Way Toward Wisdom, The

Benedict M. Ashley

Description

Once thought to be the task of metaphysics, the synthesis of knowledge has been discounted by many philosophers today. Benedict Ashley, a leading Thomistic scholar, argues that it remains a valid and intellectually fruitful pursuit by situating metaphysics as an endeavor that must cross disciplinary and cultural boundaries.

Working from a realist Thomistic epistemology, Ashley asserts that we must begin our search for wisdom in the natural sciences; only then, he believes, can we ensure that our claims about immaterial and invisible things are rooted in reliable experience of the material. Any attempt to share wisdom, he insists, must derive from a context that is both interdisciplinary and intercultural.

Ashley offers an ambitious analysis and synthesis of major historical contributions to the unification of knowledge, including non-Western traditions. Beginning with the question "Metaphysics: Nonsense or Wisdom?" Ashley moves from a critical examination of the foundations of modern science to quantum physics and the Big Bang; from Aristotle's theory of being and change, through Aquinas's five ways, to a critical analysis of modern and postmodern thought. Ashley is able to interweave the approaches of the great philosophers by demonstrating their contributions to philosophical thought in a concrete, specific manner. In the process, he accounts for a contemporary culture overwhelmed by the fragmentation of data and thirsting for an utterly transcendent yet personal God. The capstone of a remarkable career, The Way Toward Wisdom will be welcomed by students in philosophy and theology.

Sujets

• Philosophie
• Métaphysique
• Philosophie de la religion
• Comparative Religion
• Religious
• PHILOSOPHY
• Philosophie et théologie
• Theology
• Metaphysics

Informations

• Publié par: University of Notre Dame Press
• Date de parution: 31 juillet 2006
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780268045654
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

The Way toward Wisdom
T HOMISTIC S TUDIES
John Deely, General Editor
Sponsored by the Center for Thomistic Studies
Houston, Texas
The Way toward Wisdom
An Interdisciplinary and Intercultural Introduction to Metaphysics
B ENEDICT M. A SHLEY , O.P.
University of Notre Dame Press
Notre Dame, Indiana
University of Notre Dame Press
Notre Dame, Indiana 46556
www.undpress.nd.edu
All Rights Reserved
Published in the United States of America
copyright © 2006 by University of Notre Dame
Reprinted in 2009
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Ashley, Benedict M. 　
The way toward wisdom : an interdisciplinary and intercultural introduction to metaphysics / Benedict M. Ashley.
p. cm. — (Thomistic studies)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN-13: 978-0-268-02028-6 (hardcover : alk. paper)
ISBN-10: 0-268-02028-0 (hardcover : alk. paper)
ISBN-13: 978-0-268-02035-4 (pbk. : alk. paper)
ISBN-10: 0-268-02035-3 (pbk. : alk. paper)
ISBN-13: 978-0-268-04565-4 (ePub)
1. Metaphysics. I. Title. II. Series.
BD131.A84 2006
110—dc22 2006013083
∞ The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources.
This e-Book was converted from the original source file by a third-party vendor. Readers who notice any formatting, textual, or readability issues are encouraged to contact the publisher at [e-mail]
To
Mary, Throne of Divine Wisdom
and to
Mortimer J. Adler, Yves Simon, and William H. Kane, O.P.,
great guides in the search for human wisdom
Contents at a Glance
Contents in Detail
List of Diagrams
Preface
Acknowledgments
Part 1 M ETAPHYSICS: N ONSENSE OR W ISDOM ?
Chapter 1 The Problem of the Unification of Knowledge
Chapter 2 The Historical Varieties of “Metaphysics” in Western Culture
Chapter 3 Natural Science Is Epistemologically First
Chapter 4 The Culminating Foundational Theorem of Natural Science
Chapter 5 The Existence and Essence of Metascience
Part 2 T HE P ROPERTIES OF ALL R EALITY
Chapter 6 Unity, Plurality, and Efficient Causality
Chapter 7 Unity and Plurality in Other Sciences
Chapter 8 Truth and Formal Causality
Chapter 9 Truth in the Special Sciences
Chapter 10 Goodness and Final Causality
Chapter 11 Finality in the Special Sciences

Part 3 T HE F IRST C AUSE OR A BSOLUTE P RINCIPLE OF B EING
Chapter 12 The Absolute and/or Nature
Chapter 13 The One Creating First Cause
Part 4 W ISDOM , H UMAN AND D IVINE
Chapter 14 The Way toward Wisdom
Appendix 1 Outline of Aristotle’s Metaphysics
Appendix 2 Natural Substances and Their Properties
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Contents in Detail
List of Diagrams
Preface
Acknowledgments
P ART 1 M ETAPHYSICS : N ONSENSE OR W ISDOM ?
Chapter 1 The Problem of the Unification of Knowledge
A. The Information Explosion and Interdisciplinarity
1. The Fragmentation of Knowledge Today
2. Interculturality and Contextualization
B. The Common Human Search for Meaning
1. Older Worldviews
2. The Global Expansion of Science and Technology
C. The Conditions of Effective Intercultural Dialogue
D. The Modern University as Wisdom’s Home
Chapter 2 The Historical Varieties of “Metaphysics” in Western Culture
A. The Unification of Knowledge by One Material or Spiritual Principle
B. The Unification of Knowledge by Coordinating Autonomous Disciplines
C. Medieval and Renaissance “Metaphysics”
D. Modernity and Metaphysics
1. Cartesian and Idealist Metaphysics
2. British Empiricism
3. Kant and the Post-Kantian Critique
4. The Varieties of Thomistic Metaphysics
a. Essentialist Thomism
b. Platonizing Thomism

c. Transcendental Thomism
d. Existential Thomism
e. Phenomenological Thomism
f. Analytic Thomism
g. Semiotic Thomism
h. Aristotelian Thomism
E. Postmodernism and Metaphysics
Chapter 3 Natural Science Is Epistemologically First
A. The Logical Structure of Any Discipline
1. Every Science Has a Foundational Treatise
2. Question 1 about Existence
3. Questions 2 and 3 about Substantial Essence Known through Properties
B. The First Principles of Natural Science
1. Principle of Non-contradiction
2. Principle of Causality
3. The Fundamental Theorem of Natural Science
c. Questions 3 and 4 about the Causes of Properties
1. The Nine Categories of Properties of All Changeable Beings
2. Why All Changeable Substances Have These Nine Properties
a. The Intrinsic Properties
1. Quantity
2. Quality
b. Relation and the Relational Properties
3. Relation
4 and 5. Action and Receptivity
6, 7, and 8. Place, Position, and Environment
9. Time
c. Summary
D. Are the Aristotelian Foundations of Natural Science Obsolete?
1. The Natural Senses vs. Instruments and Experiments
2. Scientific Universality and Individuation
3. The Scientific Revolution and the Foundations of Natural Science

Chapter 4 The Culminating Foundational Theorem of Natural Science
A. The Prime Movers of Systems
1. All Systems of Interacting Bodies Have Prime Movers
2. Proof that a First Immaterial Cause Exists
B. The Special Case of the Human Soul
C. A Universe of Both Material and Spiritual Substances
1. The Existence of Contingent Pure Spirits
2. Does Modern Science Exclude Spiritual Substances?
D. Natural Science Validates First Philosophy
1. First Philosophy Presupposes All the Special Sciences
2. Natural Science Is Not First Philosophy but Establishes Its Ground
E. Dialogue with Other Views of Nature
Chapter 5 The Existence and Essence of Metascience
A. The Existence and Validity of an Autonomous Metascience
B. What Is the Proper Subject of Metascience?
1. The “Analogy” of Being
2. The Descriptive Definition of the Generic Subject of Metascience
C. Are Other Worldviews Metascientific?
D. Objections to the Natural Science Approach to Metascience
1. Thomist Objections
2. Objections from Modern Science
P ART 2 T HE P ROPERTIES OF A LL R EALITY
Chapter 6 Unity, Plurality, and Efficient Causality
A. The Transcendentals
B. The Demonstration that Being as such Is One
1. Transcendental “Unity” and Its Contrary “Plurality”
2. The Demonstration of Unity as Intrinsic to Every Being
C. Unity and Plurality of Contingent Material Beings
1. Substantial Unity and the Plurality of Properties
2. The Unity of a Species and the Individuation of Its Members

D. The Unity of Contingent Spiritual Substances
1. The Embodied Human Spirit
2. The Hierarchy of Contingent Pure Spirits
a. The Community of Spirits
b. The Unity of the Spiritual and Material Realms
E. Unity, Plurality, and Efficient Causality
Chapter 7 Unity and Plurality in Other Sciences
A. Unity and Plurality in Mathematics
1. Natural Science and Mathematics
2. Ancient Mathematics
3. Modern Mathematics
B. Mathematical Physics and Cosmic Unity and Diversity
C. Unity and Plurality in Ethics and Politics
1. The Unity of the Virtues
2. Persons in Community
D. Unity and Plurality in Technologies and Fine Arts
Chapter 8 Truth and Formal Causality
A. The Varieties of Truth
1. Logical and Ontological Truth
2. The Sources of Truth
a. Styles of Human Reasoning
b. Faith and Revelation
c. Mystical Experience
B. Epistemology
1. Skepticism and Sophism
2. Idealism’s Answer to Skepticism
3. Empiricism’s Answer to Skepticism
4. Aristotelian Thomism’s Answer to Skepticism
5. Personalism and Thomism
C. Formal Causality and Participation
Chapter 9 Truth in the Special Sciences
A. Scientific Logic
1. Aristotelian Logic
a. The Kinds of Logic
b. The Scientific Syllogism

c. Premises, Their Terms, and Definitions
d. Univocal, Equivocal, Metaphorical, and Analogical Terms
e. Judgment, Dialectics, and Scientific Demonstration
f. The Distinction of Metascience from Logic
g. Semiotics
2. Logic in Indian and Chinese Cultures
3. Modern Logic
B. Informal Logic
C. Truth in Natural Science and Mathematics
D. Truth in the Practical Sciences
E. Truth in History
Chapter 10 Goodness and Final Causality
A. Finality, the Causes of Causes
1. Finality and the Other Causes
2. Intrinsic and Extrinsic Finality
B. Beauty as a Transcendental
1. The Concept of Beauty
2. Physical Beauty
3. Spiritual Beauty
C. Dialogue with the Aesthetics of Other Cultures
D. The Problem of Evil
E. Love
Chapter 11 Finality in the Special Sciences
A. Teleology in Natural Science
B. Teleology in Mathematics
C. Means and Ends in the Practical Sciences
1. Deontology and Teleology in Individual Ethics
2. Revisions of Thomistic Ethics
3. Teleology in Social Ethics
4. Teleology in Technology and Ecology
D. Teleology in the Fine Arts
E. Dialogue with the Ethics of Other Cultures
F. Final Causality and the Coordination of Knowledge

P ART 3 T HE F IRST C AUSE OR A BSOLUTE P RINCIPLE OF B EING
Chapter 12 The Absolute and/or Nature
A. The Monistic View of the Supreme Principle
1. Monism and Monotheism
2. Materialistic or Nature Monism
3. Process Philosophy Monism
4. Spiritual Monism
a. Monism in the Traditional religions and Occultism
b. Neoplatonism
c. Indian, Chinese, and Japanese Monism
B. Critique of Monism
Chapter 13 The One Creating First Cause
A. Monotheism
1. The Existence of a Creator
2. The Divine Essence
B. The Divine Attributes
1. The Plenitude of the First Cause
2. The First Cause Is Personal
C. God and Creation
1. The Triple Causality of God as First Cause
2. The Extrinsic Formal Causality that Is Exemplarity
3. The Hierarchy of Creatures
P ART 4 W ISDOM , H UMAN AND D IVINE
Chapter 14 The Way toward Wisdom
A. Unified and Open Education
1. Education in the Family
2. Liberal Arts Education
3. Higher General Education
4. Professional Education
5. Continuing Education
B. Summary: Dialogue in the Search fo