PL 407 HISTORY OF MEDIEVAL PHILOSOPHY Spring 2012

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1 PL 407 HISTORY OF MEDIEVAL PHILOSOPHY Spring 2012 DAY / TIME : T & TH 12:00-1:15 P.M. PROFESSOR : J.-L. SOLÈRE COURSE DESCRIPTION : Far from being monolithic and repetitive, the Middle Ages were a creative period during which multiple solutions were proposed to make sense of the world and of human life. The legacy of Antiquity, the philosophic and scientific knowledge of the time, and religious views were combined in original syntheses. The aim of the course is to provide an accurate image of the resulting diversity of theories. We will study the main topics that were strenuously debated during a good thousand years. This will be an opportunity to read a wide range of authors (Christian thinkers from St. Augustine to Ockham, but also Islamic and Jewish philosophers). Medieval philosophy was an important step in the development of human thought. Discovering it will be essential to your philosophical education. This course will especially highlight the essential concepts that were formed in the Middle Ages and that have been transmitted to modern philosophy, in metaphysics, theory of knowledge and consciousness, ethics, etc. In addition, analysis of texts, debates and writing assignments will help you to develop rigorous argumentation and expression skills. READINGS : Required textbooks: D. Kolak & G. Thomson, The Longman Standard History of Medieval Philosophy, 2008, ISBN ; Armand Maurer, Medieval Philosophy. An Introduction, 2 nd edition, 1982, ISBN Some other primary sources will be photocopied or digitized. The course has a Blackboard site which provides various complementary information and materials. As Medieval authors very often refer to Ancient authors and prolong their lines of thought, studying philosophy in Middle Ages will be easier if you have some knowledge of philosophy in Antiquity. I thus advise you to consult: the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, online version in the library databases, or printed: O'Neill B51.R ,

2 and/or the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (online and free) when you need some information about Ancient philosophy: authors, e.g. Porphyry or Simplicius; topics, e.g. Immortality or Substance ; concepts, e.g Nous or Pneuma, etc. Besides, as you will see in the syllabus, the reading of some articles in these encyclopedias is required. OFFICE HOURS W 4:30-6:00, Maloney Hall 390. Tel.: I am also most often in my office on T and TH afternoon, or we can make an appointment. I do not respond by to course questions, but I ll be glad to talk to you. CLASS POLICY Texts assigned in the syllabus must be studied before the class, with the help of the study questions at the end of each selection in the textbook. Attendance: Students are expected to attend classes regularly, take tests, and submit papers and other work at the times specified by the professor on the course syllabus. Students who are absent repeatedly from class or practica will be evaluated by faculty responsible for the course to ascertain their ability to achieve the course objectives and to continue in the course (from BC Academic Regulations). Academic integrity: see Plagiarism is a form of fraud and will be punished as such. The definition of plagiarism includes not only turning in someone else's work as your own or copying sentences without the appropriate quotation conventions, but also paraphrasing (that is, changing the words while reproducing the sentence structure or the ideas of someone else) without giving credit to the source. This applies to any material found on the Internet. For the appropriate forms of quotation, see COURSE CREDIT Four papers (after parts I, II, III-IV and V of the course) will each count for 25% of the final grade. Class participation: bonus added to the average resulting from the papers (4 pts maximum). Grades in this course mean the following: A: Exceptional work, unusual in how well it fulfills the assignment * B: Strong work that fulfills the assignment 2

3 C: Good work that adequately fulfills most of the assignment D: Work that inadequately addresses much of the assignment F: Work that fails to address most of the assignment Numerical scale: D D D C C C B B B A * A * * I urge you to use these top grades only for truly outstanding work (BC A&S Dean to the faculty). SYLLABUS Abbreviations: LS = The Longman Standard History of Medieval Philosophy (textbook) Maurer = Armand Maurer, Medieval Philosophy (textbook) phot. = photocopies REP = Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy (online, library database) SEP = Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (online, free) Req. = required readings Opt.* = optional but strongly recommended readings Opt. = optional readings Jan. 17 Class 1: Introduction Jan. 19 Class 2: Historical sketch, part 1 Req.: Aristotle #7-19 in REP. Opt.*: Aristotle Commentators, Forms, platonic, Neoplatonism, Platonism, Plotinus in REP. Jan. 24 Class 3: Historical sketch, part 2 Req.: P.V. Spade, The Greek background (phot.). Opt.: Greek Philosophy: impact on Islamic Philosophy, Islamic philosophy: transmission into Western Europe in REP. 3

4 I DEBATES ON REVELATION AND REASON Jan. 26 Class 4: Req.: Justin, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian (phot.); Augustine, The City of God, VIII, chap (phot.); Maimonides, Guide for the Perplexed (LS pp ). Maurer pp. 3-5, Opt.: Patristic Philosophy in REP. Jan. 31 Class 5: Req.: Al-Ghazzali, Deliverance From Error (phot.), The Incoherence of the Philosophers (LS p phot.). Al-Ghazali in SEP; Maurer pp Opt.*: Causality and necessity in Islamic thought in REP. Opt.: Ash ariyya and Mu tazila, Neoplatonism in Islamic Philosophy in REP. Feb. 2 Class 6: Req.: Averroes, The Incoherence of the Incoherence, About the natural sciences (LS pp ). Maurer pp Opt.*: Natural philosophy, medieval, #6: The Aristotelian Cosmos, in REP. Feb. 7 Class 7: Req.: Erigena, Philosophy, Faith and Reason (phot.); Roger Bacon, Opus Maius (LS pp ); Stephen Tempier, Condemnation of 1277 (phot.). Maurer pp , 47-49, 59-61, 85-92, , , , , , Opt.: Condemnation of 1277 in SEP. Feb. 9 Class 8: Debate. II DEBATES ON THE NATURE OF HUMAN BEINGS II.1 THE SOUL Feb. 14 Class 9: Req.: Augustine, The City of God, XI, chap. 26, On The Trinity, chap (LS pp ); Ockham, Quodlibet II q. 12 and Quodl. I q. 14 (LS 394b-397a); Avicenna, Concerning the 4

5 Soul, chap, 1-13 (LS pp ), Erigena, On The Division of Nature, IV, chap. 7-9 (LS pp ). Maurer pp. 8-10, 37-39, Opt.: Soul in Islamic philosophy in REP. Feb. 16 Class 10: Req.: Aquinas, On Being and Essence, chap. 2 (LS pp ). Maurer pp , Feb. 21 Class 11: Req.: Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles, II, chap (LS pp b), (LS pp ), (LS pp. 281a-285). Feb. 23 Class 12: Debate. II.2 THE INTELLECT Feb. 28 Class 13: Req.: Al-Farabi, The Letter Concerning the Intellect (phot.); Averroes, Commentary on On The Soul (LS pp ). Arabic and Islamic Psychology and Philosophy of Mind in SEP. Opt.: Alexander of Aphrodisias, Themistius, Ibn Bajja, Ibn Tufayl in REP.. March 1 Class 14: Req.: Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles, II, chap (LS pp. 265b-269a), (LS pp. 271a-275a), (LS pp. 276b-281a). Maurer pp Opt.*: Averroism in REP. SPRING BREAK March 13 Class 15: Req. : Augustine, On Free Will, II, chap. III-XVII (LS pp ); Scotus, Oxford Commentary on the Sentences, I, d. III, q. 4 (LS pp ). Maurer pp. 5-8, 10-12, , Opt.*: Illumination in REP; Divine illumination in SEP. 5

6 III DEBATES ON THE HUMAN KNOWLEDGE OF THINGS March 15 Class 16: Req. : Boethius, Commentary on Porphyry s Isagoge, 2 nd ed. (LS pp ); Abelard, Glosses On Porphry (LS pp ); John of Salisbury, Metalogicon (LS pp ). Maurer pp , Opt.*: Medieval Problem of Universals in SEP. March 20 Class 17: Req. : Avicenna, Metaphysics, The Nature of universals (LS pp ); Scotus, Ordinatio II, d. III pt. 1, qq. 1 & 6, & Commentary on Aristotle s Metaphysics, VII, q. 18 (LS pp ). Maurer pp. 98, Opt.*: Duns Scotus, #12, in REP. Opt.: Medieval Theories of Haecceity in SEP. March 22 Class 18: Req. : Ockham, Sum of Logic I, chap & Quodlibet I q. 13 (LS pp b). Maurer pp , Opt.*: Nominalism, #2 in REP. March 27 Class 19: Debate. IV DEBATES ON THE HUMAN KNOWLEDGE OF GOD March 29 Class 20: Req. : Anselm of Canterbury Proslogion (LS pp ). Maurer pp Opt.: Ontological arguments in SEP. April 3 Class 21: Req. : Avicenna, Metaphysics (LS pp ) ; Aquinas, Sum of Theology (LS pp ). Maurer pp , , , Opt.: God, arguments for the existence of in REP. 6

7 April 10 Class 22: Req. : Aquinas, On Being and Essence, chap. 4-5 (LS pp. 293b-297b); Pseudo-Dionysius, On the Divine Names, chap. I, II, IV (phot.) ; Nicholas of Cusa, On Learned Ignorance, chap. 1-4 (LS pp ). Maurer pp , , , , , Opt.*: Pseudo-Dionusius the Areopagite in SEP. Opt.: Negative theology in REP. April 12 Class 23: Debate. V DEBATES ON GOD AND THE CREATION V.1 -- DVINE FOREKNOWLEDGE AND HUMAN FREE WILL April 17 Class 24: Req. : Augustine, Against the Manicheans and Enchiridion (LS pp ), On Free Will, II, chap. I-II (LS pp ); Scotus Oxford Commentary, I, d. 39 (phot.). Maurer pp , ; Duns Scotus #14 in REP. Opt.: Free will in SEP. April 19 Class 25: Req. : Boethius Consolation of Philosophy, V (LS pp ) ; Luis de Molina, Concordia, IV (phot.). Maurer pp ; Foreknowledge and Free Will in SEP. Opt.: Medieval Theories of Future Contingents in SEP. April 24 Class 26: Req. : Peter Damian, On Divine Omnipotence (phot.). Peter Damian in SEP. Opt.: Omnipotence in REP. 7

8 V.2 DID THE WORLD HAVE A BEGINNING? April 26 Class 27: Req. : Augustine, Confessions XI (LS pp. 63b-74) ; Averroes, The Incoherence of the Incoherence, First discussion (LS pp b). Opt.*: Eternity of the world, medieval views of in REP. May 1 Class 28: Req. : Siger of Brabant, Questions on the Eternity of the World (phot.); Aquinas (phot.). Maurer pp , May 3 Class 29: Debate. 8