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242Personal relations and moral residueHistory of the Human Sciences 17 (2-3): 33-56. 2004.To what extent can one be saddled with responsibility or guilt as a result of actions committed not by oneself but by others with whom one has a familial or national connection or some other communal association? The issue of communal guilt has been extensively discussed, and there has been no shortage of writers willing to apply the notion of communal responsibility and guilt to Germany after the Holocaust. But the whole notion of communal guilt is deeply puzzling. How can evil actions cast a s…Read more
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219Aquinas on the Sufferings of JobIn Daniel Howard-Snyder (ed.), The Evidential Argument From Evil, Indiana University Press. pp. 49--68. 1996.
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217Libertarian freedom and the principle of alternative possibilitiesIn Jeff Jordan & Daniel Howard-Snyder (eds.), Faith, Freedom, and Rationality: Philosophy of Religion Today, Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield. pp. 73-88. 1996.
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217Alternative Possibilities and Moral Responsibility: The Flicker of FreedomThe Journal of Ethics 3 (4): 299-324. 1999.Some defenders of the principle of alternative possibilities (PAP) have responded to the challenge of Frankfurt-style counterexamples (FSCs) to PAP by arguing that there remains a “flicker of freedom” -- that is, an alternative possibility for action -- left to the agent in FSCs. I argue that the flicker of freedom strategy is unsuccessful. The strategy requires the supposition that doing an act-on-one's-own is itself an action of sorts. I argue that either this supposition is confused and leads…Read more
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215Alternative possibilities and moral responsibility: The flicker of freedom (review)The Journal of Ethics 3 (4): 299-324. 1999.Some defenders of the principle of alternative possibilities (PAP) have responded to the challenge of Frankfurt-style counterexamples (FSCs) to PAP by arguing that there remains a flicker of freedom -- that is, an alternative possibility for action -- left to the agent in FSCs. I argue that the flicker of freedom strategy is unsuccessful. The strategy requires the supposition that doing an act-on-one''s-own is itself an action of sorts. I argue that either this supposition is confused and leads …Read more
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212The Non-Aristotelian Character of Aquinas’s EthicsFaith and Philosophy 28 (1): 29-43. 2011.Scholars discussing Aquinas’s ethics typically understand it as largely Aristotelian, though with some differences accounted for by the differences in worldview between Aristotle and Aquinas. In this paper, I argue against this view. I show that although Aquinas recognizes the Aristotelian virtues, he thinks they are not real virtues. Instead, for Aquinas, the passions—or the suitably formulated intellectual and volitional analogues to the passions—are not only the foundation of any real ethica…Read more
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212Augustine on free willIn Eleonore Stump & Norman Kretzmann (eds.), The Cambridge Companion to Augustine, Cambridge University Press. pp. 124--47. 2001.
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206The Non-Aristotelian Character of Aquinas’s EthicsFaith and Philosophy 28 (1): 29-43. 2011.Scholars discussing Aquinas’s ethics typically understand it as largely Aristotelian, though with some differences accounted for by the differences in worldview between Aristotle and Aquinas. In this paper, I argue against this view. I show that although Aquinas recognizes the Aristotelian virtues, he thinks they are not real virtues. Instead, for Aquinas, the passions—or the suitably formulated intellectual and volitional analogues to the passions—are not only the foundation of any real ethica…Read more
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197The Cosmological Argument from Plato to Leibniz (review)Review of Metaphysics 36 (3): 701-703. 1983.As he makes plain in the preface, Craig's purpose in writing this book is to provide a historical, rather than a critical, exposition of the cosmological proof for the existence of God. In recent years, interest in the cosmological argument has been increasing, but evaluation of it on the part of philosophers of religion has been marked by "woeful ignorance of the historical versions of the argument," as Craig quite correctly remarks. In this book, Craig attempts to lay the foundation for more i…Read more
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196Dante on the Evil of Treachery—Narrative and PhilosophyIn Andrew Chignell (ed.), Evil: A History (Oxford Philosophical Concepts), Oxford University Press. pp. 252-257. 2019.
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193Petitionary prayerIn J. Houston (ed.), Is it reasonable to believe in God?, Handsel Press. 1984.
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191Aquinas’s Moral Theory (review)Philosophical Review 110 (4): 596-599. 2001.The editors comment that the core of this book is formed by the papers presented as a special session at the Ninth International Congress of Medieval Philosophy, honoring Norman Kretzmann’s contribution to the study of medieval philosophy. They decided to publish these papers with other essays devoted to issues in Aquinas’s moral theory specially commissioned from a group of Kretzmann’s colleagues, friends, and former students. The book, consisting of ten essays and a list of Kretzmann’s publica…Read more
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188Aquinas on the Foundations of KnowledgeCanadian Journal of Philosophy, Supplementary Volume 17 (sup1): 125-158. 1991.Aquinas is sometimes taken to hold a foundationalist theory of knowledge. So, for example, Nicholas Wolterstorff says, “Foundationalism has been the reigning theory of theories in the West since the high Middle Ages. It can be traced back as far as Aristotle, and since the Middle Ages vast amounts of philosophical thought have been devoted to elaborating and defending it‥ ‥ Aquinas offers one classic version of foundationalism.” And Alvin Plantinga says, “we can get a better understanding of Aqu…Read more
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179Faith, Wisdom, and the Transmission of Knowledge through TestimonyIn Timothy O'Connor & Laura Frances Callahan (eds.), Religious Faith and Intellectual Virtue. pp. 204-230. 2014.
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170AquinasRoutledge. 2003.Few philosophers or theologians exerted as much influence on the shape of medieval thought as Thomas Aquinas. He ranks amongst the most famous of the Western philosophers and was responsible for almost single-handedly bringing the philosophy of Aristotle into harmony with Christianity. He was also one of the first philosophers to argue that philosophy and theology could support each other. The shape of metaphysics, theology, and Aristotelian thought today still bears the imprint of Aquinas' work…Read more
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161Orthodoxy and HeresyFaith and Philosophy 16 (2): 147-163. 1999.Alvin Plantinga’s “Advice to Christian Philosophers” had the effect of getting contemporary Christian philosophers to recognize themselves as a part of a community with a worldview different from that found in the rest of Academia, and to take seriously in their work their commitment to that distinct worldview. I argue that in the current climate of opinion, generated at least in part by Plantinga’s advice, it would be worthwhile for contemporary Christian philosophers to consider that we also b…Read more
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151Control and causal determinismIn Sarah Buss & Lee Overton (eds.), Contours of Agency: Essays on Themes From Harry Frankfurt, Mit Press, Bradford Books. 2002.
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141The Nature of a Simple GodProceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association 87 33-42. 2013.
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140Reasoned faith: essays in philosophical theology in honor of Norman Kretzmann (edited book)Cornell University Press. 1993.Recent work in the philosophy of religion has broken through disciplinary boundaries and ventured into new areas of inquiry. Examining aspects of the rationality of faith or bringing philosophical techniques to bear on particular religious texts or doctrines, this collection deepens our understanding of the connections between faith and reason.
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139Aquinas’s Account of FreedomThe Monist 80 (4): 576-597. 1997.It is difficult to develop a comprehensive and satisfactory account of Aquinas’s views of the nature of human freedom.
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121Wandering in Darkness: Narrative and the Problem of SufferingOxford University Press. 2010.Wandering in Darkness reconciles the existence of an omniscient, omnipotent, perfectly good God with suffering in the world. Eleanore Stump presents the moral psychology and value theory within which the theodicy of Thomas Aquinas is embedded. She explicates Aquinas's account of the good for human beings, including the nature of love and union among persons, and then argues that some philosophical problems are best considered in the context of narratives. In the context of famous biblical storie…Read more
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112Dialectic and its place in the development of medieval logicCornell University Press. 1989.Introduction Since my work in medieval logic has concentrated on dialectic. I have tried to trace scholastic treatments of dialectic to discussions of it in ...
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112The Oxford handbook of Aquinas (edited book)Oxford University Press. 2011.This Handbook is therefore meant to be useful to someone wanting to learn about Aquinas's philosophy and theology while also looking for help in philosophical ...
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107Simplicity and Aquinas’s Quantum MetaphysicsIn Gerhard Krieger (ed.), Die "Metaphysik" des Aristoteles Im Mittelalter: Rezeption Und Transformation, De Gruyter. pp. 191-210. 2016.
Areas of Specialization
Metaphysics |
Philosophy of Religion |
Action Theory |
Normative Ethics |