Medieval Philosophy Network, 20th Meeting
21 November 2018
The Bing room | The Warburg Institute | University of London | School of Advanced Study | Woburn Square | London WC1H 0AB
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11:30 - 12:30 Christophe Erismann (University of Vienna)
“Aristotle, the Perpetuation of Species and some Byzantine Views on Providence”
12:30 - 14:00 Lunch break
14:00 - 15:00 Micky Engel (University of Hamburg)
“Averroes' Paraphrase of the De anima and the Problem of Universals in the Works of Medieval Jewish Aristotelians”
15:00 - 16:00 Dragos Calma (University College Dublin)
“Metaphysics as a Way of Life: A 15th-Century Model”
16:00 – 16:30 Coffee/Tea break
16:30 – 17:30 Damiano Costa (University of Italian Switzerland, Lugano)
““Was Bonaventure a Four-dimensionalist?”
17:30 Conference ends
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ABSTRACTS
“Aristotle, the Perpetuation of Species and some Byzantine Views on Providence”
By Christophe Erismann (University of Vienna)
Tbc abstract
“Averroes' Paraphrase of the De anima and the Problem of Universals in the Works of Medieval Jewish Aristotelians”
By Mickey Engel (University of Hamburg)
Averroes' Epitome of the De anima (EDA) contains two interrelated discussions, one epistemological and the other logical/ontological. The first concerns the manner in which intelligibles are generated from sense data stored in the imaginary faculty. The second discussion concerns the relation between the intelligibles, once generated, and their particular correlatives outside the soul. In my talk I will present Averroes' arguments and their relation to the notion of human immortality, which is the focal point of the EDA. In the second part of my talk, I will illustrate the impact that Averroes' arguments and conclusions in the EDA had on Jewish philosophers during the Middle Ages.
“Metaphysics as a Way of Life : A 15th-Century Model”
By Dragos Calma (University College Dublin)
This paper challenges the commonly accepted view that between Late Antiquity and Modernity, philosophy rhymes both with abstract dialectical exercises and subordination to Christian theology. A closer examination of some 15th century overlooked texts, mostly transmitted in untapped manuscripts, provides a fresh understanding of the history of metaphysics. These texts claim that the capacity for providing a correct reading of the ontological structure of the world derives from the ability to both live a spiritual life and to lift the intellect above senses and singulars. They describe this process operating a stimulating and original concord of philosophical (Aristotle, Plotinus, Proclus) and Patristic sources (e.g. Origen, Clement of Alexandria) leading to what some contemporary scholars have called “metaphysics of the inner man”.
“Was Bonaventure a Four-dimensionalist?”
By Damiano Costa (University of Italian Switzerland, Lugano)
High scholastic authors usually adhere to a theory about the diachronic identity of substance that is nowadays called three-dimensionalism, according to which substances persist through time by being wholly present at each instant of their persistence. Recently, Richard Cross has argued that there is at least one exception to this rule, and that Bonaventure was a four-dimensionalist ante litteram. I argue that Bonaventure was no four-dimensionalist. Along the way, I explain how high scholastic accounts of persistence may or may not illuminate the contemporary debate on persistence.