Tag: Aristotelian-Thomistic philosophy

  • Why it’s called “motion”

    I can’t believe it took me so long to realise this. Aristotelians sometimes (read: often) use the word “motion” to refer to change of any kind. Thus it is much broader than how we might use the word today. It’s certainly broader than mere change in location, but even we use it in a broader… →

  • The good of others

    Previously we discussed the general notion of natural goodness, and saw that the natures of things determine what is good or bad for them. In particular, our nature as humans determines what is good or bad for us. We also saw that with humans our actions take on a moral significance to the extent that the ends or means willed… →

  • Natural and moral goodness

    “Cats have four legs.” What an innocent statement. Who would’ve thought that unpacking it would lead us to a system of ethics? Natural goodness We start by noting that statements like this one don’t tell us some quantifiable fact about cats. Rather they tell us what features a cat has by virtue of which it… →

  • An historical overview of natural law theory from Budziszewski

    In the preface to the second edition of J. Budziszewski’s What We Can’t Not Know: A Guide he gives a brief account of the history of natural law theory (a meta- and normative ethical theory very much at home in, but not limited to, Aristotelian-Thomistic philosophy). I liked it, so I’m quoting it at length: Speaking… →