Reid on intrinsically social operations of mind (social intellectual powers): EIP 1.8; EAP 5.6
For there to be anything sometimes, there must be something or other always; for there to be anything somewhere, there must be something or other everywhere; for there to be anything possible, there must be something or other necessary; for there to be anything permissible, there must be something or other obligatory.
consensus sanctorum arguments (cp. Vatican I on consensus patrorum)
Hume on promises as an argument against social contract theory
Marxism assumes the necessary separation of capitalist and worker, but it is possible for the same person to be capitalist, rentier, and worker.
In sharing common good, we see ourselves as greater than we otherwise could, because we see ourselves as in some sense including others.
kinds of argument: whole to part (deduction), part to whole (induction), part to part (example), associated to associated (enthymeme).
Rights are, so to speak, shares in common good.
the posterior partiality of utilitarianism
utilitarianism, the official ethics of colonialism
money as an instrument of justice (facilitation, compensation, and reparation)
-- this is a reason why misuse is often so serious
persona vs brand
Praise is a way we participate in the actions of others.
Acting justly and working for justice are distinct things and sometimes come apart in startling ways.
acroamatic vs exoteric modes of philosophy
"the intelligent mind of men is certainly formed to know" Zhu Xi, on Great Learning 5
Book of Rites (Li Yun 3): the rules of propriety (1) represent the ways of Heaven and (2) regulate human feelings
(Li Yun 29): "The rules of propriety are for man what the yeast is for liquor."
(Jiao Te Sheng 47): "Sacrifices were for the purpose of prayer, of thanksgiving, or of deprecation."
(Yue Ji 10): "Similarity and union are the aim of music; difference and distinction, that of ceremony. From union comes mutual affection; from difference, mutual respect."
(Yue Ji 11): "Music comes from within, ceremonies from without. Music, coming from within, produces stillness; ceremonies, coming from without, produce elegance."
(Yue Ji 14): "Music is the harmony between heaven and earth; ceremonies reflect the orderly distinctions of heaven and earth."
Rosmini: Aristotle's categories only divide the formal cause; they do not consider the other three as such.
intelligibility, activity, durability, intrinsic order
Rosmini on divine imagination: Theosophy 462-466
real, ideal, moral // efficient, exemplar, final
Marian intercession as purest case of intercession of saints, the latter converging on the former
Wis 14:14 -- idolatry comes about through the empty-headedness of men
Bede's Ecclesiastical History is significant in part for being the first developed missiological account of the Church.
It is noteworthy in both East and West that the impulse of empire was first to iconoclasm.
two modes of oikonomia (Quinsext canon 102): akribeia (strictness), synetheia (customary usage)
The role of icons in conversions has been extensive.
ceremonies as books for the nonstudious
Regulating icons and relics is the primary ordinary way in which the Church keeps veneration of saints within orthodox bounds.
"The icon is said to be a door, which opens our mind, created after God, to its inward likeness to the archetype." Stephen the Deacon, 'Life of St. Stephen the Younger'
"Notice that through Moses and Peter, the fathers of both Testaments, is signified a unity between kingship and priesthood, since one is called a priestly king and the other is called a royal priest." Innocent III
One of the implications of II Nicaea is that the Eucharist cannot be merely an icon.
icons as discipline of memory and desire
Most of the good in life is unearned.
Wisdom 12:3-18 on the conquest of Canaan
Not possession but record is nine-tenths of the law.
'Education' covers both artificial and natural causes.
T 1.3.12.20 (SBN 139) can be flipped into a reductio
All monastic and clerical reforms, even the most successful, are only partial successes.
mystery : action :: sacrament : sign
the human body as natural signifier, as naturally apt to signify
aliens and UFOs as pictures of the scientific uncanny, the uncanny aspects of scientific progress
(1) the aliens want to study us
(2) the aliens us their advancement to conquer us
(3) the aliens use their advancement to steal our resources
(4) the aliens us their advancement to destroy us
(5) the aliens regard us as too inferior to consider
(6) the aliens are us, changed beyond recognition
(7) the aliens want to help us in ways we don't understand
Justice is not rendering what is deserved but rendering what is due; the two overlap only for a narrow range.
Troeltsch's conception of the essence of religion (cp Heidegger)
(1) psychological (matter): mysticism
(2) epistemological (form): a priori of religious reason
(3) historical (union of matter and form)
(4) metaphysical (relation to all else): the religious as principle of all a priori
regularities in nature -> laws of nature -> divine ideas
Ryle: "Misunderstanding is a by-product of knowing *how*....Mistakes are exercises of competencies."
We associate joy with excellent youth and peace with excellent age; love, ever ancient and ever new, is a fontal plenitude from which both joy and peace spring.
faith : hope : love :: love : joy : peace
mathematical functions as abstract conditional dependencies
limits as numbers defined by indefinite sequential requirements
Kant's highest good argument
(1) The highest good is the union of happiness and virtue.
(2) Moral reason imposes a duty to promote the highest good to the utmost of our capacity.
(3) Ought implies can.
(4) Therefore, moral reason posits that the union of happiness and virtue can be achieved.
(5) The union of happiness and virtue can in actuality only be achieved if something like God exists.
(6) There are no rational demonstrations that God cannot exist.
(7) Therefore, in fulfilling duty, one is acting according to reason by positing God's existence.
--- Kant takes hope to be concerned with happiness; the idea with (1) is that duty and hope in convergence are concerned with our highest good.
--- NB that (4) does not imply that the union can be achieved by us on our own.
"There is a God: for there is in moral-practical reason a categorical imperative, which extends to all rational world-beings and through which all world-beings are united." Kant (OP, AA 22:105.1-3)
-- In OP Kant keeps arguing that human duties practically speaking have to be conceived as divine commands. (also by ought implies can: OP AA 22.121.13-21)
What counts as a surprising result in inquiry is determined by the structure of the inquiry, not by the feeling of surprise, although the former may be apt for causing the latter.
Elements by which sin becomes locked in:
(1) the temptation itself
(2) exploration and experimentation with the sin
(3) secrecy and privacy
(4) encouragement by others
(5) reasoning that, really, it is good
(6) being recognizably in the same boat with others
Pariotism without civil religion becomes branding-kitsch.
bonsai as symbols of tradition
We directly experience some things as represented (image and object together), and the continued existence of some things we sense as independent from other things we sense, including our own bodies, which we recognize as not wholly independent of us, but united to us, as expressing us.
relics, icons, orders of patronage
relic : index :: icon : icon :: order of patronage : symbol
Christ and mediation of disjunctive transcendentals
In Christ, prior being becomes posterior being; independent being becomes dependent being; necessary being becomes contingent being; absolute being becomes relative being; being simply becomes being after a fashion; being for its own sake becomes being for another; essential being becomes participated being; actual being becomes potential being; simple being becomes composite being; immutable being becomes mutable being; yet in each case without ceasing to be, without confusion, without mixture, without loss.
three elements of indulgences: authority of Church, communion of suffrages, work and devotion of the penitent
-- require an increase of charity, contrition, and devotion
-- two benefits: remission of past debt, medicine against future sin
kinds of indulgenced acts (may overlap)
(1) specifications: particular forms of penance the Church wishes to encourage
(2) substitutions: particular acts that the Church chooses to take as penance in place of ordinary penances
the treasury of merits as the formal cause of remission of penalty in indulgences
the keys and the power to apply the treasury (historically this is linked specifically to the Petrine Commission)
it is linked with the 'key of jurisdiction', not the 'key of order'
prayer as part of every common good
Euler derives "A body remains in a state of absolute rest, unless it is disturbed to move by some external cause" from PSR; and he uses PSR as one of the reasons for "A body having uniform absolute motion will always be moving, and with the same speed now that it had at any earlier time, unless an external cause should act on it or have acted on it" (the other is the impossibility of coming to rest or emerging from rest on its own, based on the fact that it could then increase or decrease on its own); he also uses it to conclude that "The body with a given absolute motion shall progress in a straight line, or the distance that it describes shall be a straight line."
Nothing can be counted unless it is first divided from other things.
Human nature is intrinsically apt to be represented by physical signs.
Is 56:4-8 and the eucharist as sacrifice
hierarchia as the structure of redundantia
truth of art, i.e., true to productive goal
explanation of natural processes by analogy to art/skill (as if they were art/skill)
(1) art/skill as loose model (pure analogy)
(2) art/skill as sharing the essential features with nature (genus-sharing)
(3) art/skill as sharing essential features with nature (art/skill adapting the actual natural process in part)
The bishop of Rome shares in the Petrine ministry by office; other Patriarchs share in it by communion with the bishop of Rome.
All waters stirred get muddier; sometimes you must let the topic settle a bit.
the world as the chora, Christ as the demiurge, the Church as the cosmos
