Finite and Infinite Being: Medieval Perspectives on the Cognition of Infinite - AFS100772

• Title: Finite and Infinite Being: Medieval Perspectives on the Cognition of Infinite
• Guaranteed by: Institute of Philosophy and Religious Studies (21-UFAR)
• Faculty: Faculty of Arts
• Actual: from 2022
• Semester: winter
• Points: 0
• E-Credits: 5
• Examination process: winter s.:
• Hours per week, examination: winter s.:0/2, C [HT]
• Capacity: unknown / unknown (unknown)
• Min. number of students: unlimited
• 4EU+: no
• Virtual mobility / capacity: no
• State of the course: not taught
• Language: Bosnian
• Teaching methods: full-time
• Teaching methods: full-time
• Additional information: https://dl1.cuni.cz/course/view.php?id=12220
• Note: course can be enrolled in outside the study plan; enabled for web enrollment
• Guarantor: Anna Tropia, Ph.D.

Annotation

Last update: Anna Tropia, Ph.D. (18.09.2021)

FALL TERM 2021
BA module – Profilující Seminář středověky filosofie
e-mail me for consultation or questions: [e-mail]

This course will target the theme of the relation between finite and infinite being through the analysis of a corpus of texts that belong to the medieval period (Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, Henry of Ghent, John Duns Scotus). The main question around which the textual analysis will revolve is that concerned with the possibility of a contact between the finite and the infinite and, more particularly, is an epistemological one. How can the finite mind access the infinite being?

NB. This course will be taught in English

Aim of the course

Last update: Anna Tropia, Ph.D. (12.09.2021)

The main goal of the course will be that of familiarizing the students with a classical corpus of medieval philosophical texts, as well as that of providing them with an introduction to the main cognitive models of the Latin Western tradition: participation, illumination, innatism, abstractionism. 

Literature

Last update: Anna Tropia, Ph.D. (12.09.2021)

 

Primary Literature 

 

 Augustine, “On Divine Ideas and Illumination”, in Medieval Philosophy. Essential Readings with Commentary. Eds. G. Klima et al., Blackwell Publishing 2007.

 

Thomas Aquinas, selection of quaestiones from On Truth (De Veritate) and Sum of Theology (Summa theologiae).

 

Latin text of the De Veritate: Sancti Thomae de Aquino Opera omnia iussu Leonis XIII P. M. Edita, Romae, 1889-, vol. 22, 2.1. (UFAR library and accessible online: https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k94800/f9.item)

 

English text of the De Veritate: https://isidore.co/aquinas/QDdeVer10.htm

 

Latin text of the Summa: Sancti Thomae de Aquino Opera omnia iussu Leonis XIII P. M. Edita, Romae, 1889-, vols. V and 13. Both are accessible at the UFAR library as well as online: https://www.corpusthomisticum.org/repedleo.html

 

English Translation by Alfred Freddoso available online:

https://www3.nd.edu/~afreddos/summa-translation/TOC-part1.htm

 

John Duns Scotus, selection of distinctions from the Ordinatio (vol. III of J.D.S, Opera Omnia, Typis Polygl. Vaticanis, Civitas Vaticanas 1950-. UFAR library)

 

English Translation: J. Van der Bercken, Being and Cognition. Ordinatio I.3. Fordham University Press 2016.

 

René Descartes, Meditations, Objections and Replies. Ed. and tr. by R. Ariew and D. Cress, Hackett Publishing Company 2006

 The critical text of the Meditations (in Latin and French) is to be found in R. Descartes, Oeuvres, eds. by Ch. Adam and P. Tannery, Vrin 1996 (vols. 3 and 9)

 

Secondary literature (a selection: all on Moodle)

V. Boland, Ideas in God according to St. Thomas Aquinas. Sources and Synthesis, Brill 1996

G. O’ Daly, Augustine’s Philosophy of Mind, Duckworth 1987

R. Pasnau, Thomas Aquinas on Human Nature, Cambridge University Press 2002

O. Boulnois, Etre et représentation, Vrin 1998

E. Scribano, Angeli e beati. Modelli di conoscenza da Tommaso a Spinoza, Laterza 2006

Requirements to the exam

Last update: Anna Tropia, Ph.D. (11.09.2021)

Active in-class participation and final oral exam. 

Syllabus

Last update: Anna Tropia, Ph.D. (12.09.2021)

 

Module I: Augustine. Between Neoplatonism and Christianity

Module II: Thomas Aquinas. The separation of finite/infinite being

Module III: John Duns Scotus. A clear and distinct idea of the infinite

Module IV: Early-modern echoes and recapitulation.