Philosophy

This article is focused on Angelo Poliziano's general attitude to philosophy as a discipline and on his specific accounts of scholastic philosophy, found mainly in his four opening lectures to his courses on Aristotle's logic and ethics that were held in the Florentine Studium between 1490 and 1494, in the light of his overall exclusive classical approach. It shows, among other things, that philosophy was more important to Poliziano than common expressions such as " the humanist interest in philosophy " may suggest. Poliziano's important definition of history presented in his Panepistemon, together with other pieces of evidence, can reveal the moment in which disciplines associated with the " humanities " (in the modern sense of this term) began to be separated from the natural sciences — at a point just preceding the massive critique of Aristotelian science during the sixteenth century — through Poliziano's notion of a philosophical literature to which also the Aristotelian texts belong.

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Th is article presents the first detailed account of Giorgio Benigno Salviati's discussion of the will written in Urbino during the mid-1470s and the early 1480s. A Franciscan friar and a prominent professor of theology and philosophy, Salviati was a prolific author and central figure in the circles of Cardinal Bessarion in Rome and of Lorenzo de' Medici in Florence. Th is article focuses on his defense of the Scotist theory of the will. It considers its fifteenth-century context, in which both humanist and scholastic thinkers dealt with the question of the intellect and the will. While basing himself partly on authorities such as Aristotle, Augustine, and Th omas Aquinas, Salviati is clearly aware of the novelty of his theory, and its important implications for ethics and theology.

Sermons were an essential part of a dynamic oral culture of the Renaissance, where we find a blend of traditional and new forms such as public speeches for different occasions, introductory lectures for university courses, public debates in the universities, in the houses of learning of the different religious orders and in private palaces and villas, and special sermons delivered in the many different religious confraternities. This is the proper historical context for understanding the role of sermons in the Renaissance ; in many cases these sermons reflect important aspects of the new cultural atmosphere we call " the Renaissance " , which does not always correspond to some popular and old historiographical images of a secular and anti-religious movement 1. We can still find in the Renaissance a tendency towards the convivio and the more open and less academic and formal debates. One example

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, US Republican Candidate Donald Trump made one of his most divisive and controversial statements: "I am calling for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country's representatives can figure out what is going on", he said (Trump, 7 December 2017). This statement led to uproar among the international community, coming during the biggest mass migration of our time. What we once viewed on our televisions-aghast, in horror at the images of despair and deprivation-is now arriving at our doorstep as hundreds of thousands flee chaos and war. What is happening? We have come to regard our new 'neighbours' as a potential threat to security. Malala Yousafzai condemned Trump's comment saying that it would only "radicalise more terrorists," (BBC, 16 December 2015): over two weeks later Trump's comment featured on an Al-Shabaab recruitment video. So what is the purpose of making such divisive comments about a given population such as Muslims? Does it tap into a sentiment of another population of America that long for such a divide? Why did his statement create such uproar in several heads of state? For Trump, perhaps his controversial comment only creates the terror it aims to defend itself against. But there is, in my opinion, something more to this demagogue which activates such an outcry. This composition aims to explore Jacques Lacan's elaboration of "the commandment which is expressed in our civilisation in the form of the love of one's neighbour" in Seminar VII: The Ethics of Psychoanalysis (1999/1959-60, 179). Within this elucidation Lacan uses several authors to argue his point that to love thy neighbour is a commandment not to be taken lightly when it comes to morality.

This article revisits the life and academic career of Peter of Ireland (Petrus de Hibernia, ca. 1200-1260) whose Opera Omnia were edited by the author (Louvain-Paris, 1993, 1996). A recapitulation is also given of a recent debate as to whether the early sources for the life of Thomas Aquinas were right in stating that Peter of Ireland taught the young Aquinas when the latter was a student at the University of Naples in the years 1239-44. While acknowledging that it is now impossible to be absolutely certain of this, the author argues that the likelihood remains that Aquinas was introduced to philosophy by an Irishman.

When John Duns Scotus died at the young age of 42, seven centuries ago in 1308, he did not leave behind a completed body of work which would present his mature philosophical thought. Thus, the followers of Scotus were faced with the challenging task of interpreting the texts of the Subtle Docotr. Since Scotism became one of the most important schools of thought by the early modern period, the synthesis elaborated by the most famous of the commentators on Scotus"s philosophy Hugo Cavellus (1571-1626), Irish Franciscan and Archbishop of Armagh is of capital importance. Cavellus dedicated a considerable part of his commentary on the De Anima of Duns Scotus to the problems relating to the theory of the knowledge. Because of Cavellus"s central importance in seventeenth-century Scotism, his writings on doubt, evidence and certitude are noteworthy in terms of developments in modern thought. 1 A useful (if somewhat brief) source on Cavellus" life is the entry in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography written by T. Clavin. The reader should note that our author is commonly known by three names, Hugh MacCaghwell, Hugo Cavellus, and Aodh Mac Aingil. The first is the anglicised version of his birth name Aodh Mac Cathmhaoil, the second the latinised version which he used in his published Latin works, and finally the name by which he is best known among Irish scholars, "Mac Aingil", literally "the son of an angel". A more extensive examination of his life is to be found in C.

In Surplus-Enjoyment: A Guide for the Non-Perplexed, Žižek reiterates what he has already been saying for the last thirty years. As the saying should go: if one has read his acclaimed The Sublime Object of Ideology one has gained adequate knowledge of most of his works. This general strand—which passes through all his works—what is it? In other words, what is the essence of Mr. Žižek’s works? If one were to approach this superficially, one would say that he tries to analyse contemporary literature, movies, and other pop-culture phenomena, and reach a conclusion which enlightens the reader of the discrepancies of contemporary life, i.e. help create the examined life. But, like everything else surrounding Mr. Žižek, it is not so simple. However, to save the readers’ valuable time, a defining feature of (most of) Žižek’s books is the promotion of Lacanian structural psychoanalysis. If not in absolute agreement with its claims, he nonetheless features it as either an authoritative reference point, a source of inspiration, or by way of grafting it onto other forms of analysis—such as the Marxist/Marxian one. To go a step further, his public persona of a Marxist thinker has helped give relevance to his work. People, students and young people in particular, have become more ‘Left-leaning’ than ever before. It helps to discuss existential matters in a classroom, and better still to extrapolate one’s understanding of logic. However, when one’s actual existence is scrutinised, and one’s means of continuing to live are endangered, philosophy itself becomes more than a struggle over intellectual pursuits—the intellectual informs and reflects the very real material conditions of one’s actual existence. That is to say, in more ways than in an ordinary sense, one has a stake in the conclusions produced by these matters of philosophy. And so, Mr. Žižek prospers. His titles include no less than ‘The most dangerous philosopher in the west’. Here lies one of the biggest problems that plague us today: the sensational nonsense with which we greet our modern-day celebrity-thinkers. Žižek is a Marxist that threatens with his Stalinism, all the while insisting that we should return to Hegel through Marx. In the end, this Marxism of his bares no semblance of emancipatory will. If one were to congratulate him for anything, it would be for his making of Marx, and of Marxism, a lifestyle brand. To add to his accolades, Mr. Žižek is the greatest Marxist thinker that could be enjoyed by the capitalist simpleton of today. Just like our contemporary politics, his Marxism is only there to please us as yet another form of cheap entertainment. Mr. Žižek acts as Capitalism’s Court Jester (Rockhill 2023).

This paper will analyze Cusa’s approach to Islam as a test case regarding toleration. Firstly, we will establish toleration and its key components as tertium comparationis. Secondly, we will give a brief overview of Cusa’s main positions on Islam and (religious) diversity, including some shifts that occur within his sustained study of the Qur’an. Thirdly, we will apply the concept of toleration to some key points taken from two of Cusa’s works in which he engages in an imagined dialogue with Islam in order to identify his grounds for accepting, objecting to, and rejecting Islamic doctrines. We will argue that while Cusa’s irenic position and his concept of human nature remain constant principles regarding his toleration of Islam, Cusa’s application of the concept of rationabilitas plays a major role in shifting from tolerating to rejecting Islamic doctrines the more the latter are interpreted as heretical.

This paper investigates the development of Scheler's concept of upheaval (Umsturz) within the political context of the turmoil in the time from World War I to the Weimar Republic. I will argue that Scheler's concepts and philosophical developments cannot be understood without taking the political and social events into account. In a first step, the essential points of the political context will be roughly outlined. In a second step, I will take a closer look at the development of "upheaval" in his political and social writings. My conclusion will be that while the Scheler of the middle period, rethinking and using Nietzsche's idea of the revaluation of values is indeed a catalyst of his era, the later Scheler comes into his own, finally going beyond the mainstream ideas of his time.