On Determining What There is (eBook)

The Identity of Ontological Categories in Aquinas, Scotus and Lowe

Paul Symington (Autor)

eBook Download: PDF

2010
172 Seiten
De Gruyter (Verlag)
978-3-11-032248-4 (ISBN)

Infos

Generally, categories are understood to express the most general features of reality. Yet, since categories have this special status, obtaining a correct list of them is difficult. This question is addressed by examining how Thomas Aquinas establishes the list of categories through a technique of identifying diversity in how predicates are per se related to their subjects. A sophisticated critique by Duns Scotus of this position is also examined, a rejection which is fundamentally grounded in the idea that no real distinction can be made from a logical one. It is argued Aquinas's approach can be rehabilitated in that real distinctions are possible when specifically considering per se modes of predication. This discussion between Aquinas and Scotus bears fruit in a contemporary context insofar as it bears upon, strengthens, and seeks to correct E. J. Lowe's four-category ontology view regarding the identity and relation of the categories.

Inhalt

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 9
INTRODUCTION 11
CHAPTER ONE: AQUINAS ON ESTABLISHING THE IDENTITY OF ARISTOTLE’S CATEGORIES 25
I. The Aristotelian Context for the Derivation: Aristotle’s Metaphysics V.7 28
II. Fr. John Wippel’s Interpretation 32
III. per se Predication and the Identity of the Categories 41
IV. The Derivation of the Categories from per se Predication 48
V. Conclusion 55
CHAPTER TWO: SCOTUS’S CRITICISM OF AQUINAS’S DERIVATION OF THE CATEGORIES 57
I. Second Intentions, Essences, and Modes of Predication 60
II. Additional Criticisms of Aquinas’s Method of Establishing the Categories 88
III. Scotus and the Role of per se Modes of Predication in the Derivation 98
CHAPTER THREE: A RECONSIDERATION AND DEFENSE OF AQUINAS’S POSITION 100
I. The Categories in Aquinas: Their Nature and Relation to Predication 102
II. Addressing Scotus’s Arguments 119
III. Conclusion 138
CHAPTER FOUR: LOGICAL SYNTAX AND LOWE’S FOUR-CATEGORY ONTOLOGY 139
I. Lowe’s Categories and Aquinas’s Strategy of Deriving Categories 142
II. The Relationship between Logical Syntax and Ontology 149
III. A Problem with Lowe’s Justification of the Four-Category Ontology and its Resolution 157
IV. Conclusion 163
CONCLUSION 164
WORKS CITED 170

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 2.5.2013
• Reihe/Serie: Eide
• Reihe/Serie: Eide
• Reihe/Serie: ISSN
• Reihe/Serie: ISSN
• Verlagsort: Berlin/Boston
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Philosophie ► Allgemeines / Lexika
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Philosophie ► Geschichte der Philosophie
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Philosophie ► Metaphysik / Ontologie
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Philosophie ► Philosophie des Mittelalters
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Philosophie ► Philosophie der Neuzeit
• Schlagworte: Duns Scotus • Metaphysik • Ontologie • Philosophie • Thomas von Aquin
• ISBN-10: 3-11-032248-X / 311032248X
• ISBN-13: 978-3-11-032248-4 / 9783110322484