Thomas Aquinas presents an account of human immortality and bodily resurrection intended to be both faithful to Christian Scripture and metaphysically sound as following from the Aristotelian view of human nature. One central question is whether a human person persists between death and resurrection by virtue of her soul, given Aquinas’s hylomorphic account of human nature and assertion that a human person is not identical to her soul. Robert Pasnau contends that only a (...) part of a person exists between death and resurrection; whereas Eleonore Stump argues that a person substantially exists, albeit deficiently, during the interim period as composed of, but not identical to her soul. In this essay, I will adjudicate this dispute through textual and metaphysical analysis. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to show that human persons belong, ontologically, in social ontology. After setting out my views on ontology, I turn to persons and argue that they have first-person perspectives in two stages (rudimentary and robust) essentially. Then I argue that the robust stage of the first-person persective is social, in that it requires a language, and languages require linguistic communities. Then I extend the argument to cover the rudimentary stage of the first- (...) class='Hi'>person perspective as well. I conclude by enumerating ways in which human persons differ from nonhuman animals. (shrink)

This study discusses the mind-body problem, arguing that the human person is best understood as an animal who is also spirit. Braine suggests that human beings should be described holistically, in the tradition of Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas. His final chapter explores a doctrine of immortality.

The theme of the human person and immortality has currently and forcefully become an issue in the face of modern materialism and dehumanization. The purpose of this paper is to investigate some philosophical issues involved in this theme with reference to Ibo mataphysics as a contribution in this area. The approach is partly interpretive and partly analytical of some cultural ideas of the Ibos. The Ibos are not total materialists in their fundamental views of reality, especially with regard (...) to the human person of which they have high regard. An analysis of some of their primitive notions and traditions shows the transcendental or metaphysical aspect of the human person. By analyzing human presence metaphysically, it is shown that personhood is a manifestation through the body. The person or Thou survives the decay of the body. The Ibo notion of death as a "passage," the cult of ancestors, belief in reincarnation and an analysis of some dreams indicate the native sense of personal immortality. In conclusion, a warning is given against imported materialism which poses a threat to the Ibo holistic view of man since the problem today is how to integrate modern scientific and technological achievements with the traditional values without losing sight of the vital transcendence of the human person. (shrink)

In a recent conference volume, American philosopher Michael Sandel engages the Confucian tradition in the search for alternatives to what Sandel calls the “unencumbered self,” the unattached liberal subject as detailed in the philosophy of John Rawls. Responding to Sandel, American Confucianist Roger Ames draws on a lifetime of comparative thought to advance the Pragmatism of John Dewey as a way to interrogate Western philosophy in general, arguing that “humane becomings,” a view of the human person facilitated, Ames (...) writes, by Deweyan Pragmatism, are the Confucian ideal and the key to recovering a holistic anthropology within the Western tradition. In this essay, I intervene in the Ames-Sandel debate to argue that Charles Peirce, and not John Dewey, is the best American Pragmatist for bridging the divide between the Confucian and Rawlsian views of the human person. Peirce’s emphasis on love as true intersubjectivity and on communication as the exchange of real meaning is, I argue, the key to unlocking the Confucian ideal to the West. (shrink)

Recently, Edward Furton commented on an article that we published in Health Care Ethics USA concerning the philosophical and theological anthropology informing the discussion of appropriate care for individuals with gender dysphoria and intersex conditions. We appreciate the opportunity to clarify the points we made in that article, particularly the metaphysical mechanics underlying our contention that, as part of a unified human person, the human rational soul is sexed. We hope this more in-depth metaphysical explanation shows that (...) Furton’s concern, while valid insofar as our position may have needed clarifying, is nevertheless ill-founded with respect to our contention that actually existent human rational souls are sexed. (shrink)

About Christian philosophy, by J. Maritain.--Von Hildebrand and Marcel: a parallel, by A. Jourdain.--Love and philosophy, by J. V. Walsh.--The concepts of cyclic and evolutionary time, by B. de Solages.--The sovereignty of the object; notes on truth and intellectual humility, by A. Kolnai.--Authentic humanness and its existential primordial assumptions, by C. Marcel.--Individuality and personality, by M. F. Sciacca.--Can a will be essentially good? By H. de Lubac.--Reason and revelation on the subject of charity, by R. W. Gleason.--Technique of spiritualization and (...) transformation in Christ, by J. A. Cuttat.--Some reflections on gratitude, by B. V. Schwarz.--Bibliography of the works of Dietrich Von Hildebrand (p. 195-210). (shrink)

METAPHYSICAL RESEARCH Herausgegeben von 1 Edited hv Uwe Meixner • Johanna Seibt Barry Smith • Daniel von Wachter Band I 1 Volume I ...

I describe an ethic for business administration based on the social tradition of the Catholic Church. I find that much current thinking about business falters for its conceit of truth. Abstractions such as the shareholder-value model contain truth - namely, that business is an economic enterprise to manage for the wealth of its owners. But, as in all abstractions, this truth comes at the expense of falsehood -namely, that persons are assets to deploy on behalf of owners. This last is (...) "wrong" in both senses of the word - it is factually wrong in that persons are far more than business assets, they are supernatural beings, children of God; and it is morally wrong in that it is an injustice to treat them as the former when they are the latter. I draw upon the social tradition of the Catholic Church to recognize that the business of business is not business, but is instead the human person. Following Church teachings, I describe a person-centered ethic of business based upon eight social principles that both correct and enlarge the shareholder-centered ethic of much current business thinking. I discuss implications of this person-centered ethic for business administration. (shrink)

The article starts with the recognition of the fact that each human being is driven by the tendency to auto-preservation and, thus, to persevere in being, secure the corresponding living space and safeguard the proper place under the sun. Societies are understood as societies of self-preserving individuals wherein each member is after his or her own interests. This drive to realize oneself, however, may happen at the expense of the self-realization of others. Violence includes but is not limited to (...) physically injuring or annihilating persons. Recalling the thought of Emmanuel Levinas, the author of the article sees violence as the factor that interrupts any line of continuity between human beings, whereby they are made to play roles in which they no longer recognize themselves, and, thus, are forced or induced to carry out actions that, as such, simply will destroy every possibility for action itself The problem of violence, therefore, resides in a kind of interestedness in which, in the pursuit of own interests, we use and manipulate things, simply reducing them to ourselves. In other words, the present article calls our attention to the fact that each one of us can be a rampaging and ravaging force that not only assimilates things but also exploits and thus inflicts violence upon other human beings. The question here asked, therefore, is the one about the very possibility of violence and peace and, ultimately, if violence can at all be seen as a natural way for our becoming as human persons. /// O presente artigo parte do reconhecimento do facto de que cada ser humano é movido pela tendência à auto-preservação e, desse modo, a perseverar no ser, assegurar o respectivo espaço vital e a proteger o lugar que lhe é próprio debaixo do sol. Nessa medida, as sociedades humanas são compreendidas como sociedades de indivíduos que se auto-preservam sendo que nelas cada um dos indivíduos que as compõem estão simplesmente movidos pelos seus próprios interesses. Mas esta tendência para a auto-realização, contudo, pode frequentemente dar-se à custa da auto-realiza-ção dos outros. A violência inclui, mas não se limita à injúria física ou à aniquilação de pessoas. Assim, retomando o pensamento de Emmanuel Levinas, o autor do artigo reconhece na violência um factor que interrompe toda e qualquer linha de continuidade entre os seres humanos, processo esse em que eles são forçados ou induzidos a desempenhar papeis que, enquanto tais, simplesmente destruirão toda e qualquer possibilidade de acção enquanto tal. Nessa medida, o problema da violência reside num tipo de interesse segundo o qual, no processo de procurar realizar os nossos próprios interesses, nós usamos e manipulamos as coisas, simplesmente reduzindo-as a nós mesmos. Por outras palavras, o presente artigo chama a atenção para o facto de que cada um de nós pode muito bem transformar-se numa força violenta e destruidora que não só assimila as coisas, mas também as explora e, nessa medida, inflige violência sobre os outros seres humanos. Assim, a questão que aqui se levanta, portanto, é a questão acerca da própria possibilidade da violência e da paz e, em última análise, procura discernir até que ponto a violência tem alguma plausibilidade de poder ser vista como um dos modos naturais do nosso devir enquanto pessoas humanas. (shrink)

In the essay, I want to disscuss Maritain's concept of freedom. If we want to understand some obscure thoughts about Maritain, we have to understand Thomas's thoughts. In the essay entitled "The Conquest of Freedom.", Maritain illustrates what freedom means. He indicates it is inseparable between the notions of personality and independent freedom. It is therefore necessary to study the Thomistic concepts of the will as nature and the will as reason . My purpose in this paper will be twofold: (...) to consider first of all the differences which Maritain establishes between individuality and personality, and secondly, to understand what he says about freedom by placing it within the Thomistic context which is both philosophical and theological. (shrink)

Abstract Western philosophical and psychological thinking lacks an accepted theory of human personality; it has produced conflicting and inadequate notions, such as the religious one of a soul, the vague concept of the ?mind? and biological theories basing their understanding of man on the functions of the nervous system, particularly the brain, or dealing with his mental dimension only in terms of behavioural patterns. This paper explores the notions of personality in Indian systems and finds that virtually all of (...) them understand it, despite differing terminology, as a fluid complex of functions or living forces characterised by intrinsic intelligence and coordinated by a dynamic structural principle, operating on three levels of reality: phenomenal material, phenomenal immaterial and noumenal or absolute. One can say that the Indian tradition fully appreciated the complexity of the problem and produced theories of personality which are more comprehensive than western ones and merit study as well as attention from the point of view of contemporary creative philosophical thinking. [1]. (shrink)

The Logic of Human Personality shows how the ancient definition of person remains useful today, and explains how it happened to fall into disuse. The method of using the categories of Aristotle is illustrated by showing how action, relation, and time as well as the fundamental category of substance, can help us understand what it is to be a person. The Logic of Human Personality agrues, against Mill and others who have found Aristotle's categories unsatisfactory, that (...) in fact they are useful for much psychological and anthropological research today, particularly in the intercultural field. (shrink)

We are pleased to present this special issue of Journal of Critical Realism, which is a wide-ranging selection of papers from the 2020 International Association of Critical Realism Congress in Wars...

Karol Wojtyła—the future pope John Paul II—chose the human being, especially in its personalistic dimension, as the main point of his philosophical research. Inaccordance with the metaphysical rule agere sequitur esse, he investigated the dynamisms proper to a human being: the reactive dynamism of the human body, the emotive dynamism of the human psyche, and the personalistic dynamism associated with free choice of the will. These allowed him to experience and understand the human being as (...) a complex yet integrated entity. The personal structure of the human being is manifest in terms of selfpossession, self-determination, and self-governance. Thanks to self-possession, human beings experience freedom of the will, which expresses itself in each free act. Being endowed with a free will, the human being is able to grow in freedom but can also lose his freedom. Wojtyła’s philosophical investigations are innovative by way of the use that he made of the philosophy of being according to Thomas Aquinas and the philosophy of consciousness articulated by Husserl. He not only pointed out man’s structure but also presented man as an objective entity in an objective world. Each human being is constituted by his or her inner self, which is absolutely exceptional because it is completely irreducible to anything else in the world. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:THE INCOMMUNICABILITY OF HUMAN PERSONS JOHN F. CROSBY, III Franciscan University of Steubenville Steubenville, Ohio I PROPOSE TO explore the idea that persons do not exist as replaceable specimens of or as mere instances of an ideal or type, but rather exist in some sense for their own sakes, each existing as incommunicably his or her own.1 I undertake this study in the conviction that the incommunicability of (...) persons is profoundly characteristic for them precisely as persons, and has a major role to play in any philosophy of the person. And there is an entirely different reason which attracts me to this subject. I think that most of what I have to say here can find acceptance across a broad spectrum of philosophical positions. At a time when thinkers are increasingly suspicious of universally valid truth about man, when many of them think that a vision of man is proper only to some tradition and valid only within that tradition and not beyond it, one can offer a salutary challenge to one's contemporaries by showing a centrally important truth about persons which, as I say, can be accepted by philosophers coming from the most various points of view. Suppose that you were to minimalize the death of someone by saying that at least the human species did not die with him or her, as if the immortality of the species more than compensated for the mortality of this individual : everyone understands that you would thereby radically depersonalize the deceased. Or suppose that you were grieving over the death of someone dear to you, and a friend tried to comfort you with the thought that the 1 My thanks to Josef Seifert, William Frank, Damian Fedoryka, and Katryna Fedoryka for their comments on earlier drafts of this study. The text of this article forms Chapter Two of my book, Essay on Personal Selfhood, which is close to completion. 403 404 JOHN F. CROSBY, III particular excellences of the deceased, which awakened your love, also exist in other human beings who are still living, as if you could continue to love in them what you had loved in the deceased. Again, everyone understands that if you treat people having excellences as if they were replaceable specimens of those excellences, then you lose your grip on them as persons. But why is this? Why is personhood driven out of human beings as soon as their species-membership, or their particular excellences, are thought to predominate in them? What is that incommunicability of each person which is obscured as soon as persons are thought to be only specimens? One commonly thinks that this aspect of personal selfhood has been recognized only in modern thought; in fact it was recognized already by St. Thomas Aquinas. Creatura autem rationalis divinae providentiae substat sicut secundum se gubernata et provisa, non solum propter speciem, ut aliae corruptibiles creaturae : quia individuum quod gubernatur solum propter speciem, non gubernatur propter seipsum; creatura autem rationalis propter seipsam gubernatur, ut ex dictis manifestum est. Sic igitur solae rationales creaturae directionem a Deo ad suos actus accipiunt non solum propter speciem, sed secundum individuum.2 Notice that Aquinas teaches here the metaphysical ultimacy of personal incommunicability; it exists even before God in the sense 2 " Now, a rational creature exists under divine providence as a being governed and provided for in himself, and not simply for the sake of his species, as is the case with other corruptible creatures. For the individual that is governed only for the sake of the species is not governed for its own sake, but the rational creature is governed for his own sake, as is clear from what we have said (ch. 112). And so, only rational creatures receive direction from God in their acts, not only for the species, but for the individual." Summa Contra Gentiles, III, ch. 113 (Bourke translation). By the way, Chapters 111-114 of Book III seem to me to constitute the most " personalist " passage' in the entire corpus of St. Thomas. The modern reader sees to his amazement that St. Thomas here has already made his own the Kantian idea that each person in a sense exists for his... (shrink)

The dialogue between science and theology is no longer confined to discussing theology, physics and biology, but, as these essays make clear, sociology, psychology & neuroscience are now open for discussions between theologians and scientists.

What are persons and how do they exist? The predominant answer to this question in Western metaphysics is that persons, human and others, are, and exist as, substances, i.e., ontologically independent, well-demarcated things defined by an immutable (usually mental) essence. Change, on this view, is not essential for a person's identity; it is in fact more likely to be detrimental to it. In this chapter I want to suggest an alternative view of human persons which is motivated (...) by an appreciation of their biological nature. Organisms, human and non-human, are dynamical systems that for their existence and persistence depend on an ongoing interaction with the environment in which they are embedded. Taking seriously this most fundamental human condition leads to recognising human persons as processes, i.e., as entities for the identity of which change is essential. It also implies a holistic view of the human mind. (shrink)

This monograph rigorously argues for a Thomistic account of the human person. Each chapter addresses different stages of...

The ArgumentThis article considers three major problems with the concept of genes for human personality traits: uncertainty about what human personality is; what we mean when we say there is a gene “for” a mental attribute; and the complexity of interactions between genes and environment, and among the genes themselves. It then draws on examples from empirical human genetic studies by the author and his colleagues in order to suggest that the concept of genes for human (...) personality traits nevertheless does have some validity, and also that we may be on the brink of discovering genes with major effects on human personality. This possibility, in particular its ethical aspects, has aroused some public concern. It is suggested that confidential information about an individual's genes does not differ in principle from other confidential information about him or her, and that the ability to affect genes and their expression, temporarily or permanently, does not differ ethically from our current ability to affect other aspects of an individual's physical and psychological functioning. Genes for potential offspring, contained in ova and sperm cells, constitute a special case. (shrink)

This article explores a problem of the articulation of an adequate account of the human person in both philosophical and nursing theory. It follows the lead of philosopher Norris Clarke in suggesting that there has been a significant division in the way philosophers have looked at the human person and goes on to suggest that this division is paralleled in prominent nursing theories. The paper reviews and argues for the synthesis of two contemporary philosophic theories of (...) the person that arise from the traditional philosophical division, and uses Clarke's account to show the ontological need for such a synthesis if we are to have a more adequate account of the human person. Next, accounts of the person identified in a number of the prominent theories of nursing are briefly reviewed revealing the vast complexity of the person encountered in nursing practice. It is suggested that each new theory of nursing is founded, at least in part, on the need to account for attributes of the person missing from prior nursing theories. It will be seen that the synthesized account of the person argued for here more adequately accounts for the various attributes identified in these nursing accounts and it is hoped that this synthesized account will serve as a somewhat more complete basis for a continued exploration of the persons encountered in nursing practice in its many and varied manifestations. (shrink)