In our modern world, says Adrian Thatcher, “the credibility of theism suffers from a close association with Cartesian Dualism.” (180) Thus, Thatcher’s goal is to show that the Christian concept of God and the Christian concept of human persons does not require dualism. Thatcher begins his argument by outlining six different uses of the conceptContinue reading “Christian Theism and the Concept of a Person”
Category Archives: Philosophy
Communion and Otherness
In Communion and Otherness, John Zizioulas expands and elaborates upon ideas that were presented in Being and Communion. What sets this book from the earlier book is that instead of focusing on how communion is related to being he focuses on how otherness is related to being – what ties together communion and otherness isContinue reading “Communion and Otherness”
CFP: GOD, TIME AND CHANGE
GOD, TIME AND CHANGE Call for Papers 23rd Conference of the European Society for Philosophy of Religion God, Time and Change University of Leeds, UK: 3–5 September 2020 This conference investigates the impact of time and change, as two facets of human experience and cognition, on conceptions of God, the divine and ultimate reality.Continue reading “CFP: GOD, TIME AND CHANGE”
Persons – What Philosophers Say About You
Warren Bourgeois attempts to tackle a set of perennial questions in Persons: What Philosophers Say About You. These questions include, “What are persons?” “What makes this person now identical to that person in the past?” and “What marks the beginning and end of a person.” Bouorgeois’s questions are, in part, motivated by events that areContinue reading “Persons – What Philosophers Say About You”
The Call to Personhood
In The Call to Personhood Alistair McFadyen expresses concern about two unsatisfactory conceptions of individuality and personality, these two conceptions are Individualism and Collectivism. Individualism attempts to maintain personal freedom and autonomy and Collectivism tries to take social relations and institutions seriously. However, when each of these two conceptions of personality get pressed too farContinue reading “The Call to Personhood”
I and Thou
Martin Buber’s I and Thou begins with the claim that “to man the world is twofold.” Human beings exist and interact with the world in two different ways. These ways are the “I-Thou” relation and the “I-It” relation. The first kind of relation, he says can only be spoken with the whole being, the secondContinue reading “I and Thou”
7 Theories of Human Nature
Seven Theories of Human Nature is a general introduction to philosophical anthropology. Written by Leslie Stevenson, who was a Reader in Logic and Metaphysics at the University of St. Andrews, this book focuses not only on major theories of what it is to be a human being but it also makes suggestions for how toContinue reading “7 Theories of Human Nature”
“To Heal a Fractured World” by Rabbi Jonathan Sacks – A Review
Rabbi Jonathan Sacks writes that “the twenty-first century confronts humanity with challenges and scope that seem to defy solution.”[1] (264) A brief perusal of any national newspaper will quickly verify the truth of this claim: regional conflict has kept millions of Yemenis in a state of famine, migrant children suffer atrocities in American detention centers,Continue reading ““To Heal a Fractured World” by Rabbi Jonathan Sacks – A Review”
Non-Reductive Physicalism – Some Problems (Part 2)
Yesterday, I mentioned one challenge that non-reductive physicalists face. Today I’d like to mention two more. The Problem of the Intermediate State… A second challenge that the nonreductive physicalist faces is the problem of the intermediate state and the afterlife. All physicalist accounts face the problem of a “gappy existence” during the intermediate state. ThatContinue reading “Non-Reductive Physicalism – Some Problems (Part 2)”
Non-Reductive Physicalism – Some Problems (Part 1)
Holding to non-Reductive physicalism has some benefits…. First, it takes seriously the dualist’s intuition—and the biblical data—that we cannot be reduced to the material; that is, we are more than merely matter. Second, it might avoid the reductionist pitfall of eliminating moral responsibility. Some people, like Nancey Murphy, have argued that can provide an accountContinue reading “Non-Reductive Physicalism – Some Problems (Part 1)”
