Wednesday, January 10, 2024

Progress report

My friends, it exists. More news later.

Posted by at

149 comments:

  1. spaghetti-headJanuary 10, 2024 at 5:30 PM

    My money is ready.

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  2. John DeRosaJanuary 10, 2024 at 5:48 PM

    Best news I've read all week! Exciting stuff!

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  3. AnonymousJanuary 10, 2024 at 7:53 PM

    Does it have an essence?

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    1. AnonymousJanuary 12, 2024 at 2:09 PM

      Since essence is prior to existence, it must have an essence if it exists.

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    2. AnonymousJanuary 13, 2024 at 5:14 AM

      There is no such thing as essence.

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    3. AnonymousJanuary 15, 2024 at 2:24 PM

      Existence is prior to essence. How can essence be prior existence? That would mean essence exists before it exists.

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  4. AnonymousJanuary 10, 2024 at 10:35 PM

    Although I am far from convinced that the arguments for an immaterial ( let alone immaterial and immortal ) soul are successful, it is obviously a hugely important issue, and I am open to being persuaded otherwise. I am therefore really looking foreward to reading your book, which I am sure will be written with your trademark readability and clarity, to see if you can shift my position.

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    1. NemoJanuary 11, 2024 at 10:12 PM

      Have you read Plato's Phaedo? If Socrates cannot convince you of the immortality of the soul, no man can.

      As a teaser, one of his arguments is based on the notion of Justice: If one accepts that justice is objective, not merely a social construct, and that there is much injustice in this life, then for Justice to be real, there must be an afterlife, where justice is served, and each and every person gets his due.

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    2. BrianR January 11, 2024 at 11:56 PM

      That is Kant's argument in 'Religion within the bounds of reason'.

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    3. MartinJanuary 12, 2024 at 2:54 PM

      Nano,

      I love Phaedo! I remember reading it and then going to a funeral shortly after, and it influenced the way I framed the ceremony. That said, I tend to think later arguments from Aristotle and the scholastics are a bit stronger, especially when updated with modern philosophy of mind in...er...mind. I'd bet a modern book published by Edward Feser would be more convincing than Phaedo, when it comes down to it.

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    4. NemoJanuary 12, 2024 at 5:07 PM

      Martin,

      I would volunteer to proofread Feser's text, in exchange for a free copy of it. :)

      Just to explain why I think nobody can outdo Socrates regarding the belief in the immortality of the soul:
      It is one thing to speculate about an idea in the comfort of one's chair, it is quite another to stake one's life on the idea. Socrates staked his whole life on the immortality of the soul, and was eventually put to death by the Athenians for his belief. He didn't take such an enormous risk without having first thought it through. The dialogues in Phadeo show that he thought about absolutely everything, because it was literally a matter of life and death for him. The same cannot said about modern philosophers.

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    5. AnonymousFebruary 23, 2024 at 1:15 PM

      Me too!

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  5. StephenJanuary 10, 2024 at 10:51 PM

    Hurrah!

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  6. Michael CopasJanuary 11, 2024 at 2:07 AM

    Congratulations on getting the MS completed! Very much looking forward to reading it and grateful for your work.

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  7. G. Mancz 滿償喬治January 11, 2024 at 5:14 AM

    This is splendid news, it has truly been too long since Aristotle's Revenge!

    Hopefully (which hope, I must say, is somehow reinforced by the title), and especially in light of renewed controversy* concerning certain natural desires, or, say, limbo, the book will treat postmortem cognition in some detail, particularly the natural mediate contemplation of God by the separated soul (cf. St. Thomas on this in eg. SCG , 3. 49, inter alia), more particularly as constituting the properly natural end of man, as discussed by e.g. M. J. Scheeben and the manualists.
    I daresay this area has been somewhat neglected in contemporary philosophy/theology.

    *Two-tier Thomism Forever!
    Two-tier Thomism or Death!

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    1. Miguel CervantesJanuary 11, 2024 at 11:44 PM

      Many blessings for 2024, George.
      I think though, Saint Thomas would refuse to be dissected into two tiers, whatever some corners of the thomist galaxy have to say. He kills the idea off in chapter one of the ST so perhaps just bet a symbolic dollar or rouble on it. Aquinian logic never misses.

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    2. G. Mancz 滿償喬治January 13, 2024 at 6:10 AM

      And to you, too, Michael.

      Since you appear to be well-disposed to normal conversation, I suppose that, in keeping with the festive spirit, invoking the prayers of the holy Wise Men, I'm prepared to try out suspending my policy of non-engagement with you.

      I'm not entirely sure what you mean by "one chapter", but if you are perchance referring to ST 1a-2ae q. III (particularly art. VIII), I'd like to draw your attention to the fact that, as Cardinal Cajetan - located at the centre of the Thomist galaxy, surely, rather than the corners, whose commentary Leo XIII of happy memory saw fit to order to be published with the official Leonina edition of the ST -

      notes in said commentary on that article, notes in said commentary on that article,

      "Observe that the statement in article VIII, namely, that the human intellect, the first cause remaining not known in any way other than "that [it]is", has the natural desire to know the "what [it] is" of the first cause and so on, is not lacking in ambiguity, because [human] natural desire does not exceed the power of nature, nor does it concern supernatural activity, and this not only that of itself, but every created intellect.

      But this can be more quickly solved if natural desire is distinguished in the way mentioned in the beginning of book I [1a q. 1, art 1. comment X]. A desire can be said to be natural with nature taken to mean the subject only: and so we naturally desire to see God. And it can also be said to be natural with nature taken as both the subject and mode: and this is how objections proceed. Nor does this take away anything from the efficacy of this argument [Mancz: that of St. Thomas], because perfect beatitude would leave neither such desire unfulfilled.

      One could also say that the Author treats man as a theologian, whose [office] it is, as said in II Contra Gent., cap. IV, to consider creatures not according to their proper natures, but as they are related to God. And this, although there isn't, in man, a natural desire of this sort, it is nonetheless natural for man as ordered by divine providence to this patria etc."

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    3. G. Mancz 滿償喬治January 13, 2024 at 6:11 AM

      Additionally, in the instance St. Thomas does have occasion to treat postmortem happiness proportional to human nature, namely in his discussion of limbo, in reply to the (5th) objection, which runs

      "<...> separation from what we love cannot be without pain. But these children will have natural knowledge of God, and for that very reason will love Him naturally. Therefore since they are separated from Him for ever, seemingly they cannot undergo this separation without pain"

      the saint replies thus:

      "Although unbaptized children are separated from God as regards the union of glory, they are not utterly separated from Him: in fact they are united to Him by their share of natural goods, and so will also be able to rejoice in Him by their natural knowledge and love."

      And in the body of the article, we read:

      "Accordingly, it must be observed that if one is guided by right reason one does not grieve through being deprived of what is beyond one's power to obtain, but only through lack of that which, in some way, one is capable of obtaining. Thus no wise man grieves for being unable to fly like a bird, or for that he is not a king or an emperor, since these things are not due to him; whereas he would grieve if he lacked that to which he had some kind of claim. I say, then, that every man who has the use of free-will is adapted to obtain eternal life, because he can prepare himself for grace whereby to merit eternal life [Cf. I-II:109:5-6]; so that if he fail in this, his grief will be very great, since he has lost what he was able to possess. But children were never adapted to possess eternal life, since neither was this due to them by virtue of their natural principles, for it surpasses the entire faculty of nature, nor could they perform acts of their own whereby to obtain so great a good. Hence they will nowise grieve for being deprived of the divine vision; nay, rather will they rejoice for that they will have a large share of God's goodness and their own natural perfections."

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    4. G. Mancz 滿償喬治January 13, 2024 at 6:13 AM

      Please consult De Malo, qu. V, art. III , for a relevantly similar, if somewhat different treatment of the same issue by the saint:

      " <...> we say that, although the souls of the children do not lack the natural knowledge belonging to the separated soul according to its nature, but that they lack supernatural knowledge implanted in us through faith, because they neither had faith actually nor recieved the sacrament of faith. It pertains to natural knowledged that the soul knows itself to have been created for beatitude, and that beatitude consists in the attainment of the perfect good, but that this perfect good, for the sake of which man has been made, is the glory the saints possess, is above natural knowledge. For this reason the Apostles says "[t]hat eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, what things God hath prepared for them that love him", and later adds "[b]ut to us God hath revealed them, by his Spirit", which revelation belongs to faith.

      Therefore, the souls of the children do not know themselves to be deprived of that good, and so do not suffer on that account, rather, possess what they do by nature without being grieved."

      So I'm not at all worried about my chances. I'm betting on Aquinas and his school as endorsed by the Church, after all.

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    5. Miguel CervantesJanuary 13, 2024 at 9:51 PM

      Thank you, George!
      I was talking, however, about the first chapter of the ST. I'd like you to use that to justify "two-tiered" Thomism. Hang on to those dollars.

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    6. G. Mancz 滿償喬治January 15, 2024 at 3:45 AM

      I see. It would seem that my misunderstanding stemmed from supposing that you were familiar with the canard (wrongly, apparently).

      As a Google search would’ve no doubt fairly quickly revealed, "two-tier Thomism" is a polemical pejorative label referring to the Thomist (really, Catholic) distinction between the order of nature, corresponding to the natural light of human reason and philosophy, and that of grace, corresponding to revelation and theology, or sacred doctrine.

      Allow me cite an article aimed at Dr. Feser's criticism of his position by D.B. Hart (see here for a summary of that controversy, and also here) a notorious (and sadly, fairly popular, even among Catholics) opponent of such "Baroque Neo-Scholastic" (more-or-less his language) notions, for a fairly early example of its use:

      "There is an old argument here, admittedly. Somewhere behind Feser’s argument slouches the specter of what is often called “two-tier Thomism”: a philosophical sect notable in part for the particularly impermeable partitions it erects between nature and grace, or nature and supernature, or natural reason and revelation, or philosophy and theology (and so on). To its adherents, it is the solution to the contradictions of modernity. To those of a more “integralist” bent (like me), it is a neo-scholastic deformation of Christian metaphysics that, far from offering an alternative to secular reason, is one of its chief theological accomplices. It also produces an approach to moral philosophy that must ultimately fail."

      (Please observe near the (probable) evocation of De Lubac's thesis, which, apart from positing a true desire for the beatific vision in virtue of having human nature alone, without reference to grace, also involves blaming thinkers like e.g. Cardinal Cajetan for notably contributing to secularisation etc. etc. Naturally, he is wrong to suggest that Thomists are somehow opposed to the possibility of the integration of these really distinct orders. But then, he doesn't stop there, sadly)

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    7. G. Mancz 滿償喬治January 15, 2024 at 3:47 AM

      Because of Dr. Feser's long history of interaction with Hart, and the latter' s wont to repeat the canard, I expected it to be instantly recognisable to long-time readers (and our host, naturally), and picked it to laud and cheer on Dr. Feser's labours on the happy occasion of his latest MS's completion.

      Now that this is out of the way, I'm not quite sure precisely what it is that I have left to clarify, but based on our previous discussions, perhaps you're objecting to the differentiation between philosophical and theological Thomism.

      AFAIK, the ST is not customarily divided into chapters.
      Supposing you're referring to question 1, the matter appears to me to very clear as is.

      In art. 1 in arguing for the necessity of sacred doctrine, the saint affirms the existence of "philosophical disciplines studied by human reason" ("philosophicas disciplinas, quae ratione humana investigantur") as a science distinct from the former, and art. 2 proceeds to prove that sacred doctrine is also a science.

      Questions from 4 to 10 do not strike me as plausibly relevant for this discussion (more on art. 5 below), so my guess is that you're referring to art. 3, which establishes that theology is one science (rather than many), so if Thomism is a -theological- school/"system", affirming a distinct philosophical Thomism would be (somehow) impossible.

      On the contrary, St. Thomas shows that philosophy and theology are really distinct and, despite being a theologian by trade (though he became an MA prior to taking up theology, naturally) takes philosophical positions and makes philosophical (that is, not relying on revelation) arguments in their favour, just like his followers.

      Hence Thomism can, in fact, be differentiated as a philosophy, and has been taught as such for centuries, hence works like e.g. “Cursus –philosophicus- Thomisticus” by John of St. Thomas, “Elementa –philosophiae- Aristotelico-Thomisticae” by Fr. J. Gredt, OSB; “Cursus –Philosophiae- Thomisticae” by Fr. Edouard Hugon, OP; Cardinal Zigliara's “Summa –philosophica-”, in which he "plainly follows the mind of Saint Thomas" (needless to say, the arguments in these works do not rely on revealed truths to proceed, even if the philosophical implications of revealed data are sometimes considered).

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    8. G. Mancz 滿償喬治January 15, 2024 at 3:49 AM

      In fact, it would seems that the closest thing to an authoritative definition of Thomism, namely, its ecclesiastical approbation, directly concerned it as a philosophy, precisely, formulated in the 24 –philosophical- Thomistic theses, and canons 589, § 1 and 1366, § 2 of the CIC of 1917 recommend St. Thomas as teacher of both philosophy and theology.


      Oxford Learner's Dictionary defines "tier" thus:

      1. a row or layer of something that has several rows or layers placed one above the other;
      2. one of several levels in an organization or a system.

      Now, I submit that the articles by St. Thomas discussed here readily supply matter to apply this to. As article 5 of that same question indicates, sacred doctrine “can in a sense depend upon the philosophical sciences, not as though it stood in need of them, but only in order to make its teaching clearer. For it accepts its principles not from other sciences, but immediately from God, by revelation. Therefore it does not depend upon other sciences as upon the higher, but makes use of them as of the lesser, and as handmaidens: even so the master sciences make use of the sciences that supply their materials, as political of military science”.

      There is a clear sense of subordination here as regards the two sciences, and to the extent Thomism is systematic, “tier” seems entirely applicable to Thomism as a school, and as is clear from the practice (and legislation already mentioned) of the Church, philosophy customarily rather obviously serves a propaedeutic function when it comes to the study of theology, to which the ST plainly testifies, assuming as it does the working knowledge of Aristotelian philosophy (cf. also e.g. art 19, § 1 of the Jesuit Ratio Studiorum, (p. 160), with its insistence that, generally, [t]heologiam vero scholasticam audiendam nemo admittetur, qui mediocritatem in Philosophia non superarit).

      As regards the original occasion of the phrase’s coinage, I’d say it’s all not altogether inapplicable, because human nature (more precisely, our soul) with its obediential potency for grace serves as –matter- for the accident that is grace (and so is ordered to it), the latter being –nobler- than the soul, as St. Thomas teaches in e.g. IaIIae, q. 110, art. 2 ad 2 et 3.

      Probably because I’m not a native speaker of English, I cannot quite tell precisely how this term peculiarly suggests some vicious separation between nature and grace/philosophy and theology (that is, if it does, which Hart et al seem to find), and to the extent it does, it wouldn’t be my first choice, but apart from this I guess it could be used to get the Thomist (and orthodox) point across.

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    9. G. Mancz 滿償喬治January 15, 2024 at 11:13 AM

      Apologies for the accidental misplaced italicisation, and other defects of formating.

      Attempting this while typing on the phone may not have been a good idea.

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    10. Miguel CervantesJanuary 15, 2024 at 11:45 PM

      Thanks, George, for going to so much trouble. I would have liked to see some exegesis based purely on the tight logic of the first question in the ST, which describes Aquinas' professional raison d'etre, and admits of no tiers, only ancillaries. No matter.

      Of course, it's true one can find marvelous philosophy in Aquinas (and very essential it is too, if Catholics are to see past the faults in Aristotle, and a host of other issues). But there is also history, apologetics and natural science. To be provocative, one could even do a short study of the practice of Christian virtue in Joseph Stalin, but it would be hard to make this out to be his life's mission statement, and he wouldn't have done so, any more than Aquinas made his out to be philosophy. I take what people say about themselves at face value, and Aquinas frames his work very clearly and with unavoidable logic.

      Naturally, I'm in full agreement over Hart, etc.

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    11. G. Mancz 滿償喬治January 30, 2024 at 2:01 AM

      Because it so happened that, in your reply, you had falsified my all-too-hopeful assessment of your disposition (by, e.g. brutely asserting the opposition between tiers and ancilliaries, or apologetics, of which the explicitly and profoundly philosophical SCG is most representative, and philosophy, or continuing to muddle the issue by conflating the person of St. Thomas with his doctrine), initially I thought any response uncalled for.

      But then I remembered the motu proprio 'Doctoris Angelici'
      by St. Pius X, and reconsidered. Perhaps you will be deterred from this sort of nonsense by authority, if nothing else.

      The saint writes:

      "In recommending St. Thomas to Our subjects as supreme guide in the Scholastic philosophy it goes without saying that Our intention was to be understood as referring above all to those principles upon which that philosophy is based as its foundation. For just as the opinion of certain ancients is to be rejected which maintains that it makes no difference to the truth of the Faith what any man thinks about the nature of creation, provided his opinions on the nature of God be sound, because error with regard to the nature of creation begets a false knowledge of God; so the principles of philosophy laid down by St. Thomas Aquinas are to be religiously and inviolably observed, because they are the means of acquiring such a knowledge of creation as is most congruent with the Faith (Contra Gentiles, II, 2, 3); of refuting all the errors of all the ages, and of enabling man to distinguish clearly what things are to be attributed to God and to God alone (ibid., iii; and Sum. Theol., 1, xii, 4: and liv, 1). They also marvellously illustrate the diversity and analogy between God and His works, a diversity and analogy admirably expressed by the Fourth Lateran Council as follows: "The resemblance between the Creator and the creature is such that their still greater dissimilarity cannot fail to be observed" (Decretalis iii, Damnamus ergo, etc. Cf. St. Thomas, Quaest, disp. De Scientia Dei, a. 11). --For the rest, the principles of St. Thomas, considered generally and as a whole, contain nothing but what the most eminent philosophers and doctors of the Church have discovered after prolonged reflection and discussion in regard to the particular reasons determining human knowledge, the nature of God and creation, the moral order and the ultimate end to be pursued in life.
      <...>
      As for sacred theology itself, it is Our desire that the study of it be always illuminated by the light of the philosophy before referred to, but in ordinary clerical seminaries, provided suitable teachers are available, there is no objection to the use of text books containing summaries of doctrines derived from the source of Aquinas. There is an ample supply of excellent works of the kind.

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    12. G. Mancz 滿償喬治January 30, 2024 at 2:01 AM

      <...>
      The experience of so many centuries has shown and every passing day more clearly proves the truth of the statement made by Our Predecessor John XXII: "He (Thomas Aquinas) enlightened the Church more than all the other Doctors together; a man can derive more profit from his books in one year than from a lifetime spent in pondering the philosophy of others" (Consistorial address of 1318). St. Pius V confirmed this opinion when he ordered the feast of St. Thomas as Doctor to be kept by the universal Church: "But inasmuch as, by the providence of Almighty God, the power and truth of the philosophy of the Angelic Doctor, ever since his enrolment amongst the citizens of Heaven, have confounded, refuted and routed many subsequent heresies, as was so often clearly seen in the past and was lately apparent in the sacred decrees of the Council of Trent, We order that the memory of the Doctor by whose valour the world is daily delivered from pestilential errors be cultivated more than ever before with feelings of pious and grateful devotion" (Bull Mirabilis Deus of the 11th April, 1567). To avoid recapitulating the many other resounding praises of Our Predecessors, We may adopt the following words of Benedict XIV as a summary of all the commendations bestowed upon the writings of Thomas Aquinas, more particularly the Summa Theologica: "Numerous Roman Pontiffs, Our Predecessors, have borne glorious testimony to his philosophy. We also, in the books which We have written on various topics, after by diligent examination perceiving and considering the mind of the Angelic Doctor, have always adhered and subscribed with joy and admiration to his philosophy, and candidly confess that whatever good is to be found in Our own Writings is in no way to be attributed to Us, but entirely to so eminent a teacher" (Acta Cap. Gen. O.P., vol IX, p. 196).

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    13. G. Mancz 滿償喬治January 30, 2024 at 2:02 AM

      <...>
      Therefore that "the philosophy of St. Thomas may flourish incorrupt and entire in schools, which is very dear to Our heart," and that "the system of teaching which is based upon the authority and judgement of the individual teacher" and therefore "has a changeable foundation whence many diverse and mutually conflicting opinions arise . . . not without great injury to Christian learning" (Leo XIII, Epist, Qui te of the 19th June, 1886) be abolished forever, it is Our will and We hereby order and command that teachers of sacred theology in Universities, Academies, Colleges, Seminaries and Institutions enjoying by apostolic indult the privilege of granting academic degrees and doctorates in philosophy, use the Summa Theologica of St. Thomas as the text of their prelections and comment upon it in the Latin tongue, and let them take particular care to inspire their pupils with a devotion for it.
      <...>
      Such is already the laudable custom of many Institutions. Such was the rule which the sagacious founders of Religious Orders, with the hearty approval of Our Predecessors, desired should be observed in their own houses of study; and the saintly men who came after the time of St. Thomas Aquinas took him and no other for their supreme teacher of philosophy . So also and not otherwise will theology recover its pristine glory and all sacred studies be restored to their order and value and the province of the intellect and reason flower again in a second spring."

      Now, irrespective of whether it is advisable to call St. Thomas a philosopher, in addition to “theologian” (I mean, if we go by nominal definitions, then he certainly was one: St. Thomas is obviously a person who studie[d] or wr[ote] about philosophy ), it should be obvious that Thomism, that is, the philosophy of St. Thomas recommended by the pontiffs above, is a philosophy.

      That there can also be said to be a theology called Thomism, one that is higher than the philosophy, is readily conceded by me. Indeed, I’d say there is hierarchical arrangement here, one that would admit the language of tiers (with the above caveats).

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    14. G. Mancz 滿償喬治January 30, 2024 at 2:12 AM

      Though this is, strictly speaking, beside the point at issue (which is Thomism, rather than St. Thomas), insofar as calling Aquinas a philosopher (and, perhaps, maintaining this to be a necessary requirement for the title of a scholastic theologian, as per the evidence adduced above) in no way involves making philosophy "his life's mission statement", one wonders why you'd feel compelled to bother writing something like this.

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    15. Miguel CervantesFebruary 1, 2024 at 10:35 PM

      I hope my brutality didn't get you out the wrong side of bed. Thanks, though, for bringing before the readership Pius X's excellent and well-known text. It agrees with what St. Thomas says in the first chapter of the ST about the theological nature of his work, and the ancillary nature of philosophy. That St. Thomas did such marvelous things with his ancillary is only to his credit, and he did it in order to tackle the main game for him, theology.

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    16. G. Mancz 滿償喬治February 2, 2024 at 1:58 AM

      Worry not, your (among other things, non sequitur-prone) rants are not brutal (if brute, i.e. unargued for), merely tedious and disappointing.

      Thanks, though, for bringing before the readership Pius X's excellent and well-known text"

      Glad to have helped you catch up! Now that you've familiarised yourself with it, I hope you see how egregiously off the mark (as well as beside the point!) your comments about "dissecting St. Thomas" and the proposed analogy between St. Thomas's philosophical work and Stalin's practice of Christian virtue are.

      <…> the first chapter of the ST about the theological nature of his work, <…>

      However, the way you consistently write here makes one wonder if you realise St. Thomas's pen produced many more texts other than the ST.

      For example, there are his voluminous commentaries on Aristotle, and there are also original philosophical works like De ente et essential, enjoying lasting renown and significance (at least some of them having “first chapters” discussing the position of respective sciences!)

      That St. Thomas did such marvelous things with his ancillary is only to his credit, and he did it in order to tackle the main game for him, theology.

      Amen!
      This reads like a correction of sorts, but I confess to be at a loss when it comes to understanding what it is addressing.

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    17. Miguel CervantesFebruary 2, 2024 at 6:28 PM

      Something still seems to be robbing your of your Thomistic equanimity, causing you to write a few cranky non sequiturs of your own in the last comment, which seems to agree with mine. But I'll leave it there. God bless.

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  8. Ian M.January 11, 2024 at 7:35 AM

    Awesome! Judging from the photo, looks like the book on immortality might be everlasting :P.

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  9. Paul D. Van PeltJanuary 11, 2024 at 8:36 AM

    The title is interesting. However, is human nature a corporeal manifestation of immortal soul, or only a poor representation of the proposed perfection of everlasting life? How many ways are there? Hmmmm...

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  10. AnonymousJanuary 11, 2024 at 10:27 AM

    I like the subtitle.

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    1. AnonymousJanuary 13, 2024 at 12:36 AM

      Me too. Nature means principle of operation. Our nature is the proximate source of our super powers: intellect and our will.

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  11. Tim FinlayJanuary 11, 2024 at 10:46 AM

    Congratulations on the book, Ed. If I may, I would like to write some posts attacking Christian physicalism.
    Brandon Rickabaugh wrote, "Here is a staggering truth: the ontology of the human person currently embraced by the most vocal Christian scholars working on this issue is a view that almost no Christians thought plausible only 100 years ago. Until recently, the dominant view among Christian thinkes has been various forms of mind-body dualism (hereafter, dualism), according to which the human person comprises body and soul. In stark disagreement, many contemporary Christian scholars vigorously advance antidualism and defend physicalism (reductive or nonreductive), understanding the human person as fundamentally physical. These Christian physicalists proffer the strong impression of a uniform rejection of dualism across the neuroscientific, theological, and philosophical communities, as if dualism has been defeated, just as phlogiston was in the 1770s. Here is another truth: this certain-defeat of dualism narrative is demonstrably false" in Trinity Journal 40 (2019) page 215. These Christian physicalists have, in addition to refuting philosophical arguments for dualism and New Testament exegetical arguments for dualism, to explain why Christianity from the Church Fathers onwards unambiguously believed in mind-body dualism. This they do by something called the Hellenization thesis, which I shall explain in a follow up post.

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    1. Peter SimpleJanuary 11, 2024 at 4:57 PM

      Generally, anti-dualism is just assumed by philosophers and scientists, or some lame gesturing to the success of physical science is made. At best you get the much more over-hyped interaction issue.

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  12. Graham DraperJanuary 11, 2024 at 11:07 AM

    I can't wait for this to come out - really excited!

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  13. AnonymousJanuary 11, 2024 at 1:31 PM

    Feser locuta. Causa est fineta

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  14. Hal FriederichsJanuary 11, 2024 at 4:33 PM

    Dr. Feser,
    Although my conception of the human mind (being drawn from Wittgenstein's philosophy) shares much with your conception, it differs in at least one very important aspect: the mind cannot survive the death of the body.
    In any case, am very much looking forward to reading your new book. I expect it will give me much to ponder.:-)

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    1. Nearly NormalJanuary 12, 2024 at 5:46 PM

      Are you by any chance related to Hal in the Space Odyssey movie?
      Or perhaps his reincarnation?

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  15. AnonymousJanuary 12, 2024 at 11:30 AM

    WCB

    @Nemo

    Read Plato's The Laws - Book X

    Plato tries to argue that God is a good workman. A good workman always finish his job satisfactorily. So if there is injustice done to a person in this world, there must be a God to finish that job in another world. So that proves God must exist. God being a good workman. Book X is Plato's ideas on religion, especially atheism. And this book is essentially the start of natural theology in the Western world. If you have never read this work of Plato's check out his attempts to demonstrate God exists. I call this the Good Workman proof.Circular reasoning. It is hope, not evidence.

    WCB

    WCB

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    1. NemoJanuary 12, 2024 at 4:32 PM

      Read Plato's The Laws - Book X
      I did, many years ago.

      I call this the Good Workman proof.Circular reasoning. It is hope, not evidence.
      Let me quote Cicero in response,
      "And if I err in my belief that the souls of men are immortal, I gladly err, nor do I wish this error which gives me pleasure to be wrested from me while I live. But if when dead I am going to be without sensation (as some petty philosophers think), then I have no fear that these seers, when they are dead, will have the laugh on me!"

      Delete
    2. DrYogamiJanuary 12, 2024 at 4:44 PM

      @WCB

      What exactly would count as evidence, in your view?

      Delete
    3. AnonymousJanuary 13, 2024 at 9:51 AM

      WCB

      Evidence? I can't think of any. I find too many problems with all God concepts I can think of to see any possibility of a decent, believable God. And I have spent years thinking about this. Abrahamic , perfect Gods are simply, to me, impossible.

      Ancient ideas of gods, Mars, god of war, Venus, beauty and love, Nike, victory etc. Are personifications of various aspects of life. To me, God is a similar personification of physics, that is nature.

      At bottom of reality is some sort of brute fact. Physics, or gods?

      Attaching revelations to all of this does not help, the problems of an all powerful, merciful, compassionate God creates more problems for the entire concept. The more I think about it, the more unlikely I find it.

      Can physics explain it all? Physics has done well, but in that end, no. In a very real sense we are still like the ancient Greek thinkers, developing the tools to discover the facts. They did not have telescopes, microscopes et al. And no idea of these things and so could only go so far.

      We have no idea of what exactly physics of 100 years from now will look like. But as far as I can see, theology is at a dead end.

      The only way out isfor God to make a grand appearance such as to the elders of Israel, standing on a sapphire pavement as per Exodus 24.

      I have thought about this as deeply as I can, and this is my present conclusion.

      All too much for a simple combox, sorry about that.

      WCB

      Delete
    4. AnonymousJanuary 13, 2024 at 9:11 PM

      You didn't think deeply enough.

      Delete
    5. DrYogamiJanuary 13, 2024 at 11:30 PM

      @ WCB

      Okay, fair enough, and I suspect Stardusty would say something similar. Temperamentally, the God concept just doesn't 'attract' you, or 'work' for you. But it does raise a question that exasperates me and others here: if your mind can't be changed, why bother returning here to debate at all? It just kind of seems pointless.

      I suspect in the end as I said above, this is a temperament thing. Atheists like to fancy themselves to be more rational than theists in these matters, but I'm not buying it. The more I think about it, the less plausible I find materialism. So physical theories as the ultimate explanation also don't work for me.

      Delete
    6. AnonymousJanuary 14, 2024 at 2:34 AM

      WCB

      Why post here? Due diligence. And such sites stimulate my thinking. What is the main set of ideas from the theist stance? This helps me avoid battling atheist straw men. To make sure I am examining theist ideas from sophisticated theist minds.

      WCB

      Delete
    7. AnonymousJanuary 14, 2024 at 3:14 PM

      Right, WCB. Only "sophisticated theist minds"
      need to post here to "stimulate" your thinking.
      You set an impossibly high bar.

      Delete
    8. Michael CopasJanuary 19, 2024 at 4:24 AM

      Dr. Yogami,

      It is certainly right to give a stranger the benefit of the doubt. If however that person shows himself to lack good will, there is no more doubt. If someone hits you with a bat the first time you see them, there might be some rational explanation. If they do it repeatedly, it would be unwise to treat them as a normal person of good will. WCB is not interested in the truth which is essential to having a good will. For evidence of this, look at our interaction below on the Pentateuch. As with almost everything he says here, he hasn't a clue what he is talking about. He is just a pretender without the slightest interest in the truth.

      Delete
  16. AnonymousJanuary 12, 2024 at 4:54 PM

    As someone terminally ill with ALS, this has been on my mind.

    In particular, I wonder about continued *consciousness* after death, rather than mere existence. If we can lack consciousness while alive, and often do, why is a conscious state assumed after death?

    Serious physical injury or brain damage can cause unconsciousness; wouldn’t such a state be the assumed default after death?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. NemoJanuary 13, 2024 at 11:20 AM

      If we can lack consciousness while alive, and often do, why is a conscious state assumed after death?

      Good question. I'll take a shot at it, if I may.

      I tend to think that "consciousness" is the tip of the iceberg of what and how human beings think and know, and it is only one type of knowing that is bound up with the body (viz. we're conscious of our own body and our physical environment). This is also why our physical condition (such as illness and injury) would affect our consciousness. When we're asleep, we're unconscious, but our brain is still active, and our state of consciousness is different from when we are awake.

      If we grant that there are things that are not physical, but no less real, such as mathematics, justice, beauty, charity, and the God of Christianity, then consciousness of these things would not be dependent upon the physical body, and so the soul can be conscious of them after its separation from the body, i.e., after death.

      Delete
    2. NemoJanuary 13, 2024 at 11:31 AM

      To make an imperfect analogy, take a look at this scene from the Holocaust movie "The Pianist". Just as even when the piano can make no sound, the music is still alive; so even when we lose consciousness along with the body, the soul is alive and active.
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=shrG3sRlsLU

      Delete
    3. AnonymousJanuary 13, 2024 at 1:36 PM

      I am sorry you are terminally ill. I will pray for you everyday.

      Delete
    4. Hal FriederichsJanuary 14, 2024 at 7:57 AM

      Nemo,
      Afraid you are simply using the word "alive" differently in your example from "The Pianist".
      In any case, consciousness is not a thing that exists on its own. Consciousness is a capacity or power that many living things have.
      I think Anonymous is holding the correct view here.

      Delete
    5. NemoJanuary 14, 2024 at 11:22 AM

      Hal Friederichs wrote,
      Consciousness is a capacity or power that many living things have.

      I read Anonymous's question as whether the soul can be conscious, and not merely exists, after death. So the existence of soul after death is given, and the question is whether it still possesses the power of "consciousness". If one denies that soul continues to exist after death, that would be a different question.

      IF we accept that consciousness is "a power" of the soul, is there only one type of power or many? We have many powers of the senses, seeing, hearing and touching, etc, it seem to me reasonable to think there may be different powers by which the soul can be conscious of things, visible and invisible, physical and non-physical. I've given examples of the non-physical things that the soul can be conscious of in my previous comment. The soul's power to know these would be independent of the body, and therefore will continue to function after death.

      Delete
    6. NemoJanuary 14, 2024 at 12:29 PM

      Hal FriederichsJ wrote,
      Afraid you are simply using the word "alive" differently in your example from "The Pianist".
      Not quite. When I said "music is alive" apart from the piano, what I had in mind is the counter-argument (presented in Phadeo) that consciousness is a product of the body/brain, as music/harmony is a product of musical instruments, Without musical instrument, there would be no music, so without the body there would be no consciousness. My argument is that music exists independently of the musical instrument, and that the latter is just one of many ways to manifest the former. Similarly, the consciousness bound up with the body is but one of many ways the soul manifest its knowledge.

      Delete
    7. AnonymousJanuary 15, 2024 at 3:52 PM

      Without musical instrument, there would be no music, so without the body there would be no consciousness. My argument is that music exists independently of the musical instrument, and that the latter is just one of many ways to manifest the former.

      I think that if no instrument had ever played a musical note, it would not be true simply speaking that "music exists". The more precise way of speaking would be that the formal principles of music exist in the very nature of sound, the human ear, and the human soul, which (all together) can apprehend the musicalness of some musical sounds. And (once a person has experienced music and has learned its principles properly), the human mind can think about music, and can create new musical arrangements as to their formal aspects, and the human imagination can imagine musical sounds. But actual music actually exists in sound waves in physical stuff, not in the mind or in the imagination, and the imagination could not generate phantasms of sound unless the person had sometime heard actual music.

      Be that as it may: even if the illustration fails, that doesn't mean the basic thesis is false. It may indeed be that regardless of music, the soul is conscious without the body.

      But I tend to doubt that the human soul would be conscious in any sense we normally would recognize without the body, if it were not for God intervening and supplying somewhat what is lacking: some people in comas, after awaking, clearly have some memory of "being aware" during the coma, whereas others do not. But (apparently) if you were in a coma because of brain damage and it damaged your visual cortex, you don't have any visual impressions (including memories or imaginings), and similarly for auditory. So, (I suggest) without the aid of the normal brain functions that normally constitute essential support for our thinking and awareness, it would be impossible to be aware. For example, most of us verbalize thoughts and concepts - the "conversation" inside us: but without a brain with its memories and phantasms, it would be impossible to actively formulate those concepts, even though the soul as such already has the concepts as to their formal content. (We are all aware of instances of being unable to think a precise thought that we want because we can't recall the precise word that (in our own thought architecture) goes WITH that concept.)

      The Socratic / Platonic theory of thought claims that a soul pre-exists its presence in the body, and that it already has its concepts. But the A-T thesis is that at least in humans, the formulation of concepts (e.g. in babies) first requires sensory input, and (later on) the actual use in some instance of that concept still involves (as a physical support) the use of a phantasm in the imagination, even though the phantasm isn't itself the concept, which is immaterial.

      Angels are not designed to think by way of sense and phantasms, so their thinking doesn't depend on body, neither in the historical sense of first getting the concepts due to sense impressions, nor in the process sense of using a phantasm to help use the concept. But man (apparently) does.

      Hence it is at least arguable that without God intervening, we humans, after death and before the final resurrection, would be unable to think as separated souls. But nothing hinders that God should indeed intervene and supply to the soul what is lacking in order that it may be aware and think. Indeed, it seems clearly to be so as to saints interceding on our behalf: they could not possibly HEAR our prayers asking for their intercession, on their own, and (in any case) senses alone would not be enough, as many prayers are not uttered aloud - God must supply to enable the saint to "hear" the request.

      Delete
    8. NemoJanuary 16, 2024 at 12:55 AM

      Anonymous,

      For the sake of discussion, could you please add a (user)name to your messages, so I can tell you apart from the other Anonymouses, and know whom I'm responding to?

      You wrote, "I think that if no instrument had ever played a musical note, it would not be true simply speaking that "music exists".

      The early Church Fathers wrote about the Music of God. For example, Clement of Alexandria wrote, "the Word of God, despising the lyre and harp, which are but lifeless instruments, and having tuned by the Holy Spirit the universe, and especially man,—who, composed of body and soul, is a universe in miniature,—makes melody to God on this instrument of many tones;" "And He Himself also, surely, who is the supramundane Wisdom, the celestial Word, is the all-harmonious, melodious, holy instrument of God."

      Accordingly, the formal principle of music is in the Word, or Reason, and the material cause of music can be the universe, or the soul of man. The type of music that is produced by sound waves and audible to us becomes insignificant, compared with the music of God.

      If it isn't obvious by now, I'm a Platonist, not an Aristotelian or Thomist. So to my mind, the formation of concepts is aided by sensory inputs, but doesn't require it. For instance, no amount of sensory input would teach a person how to do justice. For our senses tell us how things are, not what they ought to be., and the latter can only be found in Reason, and comprehended by the soul. Come to think of it, this is perhaps partly why the Israelites were forbidden to use any sensory aides in their worship of God, though He is described in anthropomorphic terms.

      The words we use to formulate concepts are but signs and symbols that point to things in reality, which exist independently of those symbols. "Words seem so futile, so feeble". If our knowledge of things stops at these symbols, we would be most pitiable indeed.

      Delete
    9. TonyJanuary 16, 2024 at 5:58 PM

      Nemo, I was the Anonymous who responded above. Normally I attach my name, but I forgot this time.

      I see: as a Platonist, of course my argument would leave you unconvinced, as it proceeds from an A-T basis. It would be necessary for us two to tackle the more foundational differences between Plato and Aristotle - which I am betting Prof. Feser gets into at least partly in the book - in order to make any headway on convincing the other.

      But even aside from that discussion, I think it is easy to note that in your comments about God's music, saying such things certainly involves using "music" in more than one sense, i.e. equivocation (or possibly, at the outside edge, analogy). Any form of orderliness can be called a "music", and I have heard people use expressions using "music" and "harmony" in reference to such disparate things as the activity of a healthy cell, and the consummate execution of a complex play by a champion football team. Such things share with music some of the same underlying principles, and especially the underlying principle of orderliness as such, but they are not music specifically in its proper sense.

      Come to think of it, this is perhaps partly why the Israelites were forbidden to use any sensory aides in their worship of God, though He is described in anthropomorphic terms.

      Well, actually they used physical things in worship of God, including sacrifice of animals and other things, burned incense, etc.

      If our knowledge of things stops at these symbols, we would be most pitiable indeed.

      Agreed: our minds are capable of apprehending essences, at least those of lesser beings. And with this, capable of formulating propositions that are universal in character, and known as universally true.

      Delete
    10. Hal FriederichsJanuary 17, 2024 at 6:34 AM

      Nemo wrote:
      "IF we accept that consciousness is "a power" of the soul, is there only one type of power or many? "

      We disagree on that. It is a capacity of the human being, not of a part of the human being. Humans have a wide array of powers.

      Unfortunately, since you inhabit the Plato camp and I the Wittgenstein camp, I'm afraid we will have trouble finding much in common.

      I have been reading your posts and find them to be quite interesting and well written. I look forward to reading more despite our differing views.

      Delete
    11. NemoJanuary 17, 2024 at 1:35 PM

      Hal Friederichs wrote,

      Unfortunately, since you inhabit the Plato camp and I the Wittgenstein camp, I'm afraid we will have trouble finding much in common.

      I haven't read Wittgenstein, but I'm sure there is much I can learn from him, even if it turns out that I disagree with him on most things.
      But communication may be a problem between people in different camps. I'm having difficulty making myself understood by Thomists, and we're supposed to be in the same "Ur-Platonist camp. :)

      Delete
    12. NemoJanuary 17, 2024 at 2:50 PM

      Tony,

      You wrote, "I think it is easy to note that in your comments about God's music, saying such things certainly involves using "music" in more than one sense, i.e. equivocation ..."

      "Equivocation" is one of the common criticisms of Plato/Socrates, but I think the critics are mistaking abstraction for equivocation: the former identifies what diverse elements have in common, whereas the latter use the same words to refer to things that are different.

      Clement of Alexandria (also a Platonist) may be using the word "music" to refer to a genus, of which the "music in its proper sense", as you put it, is but one species. In the former sense, the world is God's piano, and man his masterpiece.

      More relevant to the current discussion, however, I'm quoting Clement to draw people's attention away from the sensible to the intelligible. My point is that music has it's formal cause in Reason, not in matter, though it has many representations in the material world, one of which is the audible form, the other is musical transcription, yet another may be mathematical representation (though I haven't see it myself, it is conceivable). Music exists apart from the representations: if you destroy one, there are many others, and new ones can be made.

      The soul has its formal cause in the Word. Consciousness that is bound to the body may be one of many representations or manifestations of the power of the soul. If the body is transformed by God into a more glorious form, then consciousness would be transformed also, and then, we shall see God face to face, and we shall know God as we are known, as Apostle Paul writes.

      Delete
    13. TonyJanuary 17, 2024 at 9:40 PM

      Clement of Alexandria (also a Platonist) may be using the word "music" to refer to a genus, of which the "music in its proper sense", as you put it, is but one species.

      Suppose that is it. If so, then "music in its proper sense" being one species, has indeed something in common with the other members of the genus, AND it has some specific difference which makes it distinct in kind from the other members of the genus. It is, I think rather obvious what one might urge as the "in common" aspect is to the genus, (or at least, one component of it): orderliness among many parts, and even beauty in that orderliness. But there are many distinct kinds of beauty, and they must necessarily inhabit distinct species: "music" is not the proper referent for the kind of beauty in a sculpture, or in a landscape painting...except by extending the meaning so far outside of its proper sphere that it begins to lose its integrity. It is perfectly fine to employ a term like "music" for the genus when the genus does not have its own proper term, as long as we keep clear on the fact that we are borrowing it from its natural species and applying it equivocally or analogically BECAUSE there is no existing term for the genus.

      I recall that Aristotle in the Poetics has a similar problem, in that he is faced with no general term for an overarching art that encompasses works of drama, lyric poetry, flute-and lyre playing, and dance. His settling on "poetry" for the purpose is both understandable, and lamentable, as in doing so he bypasses the discussion of even whether these belong within the same archonic art form, or at least does it so briefly and implicitly that the debates are unsettled.)

      In any case, in a dispute between Platonists and Aristotelians, asserting that music "exists" even if no extant example exists embodied, because it exists-in-form, is just asserting the difference between us. It does not advance the dispute. I acknowledge that this is a poor place to try to hash out the actual arguments by which we can get at the disputed principles.

      Delete
  17. bmillerJanuary 12, 2024 at 7:43 PM

    I'm happy the manuscript is finished, as most everyone else is. Can't wait.

    So the question is "how long do I have to wait to read it"?

    Sorry if this is redundant.

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  18. AnonymousJanuary 13, 2024 at 5:06 PM

    Nice

    ReplyDelete
  19. ficino4mlJanuary 13, 2024 at 6:14 PM

    Today I was at a Pentecostal service. Everyone thought they knew the truth and that their take on divine matters was truth known so with certitude.
    Later I walked past a bunch of Hare Krishna. They were dancing, attracting a crowd...
    Shall I suppose that neither sect "knows" the truth, that instead, it is known by adherents of the bishop of Rome? Or maybe not even by those.
    Quot homines, tot sententiae ... ?

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    1. bmillerJanuary 14, 2024 at 7:00 AM

      ficino4ml,

      I suppose you can maintain that since there are so many contradictory answers from so many people that only you are correct.

      Assuming there is only one aspect we are talking about and the proposed answers can only be true or false there are other options:

      Everyone is wrong.
      One is correct and the others wrong.

      I would find it highly unlikely to conclude that my answer in a math test was the only correct one since so many students came up with so many different answers.

      Delete
    2. ficino4mlJanuary 14, 2024 at 11:33 AM

      @bmiller: Yes, I CAN maintain that only I am correct, but I do not, and I don't have a way of justifying a claim that that only I am correct, even if I were so to claim.

      You may recall the words attributed to Protagoras: “About the gods, I am unable to know whether they exist or do not exist, nor what they are like in form: for there are many things that hinder sure knowledge – the obscurity of the subject and the shortness of human life.” [note that P is not claiming that "no one can know"]

      Of course, the Athenians decreed that Protagoras' writings should be burned ...

      Delete
    3. bmillerJanuary 15, 2024 at 10:35 AM

      ficino4ml,

      You seemed to have been attempting make some sort of point about different groups of people having different answers about the truth of some matter. What point were you trying to make?

      I agree that you have no way of justifying that you are correct.

      Delete
  20. Tim FinlayJanuary 13, 2024 at 6:31 PM

    There are several doctrines (mind-body dualism is only one) which proponents of fads claim were falsely taught by the Church because of the "Hellenization thesis" initially popularized by Adolf von Harnack. The idea is that doctrine X was not believed by the New Testament writers but the Church Fathers introduced it because of the prevalent and malevolent influence of Greek philosophy. Yet dualism long preceded Hellenization. Jaegwon Kim is a physicalist but concedes that the default position of human societies is not physicalism but dualism: "Something like this dualism of personhood, I believe, is common lore shared across most cultures and religious traditions." Charles Taliaferro lists among the non-dualists who concede that dualism has been held by most people throughout history figures such as Michael Levin, Daniel Dennett, David Lewis, Thomas Nagel, J. J. C. Smart, Richard Rorty, Donald Davidson and Colin McGinn (who has a mysteryism view). So the Ancient Hebrews were almost certainly dualists. Nancey Murphy is a prominent Christian physicalist who discusses Old Testament texts which seem to indicate dualism. She claims that the writers of the Hebrew Bible were not dualists and that "later translators had read dualism back into the texts by employing, first, Greek anthropological terms, and then later translating these Greek terms into modern languages in ways that reflect their use by Greek philosophers." But this simply does not hold up. Dualism was the common sense presumption way before the Hebrews became Hellenized.

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    1. AnonymousJanuary 14, 2024 at 9:56 AM

      WCB

      In the Torah, spirit, breathe was what gave us life. When you died, that breath, left. In Isaiah, in the coming God's Holy Mountain, Israelite Utopia, mankind will live to be 100 years old. A life after death is not mentioned. That is a later concept added to Judaism post Isaiah.

      A careful reading of the final chapters of Isaiah gives us a snap shot of developing Israelite theology. We have not arrived at heaven, hell, eternal life or immortal souls yet. But Isaiah is a step up from Genesis 1 - 6.

      And it is this development, scattered through the Bible that is notable. God's Holy Mountain of Isaiah did not happen as promised.

      WCB

      Delete
    2. AnonymousJanuary 14, 2024 at 10:02 AM

      WCB

      @nemo

      Read Plato's The Laws - Book X
      I did, many years ago.

      Plato's Theaetetus is another Plato book that tries out some theological concepts from Plato.

      WCB

      Delete
    3. AnonymousJanuary 15, 2024 at 10:45 AM

      In the Torah, spirit, breathe was what gave us life. ... A life after death is not mentioned. That is a later concept added to Judaism post Isaiah....We have not arrived at heaven, hell, eternal life or immortal souls yet.

      King Saul consulted with the witch of Endor to raise Samuel's spirit after he had died. The belief in an afterlife is clear by the time of the first king. Psalm 17: 15, and Ps. 29:15 clearly indicate David's understanding of a state of soul persisting after death. Elijah raised a widow's son from the dead, demonstrating a subsisting soul providing the continuity of personality.

      These are not in the Torah, but were long before the exile period or any Greek influence.

      Delete
    4. AnonymousJanuary 15, 2024 at 11:53 AM

      I see very little evidence of dualism in the OT. Dualism was an Early Egyptian idea. And some Persian religions. Greek ideas of souls seems to be later than the Israelite prophets. Roman Lares and Penates of Romans indicate belief in dualism, spirits. Such ideas are not uncommon to ancient cultures, but do not seem to be important in the prophets. But the redactors of such later writings seemed to believe in spirits.
      The Witch of Endor for example calling up the spirit of Samuel.

      WCB

      Delete
    5. Tim FinlayJanuary 23, 2024 at 10:11 AM

      As even WCB pointed out, the Early Egyptians were mind-body dualists. The Israelites were slaves in Egypt for at least 200 years, so they would have been aware of mind-body dualism and yet never taught against it. [There are numerous statements that are neutral to a physicalist interpretation or a dualist interpretation, but there is no explicit refutation of the dualist position in the Hebrew scriptures. Qohelet comes closest in expressing skepticism towards it.] Let me reiterate my original point: leading atheist physicalists concede that mind-body dualism is the default position of cultures. Jaegwon Kim writes, "Something like this dualism of personhood, I believe, is common lore shared across most cultures and religious traditions." The default assumption is that the ancient Israelites were mind-body dualists.

      Delete
  21. StirlingJanuary 14, 2024 at 11:48 AM

    Just discovered your site. Looking forward to exploring but after perusing for a bit, I've realized that I'm likely not smart enough to be here. Patience and repetition.

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    1. AnonymousJanuary 15, 2024 at 7:01 PM

      Stirling
      If you can read and write, you are smart enough to comment here.
      Most of those who comment on this blog are not trained philosophers.
      Anything you don't understand you can Google it. Read Dr Feser's book "Aquinas. " It's clearly written and can be understood by the average reader.

      Delete
  22. Hal FriederichsJanuary 14, 2024 at 11:55 AM

    Tim,
    Agree with most of what you wrote regarding dualism.
    I would go even further and say many materialists are dualists. Instead of mind/body dualism they have have identified the mind with the brain and so have adopted brain/body dualism. By doing so they end up dealing with the same conceptual issues that are found in dualistic concepts.

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    1. AnonymousJanuary 15, 2024 at 11:43 AM

      WCB

      Mind is a process. It is the activity of a correctly functioning physical brain. Dualism is the idea that some sort of non-material soul or spirit is involved with underlying the physical brain and body. These two concepts are not the same. And should not be confused, or conflated.

      WCB

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    2. Hal FriederichsJanuary 17, 2024 at 6:12 AM

      WCB,

      Without a brain a human being could not be said to have a mind. I think we would agree on that point.
      However, it is mistaken to identify the mind with the brain and its activity.
      One reason is that it would be confusing a power with its vehicle.
      Another is that the mind is not an entity or thing or activity. The word "mind" is a façon de parler. We use it to talk about the intellectual capacities humans have.
      Also, it only makes sense to attribute those intellectual capacities to the human being, not to the bain. The criteria of identity we use for
      those intellectual powers are based on the behavior of the human being. Not on the neural activity in the brain.

      Delete
  23. AnonymousJanuary 14, 2024 at 4:17 PM

    WCB

    @Nemo

    "If we grant that there are things that are not physical, but no less real, such as mathematics, justice, beauty, charity, and the God of Christianity, ......"

    There are things. That have properties. And processes involving those things.

    Mathematics is relationships of things. 1 thing is different from 2 things for example. Man experiences justice. Rocks do not. But when we jump to things, not processes such as gods, here is where we start making errors.

    WCB

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    1. AnymouseJanuary 15, 2024 at 10:27 AM

      Mathematics is relationships of things.

      And their relationships are not real?

      There are things. That have properties. And processes involving those things.

      According to quantum theory, or at least some versions of it, "matter" is an emergent property of processes like vibrations. And matter / anti-matter pairs form spontaneously from the base energy state of a region of space.

      Delete
    2. AnonymousJanuary 15, 2024 at 4:38 PM

      WCB

      Relationships are real. But need real things to exist.

      Emergent properties cannot exist without things that are real underlying them. Which physicists nowadays tend to think of in terms of fields.

      Whether it is strings or something else has not been determined yet. And things like dark matter are not yet understood. Some physicists think MOND, modified Newtonian dynamics may be a possible answer. Plus other theories. We just don't know yet. There is a lot of work going on in physics and we may not know for centuries what the basic underlying physics is.

      But that does not mean we are free to fill that gap with something like disembodied creators that have serious theoretical problems that are serious, such as where does logic, logos, reality come from? Does God create these things as per Descartes? Or does this God have limits, not capable of doing the impossible, according to Aquinas. Which implies outside forces limiting God Aquinas. If God creates metaphysical necessities and is good, God could banish moral evil. Creat man with free will who freely only does moral good. If God is limited by outside forces, logic, we can equally give credit for that outside logos for all existence.

      I see this as a serious issue. Far more serious than problems with today's physics. What then is the nature of reality? What evidence do we have souls or disembodied intelligent beings can and do exist? Other than woo woo from paranormal cable TV shows.

      WCB

      Delete
  24. KevinJanuary 14, 2024 at 5:23 PM

    God's Holy Mountain of Isaiah did not happen as promised.

    "Has not happened yet" would be more precise.

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    1. AnonymousJanuary 15, 2024 at 11:21 AM

      WCB

      Isaiah is full of false prophecies. Isaiah 61-66 was the Holy Mountain Utopia soon to come. It did not as promise. Trying to tell us it is still to come is not very convincing. Many Christians tell us it predicting the coming of Christ but then we have the failed coming of the Kingdom Of God in the times of the followers of Jesus, so that is not convincing either. And Isiah's prophecy does not have any mention of souls, eternal life, life after death etc. Important to this thread. Again, we have developing Israelite theology.

      WCB

      Delete
    2. KevinJanuary 15, 2024 at 5:26 PM

      Many Christians tell us it predicting the coming of Christ but then we have the failed coming of the Kingdom Of God in the times of the followers of Jesus, so that is not convincing either.

      That also wasn't a failure. Jesus knew the scriptures, and per the timeline of Daniel 9, what he said would have been perfectly accurate. But he also said no one, not even himself, knew the exact time. Only the Father knew that.

      The church at Pentecost was clearly preparing per Jesus' words as presented in the Gospels. Everything was on track.

      Then Jesus appeared to a scoundrel named Saul, who became the apostle Paul. Paul was given a mystery regarding the meaning of Christ's death, that anyone could be saved if they accepted that Christ died for their sins and that this work satisfied God. No one knew of this, for Paul plainly states it is being revealed through him and his ministry.

      The meaning of the cross, salvation to the Gentiles through Christ's death, and the dispensation of the grace of God were all mysteries revealed by Paul. This is the age where through the fall of Israel, salvation came unto everyone else. This two thousand year period was not in prophecy, but a mystery hid in God the Father.

      One day this dispensation will end, and the final week of Daniel 9, the seven year tribulation period, will begin. And afterward Christ will establish the kingdom, and the Isaiah prophecy will be fulfilled.

      Again, not a failure. Everything looks to be right on track to me.

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    3. KevinJanuary 15, 2024 at 5:31 PM

      Again, we have developing Israelite theology.

      I don't see how this is an issue. Adam and Noah didn't know what Abraham had revealed to him. Abraham didn't know the Levitical law because it was given to Moses much later. More was revealed to David, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel, and so on. That's how prophecy and revelation work. You'd expect the theology to develop, not remain static.

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    4. AnonymousJanuary 16, 2024 at 10:18 AM

      WCB

      Adam and Eve et al are mythology. Again, part of Israelite theology much redacted et al. The state of Israelite theology in Isaiah et al does not have a heaven, hell, eternal life, this is the state of Israelite theology of the prophet era. The idea of such things is widespread, Egypt, Persia and so on. It slowly crept into Israelite theology over time. I am sure Dr. Feser's book will address some of that. I hope so anyway. And of course, we only know scraps and bits of what was believed when and by who in Israel. All we can do is take what the prophets wrote as evidence of what was at that time, what was believed.

      WCB

      WCB

      WCB

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    5. Michael CopasJanuary 16, 2024 at 12:17 PM

      WCB,

      If the account of Adam and Eve are redacted, tell in detail how you KNOW the original tradition and how you know that the text of Genesis varies from that tradition. We are all on the edge of our seat waiting for you to enlighten us with something other than dated tropes from a bygone age of Pentateuchal studies. If you actually kept up with the state of the discipline of Pentateuchal source theory, you would realize that there is now widespread rejection of Wellhausen's theory and that there is no accepted framework to replace it. So you can't appeal to scholarly consensus for your amateurish repetition of something you learned a little bit about from reading someone's blog. So, who again do you think you are fooling? Instead of pretending like you have a clue what you are talking about on a wide range of topics where a mere scratch below the surface shows you to be clueless, why not try to engage a topic at a deeper level where it is clear that you actually understand what you are so hell bent on criticizing. That would be refreshing to all readers of this blog.

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    6. AnonymousJanuary 16, 2024 at 4:41 PM

      WCB WCB WCB You've been on Wikipedia a lot.

      Delete
    7. AnymouseJanuary 16, 2024 at 6:09 PM

      Adam and Eve et al are mythology....blah blah blah.

      You can assert such things all day long. But merely asserting them is empty, and frankly a little obnoxious.

      I imagine that you have read essays or books whose theses include your claims above. You could have mentioned a few of these, maybe an author or two, even given a brief outline of how one such argument runs. That would have been worth a bit. (Probably not much, but a bit.) What you did write is below the bare minimum to engage, sheer empty blather.

      You have bothered to enter this forum an awful lot. Why don't you try a new tack: try to locate some kind of common ground with the likely protagonists that are here readily found, and then develop arguments from that shared base?

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    8. SacredKnowingJanuary 16, 2024 at 10:44 PM

      @Michael Copas

      That Adam and Eve are a small redacted edition of some ancient narrative that holds the complete Truth is cringy folklore. In fact, I think it has to be somewhere in the Aarne-Thompson Folklore classification.

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  25. MechaMutohJanuary 15, 2024 at 6:20 AM

    I sure hope the book will address the question of why the soul becomes "set into state" (whether in a state of grace or in mortal sin) after death because of the separation of the body, but will remain set even after resurrection. I can understand why after a soul has seen God it can't ever separate from Him again, but the state of the reprobate seems harder to grasp.

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  26. AnonymousJanuary 16, 2024 at 1:49 PM

    WCB

    @Kevin
    "That also wasn't a failure. Jesus knew the scriptures, and per the timeline of Daniel 9, what he said would have been perfectly accurate."

    Jesus repeatedly claimed his return was to be in the times of his followers. Most certainly his commands to abandon homes and families to wait for the coming Kingdom of God does not fit with ideas that this was not soon, very soon. Matthew is quite clear about that.
    This Kingdom Of God, a new world run by Jesus as king, a heaven on Earth does not seem to involve souls in heaven as most people understand Christianity today.

    Perhaps Dr. Feser in his book will address this aspect of the NT.

    WCB

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  27. BillyJanuary 16, 2024 at 2:15 PM

    I'm interested in the question of whether souls are gendered. I've seen different Thomists give different answers.

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    1. Michael CopasJanuary 19, 2024 at 5:38 AM

      This is an important question and one's answer is determined by how one understands basic, but complicated philosophical questions about the relationship of form and matter within hylemorphism. If knowledge is of the universal and the soul is the form of the body, then our souls are formally the same, but our act of existence ("nature", a third thing beyond form and matter)--which includes the body--is individuated because of the body. So, we are male and female by our bodies and not by our souls. The species is determined by the soul. We are all rational animals. The body accounts for individuating differences within the species (race, gender, these parents, born in this place, etc.).

      Scotus held that there is an individuating form that makes things individual giving each thing its "thisness." He presented arguments for this position in at least a couple of places (his lectura and either the ordinatio or reportatio), but his options were affected by the condmentation of 1277 which, according to Fr. Wippel, condemned certain Thomistic positions (and was later reversed after the canonization of St. Thomas in the 1320s). Among those was the teaching that matter individuates material things. One of the problem for the scholastics was then: how are angels individuated as they are not material. St. Thomas' answer was that they are each individuated by species. Each angel is a distinct species.

      I think that this framework works extremely well and that Scotus' philosophical critique of matter as a principle of individuation makes a mistake of reifying prime matter as a though it were universal and could not provide what is needed for individuation. In other words, individuating forms are unnecessary exposing Scotus to Ockham's machete (as Gyula Klima has called it). However, Ockham's solution was no solution at all and resulted in the possiblity of demon skepticism. This is something that, as Gyula Klima has noted, can't even get off the ground within Thomistic realism. So, realism as presented by St. Thomas and defended and develloped within Thomism is the most robust, profound, and well reasoned framework for accounting for reality.

      It is also important to keep in mind that there are strands of Thomism and even professed Thomists who go wildly off the rails. There are Thomists who appallingly assert that St. Thomas was a nominalist (Benedict Ashley in his metaphysics book). This is a radical misreading of St. Thomas that tells us more about Fr. Ashley and the line of influence through Suarez on Thomism than it does about St. Thomas. So how one answers the problem of universals and how one understands individuation (i.e. has one's account been influenced by Scotus through Suarez) affects how one answers this question.

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    2. NemoJanuary 19, 2024 at 4:04 PM

      Michael Copas,

      You wrote, "If knowledge is of the universal and the soul is the form of the body, then our souls are formally the same"

      I'm not sure I follow the logic: Given "the soul is the form of the body", it would follow that our souls are all forms of our bodies, but not that they are the same forms.

      The species is determined by the soul. We are all rational animals. The body accounts for individuating differences within the species (race, gender, these parents, born in this place, etc.).

      Is there a reason why, for individuation, some differentiating factors are assigned to matter, and others to the soul? It seems arbitrary to me. If an angel can be a species, then a fortiori gender can also be a species.

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    3. Michael CopasJanuary 22, 2024 at 8:52 AM

      @ Nemo

      Thank you for the comments.

      "I'm not sure I follow the logic: Given "the soul is the form of the body", it would follow that our souls are all forms of our bodies, but not that they are the same forms."

      I mean to say that they are formally identical. The soul in every man is that by which he is a rational animal and in this way all men are the same. They are formally identical. However, the act of the form is through a body and this act is individuated through the body. So there is not one act of existence and in this way not one human soul. However, no human soul is anything other than the rational life ordered toward a body and in this way each human soul is formally the same.

      "Is there a reason why, for individuation, some differentiating factors are assigned to matter, and others to the soul? It seems arbitrary to me. If an angel can be a species, then a fortiori gender can also be a species."

      The answer of St. Thomas was that matter is the principle of individuation in material things. It distinguishes us from other animals of the same species. If however there were only one of a species (as with angels) the species itself would be sufficient for individuation. The way the logic of this moved historically was based on a few things. First, matter was held to be the principle of individuation in material things based on Aristotle. Second, when the broader Aristotelian corpus was introduced to the scholastics in the 1200s, they started to ask about things that were individuals and yet not material, like angels. Third, they held angels were indiviuals because they held them to be persons and Boethius' definition of person was "an individual substance of a rational nature."

      Then the question came up: if ALL things are individuated by matter and angels are both immaterial and indivuals, how could they be indiviutated without matter. The answer was that this is impossible upon the supposition that ALL things are individuated by matter. Rather only material things are individuated by matter. Each angel is it's own species and by this it is individuated.

      The species is one of the five predicables of porphry along with genus, difference (or specific difference), property (or proper accident), and accident. Understanding the categories may help in understanding that a movement toward the genera is a movement toward being in its broadest sense and movement toward the specific is a move toward the individual.

      All of this is to say that matter is sufficient for individuation but not necessary.

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    4. NemoJanuary 22, 2024 at 9:43 PM

      @Michael Copas,

      If I understand you correctly, and simply put, If the soul can exist without the body, then it would be impossible to tell the difference between one soul and another, for the soul has no race, no gender, no age, no religion, no country, no culture - nothing is predicated of the soul apart from living and rationality. Is that right?



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    5. Michael CopasJanuary 23, 2024 at 11:18 AM

      @Nemo,

      That is a helpful way of framing the question. Answering it requires framing the relationship between the body and the soul and understanding the person as a composite of body and soul. As a formal cause, the soul is associated with actuality in relation to the body in two senses. First, the soul actualizes the body making it a human body. Second, the soul acts through the body. When we choose some exterior act (to run, to write, to talk), these acts stem from the soul but are through the body. It is for this reason that the will is fixed at death. Without the body, it has no means of achieving its exterior act. In this way, the natural relation of soul and body is that the soul acts through the body.

      This is related several of the negations you made. The person is a composite of the soul and body and in this way the person does have race, gender, age, religion, country and culture. Race, gender, age, and country/culture of origin happen to the person (passively) through the body but they do not have their proper origin in the soul of the person who has a certain gender, race, etc. In other words, neither race, gender, age, nor country/culture of origin are determined by the soul's act. They happen to the body so to speak and in this way they affect the person.

      Religion is different, however, in that it is something that we choose (hopefully in accordance with Truth). In other words it stems from the intellect and the will which are faculties or powers of the soul. In this way, it could be said that the soul has a religion, but would not be proper to say that the soul has an ethnicity or gender.

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    6. NemoJanuary 24, 2024 at 5:47 PM

      @Michael Copas,.

      Religion is different, however, in that it is something that we choose (hopefully in accordance with Truth).

      "No religion" was a tribute to John Lennon, but your response about free choice of the will is interesting. It seems to me that our cultural and ethnic identify can also be the result of will and intellect. For example, the Passover is an important part of Jewish culture. The Biblical account tells us that it celebrates the delivery of the Israelites from slavery. Many people disregard their culture heritage, but many choose to embrace their culture heritage and identity, because it aligns with their core values. The same can be said about religion.

      When we ask questions like, "What does it mean to be a human being (or Black, or a Jew, or a Christian)?" I think the answers would have little to do with our bodies, but much do do with the struggles and aspirations of our souls. This is partly why I'm having difficulty attributing these traits to the body or matter.

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    7. TonyJanuary 24, 2024 at 9:14 PM

      If the soul can exist without the body, then it would be impossible to tell the difference between one soul and another, for the soul has no race, no gender, no age, no religion, no country, no culture - nothing is predicated of the soul apart from living and rationality.

      The soul, considered as if it had not yet been individuated by specific matter, has none of the facets like sex, age ethnicity, etc. But that's a mere mental as if because the soul isn't ever actual except at the moment it first becomes the soul of a person, the form of the body of that person.

      Once it HAS BEEN the form of a determinate body, it has been individuated, and it retains its individuation by reason of that composition. It doesn't "go back to" some primordial unsexed state after death, both because it never had such a primordial state, and because even after death it has an orientation toward a determinate body.

      As a partial analogy: Once the soul learns the Pythagorean Theorem, through hearing a teacher and looking at the diagram and thinking through the logic, it knows that truth ever after, whether it ever hears that professor again, and whether it ever goes through the logical steps again. It knows the truth in virtue of its past action, which never ceases to be ITS OWN past action, even after death. So, it doesn't revert to a state without such a past, it persists in the knowledge that it once obtained by act. The act that it undergoes permanently changes the soul as to the accident that consists in knowing that specific truth.

      The soul retains also any other habits that the person acquired during life. The most critical one being the habit of charity, which merits heaven. But also any other habits that take up residence as to the soul: vices and virtues, and other things.

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    8. NemoJanuary 26, 2024 at 12:51 AM

      Tony wrote, "The soul, considered as if it had not yet been individuated by specific matter, has none of the facets like sex, age ethnicity, etc."

      I understand now (from what Michael Copas wrote above) that this is a Thomist conception of the soul. I was curious what arguments could be made to support it, that is, if this conclusion can be derived from what we know.

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    9. AnonymousJanuary 26, 2024 at 2:24 PM

      Under what sense of "what we know"? According to the materialists, there is no such thing as "the soul" nor "forms", and even there could be some immaterial thing, we can't know it. So, what kind of knowing do you grant for the sake of discussing forms and the soul?

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    10. NemoJanuary 27, 2024 at 11:19 PM

      Anonymous wrote, "what kind of knowing do you grant for the sake of discussing forms and the soul?

      Granted that the soul is the form of the body, how does one get to the conclusion that the soul has no gender, nor race, nor any other personal traits. So far, it has been asserted by Michael and Tony, but not argued - they define the soul as something void of personal traits.

      Granted that each person has a soul, each person would also have some knowledge and experience of the soul, its activity and power, does this "blank slate" definition of the soul correspond with what we know of the soul?

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    11. Hal FriederichsJanuary 28, 2024 at 6:10 AM

      Nemo wrote: "Granted that each person has a soul...."

      From a Wittgensteinian perspective, one would need to examine what is meant by "to have" something. And that requires examining the various contexts in which it is used.
      "Joe has a coin in his pocket."
      "Jill is having a good time at the party."
      "Each human has a soul."
      Seems that some form of possession is expressed by "to have". Joe can lose the coin he had in his pocket. He can give it away to another person. Can Jill do that with her "good time"? Or can humans do that with their souls?
      We do say that a person has lost his soul. But does it make sense to say he lost it somewhere in his house? Or to say "he didn't lose, he gave it away to his good friend"?

      Also, what criteria do we use to establish the truth of the above 3 sentences?
      In the first, we can simply ask Joe to show us his coin.
      In the second, we can see the happy expression in her face and hear it in her voice.
      In the the third, don't we attribute souls to people because they have the capacity to act morally? If a person's behavior becomes so depraved, don't we say "He has lost his soul."?

      Interstingly, the only way we can apply the above criteria is if a person has a body. Perhaps the assumption that the soul is some sort of entity that can exist free of the human body is wrong.

      I'm not presenting the above as some kind of proof that there aren't human souls. Personally, I think it is true that humans have souls. But I don't think that entails believing it is something that is immortal and enjoys indendent existance free of the body.

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    12. AnonymousJanuary 28, 2024 at 4:44 PM

      Granted that the soul is the form of the body, how does one get to the conclusion that the soul has no gender, nor race, nor any other personal traits. So far, it has been asserted by Michael and Tony, but not argued - they define the soul as something void of personal traits.

      Not at all: it follows directly from the soul being the substantial form of the body. The form is what determines the species of a thing, and thus the form is the same in all members of the species. As soon as we note that men and women are the same in species, we already can say that they are the same in form. (They are the same in species because - among many other proofs - they reproduce together, and produce both male and female children. The same applies to humans of different races: since they are humans, they share forms that are like to each other, for the form determines the species. All the more so for cultural differences, since they are due to environment / how you are raised: if you take a baby born to Italians, and raise him in Japan, he will be more Japanese in cultural attitudes and behaviors than he will be Italian - but in any case, it's not a difference of species, so it cannot be found as a difference in form.

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    13. NemoJanuary 28, 2024 at 7:01 PM

      Anonymous,

      First of all, could you please add a name to your messages? (I ask this of all Anonymouses). It is very awkward having a discussion without knowing whom I'm responding to each time.

      You wrote, "it follows directly from the soul being the substantial form of the body. The form is what determines the species of a thing, and thus the form is the same in all members of the species.

      Again, i don't follow the logic. IF the soul is the form of the body, and the body is the body of an individual, not the species (for we don't say the species has a body, but the individual has a body). How can the soul be the form of an individual body AND the form of the species?

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    14. NemoJanuary 28, 2024 at 9:20 PM

      Hal Friederichs wrote,

      From a Wittgensteinian perspective, one would need to examine what is meant by "to have" something. And that requires examining the various contexts in which it is used.

      If I agree with your statement above, does it make me a Wittgensteinian? :)

      Interstingly, the only way we can apply the above criteria is if a person has a body

      The body is a vehicle of expression, but not the only one. For example, when I read Xenophon's Anabasis, I can feel the joy of those Greek soldiers when they shouted "the Sea! the Sea!" realizing they were finally home. I know they had a good time without a doubt, though they were dead and buried more than 2000 years ago, and I have no idea what they looked or sounded like.

      In the the third, don't we attribute souls to people because they have the capacity to act morally? If a person's behavior becomes so depraved, don't we say "He has lost his soul."?

      As far as I can tell, for every capacity/power we have, there is a corresponding organ (or you might call it vehicle), eyes for sight, ears for hearing, etc. So it seems reasonable to think that our moral capacity also has its organ/vehicle. And it is due to the loss of the proper function of this vehicle that we say the person "lost his soul" or conscience.

      You seem to be saying that our moral capacity has no identifiable vehicle, and that we judge a person's morality by their behaviour. If that were the case, then it wouldn't make sense to say that the person "lost his soul". Instead, we would say that the person committed a moral or immoral act, as the actor on stage gives a good or bad performance.

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    15. Hal FriederichsJanuary 29, 2024 at 4:30 PM

      Nemo said:
      "If I agree with your statement above, does it make me a Wittgensteinian? :)"
      No.:-)

      I've no disagreement with your discussion regarding the vehicles of our powers. But that kinda misses the point I was making:
      What are the criteria we use to ascribe capacities or powers or attributes to a human being. Since those criteria (I usually call them 'criteria of identity') are typically behavioral, they can only be applied if a human has a body. Even your example illustrates this nicely:

      "The body is a vehicle of expression, but not the only one. For example, when I read Xenophon's Anabasis, I can feel the joy of those Greek soldiers when they shouted "the Sea! the Sea!" realizing they were finally home."

      The Greek soldiers could only shout "the Sea! the Sea!" because they have bodies. Of course they also have to know a language and be able to express it through their speech organs.

      "You seem to be saying that our moral capacity has no identifiable vehicle, and that we judge a person's morality by their behaviour."

      In my view, neither the mind nor the soul is an entity or thing that exists as a part of the human being. Nor can they exist apart from the body. Rather a human being can be said to have a mind because he displays various intellecutal capacities and is able to act for reasons. And a human being can be said to have a soul because he is able to act for good or for evil.

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    16. NemoJanuary 29, 2024 at 11:50 PM

      Hal Friederichs,

      You wrote, "What are the criteria we use to ascribe capacities or powers or attributes to a human being. Since those criteria (I usually call them 'criteria of identity') are typically behavioral, they can only be applied if a human has a body."

      It seems to me you're conflating identify with observable bodily behaviour. While it is true that we usually learn about a person by observing their behaviour and inferring their attributes from their behaviour, i.e., inferring cause from the effect. My point with Xenophon is that a person can have an effect on other people and the world that lasts far beyond the existence of his/her body. IF we attribute all the effects a person has on the world to their cause, not just the ones produced through his own body, we'll have to conclude that his identity is not limited to his body. For we cannot deny that some power is at play here. To what shall we attribute that power then?

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    17. Hal FriederichsJanuary 31, 2024 at 6:22 AM

      Nemo,
      "To what shall we attribute that power then?"

      We attribute it to the human being who displays it through his behavior.

      You and Xenophon both have the capacity (power) to use language. So Xenophon was able to write about the joyful Greek soldiers and you are able to read what he wrote.




      Delete
    18. SteveKJanuary 31, 2024 at 7:32 AM

      Ah, there you are Hal. You left Victor's blog so abruptly that I thought maybe you were in trouble. Good to see you.

      Delete
    19. Hal FriederichsJanuary 31, 2024 at 2:34 PM

      Hi SteveK,
      Thanks for the warm greeting. Sorry to have caused any worries on your part. I had too many other things on my plate at that time. Couldn't deal with them all. I should have at least dropped you guys a quick good bye. My apologies.
      Take care.

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    20. NemoFebruary 1, 2024 at 2:38 PM

      Hal Friederichs,

      Before I proceed, can I assume that you agree there is a difference between identity and observable behaviour?

      You wrote, So Xenophon was able to write about the joyful Greek soldiers and you are able to read what he wrote.

      He wrote a book over 2,000 years ago, and both he and the book(s) he wrote ceased to exist. If we attribute power to a person presumably dead, aren't we suggesting that he somehow exists in some form free of his body?

      Interestingly, this is actually one of the ways in which people in many (ancient) cultures envision immortality. For instance, artists seek immortality in their art. To quote another Latin writer, “Let that day come which has no power save over this mortal frame, and end the span of my uncertain years. Still in my better part I shall be borne immortal far beyond the lofty stars and I shall have an undying name”.

      I realize that the word "immortality" has different senses, but something is preserved, whatever the sense may be. I wonder what is actually preserved and what people hope to preserve when they think about immortality.

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    21. Hal FriederichsFebruary 2, 2024 at 5:07 AM

      Nemo,
      "Before I proceed, can I assume that you agree there is a difference between identity and observable behaviour?"

      Yes, but they are conceptually linked. There is an internal relationship between the two. If there wasn't we couldn't use that behavioral criteria to identify the powers that a human being has.


      "He wrote a book over 2,000 years ago, and both he and the book(s) he wrote ceased to exist. If we attribute power to a person presumably dead, aren't we suggesting that he somehow exists in some form free of his body?"

      No. As you said "he wrote a book". It was when he was living that he had the ability to write his tale of the Greek soldiers. Also, it is possible that he may have lost that ability before he even died. After all, our mental and physical powers do generally weaken as we age. For example, my ability to write in cursive has almost completely disappeared. I see no reason to think Xenophon's powers could have continued to exist after his death. In any case, we can't attribute them to his corpse. We only know that he had the ability to write his tale because he wrote it down and others made copies of his book.
      I agree with your observations regarding the various uses of the word "immortality". But I have the impression that you are using it more literaly in this case. If I'm mistaken and you think that it means something like 'the fame of Xenophon will endure' then it would be helpful if you clarify this point.

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    22. NemoFebruary 2, 2024 at 12:17 PM

      Hal Friederichs,

      I'm asking why someone who wrote books 2,000 years ago should have the power to affect us today. Surely this power is different from the power to read and write, for many modern authors we read have no effect on us whatsoever, and presumably lasting fame is the result and proof of such power.

      You wrote, "I agree with your observations regarding the various uses of the word "immortality". But I have the impression that you are using it more literaly in this case."

      Remember this thread started with the question whether the soul has gender. I haven't formed an opinion on this at all, and so I'm following the practice of Aristotle here, that is, gathering all existing ideas on the soul (and immortality), and sifting through them to decide which ones seem most coherent and reasonable.

      Do I use the word "immortality" in a "literal" sense? Yes, otherwise I wouldn't call myself a Platonist. :) But I'm wondering whether when ancients talk about "immortal fame", they also mean it literally, though not in a material sense.

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    23. Hal FriederichsFebruary 3, 2024 at 11:40 AM

      Nemo,
      "I'm asking why someone who wrote books 2,000 years ago should have the power to affect us today. Surely this power is different from the power to read and write, for many modern authors we read have no effect on us whatsoever, and presumably lasting fame is the result and proof of such power."

      Any well-written story can affect us. Whether it is a 2,000 year old story or one the was written last year. Seems to me the year a tale is told or written down has nothing to do with the quality of the tale. I can recall many modern novels that have moved me much more than anything Xenophon wrote. Our powers are not distributed evenly among the human race.
      So it is not really a different power but the quality of that power which explains your response to Xenophon's tale of the Greek soldiers.

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    24. NemoFebruary 4, 2024 at 12:45 AM

      Hal Friederichs

      You wrote, ."I can recall many modern novels that have moved me much more than anything Xenophon wrote."

      I don't doubt it, but that's beside the point. The question is not whether some modern authors can write, but to what or whom should we attribute the power that affects people.

      You wrote, "Any well-written story can affect us.."

      Are you suggesting that a story is an entity with power to affect people, even though it has no physical existence?

      Delete
    25. Hal FriederichsFebruary 4, 2024 at 11:27 AM

      Nemo,
      “The question is not whether some modern authors can write, but to what or whom should we attribute the power that affects people.”
      We attrribut it to the author. Stories don’t write themselves.

      “Are you suggesting that a story is an entity with power to affect people, even though it has no physical existence?”
      Not at all. Please note that I said “well-written”. The power to write a moving story is attributed to the author.
      Most humans have linguistic powers, but those powers are not distributed equally. Some people are better writers than others. Just as some baseball-players are better than other ones.

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    26. Hal FriederichsFebruary 4, 2024 at 1:51 PM

      Nemo,
      I would also like to add that we should not forget the linguistic powers of the reader. Like authors, some readers are more skillful than others. And readers have different tastes. What may be joyful reading experience for one reader could be a boring one for another.

      Delete
    27. NemoFebruary 6, 2024 at 11:30 PM

      Hal Friederichs,

      A well-written story is still a story, and "well-written" is one of its qualities. This seems to me an example of an entity without definite physical existence, but no less real, since it has both power and qualities.

      IF, however, you attribute the power to affect people to the writer, you'll have to explain how a person long dead can exercise power over the living, unless s/he continues to exist in some form free of the body.

      The power to write ceases when the writer dies (if not before), wheres the power of his work to affect people remains, long after he is dead. They are different powers. If you insist on conflating them, this discussion will be going in circles.

      Delete
    28. Hal FriederichsFebruary 7, 2024 at 6:43 AM

      Nemo,
      "....you'll have to explain how a person long dead can exercise power over the living, unless s/he continues to exist in some form free of the body."

      The author exercises this literary power by writing it down. As long as a copy of the story exists and there are people who can read it then it is irrelevant whether or not the author is living or dead.

      Any power you want to attribute to a story is really derived from the linguistic abilities of the author and his readers. Without those linguistic powers there could be no literary works.

      That is why authors such Shakespeare or Mellville or Faulkner are revered and celebrated by their readers. They each have demonstrated their literary powers by creating such great works of literature.

      "...this discussion will be going in circles."

      I think it already has been for some time. That's why this will be my last post on the topic. It has been very interesting. Also, thanks much for keeping it civil.




      Delete
  28. AnonymousJanuary 17, 2024 at 7:18 AM

    WCB

    @Michael Copas

    If the account of Adam and Eve are redacted, tell in detail how you KNOW the original tradition...."

    It has been well established the Torah is a work of many hands. A simple reading of Genesis 1 - 3 tells the tale.

    All early cultures had their creation tales. This is the tale of early Israel. Possible influenced by earlier cultural tales. Which matters little. This tale has two creation tales, Genesis 1 and 2. It all explains why life is hard, why life if short, and that is the important point.

    From here, people still reinterpret this tale rather than reading it carefully. The serpent becomes Satan. But Satan is not found in the Torah.

    Adam was created as a gardener. To be denied knowledge of good and evil, reserved to God and his sons, (see Geneis 6 and Job 1 and 2) and immortality. Adam was not to be a divinity himself.

    Early tales of God creating mankind as servants et al are common in that era in many cultures.

    It is easy to misread this creation tale and add claims not supported by a more neutral reading that lets the tale speak for itself.

    Death entered the world due to Adam's sin. No, man never had immortality, denied that by God, Adam's creator.

    Immortal souls, heaven, hell, Satan et all are absent from the Torah. This early Israelite theology did not have such concepts. This was the simplest and earliest layer of development of Judaism. And we are missing a lot as we cannot go back and ask these early writers, "What exactly did you mean by that?" or "Where did that idea come from?". We work with what we have. And the 2 far different creation stories of Genesis 1 and Genesis 2 are signals that we cannot take them too seriously as revealed truths.

    WCB

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    Replies
    1. Son of Ya'KovJanuary 17, 2024 at 1:54 PM

      In other words he doesn't know. Oh WCB.
      Never change.....
      :D

      Delete
    2. AnonymousJanuary 18, 2024 at 7:06 AM

      WCB

      In other words, we cannot ask the original writer why there are two different creation stories of Genesis 1 and Genesis 2.

      WCB

      Delete
    3. Michael CopasJanuary 19, 2024 at 3:53 AM

      WCB,

      "Well established" "A simple reading".

      I have read it. Many times and in Hebrew. So, again, tell us all how you KNOW this. No appeal to your own folklore. No appeal to a non-existing consensus. Lay out IN DETAIL, how you know the original tradition and how you KNOW that there is variation off that tradition. No more of your silly mythology WCB and no more hiding behind a non-existent consensus. Take off your own little fig leaf and lay out the facts. The emperor is already seen by all here to be in the buff.

      Delete
    4. Michael CopasJanuary 19, 2024 at 4:02 AM

      WCB,

      "Possible influenced by earlier cultural tales. Which matters little."

      I think you mean "possibly." And have you considered taking the time to move beyond fragments and constructing a complete sentence? Perhaps you need a good redactor. Maybe you could contact your imaginary friend, the redactor of Genesis?

      Regarding the content of what you said: At first you make a great song and dance about the material being redacted. Genesis is "much redacted". Now you want to walk that back because you haven't the slightest support for your silly assertion. Very sly. There seems to be a serpent the Feserian blogosphere. You do realize that everyone here sees through your childish tricks don't you? So what then is the purpose of letting that little forked tongue loose here? Are you looking for your own little Eve to deceive? Why would anyone eat the manifestly rotten fruit that you have to offer?

      Delete
    5. Michael CopasJanuary 19, 2024 at 4:14 AM

      WCB,

      "a more neutral reading".

      I think you missed your call in life. You were meant to be a comedian. Is that what you do at night to pay mom and dad back for living in the basement? If your routine displays the level of irony you present here, you will soon have enough money to move out.

      Wellhausen, whose theory has been widely repudiated, did not read Genesis in a "neutral way" which is why his theory was rejected. Wellhausen was an anti-semite Protestant and this completely tainted how he handled anything cultic. Anti-Catholicism and anti-judaism have been WELL documented in the development of German Protestant biblical scholarship from the 1800s and 1900s. So pretending like Wellhausen's discredited theory is "neutral" is complete non-sense. It is no more neutral than your ridiculous tropes that all readers of this blog have to suffer. In other words: "neutral reading" Yeah, that's a good one, WCB. You have got to work that into your routine.

      Delete
    6. Son of Ya'KovJanuary 19, 2024 at 10:47 AM

      I see WCB is still wining friends and influencing people with his lolcow/lolbrow Gnu Atheism?

      I once quipped he should just go to some Young Earth "Scientific" Creationist forum to ply his wears as they are more his speed and level of intellect.

      I am now doubting he can even do that.

      WCB you disappoint me by the lack of effort you put into yer Atheism. We here are Classic Theists. We deserve better than the slop you serve.

      Delete
  29. FMJanuary 18, 2024 at 1:01 AM

    Glad to see it has esse and not just essence, hehe

    ReplyDelete
  30. FMJanuary 18, 2024 at 2:03 AM

    Am I wrong or is the title meant to reflect Hume's work and Hume will be heavily criticized in it? Ok, ok... no spoilers!

    ReplyDelete
  31. AnonymousJanuary 20, 2024 at 2:14 PM

    God bless Dr Feser. However, the scripture teaches "the soul that sins it shall die" "the soul of all flesh is in the blood" "they sought the young child's soul to destroy it" "and God created great whales and every living soul that moveth" etc etc.

    Surely the above treatise is a prime example of philosophy declaring God a liar or at least incapable of communication and falls under Paul's condemnation in Colossians "beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit after the tradition of men after the rudiments of the world".
    Stephen G

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    Replies
    1. TonyJanuary 21, 2024 at 3:51 PM

      the scripture teaches "the soul that sins it shall die"

      The scripture also has it that God told Adam and Eve: But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat. For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death. Genesis 2:17

      Yet Adam and Eve did not die on the day they sinned. Or did they? They did indeed die, as to the death of the soul. But how is that, since they still lived, Adam for over 900 years? Sin results in the loss of sanctifying grace in the soul, which is the presence of God himself, and that loss is spiritual death, leading to eternal death.

      "the soul of all flesh is in the blood"

      Leviticus 17:11 has it: The life of every living thing is in the blood, and that is why the LORD has commanded that all blood be poured out on the altar to take away the people's sins. Blood, which is life, takes away sins.

      This translates it as life rather than soul which is found in the blood. And this translation makes more sense of the following phrases.

      "and God created great whales and every living soul that moveth"

      Every living thing has a soul as the principle of life. Therefore, the thing itself can be referred to as a "living soul" in virtue of its principle. This is an example of synecdoche , using a part to refer to the whole, and is a common literary device.

      But in any case: how could you know what the treatise says (and whether it agrees or contradicts the Bible) until it's been published and you've read it?

      Delete
    2. AnonymousJanuary 22, 2024 at 3:24 AM

      Well there isn't a question mark after the word "souls" so it's probable it's an assertion not a question.

      Leviticus 17:11 and the passage from Genesis use the word nephesh which means soul and is the same word in "and the man became a living soul"

      "From dust you came and to dust you return" "do not trust in mortal man in whom there is no salvation. His spirit departs he returns to the earth in that very day his thoughts perish".

      I'm quite happy to read the book when it's available just as I'm presently reading his Scholastic Metaphysics. I nevertheless think immortal soulism is a lie a doctrine of demons and destructive of Christianity

      Delete
    3. AnonymousJanuary 22, 2024 at 2:41 PM

      the passage from Genesis use the word nephesh which means soul and is the same word in "and the man became a living soul"

      Man, obviously, is not merely soul and no body, he has a body. So clearly this "became a living soul" is, again, an example of synecdoche. But also the word clearly is used in a number of different senses, dependent on context:

      soul, self, life, creature, person, appetite, mind, living being, desire, emotion, passion

      1. that which breathes, the breathing substance or being, soul, the inner being of man
      2. living being
      3. living being (with life in the blood)
      4. the man himself, self, person or individual
      5. seat of the appetites
      6. seat of emotions and passions
      7. activity of mind
      8. activity of the will
      9. activity of the character

      https://www.biblestudytools.com/lexicons/hebrew/nas/nephesh.html

      Delete
    4. AnonymousJanuary 23, 2024 at 2:12 AM

      Well, I don't necessarily disagree with any of that. However you'll note I'm sure that none of those 9 senses imply let alone demand 'immortality' which as we know 'God ALONE possesses'. The curious thing about nephesh and psyche in scripture is there exists repeated texts stating explicitly and implicitly its mortality yet none that state explicitly or implicitly its immortality! If it wasn't for a priori commitments no one would come away from scripture deducing its immortality.

      Delete
    5. TonyJanuary 23, 2024 at 4:15 PM

      If it wasn't for a priori commitments no one would come away from scripture deducing its immortality.

      You mean, other than all the places where Jesus says and St. Paul says that after death there will be judgment and there will be punishment or reward? Other than all that?

      Delete
    6. AnonymousJanuary 26, 2024 at 3:48 AM

      Having been resurrected (1 Corinthians 15:16,18)

      Delete
    7. AnonymousJanuary 26, 2024 at 1:22 PM

      Perhaps, but you can't be resurrected to life (as a composite human being) and be the same being as before, if you altogether cease to be at death. To be resurrected to life as the same person requires persistence of the personhood past death into the resurrection.

      And Jesus clearly speaks of dead evildoers being punished even now, not waiting for the resurrection. (Dives and the beggar.)

      Delete
    8. AnonymousJanuary 28, 2024 at 2:00 PM

      I'm inclined to agree with your first point but it is contentious and would only imply that we must possess a non-material 'part' eg a spirit. So human beings are spirit+ matter=living soul.
      Dives and the beggar contradicts every other teaching on the postmortem state ESPECIALLY in the Torah and therefore Jesus must be speaking judgement against the Pharisees. If we were to take it literally then (a) he would be contradicting Torah (b) he would be incoherent since the very message he gives condemns people for *not believing* the Torah and prophets (c) he would be giving new revelation to the Pharisees who he'd condemned as blind guides!

      Delete
  32. Aquinas3000January 24, 2024 at 8:13 PM

    Couldn't come at a better time. Even the Angelicum is hosting Adam Wood on this topic. His book has an appalling misunderstanding of Aquinas's arguments on this topic and needs to be combated strongly.

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  33. Paul D. Van PeltJanuary 28, 2024 at 4:09 PM

    HF's perspective on 'having'' is lucid and well-expressed. Enjoyed the pragmatic flavor of it, and the view on "immortality' of a human soul. Cats don't really have nine lives---they are just incredibly resilient and resourceful...tougher than they look.

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  34. Paul D. Van PeltJanuary 30, 2024 at 6:56 AM

    Refreshing discussion on relation between body and soul. I have thought about this. A lot. Was simply at a loss for framing it into coherent prose. Thanks.

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  35. Paul D. Van PeltJanuary 30, 2024 at 9:12 AM

    The view of mind, soul and corporeality is interesting, yet enigmatic. Mind and soul as ghosts in the machine. Enigma upon enigma, so to speak. Mind, soul and body do not reside together, yet neither do they reside independently. Hmmmm... so....does the term, consciousness have any true referent, or is IT only another morsel of word salad? Another mobius?

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  36. Paul D. Van PeltFebruary 1, 2024 at 12:44 PM

    Today, I read a lead-in on Francis' remarks, concerning wine and its' virtues. Could not reach the site, to get the whole story. Seems the Pope cannot win---everything he pronounces offends someone. Pope-ery is not for everyone. Clearly. I sorta feel sorry for the holy father. But not any more than sorrow I have for anyone who fails to earn an honest living...that sorrow morphs into anger and resentment for unabashed crooks.

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  37. Paul D. Van PeltFebruary 4, 2024 at 1:45 PM

    The power of words. I think, mind you only think, stories, fiction or non-fiction, have power to affect us. If we consider some great fiction writers, their work has been influential, yes, powerful, for several centuries. Or, well, maybe I exaggerate. Some. Cherry pick a few: Melville, London, Hemingway. Fiction writers who lived real lives. Don't argue the Devil's Advocate position. That is only another fallacy. And employment of fallacies is weak, OMEN. Did you get this? Just askin'.

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