MODULE TWO

DEFINITIONS
 Theologian – a person who is an expert on the study of God, God’s nature, and religious
belief
 Necessary causation - If x is a necessary cause of y, then the presence of y necessarily
implies the prior occurrence of x.
 Determinism - the doctrine that all events, including human action, are ultimately
determined by causes external to the will (basically Newton’s followers taking necessary
causation a step further)

AUGUSTINE
 BASICS
- Theologian
- Considered father of Theology (said you can be a good philosopher and theologian)
- Wanted to ground religion in logic
- Archae = God
 HIS LIFE
- Wrote “The Confessions” = the first major autobiography in the West
- Wrote “City of God”
- Raised in Hippo, Northern Africa
- Mom = theist/Christian, Dad = atheist
- Nineteen decided to believe in God but needed solution to the problem of evil and
suffering (POEAS: how can we be justified in believing in God given all the evil
and suffering in the world? Maybe God can’t stop it >> God is omnipotent/all
knowing. God has no bad side, God is goodness >> omnibenevolent.)
 INTELLECTUAL DEVELOPMENT
- Manichaeanism (looks like zoro asterianism) – taught cosmic dualism (2 opposite
forces at war in the cosmos), forces are gods in cosmic battle, when something
bad happens the bad god won the round. Ultimate reality is the battle between the
2 gods. // Aug believed it had rational basis. He ridiculed Christianity bc it’s
based on faith and can’t solve the POE. HOWEVER, he said manich. also
based on faith,
- Skepticism – doesn’t give much room to believe in anything, can be a method of
philosophy and a content. (method: begin by doubting everything)
a) Hard skepticism – says you can’t know anything, one should doubt
knowledge of everything
b) Soft skepticism – says you can’t know anything except that you can’t
know anything, doubt everything except the fact that you should doubt
everything (cf. Descartes: I think therefore I am. Aug: We doubt therefore
we are. >> Both prove existence)
- Neo-Platonism (Plotinus! Wrote Enneades about what he thinks are the real
teachings of Plato)
 a) POE (philosophical solution) – define evil as absence of goodness then
you have a philosophical solution. God is isn’t fully present during bad
things as he can’t be.
b) Existence of God (philosophically viable) – only thing that can stop god is
god. Shows us that it isn’t unreasonable that a God exists.
c) “The One” – pure order, form, logic, reason. Immaterial. INFINITE
MIND. Pantheistic (god is all, all is god). Is infinite so can’t be in physical
world fully (this explains evil as god is stopped by his own nature).
d) Synthesis (Platonic philosophy with Christian theology, basically logos
doctorine) – it’s reasonable bc of coherence, faith and reason can work
together to certain extent, BUT don’t push it too far as they only
compliment one another
e) Some Issues – Plotinus’ “The One” = the wrong god. Mode of knowing
the God was qua supernatural mysticism (knowledge beyond science but
not irrational. Plotinus thought highest knowledge that could be known
was through mystical relationship with “The One”. Augustine said it
wasn’t mystical knowing but through faith (superior way of knowing
ultimate reality as ultimate can’t be proven through philosophy). Plotinus
grounded WOF (true reality) onto logical grounds in the mind of “The
One”, spiritualizing WOF. Augustine likes WOF but said Plotinus had the
wrong god. Augustine said real gods = Issac, Abraham, and Jacob.
Augustine Christianizes WOF.
 ARGUMENTS
- Contra Academicos (against skepticism)
a) Logically contradictory, academics = skeptics
b) Dubito ergo sum – in order to doubt, we must exist. We know we exist so
we can’t say we don’t know anything.
c) Si fallori sum – “if you believe I made a mistake with dubito ergo sum,
you have to believe I exist”
 LOGOS DOCTORINE
Realities: 3, Downward Rationales Aeternae Human Modes of
Path of Being (eternal logic/reason, Apprehension (how we
God/mind of God), know things)(Ratio
Upward Path of Knowiing Hominus = human reason)
God (Being/Personality) Divine action qua Being Faith (God being) – Way
Disclosure – God of knowing God is through
approaches spiritually and his personality
speaks to our heart and
intuition
XXXXXXXX ACHTUNG! – we can’t XXXXXXXX
go higher than this with
just philosophy
God (Forms) Intellection (God forms) –
thinking mathematically
and intellectually
Contemplating universal

Humans (lesser reality)
Nature (in natural place)
truths which exists in Gods
minds
God = WOF
Minds = sharing thoughts
with God
Ratio hominus (human
brain) – human reasoning,
what we can do with our
reasoning.
Engage in intellection,
make sense of ourselves as
rationale beings
Ratio seminales (seeds of Cogitation = science,
reason) – looking into through superior knowing
nature can give you info of nature and sensory
about God. perception we can actually
Structure of the world is know something about it
orderly bc it was created
by logical being, read off Sensation = sensory
logic of world bc God is perception, possibly art
logic
Logic, structure implanted

- God action + human coaction = revelation about God’s being (disclosure)

- Downard Path of Being – hierarchal structure, further down is the further from
God in likeness

DESCARTES

 BASICS
- Rationalist
- Father of modern philosophy (philosophy begins to emphasize human mind, what
it can know, and limitations
- Roman Cahtolic school/Jesuit education
- Said modern philosophy doesn’t start with belief that God exists, sounds like diest
(God created universe but isn’t involved in everyday life)
- Epistemological
- Looking for self-evident truths
- DOUBT LED TO INTUITION AND DEDUCTION
- WE CAN GROUND PHILOSOPHY IN INTUITION
 HIS THOUGHTS
- Foundationalist – foundational or fundamental truth that can form basis of all
other truths
a) Goal: wants to find one foundational truth, wants one truth he can be certain
of then build on
 b) Method 1: doubt
1. Doubt – let go of some old foundations
2. Radical skepticism – begin by doubting everything, start from square one
in philosophy to overcome skepticism, he must have truth where he has 0
doubt
3. General sensory doubt – philo was based on sensory experiences but we
can’t build philosophy based on what we see bc can’t always trust it. Our
senses can deceive us, so there’s always room for doubting. Growth of
science based on this.
4. Dream doubt – can’t trust our senses bc we may be in a dream but we may
be able to trust our truth/reason. When you’re in a dream, what’s illogical
can seem logical.
5. Evil genius doubt – there can be an evil genius (god, demiurge) that
tricked us into believing that math is always true when it actually isn’t
i. DANGER! Leads to solipsism where one is trapped in their
own mind
ii. Soft solipsism – we know our own thoughts
iii. Hard solipsism – seem to know our own thoughts
(DESCARTES WAS THIS)
c) Journey: Want through all this shit. Basically wants us to take a journey
d) Destination: Cogito ergo sum
1. “I think therefore I am” = I can’t doubt that I exist.
2. This is his foundation known through intuition
e) Clear and distinct criterion: was clear to him that this is the best alternative he
has. Intuition as way of knowing is best alternative. Intuition is distinct bc all
other options failed. He has proven all others have failed but intuition was last
possibility standing.
f) Method 2: Deduction – deduction can give you new conclusions that give you
the 100% certainty you wanted
g) Affirmations vis deduction: everything he denied he ended up affirming
through deduction (ex: the senses)
1. If I know I exist > I haven’t been 100% deceived > no being 100%
deceived me > eventually use logical entailment to connect ideas
h) Criticism
1. Historians thought he was unoriginal, uncreative
2. He’s contrived, breaking rules, pretending
3. He invented dumb alternative = sellout on doubt

THOUGHTS/OUR MINDS
- A PRIORI – KNOWLEDGE WE CAN HAVE PRIOR TO SENSORY
EXPERIENCE; CAN HAVE W/O SENSORY EXPERIENCE (MAYBE WE
SHOULD TRUST KNOWLEDGE IN OUR HEADS)
- A POSTERIORI – TRUTHS WE CAN HAVE AFTER SENSORT
EXPERIENCE; REQUIRES SENSORY EXPERIENCE

KANT
 BASICS
- Raised in Lutheran Pietism, version of Christian thought
- Knew physics and theology
- Critical philosophy – philosophizing about philosophy, philosophy about
philosophy, use of logic to evaluate logic of others
- Idealism – world of mind, mind is more real, his maintains that what’s ultimately
real is a mind and the mind is ultimate reality (mind = our minds)
- Said there is no WOF and no supreme absolute mind called God
- Idealist
- Said our minds were the center of reality and were actively involved in knowing
about ultimate reality
- Physical world is projection of your mind
 CULTURAL-INTELLECTUAL CONTEXT
- Born in Enlightenment (“Age of Reason”)
- Reason over revelation and superstition
- Individual freedom over church and state authority
 NARROWER INTELLECTUAL CONTEXT FOR KANT (ACTED AS
MEDIATOR)
- GREAT DEBATES OVER NECESSARY CAUSATION (IF A THEN B
MUST FOLLOW)
- Philosophy // Hume (you can’t know causality, only correlation): philosophy >
religion, science
- Science // Newton: math, science > determinism (given event A, event B must
happen, determines exactly how humans work and behave)
- Religion // Aquinas, Anselm, Descartes (all said God existed and were good at
arguing such
 PURE REASON/LOGIC (EPISTEMOLOGICAL)
- Kant critiqued it
- He asked, “what can we know?” – if someone is making a claim but it’s beyond
what we can know then we can rule it out. Believe what you want but it isn’t
knowledge.
- Said we can’t know essence of something within itself
 COMPARTMENTS OF MIND
- We must think as if based on structure of mind, causal relationships are out there.
There are structures in our mind that are actively involved in conceptualization of
what we receive and color our judgement. We’re wired this way.
- Thought that in order to understand world, we had to employ categories to make
sense of world
- Don’t have innate knowledge but we do have structures of mind that must be
allowed to a priori
- Structures are innate and help with knowledge
- CONTRA HUME: can be logically demonstrated by pure reason COM must be
used. Hume said mind is blank state at birth
- PRO NEWTON: we have logic that helps us see what’s out there
 -All knowledge begins as sensory experience and with COM, interactions between
them give rise to some knowledge
 NOUMENAL/PHENOMENAL DISTINCTION
- Noumenal = thing as it is within itself, including God, we cant know anything
because our minds are involved in knowing
- Phenomenal = ideas, perceptions, appearances
- PRO HUME: we’re trapped in our mind except for…

 PHENOMENA-AS-SECONDARY PROPERTIES
- CONT HUME: we can have knowledge of secondary characteristics (ex: texture,
color, orientation)
- PRO NEWTON: validifies Newtonian physics (science give us this)
- KANT SAYS MIND AND SCIENCE CAN’T GO PAST SECONDARY (CF.
HUME SAYS SCIENCE CAN’T GO PAST SECONDARY)
 COM TUA (COMPARTMENTS OF MIND TRANSCENDENTAL UNITY
APPERCEPTION)
- Good ground for having self
- Filtering categories and sensory experiences, you must have some agent which
orders all perception, based on this we have reason to believe we have a self

SAID IF THERE WAS PURE REASON THEN IT WAS A PRIORI AND IT WAS
ONLY MATH AS IT’S THE ONLY THING WE CAN KNOW BEFORE
SENSORY PERCEPTIONS.

HUME
- Human experience is the closest we can ever get to the truth
- Sensory perception is the only thing we can use
- No such thing as self just the properties of ourselves
- Induction fallacy – just because something happened in the past doesn’t mean it
will happen again… science does this
- Skeptic, empiricist
- Said we can’t prove God, the afterlife, nature, or ourselves exist based on what we
see
- Self = bundle of perceptions
- Maintained human mind is a passive reality and another exists elsewhere. As
knowing agents, we should gather sensory perceptions and ideas to learn about it
- Human mind is the center of reality
- Against determinism as the idea of cause and effect didn’t exist to him because of
things like induction fallacy