Questions tagged [philosophy]

Philosophical approaches in theology and relationship between philosophy and faith.

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About the spiritual soul: can animals apprehend universals?

I'm struggling with this question for a while: It seems like dogs do know what dogs are. Is it possible for a dog to only recognize individuals and not grasp the universal concept of dog? I thought ...
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What are the correct pairings between the soul's faculties and the 3 transcendentals?

The three transcendentals and imago dei Medieval scholastic theology inherited the notions of transcendentals from Greek metaphysics. CCC 41, interpreting Wis 13:5, teaches that our soul has the ...
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Can someone clarify the eastern orthodox teaching "Temps Immobile" of Fr. Alexander Schmemann?

I've been reading about Eastern Orthodox theology and one thing that caught my attention is the unusual view of time that some Eastern Orthodox theologians have, in particular Fr. Alexander Schmemann. ...
Chris's user avatar
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Who are the prominent Christian thinkers that define "permissive" will?

I would like to get a better understanding of the term "permissive will". I have read a couple threads on this forum related to this topic, but neither has given me a satisfactory understanding. I ...
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Are WLC's arguments against Relative Identity Trinitarianism valid?

In his book Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview, William Lane Craig offers three arguments against Relative Identity. The first argument regards the alleged "spurious" nature ...
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Are Christians theologically committed to believing that all evil and suffering in the world is non-gratuitous or necessary?

Arguments from evil, such as the logical problem of evil or the evidential problem of evil, aim to demonstrate that certain forms of suffering in the world are either unnecessary or gratuitous. ...
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Is there Catholic doctrine about "divine ideas"?

Augustine was a staunch advocate of the "doctrine" of divine ideas, which locates Plato's exemplary forms in the mind of God. The theory seems to have been generally adopted by Thomas ...
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In the Writings of the Ancient Greeks---"God is Everywhere Implied"

Elements of monotheism seem to have existed in the philosophies of at least several of the celebrated ancient Greek philosophers; e.g., Parmenides, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. A while back, I ...
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How does Catholicism appropriate Aristotle's notion of the 'transcendent third'?

I was reading Bishop Robert Barron's article Silence and the Meaning of the Mass and came across Aristotle's "transcendent third": The Mass is the act by which the Son of God, in union with ...
GratefulDisciple's user avatar
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Are any Christian philosophers working on an argument from causation that works with Quantum Physics?

A chat yesterday informed me that Aquinas' argument from causation was "too Newtonian" to work for modern atheists and only works in our friendly neighborhood eminently perceivable dimension....
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How to express the Trinity in terms of category theory

I've recently been studying category theory (mathematics), in which the relations between objects are generalized to a very abstract level. I was wondering therefore if the relations between the ...
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What was the source of the concept "The Word was God " that John the Evangelist introduced in Jn 1: 1?

We read in John 1:1-2: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. Clearly, John means The Son of God for “the Word who was ...
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Were "All" of Hobbes' Works Placed on the Index of Prohibited Books?

According to Index of Prohibited Books, all of the works of Thomas Hobbes were placed on the Index of Prohibited Books in the year 1649. Thomas Hobbes wrote many more books after 1649, including his ...
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Can God ground his own parts?

One of the motivations behind the doctrine of divine simplicity (DDS) is that if God was composed of parts, God would depend upon those parts to exist and hence there would be something more ...
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Who teaches that God is bound by time?

Edit: The proposed duplicate cannot possibly be a duplicate, because I attempted to clarify the answer to this question in the proposed duplicate's comments, but was told to ask another official ...
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