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Covid-19 vaccines and Jeffrey Dahmer’s nail clippings
Serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer was murdered in prison almost thirty years ago. Suppose that, before his body was removed from the crime scene, a prison guard had clipped off some of his fingernails as a...
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Covid-19 vaccination should not be mandatory
In a recent post, I argued that a Catholic can in good conscience take one of the Covid-19 vaccines, but also that such vaccination should not be mandatory. In a follow-up post, I expanded on the...
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From Socrates to Stock
Socrates is a model for all philosophers, not only because he pursued the truth through rational argumentation, but because he did so uncompromisingly, even at the cost of his life. And he was...
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Truth as a transcendental
Last June, I presented a talk on the topic “Truth as a Transcendental” at the Aquinas Philosophy Workshop on the theme Aquinas on Knowledge, Truth, and Wisdom in Greenville, South Carolina. You can...
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Untangling the web
David S. Oderberg and others on free speech, in the new anthology Having Your Say: Threats to Free Speech in the 21st Century, edited by J. R. Shackleton.In First Things, William Lane Craig in quest of...
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Adventures in the Old Atheism, Part VI: Schopenhauer
Our series has examined how atheists of earlier generations often exhibited a higher degree of moral and/or metaphysical gravitas than the sophomoric New Atheists of more recent vintage. As we’ve...
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Neo-Aristotelian Metaphysics and the Theology of Nature
Routledge has just published the new anthology Neo-Aristotelian Metaphysics and the Theology of Nature, edited By William M. R. Simpson, Robert C. Koons, and James Orr. My article “Natural and...
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The politics of chastity
Chastity is the virtue governing the proper use of sexuality. My article “The Politics of Chastity”appears in the Fall 2021 issue of Nova et Vetera. It is part of a symposium on Reinhard Hütter’s...
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Aquinas on the relative importance of pastors and theologians
In his book Thomas Aquinas: His Personality and Thought, Martin Grabmann notes:In a passage of his… [Aquinas] touches upon the question, whether the pastors of souls or the professors of theology have...
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Geach’s argument against modernism
Catholic philosopher Peter Geach’s book Providence and Evil is interesting not only for what it says about the topics referred to in the title, but also for its many insights and arguments concerning...
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The Feast of Christ the King
Today Catholics celebrate the Feast of Christ the King, which makes it an appropriate time to remind ourselves of what the Church teaches the faithful about their duty to bring their religion to bear...
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MacIntyre on human dignity
Recently, Alasdair MacIntyre presented a talk on the theme “Human Dignity: A Puzzling and Possibly Dangerous Idea?” at the Fall Conference of the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture at the...
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Geach on original sin
Recently we dipped into Peter Geach’s book Providence and Evil. Let’s do so again, looking this time at what he has to say about the doctrine of original sin. Geach says that the doctrine holds that...
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Dissident Philosophers
Rowman and Littlefield has just published the anthology Dissident Philosophers: Voices Against the Political Current of the Academy, edited by T. Allan Hillman and Tully Borland. (The hardcover...
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Western cultural suicide as apostasy
In his classic book Suicide of the West, James Burnham famously characterized liberalism as “the ideology of Western suicide.” I’ve been meaning for some time to write up an essay on the book. This...
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The Catholic middle ground on Covid-19 vaccination
I commend to you Catholic philosopher Josh Hochschild’s recent EDIFY video addressing the question “Are Vaccine Mandates Ethical?” His position is that those who wish to take one of the Covid-19...
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The still, small voice of Christmas
A great and strong wind rent the mountains, and broke in pieces the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake;...
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Geach on Hell
Let’s take another trip into the philosophical and theological gold mine that is Peter Geach’s book Providence and Evil, and this time consider his chapter on Hell. At first I wondered whether it was...
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New Year’s open thread
Dear reader, let’s open up the discussion this year by letting you open it up. It’s time to get that otherwise off-topic comment of yours that I keep deleting out of your system at last. For in these...
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Geach on authority and consistency
If the reader will indulge me, here is one more post inspired by Peter Geach – specifically, this time, by some themes in his book Truth and Hope. Among the topics Geach covers are logical...
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