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Philosophy

The Cambridge Companion to Kant and Modern Philosophy 

The Cambridge Companion to Early Greek Philosophy

The Cambridge Companion to Greek and Roman Philosophy 

The Cambridge Companion to Socrates

The Cambridge Companion to Medieval Philosophy 

The Cambridge Companion to Spinoza

The Cambridge Companion to Leibniz

The Cambridge Companion to Descartes 

The Cambridge Companion to the Stoics

The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Augustus

The Cambridge Companion to Anselm

The Cambridge Companion to Medieval Jewish Philosophy 

The Cambridge Companion to Duns Scotus

The Cambridge Companion to Tocqueville

The Cambridge Companion to Plotinus

The Cambridge Companion to Maimonides

Aquinas talks about quiddity and essence. Matter constitutes the body or the quiddity and essence constitutes the sole or substantial form. Prime matter is without characteristics and substantial form is that which causes prime matter to have characteristics. This substantial form is a kin to the Morphogenic fields proposed by Rupert Sheldrake. Such fields might be understood as properties of observers, their knowledge, ignorance, and free energy. These informational fields give prime matter substantial form.

The Cambridge Companion to Aquinas

Early modern philosophy is defined through the skeptical influence and is a definitive element in Renaissance thought. Thinkers such as Hume, Montaigne, and Descartes where influenced by Ancient Greek skepticism. This gave birth to the philosophical outlook that could support western science. The first Ancient Greek skeptic was Pyrrho of Elis. It was this work and the influence of the Academic skepticism that brought on early modern philosophy. Pyrrho was influenced by Buddhist thought in his travels with Alexander the Great.

Early Modern Philosophy

An important part of the Republic is the relationship of Eros with the city and its populous. Eros is unruly and essentially needs to be tamed by various means of sublimation. Thus Eros is tamed through the function of beneficial activity or work. Movement and work is related to the chemical dopamine. Dopamine gives pleasure. Thus the state functions on the basis of sexual economy and dopamine is the pleasure reward that is the result of participating in this economy.

The Cambridge Companion to Plato’s Republic

Aristotle is know for his metaphysics of the prime mover. The prime mover remains unmoved. Such absence of movement implies that the prime mover is not under the influence of any forces. The prime movers only contemplation is self contemplation. We can understand this by dividing the world into three parts, subject, object, and environment. As beings subject to movement we have subjectivity which is active because of our use of attentional resources. We give attention to various objects through this we gain knowledge of objects yet remain ignorant of the environment. This is known as an onlooker is the work of Henri Bortoft. A prime mover is such that subject, object, and environment form a complete whole and there is cut between them. Such a state of a prime mover may only be described through an understanding of quantum information. In the quantum domain all information is self information.

The Cambridge Companion to Aristotle

Plato is known for his allegory of the cave. This portrays the world as a projection through the imagery of dancing shadows on a cave wall. Modern physics also talks about such a 2 dimensional feature of the world known as the holographic principle. Such holographic considerations are due to ignorance in the minds of observers. It’s is then from this ignorance that space and time emerge and the world appears.

The Campaign Companion to Plato

Schopenhauer is best known for his work The World As Will and Representation. He characterizes the phenomenal world as a manifestation of a blind will which itself cannot be known. The phenomenon of the world are a result of this blind will. Schopenhauer was influenced by the philosophy of the east including Hinduism and Buddhism. The essential part of understanding this influence lies in the philosophy of dependent origination. That the mind turns back on itself intentionality conditions consciousness which then further conditions mind. This suggests that the phenomenon are indeed a product of intentionality. An intentionality that has a basis in ignorance which is the first link of dependent origination. By the training in the method of meditation one can come to a state of the undirected which is nirvana. Another way of entering nirvana is by signlessness. These to point the way to going beyond will and representation.

The Cambridge Companion to Schopenhauer

Augustine gives a beautiful account of memory. “eternity itself always remains and does not require some figments of the imagination by which, as if by its vehicles, it may enter the mind, and if it cannot come unless we remember it, there can be memory of some things without any use of images.” This suggests that the world is whole and complete unto itself and that human contrivance is superfluous.

The Cambridge Companion to Augustine

One important idea in Berkeley’s writings is the doctrine of signs. “Berkeley was convinced that in drawing us towards what he called “materialism”- the belief that objects have an existence, “natural or real,” apart from their being perceived by the understanding [PHK 4] - human thought had failed.” Through further understanding of signification we might understand this failure. Berkeley went on to point to this failure through the understanding of abstraction. The abstraction principle that forms signification is based on the drawing from limited or incomplete information. Thus the natural attitude which is the basis for materialism is rooted in ignorance. At best it forms a conventional outlook.

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Edited by Paul Guyer

The Cambridge Companion to Kant and Modern Philosophy

Edited by A. A. Long

The Cambridge Companion to Early Greek Philosophy

Edited by David Sedley

The Cambridge Companion to Greek and Roman Philosophy

Edited by Donald R. Morrison

The Cambridge Companion to Socrates

Edited by A. S. McGrade

The Cambridge Companion to Medieval Philosophy

Edited by Don Garrett

The Cambridge Companion to Spinoza

Edited By Nicholas Jolley

The Cambridge Companion to Leibniz

The Cambridge Companion to Descartes

The Cambridge Companion to Descartes

Edited by Brad Inwood

The Cambridge Companion to the Stoics

Edited by Karl Galinsky

The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Augustus

Edited by Brian Davies and Brian Leftow

The Cambridge Companion to Anselm

Edited by Daniel H. Frank and Oliver Leaman

The Cambridge Companion to Medieval Jewish Philosophy

Edited by Thomas Williams

The Cambridge Companion to Duns Scotus

Edited by Cheryl B. Welch

The Cambridge Companion to Tocqueville

Edited by Lloyd P. Gerson

The Cambridge Companion to Plotinus

Edited by Kenneth Seeskin

The Cambridge Companion to Maimonides

Edited by Norman Kretzmann and Eleonore Stump

The Cambridge Companion to Aquinas

Edited by Donald Rutherford

Early Modern Philosophy

Edited by G. R. F. Ferrari

The Cambridge Companion to Plato’s Republic

Edited by Jonathan Barnes

The Cambridge Companion to Aristotle

Edited by Richard Kraut

The Campaign Companion to Plato

Edited by Christopher Janaway

The Cambridge Companion to Schopenhauer

Edited by Eleanore Stump and Norman Kretzmann

The Cambridge Companion to Augustine

Edited by Kenneth P. Winkler

The Cambridge Companion to Berkeley

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