Medieval Philosophy: St. Thomas Aquinas

[akwinata1]

You ask: how it is a choice? Very simple. If there were TWO Gods, you would have TWO possible choices, but you know and I that there is only ONE true God, so there is only ONE possible choice. What does it mean? It mean your freedom is not against truth. Your freedom is not to make new god. God is your happy end. Your freedom can do nothing about it, to change it. Your freedom was given to you by God in order to make it possible for you to give answer to God: yes or not. If "yes" you are happy.

[akwinata1]

One choice, because ONE God. So there is only ONE possible subject of your choice, which is ultimate and for all eternity. No other true and real God. Only ONE right choice. To choose God, your Creator and Saviour, Who truly loves you. But be very careful! Do it now. Do not wait till the moment of your death. It will be the last moment of your earthly life and in this last moment you will have possibility given by God, to make your final choice, valid for all eternity, to be with God or not.

[kern0099]

Thomas Aquinas won a battle of attrition by baiting one opponent (scientists) vs. another (papal Rome). He argued politically from a philosophical position he didn't believe in (naturalism). This formed a coalition on the losing side, and furthered the status quo on the wining side, the church. His misrepresentations enabled the protracted feature of the Dark Ages more than any one actor. Of course he personally benefitted greatly, by appealing to human greed to further his own. Nakedly evil.

[dfpolis]

Very solid and illuminating.

[morvensky]

He is smart and knows his stuff, but he is a little dry.

[akwinata1]

You man are proud to be man but why? You will answer - because of reason and free will. Yes you are right, BUT God gave you reason and free will in order to make it possible to you to believe God. If you don't believe God, and God is Truth, Jesus is Truth, you reject to use your reason and free will in the most sublime way possible for you. You reject to use your reason and free will in the way which was the main reason you received them from God.You reject to use them for what you received them

[bongolongo]

@akwinata1 What you're saying is that we were given free will in order to pick only ONE correct choice, and if we choose anything else, we'll be punished severely. How is that a choice, exactly?

[lizazoon]

This man, who wrote the script, how to deal with heretics, hence the Inquisition, was promoted a " doctor of the Church " How appropriate !!!

[airplanman]

@lizazoon My friend a heretic ,are you faithful to God ? Do you know and understand Jesus the author of Love that gave his life on a cross for the world ?No Man would do this and all the while say forgive them for they know not what they do. Do you LOVE the lord your God with all you Heart ,All your Soul,Mind and Strength? Jesus (GOD)came in the form of a man..I saw the stigmata. I know Truth.Early church fathers lived their life for God.Do you know God's LOVE.God let me love you every second.

[indirectapproach]

Boring. Boring. Boring. Old tired chump takes most interesting philosophy and can't say one interesting thing in 60 seconds.

Should be put out to grass with comfy pension and subsidised accommodation.

Spare us.

[airplanman]

@indirectapproach And where should you be put ? Please enlighten us..Do you think that you are so intelligent that you should down someone else to prove what?.Is this your philosophy? inspire us. we wait.

[indirectapproach]

@airplanman

How about in the lecture that begins, "A decent life is a noble life ..." The one that gains our attention in the first 7 words by getting to the good bit so it can build from the core out, rather than the usual boring academic tosh.

And of course I'm less brainy than the Prof but that doesn't mean I can't say he's doing a boring disservice to his discipline, when it's true.

[airplanman]

@indirectapproach I did not hear that.but in any case the word decent means respectable,proper, fitting ,fair and the word noble means high moral qualities, stately, exellent .There are those qualities that are addressed in we humans , natural order or God's way.If we work or play against natural order LAW there is almost always consequence.Do this,youtube Rick Larsen's star of bethlehem and tell me what you think.I will give you more to check.remember I was about a hard core atheist. Watch !

[Uruguruh]

Hi Ralphie! That's really nifty.

But Thomas doesn't just quote Aristotle or interpret him, he uses him for his own theory and for his own purposes; using it to explain christian faith and showing that Aristotle doesn't oppose this faith. Thomas is a bit biased, don't you think?

[Azariah197]

@Uruguruh Who isn't? McInerny addresses this accusation in the introduction to his Penguin Classics book, "St. Thomas Aquinas, Selected Writings", if you can find a copy of it, or at least thumb through it in a bookstore. And Kierkegaard really adresses it in his "Johannes Climacus: Or De Omnibus Dubitandum".

[Uruguruh]

@Azariah197 Great! Thanks.

[Azariah197]

@Uruguruh He also gives a more holistic and fuller introduction to how St. Thomas approached Aristotle and why he did so (his intents and purpose).

[Zimmermanism]

Way too much gratuitious rambling! Prof. Mclnerny should revisit Cicero's text on the 'art of speaking!' Overall, a dreadful lecture!!

[ogirv101]

Great review of Scholasticism of Thomas Aquinas, it took a genius like Aquinas to join Greek Philosophy and Christian Theology to create Scholasticism which would later lay the foundation for modern Science.

[migely]

ogirv

Again, you have confused your video games with theology.

Modern science owes nothing to Christianity or Aquinas, but don't let the facts get in the way of your fantasy world!

[ogirv101]

Yes it does, Modern Science grew out of a Christian culture, in the debate "The God Delusion Debate", the prominent Atheist Richard Dawkins admits that Science grew out of a Christian culture, and thanks to Aquinas, other Theologians, and Scholasticism this type of intellectual culture for the roots of modern Science arose. Maybe you need a history lesson, but the father of modern Science (Isaac Newton) wrote more about God than Science...

[BipedalHumanoid]

He wrote a lot about Alchemy too *grin*.

[ogirv101]

Alchemy was essential for the existance of chemistry, before chemistry existed alchemy was the best form of chemistry, Newton did alchemy to understand the chemistry of the Universe. The funny thing is that people depict alchemy as something really weird, when in fact it's a protoscience, I suggest you do more research before making bare assertion fallacies.

[BipedalHumanoid]

Chemistry is what came about when someone decided to take the mystical woo woo out of alchemy. It doesn't change the fact that Newton believed in all sorts of unsubstantiated woo woo.

The point I am making is that it's possible to have the critical thinking skills to be a great scientist and then fail to apply those skills to other areas. The result is a man who can do science one day and then participate in religion and other forms of woo woo the next.

[ogirv101]

"Chemistry is what came about when someone decided to take the mystical woo woo out of alchemy."

No, alchemy was the bassi for the creation of chemistry, it just took alchemy and added inquiry to it, this person was Robert Boyle, and he himself was an alchemist before he founded chemistry. You don't know wtf you're talking about, before you keep on making a fool of yourself and make Newton (the greatest scientist of all time) try doing some damn research.

[BipedalHumanoid]

How is that in any way incompatibe with what I said? Without inquiry you have a pseudoscience, not protoscience. You have a bunch of woo woo and Newton beLIEved it just like he beLIEved in the predominent religion of the region he happened to have been born into.

[ogirv101]

No, Newton did alchemical research alongside with inquiry, stop making bare assertion fallacies liek the idiot you are and use logic and reason to analyze subjects. read more on the subject, how could a man that said: "I feing no hypothesis' do pseudoscience? You just lost your validity, and everyone in the public just saw you loose it so sadly. He didn't believe in the predominat religion, he was a heretic, lmfao, you really lost your validity. He was an aryan... lmfao!!!

[BipedalHumanoid]

*slaps forehead*

um... that would be ARIAN dickweed. And that still makes him a christian.

Having established that he was a christian we know that he held woo woo beliefs for which there is no evidence.

As for my ..ahem.. 'bare assertion' fallacies, how about you stop with your 'appeal to authority' fallacies.

At the end of the day his science was not informed by his theology.

[ogirv101]

First of all you said predominant religion, arianism was prohibited by the anglican church, he was probably one of the few, if not the only one who held that ceirtain belief in England. Furthermore, where do you keep making these stupid ad hominems about Christianity being 'woo woo'. I just love when you say that, because you sound more of an idiot than you actually are. Furthermore, theology did not inform science, but it inspired it, so stfu idiot.

[BipedalHumanoid]

LMAO. Now it's adhominem? Do you just have a list of logical fallacies that you randomly choose from? Ad hominem means attacking the man as oposed to the argument. I can see how my statement about christianity might be seen as attacking the religion but not the man.

On the other hand, your attempt to pull me on a technicality, while intentionally missing the point, solely in an attempt to discredit me personally... IS AD HOMINEM!

[ogirv101]

It always has, an appeal to ridiucle fallacy seems more suitable fallacy for your illogcial thinking. You're attacking the argument in an attempt to ridicule it, so even if isn't an ad homine, it still is an appeal to ridicule logical fallacy.

Also, it isn't an ad hominem, an ad hominem is what you just did right now, you claim I tried to discredit you on false grounds. It would actually be a strawman argument, but it isn't even close, you commited another logical fallacy....

[BipedalHumanoid]

Sorry, Wrong on all counts.

According to your def of appeal to ridicule, I could come up with a perfectly salient argument and it would be fallacious if my motive is to ridicule you by proving you're wrong. That is complete and utter BS. A to R is when the counter arg is used to ridicule the arg rather than addressing it. ie. Had I produced an argument for why the earth is 4.6 billion years old and your response was to laugh at me for believing in paeleologic timescales, that would be A to R.

[BipedalHumanoid]

If you want to accuse me of straw mannery you'll have to show that I attempted to refute a position other than the one you presented... which I did not.

If you want to accuse me of ad hominem you'll have to show that, as an argument, I chose to attack you personally instead of the argument. I think you are a stupid, arrogant dick weed but as these statements are not part of my actual argument they don't constitute ad hominem fallacy.

[ogirv101]

OMFG, forget the fallacies, lets go to the arguments already. Damn.

[migely]

ogirv

What is particularly ironic about your misguided arrogance is that your philosophy is relatively unchanged from a medieval theologian.

What intelligent, modern man looks to Aquinas? He believed the literal account of Genesis! He was only a forward thinker in that he did not see all science as heresy. He was astute enough to realize that Catholic persecution of heliocentrists and zoologists was a losing endeavour. Unlike the Pope, he would not have imprisoned Galileo.

[SonoPortoricano]

1) Are you really appealing to 'admiration' (or, more precisely, lack of admiration) as evidence for your claim?

2) Butt didn't Aquinas say that if something scientifically known were to conflict with something in scripture that we should interpret that in latter in a non-literal manner? If so, what harm does your Genesis complaint do?

4) Where there active heliocentrists in Aquinas' days?

3) Couldn't we say as well: "Unlike that Pope, some other Popes would not have imprisoned Galileo"?

[BipedalHumanoid]

Genius? Ever read his proofs for the existence of god?  Pretty crap really.

[SenatusPopulesQueRom]

Just because they are beyond your grasp does not make them crap.

[BipedalHumanoid]

LMAO. I child could understand Aquinus's supposed proofs. It's only wishful thinkers who can't see through them.

[SenatusPopulesQueRom]

Go right on thinking that, BH. Dimwit.

[BipedalHumanoid]

I will. Especially given that your only response was an ad-hominem attack.

[migely]

The fact is that myths of virgin births were part of many IF NOT ALL of the surrounding pagan religions in the place where, and at the time when, Christianity arose.

Statues of the virgin goddess Isis with her child, the god Horus, in her arms were common in Egypt and absorbed into Christian mythology and iconography.

Virgin birth gods Ra, Net, Dionysos, Jason, Perseus, Attis, Adonis, Mithra, etc.

Virgin birth was an explanation for the god's arrival upon earth in human guise.

[ogirv101]

"The fact is that myths of virgin births were part of many IF NOT ALL of the surrounding pagan religions in the place where, and at the time when, Christianity arose."

LMAO, you believe in Zeitgeist, research what you say before you come looking like a fool to a higher intellectual community, sophomoric and recalcitrant teenagers are funny.

[migely]

ogirv

Sophomoric teenagers are funny and that is why everyone gets such a good laugh from YOU! rofl

It is such a shame that you have never studied your own religion. My guess is that you have never even read through the entire NT. What a surprise!

Maybe you can get away from the video games and actually study theology. You would find that Christianity is based upon prior religions and very little is original. Good luck getting away from the video games!

[migely]

ogirv

Zeitgeist? Isn't that another one of your jokes?

Modern theological study very clearly has identified the origins of the virgin myth and the Christ myth without fear of Catholic persecution, imprisonment or death. It is all out in the open now.

The problem for you is that you are stuck in the past with your false assumptions and lack of study. Ignorance is no excuse for your arrogant outburst. The unveiling of myths will always appear to be zeitgeist to the ignorant.

[ogirv101]

"It is all out in the open now."

Give me one credible source for the bullshit you're speaking, there are none, there is just a small minority of idiots who's credibility is laughable. The cosensus in historical community doesn't agree with what you say. Calling me ignorant is just an ad hominem that covers up your true deceit.

[leomessi102]

You can't produce primary sources bud.....Go watch more zeitgeist and conspiracy theory movies....The rest of us will stick to historical documentation and BTW theres no evidence of virgin birth in a religion before Christianity. Find me a primary source if you disagree. Horus's father was osiris haha way to do ur research.

[Ryan2142]

Very nice.