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Title: History of Philosophy, Volume 2 by Frederick Copleston ISBN: 0-385-46844-X Publisher: Image Books Pub. Date: 01 March, 1993 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.25 (8 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: An outstanding general overview, but not without faults
Comment: Volumne II is a great introduction to one of the least covered areas of Western philosophy. Copleston did a great job giving a general overview of the major figures (and a few lesser known), their views from a philosophical angle, and showed why they are important. He also makes clear several important issues, such as the lack of distinction between philosophy and theology and the influence of some of the Islamic philosophers (inasmuch as they affected Europeans).
This book is so valuable because the medieval works are less accessable from a philosophical point of view than ancient and modern works. If you want to know Kant's or Plato's philosophy you can read their actual writings to get a clear understanding. But the theological nature of the medieval works makes that difficult. While it is true that they cannot be completely seperated, the anachronistic distinction does exist to us, and Copleston did a great job cutting through the theology to get to the philosopy.
The major problem is the lack of translation at certain points. When the author lists the works of Augustine, he lists them in Latin. I found myself just glossing over several lines of Latin text. He also used Latin throughout the book to list arguements. Since I don't speak Latin I either guessed what he meant, looked it up, or glossed over it.
Rating: 3
Summary: Good, but...
Comment: Copleston's series is eruditious, but this particular volume falls short of an orthodox Catholic expectation. Copleston's treatment of Aquinas mixes Kantian ideas and is not purely Thomist, as philosopher Fr. Stanley Jaki, OSB, notes. A better treatment of Aquinas and other mediaeval philosophers is given by Etienne Gilson.
Rating: 5
Summary: The Philosophy that Time Forgot
Comment: Anyone acquainted with the history of philosophy knows there is a tendency to treat Medieval philosophy as a low point between the grandeur of Greece and the radiant glow of Descartes, who salvaged philosophy from the dim ruminations of Christian theology. This theme is given notable currency in popular histories like Russell's _History of Western Philosophy_, Durant's _The Story of Philosophy_, and Gottlieb's more recent _Dream of Reason_. While these books might pay homage to Aquinas as a synthesizer of Aristotle and Catholicism, his eminent contemporaries hardly merit a sentence. Supposedly, real philosophy did not begin in earnest until it was reawakened by the "kiss of Descartes." Here Frederick Copleston, a great Jesuit scholar, seeks to remedy the damage by recreating the rich philosophical tapestry of Medievalism, a time in which philosophy hardly slept, but was full of energy and acerbic controversy.
While Christianity was definitely the philosophical template that all Medievalists began with, there was still an enormous range of conflict and disputation. Just as there is not a single issue that ensnares modern philosophy, the Medievalists were engrossed with a whole range of issues -- epistemology, politics, rationalism, and so on. A prickly controversy that the Medievalists dwelt on was the "problem of universals", an enigma that dates back to Plato and Aristotle, who each took opposing sides to the problem. On the surface the problem of universals might not seem like a problem at all, and indeed most people do not recognize it as such until they encounter it in Philosophy 101. While different formulations can be given to the problem the most succint way of presenting it is as follows: what, if anything, in extramental reality corresponds to the universal concept in the human mind? In other words, our minds (or brains) can only produce thoughts and conepts, but the world (extramental reality) is made up of particular, individual things. So what is the relationship between our thoughts and individual things, between between the intramental concept and the extramental reality? For instance, when the scientist expresses his knowledge of things he does so in abstract and universal terms, he does not make a statement about a particular atom, but atoms in general, and if the universal term has no foundation in extramental reality, his science is a social construction. This is one of the vexing issues the Medievalists tried to confront and resolve and fortunately progress was made in the area.
The crude, "exaggerated" realism of Christian Platonists, like Saint Anslem, eventually gave way to the more moderate realism of Aquinas. The extreme realists were under the impression that class-names for genera and species -- things like trees, elms, felines, cats, dogs, etc -- had a real existence -- the mental concept was indentical to extramental reality. There is a unitary nature between our minds and the world, terms had a real existence, and were not just a useful means of mental economy. Of course the brilliant dialectician Abelard exposed the nonsense behind this crude realism and paved the way for the moderate realism of Aquinas.
The existence of God, the immortality of the individual soul, the Trinity, the Resurrection and all the other facets of Christianity were accepted as self-evident by almost all Medieval philosophers. However, such theological unanimity did not guarantee philosphical unanimity. In fact, there is a great controversy throughout the Middle Ages on the proper role of reason, what role it plays in servicing theology, and what its ultimate limits are. The debate between St. Bonaventure and St. Aquinas over the existence of God and the possibility of an eternal universe highlights this admirably. While Aquinas surely thought the universe had a beginning in time, he thought reason was impotent in proving it does. Bonaventure dissents, and unleashes a series of ingenious arguments that expose the absurdity of an eternal universe. For instance, he notes that the idea of an eternal universe (one with no beginning) leads to obvious antinomies: for every solar revolution there are twelve lunar revolutions, so if the universe was infinite how could there be twelve times more lunar revolutions than solar revolutions? There can not be twelve times infinity. Also, how could we ever have arrived at this point, since that would mean we would need to pass through infinity, an impossibility. So clearly reason can establish the finite nature of the universe, and hence a contingent world requiring an infinite Creator.
This is just a sample of the issues that Copleston illuminates in this thorough, scholarly, and higly academic work. Other writers of philosophy hardly measure up to his exactness and comprehensiveness. He shows no hesitation in making short work of the often careless and erroneous pontificating of other writers, like Bertrand Russell. One gets to enjoy the subtle sparring matches that Copleston participates in, skewering Russell's simplistic understanding of Aquinas, his pretentious denunciation of Aristotle's logic, and the backward tendency of Medieval philosophy. Finally, Copleston reminds us that the Middle Ages were not a dark period where learning and progress were stagnant, but a time when Europeans immersed themselves in knowledge and learning, an age that saw the founding and spreading of the university system, a phenomenon that directly lead to the rise of science throughout the West.
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Title: History of Philosophy, Volume 4 by Frederick C. Copleston ISBN: 038547041X Publisher: Image Books Pub. Date: 01 December, 1993 List Price(USD): $18.95 |
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Title: History of Philosophy, Volume 5 by Frederick Copleston ISBN: 0385470428 Publisher: Image Books Pub. Date: 01 December, 1993 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
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Title: History of Philosophy, Volume 7 by Frederick Copleston ISBN: 0385470444 Publisher: Image Books Pub. Date: 01 February, 1994 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
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Title: History of Philosophy, Volume 6 by Frederick Copleston S.J. ISBN: 0385470436 Publisher: Image Books Pub. Date: 01 December, 1993 List Price(USD): $18.95 |
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Title: History of Philosophy, Volume 8 by Frederick Copleston ISBN: 0385470452 Publisher: Image Books Pub. Date: 01 February, 1994 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
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