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The German philosopher Robert Spaemann is one of the most important living thinkers in Europe today. This volume presents a selection of essays that span his career, from his first published academic essay on the origin of sociology (1953) to his more recent work in anthropology and thephilosophy of religion. Spaemann is best known for his work on topical questions in ethics, politics, and education, but the light he casts on these questions derives from his more fundamental studies in metaphysics, the philosophy of nature, anthropology, and the philosophy of religion.At the core of the essays contained in this book is the concept of nature and the notion of the human person. Both are best understood, according to Spaemann, in light of the metaphysics and anthropology found in the classical and Christian tradition, which provides an account of the intelligibilityand integrity of things and beings in the world that safeguards their value against the modern threat of reductionism and fragmentation. A Robert Spaemann Reader shows that Spaemann's profound intellectual formation in this tradition yields penetrating insights into a wide range of subjects,including God, education, art, human action, freedom, evolution, politics, and human dignity.
An examination and defence of the concept of personality, long central to Western moral culture but now increasingly under attack. Robert Spaemann tackles urgent practical questions, such as our treatment of the severely disabled human and the moral status of intelligent non-human animals.
Christian philosopher Robert Spaemann takes the reader on a quest for the fundamental principles of ethics. Writing in a clear style accessible to non-specialists, drawing both on ancient and modern philosophy, from Aristotle, Plato and Aquinas to Kant and Hegel, he discovers the intimate relationship between ethics and ontology - the science of being. This book is written for theologians as well as philosophers - indeed for anyone who is concerned with the meaning of a 'life well lived', with good and evil and the search for happiness.
What does it mean to love someone? What does the concept of human dignity mean, and what are its consequences? What marks the end of a person's life? Is personhood more than consciousness? These perplexing questions lurk beneath the surface of everyday life, surfacing only to demand urgent attention in crises. Renowned German philosopher Robert Spaemann addresses these and other foundational enigmas in three eloquent short essays. Speaking wisdom to controversy, he offers carefully considered, novel approaches to key philosophical and theological questions about the nature of human love ("The Paradoxes of Love"), dignity ("Human Dignity and Human Nature"), and death ("Is Brain Death the Death of a Human Person?").
The Perspective of the Acting Person introduces readers to one of the most important and provocative thinkers in contemporary moral philosophy
This volume provides a thorough introduction to three of the twentieth century’s most influential proponents of Aristotle’s moral philosophy. Arthur Madigan’s Contemporary Aristotelian Ethics examines the work of Alasdair MacIntyre, Martha Nussbaum, and Robert Spaemann in the context of twentieth-century Anglo-American moral philosophy. By surveying the ways in which these three philosophers appropriate Aristotle, Madigan illustrates two important points: first, that the most pressing problems in contemporary moral philosophy can be addressed using the Aristotelian tradition and, second, that the Aristotelian tradition does not speak with one voice. Madigan demonstrates that Aristotelian moral philosophy is divided on important issues, such as the value of liberal modernity, the character and provenance of our current moral landscape, and the role of nature in Aristotle’s ethics. Through his examination of MacIntyre, Nussbaum, and Spaemann, Madigan offers a vision for the future of Aristotelian moral philosophy, urging today’s philosophers to set a clear educational agenda, to continue refining their concepts and intuitions, and to engage with new conversation partners from other philosophical traditions.
Resorting to natural law is one way of conveying the philosophical conviction that moral norms are not merely conventional rules. Accordingly, the notion of natural law has a clear metaphysical dimension, since it involves the recognition that human beings do not conceive themselves as sheer products of society and history. And yet, if natural law is to be considered the fundamental law of practical reason, it must show also some intrinsic relationship to history and positive law. The essays in this book examine this tension between the metaphysical and the practical and how the philosophical elaboration of natural law presents this notion as a "limiting-concept", between metaphysics and ethics, between the mutable and the immutable; between is and ought, and, in connection with the latter, even the tension between politics and eschatology as a double horizon of ethics. This book, contributed to by scholars from Europe and America, is a major contribution to the renewed interest in natural law. It provides the reader with a comprehensive overview of natural law, both from a historical and a systematic point of view. It ranges from the mediaeval synthesis of Aquinas through the early modern elaborations of natural law, up to current discussions on the very possibility and practical relevance of natural law theory for the contemporary mind.
An Yves R. Simon Reader is the first collection of texts from the entirety of the philosopher’s work. French Catholic (and then American) political philosopher Yves R. Simon was a student of Jacques Maritain and one of the most important figures in the revival of Thomism. His work, however, is still little known in English, and there is as yet no English biography of him. In An Yves R. Simon Reader: The Philosopher’s Calling, Michael D. Torre provides an erudite and helpful introduction to Simon’s life and thought. The volume contains selected key texts from all of Simon’s twenty books, half of which were published posthumously, dividing them into three sections. The first fundamentally defends the Aristotelian and Thomistic account of human knowing. The second begins with his groundbreaking discussion of human freedom and ends with his account of practical wisdom. The third then expands this account to cover the chief concerns of his social and political philosophy. The selections are long enough to be substantive and contain sustained and complete arguments. Each selection has its own foreword by an eminent commentator, familiar with Simon’s work, who lays out the necessary context for the reader. An Yves R. Simon Reader includes sections from several of Simon’s last and most important essays: on sensitive knowledge and on the analogous nature of “act.” It includes a number of excerpts from his justly famous account and defense of democratic government. The hallmarks of his work—his careful conceptual analysis, his genius for finding undervalued examples, and his talent for creating expressions that revivified an outworn idea—are on display throughout. Indeed, as one of the book’s contributors says, Simon touched nothing that he did not adorn. The result is a highly readable introduction to the thought of a key and underappreciated modern philosopher. Contributors: Michael D. Torre, Jude P. Dougherty, Raymond Dennehy, John C. Cahalan, Steven A. Long, Ralph Nelson, John P. Hittinger, Ralph McInerny, David B. Burrell, CSC, Laurence Berns, Catherine Green, W. David Solomon, V. Bradley Lewis, Joseph W. Koterski, SJ, James V. Schall, SJ, George Anastaplo, Walter J. Nicgorski, John A. Gueguen, Jr., Thomas R. Rourke, Jeanne Heffernan Schindler, and Robert Royal.
Now in a fully corrected edition, one of the true spiritual classics of the twentieth century. Published for the first time with an index and Cardinal Hans Urs von Balthasar’s afterword, this new English publication of Meditations on the Tarot is the landmark edition of one of the most important works of esoteric Christianity. Written anonymously and published posthumously, as was the author’s wish, the intention of this work is for the reader to find a relationship with the author in the spiritual dimensions of existence. The author wanted not to be thought of as a personality who lived from 1900 to 1973, but as a friend who is communicating with us from beyond the boundaries of ordinary life. Using the 22 major arcana of the tarot deck as a means to explore some of humanity’s most penetrating spiritual questions, Meditations on the Tarot has attracted an unprecedented range of praise from across the spiritual spectrum.
In this excellent and clearly-written introduction to ethical thinking, Spaemann provides a stimulating discussion of the fundamental concepts we use every day when we deliberate, alone or with others, about the moral aspects of our action.