Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface and acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- PART I LIFE AND WORKS
- PART II THE PHILOSOPHY OF JOHN DUNS SCOTUS
- PART III BACKGROUND AND FOREGROUND: ANCIENT AND MODERN PHILOSOPHY
- 14 John Duns, Aristotle, and philosophy
- 15 Historical dilemmas concerning Duns Scotus' thought
- 16 Philosophy in a new key – extrapolations and perspectives
- Bibliography
- Index
14 - John Duns, Aristotle, and philosophy
from PART III - BACKGROUND AND FOREGROUND: ANCIENT AND MODERN PHILOSOPHY
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 September 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface and acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- PART I LIFE AND WORKS
- PART II THE PHILOSOPHY OF JOHN DUNS SCOTUS
- PART III BACKGROUND AND FOREGROUND: ANCIENT AND MODERN PHILOSOPHY
- 14 John Duns, Aristotle, and philosophy
- 15 Historical dilemmas concerning Duns Scotus' thought
- 16 Philosophy in a new key – extrapolations and perspectives
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Introduction
From Parmenides onwards, ancient and medieval thought had a special liking for metaphysical speculation. No doubt, speculative thought was most influentially outlined by Plato and Aristotle. However, what the Christian thinkers achieved in metaphysics was definitely more than just applying and adapting what was handed down to them. No student of medieval speculative thought can help being struck by the peculiar fact that whenever fundamental progress was made, it was theological problems which initiated the development. This applies to St Augustine and Boethius, and to the great medieval masters as well (such as Anselm, Thomas Aquinas, Duns Scotus). Their speculation was, time and again, focused on how the notion of being and the whole range of our linguistic tools can be applied to God's Nature (Being).
The originality of medieval philosophy and the creativity of its logic and theory of knowledge make themselves felt in many contributions without any counterpart in ancient philosophy. Its novelties possess a tremendous cultural importance in general and great theoretical interest for modern philosophy and current systematic theology in particular.
In his important introduction to medieval philosophy L. M. de Rijk lists four examples of original contributions that excel the inventions of ancient Greek, Hellenistic, and Roman philosophy: (1) terminist logic (which is in fact to be seen as a part of the wider phenomenon of the logica modernorum); (2) the metaphysics of Thomas Aquinas; (3) the critical theory of knowledge of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries; and (4) a way of thought which markedly differs from necessitarian Greek philosophy.
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- Information
- The Philosophy of John Duns Scotus , pp. 511 - 539Publisher: Edinburgh University PressPrint publication year: 2006