Seat of Wisdom: An Introduction to Philosophy in the Catholic Tradition

Seat of Wisdom: An Introduction to Philosophy in the Catholic Tradition by philosophy professor James M Jacobs is a masterpiece and is probably the best single volume introduction to Catholic philosophy available these days. The central theme is that a philosophy rests on the correctness of its first principles, and that many philosophies adopt an either/or approach that selects its principles from one of two options. What makes Catholic philosophy better is that it adopts a “both/and” approach where it integrates both options. Here are some examples:In metaphysics, there are the problems of the One and the Many and the problem of change. The universe has many different things, yet the universe seems to have a basic unity. The problem of change is that things in the universe constantly change, yet those same things have natures that are stable. Monist philosophies such as that of Parmenides stated that reality is one substance and change is an illusion. At the other extreme is nominalism, which sees everything as unique and that unity is an illusion. Catholic Thomist philosophy is a “both/and” philosophy which sees the universe as united since everything in the universe shares existence. The Catholic solution to the problem of the One and the Many is that immaterial essences are shared by things in the universe, and those essences are united to matter which makes those things individual things, the many. The problem of change is solved by the concepts of act and potency, where an essence has a nature with many potential forms it can take.Another example is the question in epistemology of how we know things. We know things by both reason and by sense experience. Plato opted for saying we know things mainly through reason, through knowledge of the forms. Empiricist philosophers like John Locke and David Hume said that we know things mainly through sense experience. Catholic philosophy integrates both by saying that we know things first through sense experience, after which reason abstracts universals from that sense experience and then using deductive reasoning to come up with knowledge.In the area of ethics, Utilitarians see the good as that which brings pleasure, whereas Immanuel Kant saw the good as based on reason understand one’s duty. Thomist ethics sees the good as the perfection of man’s human nature, which is based on the first principles of ethics, namely: (1) do good and avoid evil; (2) seek truth and shun lies; and (3) seek beauty and shun ugliness. Based on those first principles and natural law ethics, by doing good man will have the deep pleasure of happiness and also do his duty.Another theme of the book is that Thomist philosophy is based on the metaphysical transcendental qualities of being, unity, truth, goodness and beauty. James M Jacobs notes that philosophy needs correct definitions of those terms, and he provides them. For example, goodness is the perfection of being according to a thing’s nature. In other words, goodness is based on the reaching the final end or purpose built into a thing’s nature.There are many profound insights provided in this book. Here’s an example of where Aquinas’s Fifth Way to prove the existence of God is explained:Let us emphasize again that the Fifth Way is not a design argument. Design arguments are common in modern thinkers, because their nominalism and concomitant rejection of final causes leads them to assume order is imposed on the whole mechanical universe by an extrinsic cause. If the universe is a machine, there must be a builder who puts all the parts together in order. Design arguments are weak because the extrinsically imposed order could be the result of purely natural principles like the laws of science of even intelligent aliens. Because those alternate causal explanations are possible, design arguments can only show that God is probable but they can never establish God as a necessary cause. The argument in the fifth way, by contrast, sees order as intrinsic to specific natures because of final causality; it is about the created beings as they exist in themselves. The fact that natures - all natures, from atoms to human beings - are teleologically oriented cannot be explained by any natural principle, since even that nature would itself already be teleologically oriented. Thus, there has to be something outside of nature to account for this teleological orientation of natures and their ends, and so this argument can establish God as a necessary cause.As James M Jacobs notes, we are all called to be philosophers, to perfect the rationality of human nature. Those who read this superb book will experience the joy of learning a truly good, unified and beautiful philosophy.