Amara Esther Chimakonam

For decades, the problem of evil has occupied a centre stage in the Western philosophical discourse of the existence of God. The problem centres on the unlikelihood to reconcile the existence of an absolute and morally perfect God with the evidence of evil in the universe. This is the evidential problem of evil that has been a source of dispute among theists, atheists, agnostics, and sceptics. There seems to be no end to this dispute, making the problem of evil a perennial one in Western Philosophy of Religion. In this essay, I will contribute to this discourse from an African perspective. This essay, therefore, explores the evidential problem of evil within the African philosophy of religion. I argue that it is unlikely for the evidential problem of evil to be a problem in African philosophy of religion. I invoke an Ejima-based argument to support this claim. I conceptualize the Igbo word Ejima to metaphysically mean the inevitable coexistence of two opposite variables as complements to argue that God could be both good and evil within the African Traditional Religion, which explains why good and evil exist in the universe.

For decades, the problem of evil has occupied a centre stage in the Western philosophical discourse of the existence of God. The problem centres on the unlikelihood to reconcile the existence of an absolute and morally perfect God with the evidence of evil in the universe. This is the evidential problem of evil that has been a source of dispute among theists, atheists, agnostics, and sceptics. There seems to be no end to this dispute, making the problem of evil a perennial one in Western Philosophy of Religion. In this essay, I will contribute to this discourse from an African perspective. This essay, therefore, explores the evidential problem of evil within the African philosophy of religion. I argue that it is unlikely for the evidential problem of evil to be a problem in African philosophy of religion. I invoke an Ejima-based argument to support this claim. I conceptualize the Igbo word Ejima to metaphysically mean the inevitable coexistence of two opposite variables as complements to argue that God could be both good and evil within the African Traditional Religion, which explains why good and evil exist in the universe.

In our contemporary and futuristic times, immortality is slowly being extracted from the divine/spiritual arena by means of science and technology. There is the optimism that through the scientific and technological revitalization of human nature, humans would probably attain eternal existence in this world. This optimism, and its underlying philosophy, is based on something known as transhumanism. In this chapter, we examine the implications of transhumanism for the question of life’s meaning, especially from an African perspective. Specifically, we pit transhumanism against three dominant traditional African notions of meaning viz. the God’s purpose theory, the vital force theory and the communal normative function theory in a bid to decipher which theory, amongst the three, best undergirds a meaningful transhuman existence. We conclude that the communal view is the most attractive of the three theories in terms of answering the question of how to live meaningfully as a transhuman/post-human being. According to the communal view, a meaningful life is one that strives to acquire personhood of the highest level by performing those acts that ensure harmonious living, communal flourishing, and the common good. Attaining personhood, thus, presents itself as one plausible overarching purpose for a transhuman existence.

The ongoing debate on how best to regulate international commercial surrogacy defies consensus, as the most cogent normative and jurisprudential grounds for and against non-altruistic surrogacy remain controversial. This paper contributes to the debate by focusing on social justice issues arising from transnational, moneymaking surrogacy, with a focus on the Global South. It argues that existing theoretical perspectives on balancing interests, rights, privileges, and resources in the context of cross-border surrogacy—such as cosmopolitanism, communitarianism, liberal feminism, radical feminism, and neorealism—are not sufficient to treat the question of justice underpinning transnational surrogacy in the Global South. An Afro-communal theory of social justice is proposed as an alternative model for addressing the shortcomings in existing global justice theories. Building on Thaddeus Metz’s construction of Afro-communal social theory and a bioethic of communion, this article reveals the fundamental nature of injustices in the Global South surrogacy foray. This approach provides prima facie grounds for making commercial surrogacy more just in the evolving global order.

Since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, there has been an increase in religious conspiracy theories in Africa, ranging from outright denial, partial acceptance to spreading misinformation about the Coronavirus. This essay will argue that RCTs pose serious challenges to Covid-19 prevention by encouraging non-compliance to Covid-19 preventive measures and refusal to take Covid-19 vaccination. It will then formulate a personhood-based theory of right action. This new theory will be teased out of Ifeanyi Menkiti's account of the normative conception of personhood and deployed here as a veritable tool for overcoming the challenges posed by RCTs in the fight against the COVID-19 Pandemic in Africa.

In “Personhood in a Transhumanist Context: An African Perspective”, Ademola K. Fayemi advocates for a kind of Afro-communitarian theory of transhumanism that is compatible with the Afro-communitarian idea of personhood. In this paper, I examine Fayemi’s account of transhumanism - in particular, his Afrofuturistic account of personhood. Against his Afrofuturistic account of personhood, I argue that enhancing personhood is more plausibly viewed in terms of what I call ‘technologized personhood’ and that even if such a technologized personhood contributes to the common good, this would not support the moral permissibility of transhumanism from an Afro-communitarian standpoint. I will deploy Ifeanyi Menkiti’s account of personhood to contend with the view that such a technologized personhood would have a great implication for the Afro-normative conception of personhood in the transhumanist future.

This chapter examines the status of the transhumanist future that seeks to use the means of science and technology to radically enhance human moral capacities. I investigate the claim about the possible transformation of the human social conditions that could enable them to transcend the limitations imposed on them by biology and nature to become posthumans. I suppose that such a transhumanist future would be possible and then pose the question: How would the transhumanization of our world change our Afro-communitarian values system? In exploring this question, I employ the Afro-communitarian idea of personhood as a foil to argue that such transhumanization would affect our current values system in surprising ways. I will argue that it could cause a radical shift from the orientation of normal values system to the orientation of anormal values system and diminish the importance of moral choice.

Since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, there has been an increase in religious conspiracy theories in Africa, ranging from outright denial, partial acceptance to spreading misinformation about the Coronavirus. This essay will argue that RCTs pose serious challenges to Covid-19 prevention by encouraging non-compliance to Covid-19 preventive measures and refusal to take Covid-19 vaccination. It will then formulate a personhood-based theory of right action. This new theory will be teased out of Ifeanyi Menkiti's account of the normative conception of personhood and deployed here as a veritable tool for overcoming the challenges posed by RCTs in the fight against the COVID-19 Pandemic in Africa.

In this essay, I critically engage with Aribiah Attoe’s new book on African Metaphysics, Groundwork for a New Kind of African Metaphysics: The Idea of Predeterministic Historicity, by reflecting on some of the philosophical issues that it provokes. Attoe contests some basic assumptions undergirding the philosophical approach to metaphysics within the African episteme in this book. His contestation leads him to a materialistic conception of reality in African metaphysics. While noting the original contribution of Attoe’s book, such as singular complementarism, and predeterministic historicity, I identify and discuss some issues in the book that deserve critical philosophical engagement.