin Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarship.law.cornell.edu/clr Part of the Law Commons Recommended Citation Robert Justin Lipkin, Beyond Skepticism Foundationalism and the New Fuzziness: The Role of Wide Reflective Equilibrium in Legal Theory , 75 Cornell L. Rev. 810 (1990) Available at: http://scholarship.law.cornell.edu/clr/vol75/iss4/2 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at Scholarship@Cornell Law: A Digital Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Cornell Law Review by an authorized administrator of Scholarship@Cornell Law: A Digital Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. BEYOND SKEPTICISM, FOUNDATIONALISM AND THE NEW FUZZINESS: THE ROLE OF WIDE REFLECTIVE EQUILIBRIUM IN LEGAL THEORY Robert Justin Liphint TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION .............................................. 812 I. FOUNDATIONALISM AND SKEPTICISM ..................... 816 A. The Problem of Skepticism ........................ 816 B. Skepticism and Nihilism ........................... 819 1. Theoretical and PracticalSkepticism ................ 820 2. Subjectivism and Relativism ....................... 821 3. Epistemic and Conceptual Skepticism ................ 821 4. Radical Skepticism ............................... 822 C. Modified Skepticism ............................... 824 II. NEW FOUNDATIONALISM -
Developments in Neuroscience and Human Freedom: Some Theological and Philosophical Questions
S & CB (2003), 16, 123–137 0954–4194 ALAN TORRANCE Developments in Neuroscience and Human Freedom: Some Theological and Philosophical Questions Christianity suggests that human beings are free and responsible agents. Developments in neuroscience challenge this when wedded with two ‘fideisms’: ‘naturalism’ and ‘nomological monism’ (causality applies exclusively to basic particles). The wedding of Galen Strawson’s denial that anything can be a cause of itself with a physicalist account of brain states highlights the problem neuroscience poses for human freedom. If physicalism is inherently reductionistic (Kim) and dualism struggles to make sense of developments in neuroscience, Cartwright’s pluralist account of causality may offer a way forward. It integrates with thinking about the person from a Christian epistemic base and facilitates response to Strawson. Key Words: God, person, neuroscience, freedom, naturalism, nomological monism, physicalism, dualism, causality. Five years ago, the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, hosted a conference on ‘Neuroscience and the Human Spirit’. In his opening address, the organiser, Dr Frederick Goodwin, asked whether developments in the field do not pose a challenge to the ‘very foundation upon which our civilization rests’, namely, ‘free will and the capacity to make moral choices?’ The question I am seeking to address here raises the same issue with respect to the grounds of the Christian understanding of its message and, indeed, of what it is to be a person. In the light of recent advances in understanding the physical workings of our neural substrate, the electrochemical nature of cerebral processing and so on, does it still make sense to conceive of our minds as the free cause of our actions and the conscious centre of human life? So much suggests that the workings of our minds require to be construed in radically physical and, apparently, imper- sonal terms – as a complex causal series of synaptic firings and the like. -
On the Infinite in Leibniz's Philosophy
On the Infinite in Leibniz's Philosophy Elad Lison Interdisciplinary Studies Unit Science, Technology and Society Ph.D. Thesis Submitted to the Senate of Bar-Ilan University Ramat-Gan, Israel August 2010 This work was carried out under the supervision of Dr. Ohad Nachtomy (Department of Philosophy), Bar-Ilan University. Contents א.……………………………….…………………………………………Hebrew Abstract Prologue…………………………………………………………...………………………1 Part A: Historic Survey Methodological Introduction…………………………………………………………..15 1. Aristotle: Potential Infinite………………………………………………………….16 2. Thomas Aquinas: God and the Infinite………………………………………..…….27 3. William of Ockham: Syncategorematic and Actual Infinite……………………..….32 4. Rabbi Abraham Cohen Herrera: Between Absolute Unity and Unbounded Multitude………………………………………………………………………..….42 5. Galileo Galilei: Continuum Constructed from Infinite Zero's………………………49 6. René Descartes: Infinite as Indefinite…………………………………………….…58 7. Pierre Gassendi: Rejection of the Infinite…………………………………………...69 8. Baruch Spinoza: Infinite Unity…………………………………………………...…73 9. General Background: Leibniz and the History of the Infinite……………………....81 Summary…………………………………………………………………………….…94 Part B: Mathematics Introduction…………………………………………………………………………….99 1. 'De Arte Combinatoria' as a Formal Basis for Thought: Retrospective on Leibniz's 1666 Dissertation………………………………………………………………....102 2. Leibniz and the Infinitesimal Calculus……………………………………….……111 2.1. Mathematical Background: Mathematical Works in 16th-17th Centuries…..111 2.2. Leibniz's Mathematical Development…………………………………….…127 -
The Search for the Historical Gassendi
The Search for the Historical Gassendi Margaret J. Osler University of Calgary Writing about the history of science and the history of philosophy in- volves assumptions about the role of context and about the relationships between past and present ideas. Some historians emphasize the context, concentrating on the intellectual, personal, and social factors that affect the way earlier thinkers have approached their subject. Analytic philoso- phers take a critical approach, considering the logic and merit of the arguments of past thinkers almost as though they are engaging in contem- porary debates. Some philosophers use the ideas of historical ªgures to support their own philosophical agendas. Scholarly studies of the French natural philosopher Pierre Gassendi (1592–1655) exemplify many of these approaches. What, then, is context? At the most basic level, the context is the text itself. The most acontextual scholars examine only snippets of the text. In- terested in ideas about necessity, arguments for the existence of God, or ideas about matter and gravity, they mine the writings of historical ªgures for their views on these questions without considering the author’s aim for the book or project as a whole. This approach has frequently characterized discussions of Gassendi’s philosophy. His major work, the Syntagma Philo- sophicum, is a massive treatise in difªcult neo-Latin, daunting to all but the hardiest (or most foolish) of scholars. Consequently, of those philosophers and historians who deal with Gassendi at all, many rely on the bits that have been translated into English or French or those that deal with speciªc topics and seldom consider the entirety of his work, but the work as a whole gives the parts their meaning. -
Pierre Gassendi's Animals
[Intellectual History Archive 3, 2018] Begley, Pierre Gassendi’s Animals PIERRE GASSENDI’S ANIMALS: A CASE OF EXCLUSION Justin Begley1 University of Helsinki I. Introduction: A Learned Vegetarian The French priest, professor of mathematics, historian, and philosopher, Pierre Gassendi, was perhaps the most influential and well-respected thinkers of his day. 2 While the linguistic and conceptual complexity of his Latin tomes excluded him from the philosophical canon that was formed during the late eighteenth, historians are now beginning to appreciate just how central his ideas were to the development of early modern intellectual life. But recent studies of Gassendi have consistently bypassed a major component of his thought: his defense of a vegetarian diet.3 Conversely, because it is no small task to identify and translate the relevant passages from Gassendi’s oeuvre, historical surveys of vegetarianism have mostly neglected his arguments. Indeed, in the history of vegetarianism, emphasis has been placed on religious sectarians or intellectual outsiders such as Thomas Bushnell and Roger Crab, while figures such as Gassendi who were, historically speaking, intellectual insiders have paradoxically been neglected. 4 Proponents of vegetarianism have thus been shaped teleologically as progressive or even “radical” thinkers. But Gassendi remained thoroughly embedded in the institutions of his day, and channeled the full gamut of humanist apparatuses in his endeavor to integrate the philosophy of the ancient Greek atomist, Epicurus, into the university curriculum. For this purpose, he sought to cleanse Epicurean philosophy of its popular associations with excess, atheism, and debauchery 1 [email protected] 2 Meric Casaubon, Generall Learning: A Seventeenth-Century Treatise on the Formation of the General Scholar, ed. -
Kant's Doctrine of Religion As Political Philosophy
Kant's Doctrine of Religion as Political Philosophy Author: Phillip David Wodzinski Persistent link: http://hdl.handle.net/2345/987 This work is posted on eScholarship@BC, Boston College University Libraries. Boston College Electronic Thesis or Dissertation, 2009 Copyright is held by the author, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise noted. Boston College The Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Department of Political Science KANT’S DOCTRINE OF RELIGION AS POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY a dissertation by PHILLIP WODZINSKI submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy May 2009 © copyright by PHILLIP DAVID WODZINSKI 2009 ABSTRACT Kant’s Doctrine of Religion as Political Philosophy Phillip Wodzinski Advisor: Susan Shell, Ph.D. Through a close reading of Immanuel Kant’s late book, Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason, the dissertation clarifies the political element in Kant’s doctrine of religion and so contributes to a wider conception of his political philosophy. Kant’s political philosophy of religion, in addition to extending and further animating his moral doctrine, interprets religion in such a way as to give the Christian faith a moral grounding that will make possible, and even be an agent of, the improvement of social and political life. The dissertation emphasizes the wholeness and structure of Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason as a book, for the teaching of the book is not exhausted by the articulation of its doctrine but also includes both the fact and the manner of its expression: the reader learns most fully from Kant by giving attention to the structure and tone of the book as well as to its stated content and argumentation. -
David Hume, "The Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion," and Religious Tolerance
University of Tennessee, Knoxville TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange Supervised Undergraduate Student Research Chancellor’s Honors Program Projects and Creative Work 5-2020 David Hume, "The Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion," and Religious Tolerance Jarrett Delozier [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_chanhonoproj Part of the History of Philosophy Commons, History of Religion Commons, Intellectual History Commons, and the Religious Thought, Theology and Philosophy of Religion Commons Recommended Citation Delozier, Jarrett, "David Hume, "The Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion," and Religious Tolerance" (2020). Chancellor’s Honors Program Projects. https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_chanhonoproj/2382 This Dissertation/Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Supervised Undergraduate Student Research and Creative Work at TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. It has been accepted for inclusion in Chancellor’s Honors Program Projects by an authorized administrator of TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. For more information, please contact [email protected]. DeLozier 1 Introduction In the history of philosophy of religion and natural theology, David Hume is an immensely influential contributor. One of his most important works in the field is his Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, which contains his greatest treatment of natural theology, specifically the design argument. However, there’s a big problem which the Dialogues present to understanding Hume. Eleven of the twelve parts of the Dialogues contain Hume’s sharp criticisms and attacks on the Design argument. But in the final part, in what is often called “Philo’s Reversal,” he seems to completely reverse course by renouncing his skepticism and endorsing the Design argument. -
Defense of Reductionism About Testimonial Justification of Beliefs
Page 1 Forthcoming in Noûs A Defense of Reductionism about Testimonial Justification of Beliefs TOMOJI SHOGENJI Rhode Island College Abstract This paper defends reductionism about testimonial justification of beliefs against two influential arguments. One is the empirical argument to the effect that the reductionist justification of our trust in testimony is either circular since it relies on testimonial evidence or else there is scarce evidence in support of our trust in testimony. The other is the transcendental argument to the effect that trust in testimony is a prerequisite for the very existence of testimonial evidence since without the presumption of people’s truthfulness we cannot interpret their utterances as testimony with propositional contents. This paper contends that the epistemic subject can interpret utterances as testimony with propositional contents without presupposing the credibility of testimony, and that evidence available to the normal epistemic subject can justify her trust in testimony. I. Introduction There has recently been a considerable interest in anti-reductionism about testimonial justification of beliefs, according to which we cannot justify our trust in testimony by perceptual and memorial evidence.1 The reason for the interest is not the enticement of skepticism. Recent anti-reductionists hold that we are prima facie justified in trusting testimony simply because it is testimony. This means that there is a presumption in favor of testimony that it is credible unless contrary evidence is available. I will use the term “anti-reductionism” to refer to this non-skeptical version of anti-reductionism about testimonial justification. The more traditional position is reductionism, of which the most prominent advocate is David Hume. -
Following the Argument Where It Leads
Following The Argument Where It Leads Thomas Kelly Princeton University [email protected] Abstract: Throughout the history of western philosophy, the Socratic injunction to ‘follow the argument where it leads’ has exerted a powerful attraction. But what is it, exactly, to follow the argument where it leads? I explore this intellectual ideal and offer a modest proposal as to how we should understand it. On my proposal, following the argument where it leaves involves a kind of modalized reasonableness. I then consider the relationship between the ideal and common sense or 'Moorean' responses to revisionary philosophical theorizing. 1. Introduction Bertrand Russell devoted the thirteenth chapter of his History of Western Philosophy to the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas. He concluded his discussion with a rather unflattering assessment: There is little of the true philosophic spirit in Aquinas. He does not, like the Platonic Socrates, set out to follow wherever the argument may lead. He is not engaged in an inquiry, the result of which it is impossible to know in advance. Before he begins to philosophize, he already knows the truth; it is declared in the Catholic faith. If he can find apparently rational arguments for some parts of the faith, so much the better: If he cannot, he need only fall back on revelation. The finding of arguments for a conclusion given in advance is not philosophy, but special pleading. I cannot, therefore, feel that he deserves to be put on a level with the best philosophers either of Greece or of modern times (1945: 463). The extent to which this is a fair assessment of Aquinas is controversial.1 My purpose in what follows, however, is not to defend Aquinas; nor is it to substantiate the charges that Russell brings against him.