What Kind Of Thomist Are You? And Why Is Your Thomism The Correct One?

[MindOverMatter]

What kind of Thomist are you? For example, i am an Existential-Thomist (i think). Why is your Thomism the correct one as opposed to the others?

 

[1holycatholic]

What kind of Thomist are you? For example, i am an Existential-Thomist (i think). Why is your Thomism the correct one as opposed to the others?

How many types of Thomists are there?

Is it possible to be a Thomistic Thomist?

 

[Ghoti]

What about a “Doubting Thomist”?

 

[warpspeedpetey]

What kind of Thomist are you? For example, i am an Existential-Thomist (i think). Why is your Thomism the correct one as opposed to the others?

motorcycle ridin’, beer drinkin’, BBQ eatin’, bar fightin’, redneck Thomist! Woooooo…Hooooooo!

(it is so sad…i think i got money cuz i live in a doublewide!)

 

[cpayne]

What kind of Thomist are you? For example, i am an Existential-Thomist (i think). Why is your Thomism the correct one as opposed to the others?

Basically your run-of-the-mill classical Thomist.

This means not an existential Thomist, by the way. I think Aquinas argues for the impact of identity (being) before any judgments regarding being or acts of being (existence). However, there are some existential Thomists I really like (I think Etienne Gilson, for example, would fall into this category).

 

[MindOverMatter]

Basically your run-of-the-mill classical Thomist.

How do you know that? What in my writing has suggested this to you?

I think Aquinas argues for the impact of identity (being) before any judgments regarding being or acts of being (existence).

Can you please explain this a bit more.

However, there are some existential Thomists I really like (I think Etienne Gilson, for example, would fall into this category).

Why Etiennne Gilson? Is this person as good a writer as Maritain.

 

[cpayne]

How do you know that? What in my writing has suggested this to you?

Can you please explain this a bit more.

Why Etiennne Gilson? Is this person as good a writer as Maritain.

Sorry; a misunderstanding. I was describing myself as just a basic Thomist, just answering the question “What Kind of Thomist Are You?”

I really like Maritain a lot, too. He and Gilson were pretty much contemporaries.

 

[MindOverMatter]

Sorry; a misunderstanding. I was describing myself as just a basic Thomist, just answering the question “What Kind of Thomist Are You?”

I really like Maritain a lot, too. He and Gilson were pretty much contemporaries.

How do you differ with Gilson, and why do you hold the position that you do.

 

[cpayne]

Sorry it’s taken me a while to get back. Gilson argues, somewhere, that existence is not really a predicate one can assert of “being.” (I think he gets this from Kant, and eventually ties this into a form of existentialism.)

However, I think Aquinas argues that “being” is what the intellect first grasps by its first operation, prior to any other judgments regarding being. So he accepts being simply as “that which is”–any other judgments regarding its characteristics or even the nature of its existence follow later. In this view, the existentialist formula “Existence precedes essence” would be incorrect; actually, it’s the other way around: Essence precedes existence.

I don’t think this is very clear. So ignore my previous comments.

 

[Maso]

I’m a “Peeping Thomist”…! and my roots go all the way back to Ham, son of Noah…!

“Maso” is short for “Tomaso” which is Italian for Thomas. I am Thomas De Lello and my great great great great great great great great grandfather was “il Barone” somewhere in Itally in the 1600’s, untill he got caught “fooling around” shall we say with one of the Cardinal’s mistresses and got hisself ex-communicated and lost all his property.

Wha’dya think about that…???



Pray for me… I appreciate it…

 

[cpayne]

Ralph McInerny has a very good book entitled A First Glance at St. Thomas Aquinas: A Handbook for Peeping Thomists. You might like it!

 

[Maso]

Ralph McInerny has a very good book entitled A First Glance at St. Thomas Aquinas: A Handbook for Peeping Thomists. You might like it!

Well… I’m really not so bad really, if that is a subtle referance to pornography usage. I just like to have a little fun with words, y’know. The story about my Italian ancestor may or may not be the truth, but that is what was handed down to us and we all laugh about it. It may be the truth.

My problem is that I just refuse to take anything seriously.

 

[cpayne]

Ha! No, you can take this seriously. This is a real book, a serious book of philosophy, but with a funny title. Ralph McInerny is one of the most well-respected philosophers writing today.

No pornography intended! I really meant: If you like philosophy, you might like this book!

 

[Wowbagger]

Point 1: “Doubting Thomist”? ghoti, there’s a special level of hell for people who make puns that bad. Nice one.

Point 2: Following up on cpayne’s recommendation, McInerny’s Handbook for Peeping Thomists is an excellent read. I strongly recommend it.

Point 3: I never figured out the differences between “Gilsonian” Thomism and “Taranto” Thomism and so on and so forth. As soon as I do, I’ll let you know which one I believe in. I did hear a rumor that the philosophy faculty at Franciscan U has occasionally verged on civil war over this very question. Epic lulz ensue.

 

[Betterave]

Sorry it’s taken me a while to get back. Gilson argues, somewhere, that existence is not really a predicate one can assert of “being.” (I think he gets this from Kant, and eventually ties this into a form of existentialism.)

However, I think Aquinas argues that “being” is what the intellect first grasps by its first operation, prior to any other judgments regarding being. So he accepts being simply as “that which is”–any other judgments regarding its characteristics or even the nature of its existence follow later. In this view, the existentialist formula “Existence precedes essence” would be incorrect; actually, it’s the other way around: Essence precedes existence.

I don’t think this is very clear. So ignore my previous comments.

Do you have a citation for that? Gilson is a very good Thomistic scholar. I know that Duns Scotus says that being is what we first grasp and that it is a ‘real’ predicate, as Kant would say it is not. This claim figures importantly in his very elaborate proof for the existence of God, which I think takes Thomas’ more negative proofs to task for not providing a positive conception of being as such, i.e., for not making being to be a ‘real’ predicate.

 

[Betterave]

To clarify somewhat: faculties have proper objects, being is the primary object of the intellect (just as goodness is the primary object of the will), i.e., the object of the intellect is always sub ratione entis (that of the will, sub ratione boni); but the being that is the primary object of the intellect is being as such for Scotus, which includes the being of God, and the quiditas (whatness) of material substances for Aquinas. How is that relevant? I’m not sure.

Aquinas does state in his Qu. de veritate that the essences of things are unknown to us (rerum essentiae sunt nobis ignotae). That must be relevant, right? Also in ST I q.16: “Esse rei, non veritas eius, causat veritatem intellectus.”

N.B. Esse means being or existence, as opposed to essence (essentia). This seems confused in Cpayne’s comment.

 

[cpayne]

I’ll be back later! Best, cp

 

[punkforchrist]

Do you have a citation for that? Gilson is a very good Thomistic scholar. I know that Duns Scotus says that being is what we first grasp and that it is a ‘real’ predicate, as Kant would say it is not. This claim figures importantly in his very elaborate proof for the existence of God, which I think takes Thomas’ more negative proofs to task for not providing a positive conception of being as such, i.e., for not making being to be a ‘real’ predicate.

Kant himself seems to have a kind of middle position on this. He notes in passing, “My financial position is affected . . . very differently by a hundred real thalers than it is by the mere concept of them” (Critique of Pure Reason).

I think Kant’s main objection to the ontological argument is that we cannot simply add existence to the concept of something in order to conclude that it exists. This is likely correct, but it misconstrues Thomas’ cosmological argument, which is a posteriori. So, Kant’s dictum that “existence is not a predicate” may be true, but it is impertinent to Thomism.

 

[Betterave]

hmmm…
Kant says that nothing is added to the concept of a thing by saying that it is. The predicate ‘is’ just denotes the positing of a thing in reality (which *of course *makes a big difference in reality). Therefore existence can’t belong to the essence of a thing, since the understanding of an essence never implies positing it in existence (according to Kant - Anselm and Thomas disagree!). Scotus objects (and I’m guessing Kant would agree(?)) to Thomas’ claim that we can have no positive conception of the being of God (i.e., a posteriori arguments are all we have, even though the being of God and of things is not univocally the same, and therefore we have no proof of God’s being (which is infinite, i.e., *not *proportioned to the things of our experience) in Thomas’ a posteriori arguments).

 

[MindOverMatter]

hmmm…
Kant says that nothing is added to the concept of a thing by saying that it is. The predicate ‘is’ just denotes the positing of a thing in reality (which *of course *makes a big difference in reality). Therefore existence can’t belong to the essence of a thing, since the understanding of an essence never implies positing it in existence (according to Kant - Anselm and Thomas disagree!). Scotus objects (and I’m guessing Kant would agree(?)) to Thomas’ claim that we can have no positive conception of the being of God (i.e., a posteriori arguments are all we have, even though the being of God and of things is not univocally the same, and therefore we have no proof of God’s being (which is infinite, i.e., *not *proportioned to the things of our experience) in Thomas’ a posteriori arguments).

While Kant’s arguement may effect contingent realities, there is no basis in his arguments that demands that a thing cannot simply be existence, as in to say there is that which means existence; that is to say, synonymous to it. There is that which is the nature to be, otherwise we cannot speak meaningfully of that which is necessarily real; for that which is necessary is the very thing which defines “real”. Out of nothing comes nothing. And so, there is clearly a mistake in Kant’s thinking given the fact that he doesn’t seem to realize the implication of his own arguement.

He clearly agrees that there is such a thing as real as apposed to not real, and yet he seems to realize that essences, which he perceives, in themselves do not necessarily equal reality. He should have went one step further however; since given his initial premise, it necessarily follows that “actuality” and the essences that he perceives as actual, are not one and the same at all; but are in fact two explicitly different types of being. One is abstract, and the other one is a nature that gives actuality to that which is abstract, since an essence is not necessarily actually real in and of its self; although it does exists as an abstraction, and this is a type of being. And so “Actuality” must be a thing in itself. Thus there is that which is “Pure-Actuality” as opposed to that which only participates in reality. It would surely be incorrect to say that God possess reality or has reality as a property; but it would not be wrong to say that God “is” reality. And so, when we speak of God in regards to his essence, we do not and cannot mean that God is participating in being, but rather, Gods essence is his existence. God is reality; God is actuality.

I believe we can understand the nature of Gods being, but only analogically in reflection of that which we know to be actual and contingent. But with out that, we certainly cannot know reality in and of itself. And so although we can have a certain knowledge of Gods existence, such knoweldge is going to be imperfect, as we are using finite images to understand that which is infinitely transcendent. You cannot grasp reality in its fullness, accept indirectly and partially. We cannot picture the real, accept through that which is participates in it. I can agree with this, so long as this is understood as not being equal to the idea that we cannot know God in respect of “proofs” or inference.

I certainly agree with those in opposition of the ontological proof. We cannot define God into existence epistemologically speaking. But it does not follow from this fact that we cannot speak of God as being existence. We just cannot prove in without a-posterior considerations. The ontological arguement does not cause knowledge of God existence in the mind of a modern atheist, for it was created for and was convincing only to those who already had certain metaphysical beliefs which had implications that implied the validity of the ontological arguement. Thus the ontological argument is valid in a sense, but only when supposing particular axioms that cannot be proven by its own nature; i.e, the belief that “meaning” is absolutely ontological and thus separate from the mind.