Category: Philosophy
Plato II
Tonight’s major revelation: I am not a Platonist. Fundamentally, I think Good is not “beyond” Being. I do not see how this can be coherent. Details to follow. Time for bed.
Plato I
It’s been a long, fascinating evening of Being, Becoming and 30 amazing people. The Republic meta-thon turned in to a Timaeus/Republic metathon. You can read the Capn’s summaries (as well as some of his personal reflections) here. I won’t repeat...
Irrigating Deserts
As mentioned previously, I teach homeschoolers in a modified “great books” program. Right now we are reading C.S. Lewis’s Abolition of Man. It is, in many ways, Lewis argues that contemporary (to him) eduational philosophy makes students adopt two basic...
C.S. Lewis on Property Dualism
C.S. Lewis’s sermon “Transposition” contains in it an excellent layman’s summary of what is now known as property/substance dualism. The fundamental principle of “Transposition” is that “higher mediums” can’t be transposed/represented by “lower mediums” without the loss of something. The...
Who was M. Regulus? (And why don’t we care?)
In prep for my classes next semester, I picked up The City of God today and started what will have to a be a very fast read. It’s been a while since I was in Augustine so I was a...
Subordinate Complexity
Everyone creates. So everyone must (or should) care how to create well. From writing, to making images by photography or painting or drawing, to speaking, to planning one’s day, we are all MAKING. How do we create well? It seems...
Philosophical Writing as an Artform
I recommend Ralph McInerny’s very short Rhyme and Reason: St. Thomas and Modes of Discourse. It’s the Marquette University Aquinas Lecture for 1981. I’m thinking about it today in relation to literary criticism (a field in which I am less...