•  237
    Suarez on "universals"
    Journal of Philosophy 59 (23): 736-748. 1962.
  •  146
    Creation
    Journal of Philosophy 77 (10): 614-629. 1980.
  •  128
    Scotus’ natural theology has distinctive claims: (i) that we can reason demonstratively to the necessary existence and nature of God from what is actually so; but not from imagined situations, or from conceivability-to-us; rather, only from the possibility logically required for what we know actually to be so; (ii) that there is a univocal transcendental notion of being; (iii) that there are disjunctive transcendental notions that apply exclusively to everything, like ‘contingent/necessary,’ and…Read more
  •  122
    The Crash of Modal Metaphysics
    Review of Metaphysics 43 (2). 1989.
    Mistakes about necessity, possibility, counterpossibility and impossibility distort the notions of being and creation.1 Recently such errors cluster in the understanding of quantified modal logic (QML), a device that was for a while thought especially promising for metaphysics.2 Time has told a different story. The underlying modal platonism is gratuitous, without explanatory force and conflicts with the religion it is often used to explain. There are things to consider here that go beyond diagn…Read more
  •  84
    On Christian Philosophy
    The Monist 75 (3): 354-380. 1992.
    We have to frame a position that fits philosophy as it is done now, but respects its perennial features yet also responds to the literature concerning medieval writers and the recent suggestions for contemporary philosophy.
  •  83
    Philosophy, as Aquinas, and many others, described it-- as a demonstrative progression from self-evident premises to evident (or even necessary [Scotus]) conclusions,-- is rarely attempted nowadays, even by "scholastic" philosophers. Demonstrative success,-- that is, entirely to eliminate competitors to one's conclusions, -- is not the expectation now, nor has it been the achievement of philosophers historically. Thus, some restrictions upon starting points may be relaxed as unnecessary, e.g. th…Read more
  •  75
    Together with the Body I Love
    Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association 75 1-18. 2001.
    Philosophical difficulties with Augustine’s dualism, and with the scholastic “separated souls” account of the gap between personal death and supernatural resurrection, suggest that we consider two other options, each with its own attractions: (i) that the General Resurrection is immediate upon one’s death, despite initial awkwardness with common piety, and (ii) that there is a “natural metamorphosis” of bodily continuity after death and before resurrection
  •  70
    Justice Is Reasonableness
    The Monist 58 (1): 86-103. 1974.
    The morality of human actions consists in their reasonableness. An act is reasonable if doing that sort of thing under the circumstances is a reasonable application, in the particular circumstances, of general principles of action which are intelligible and obvious to virtually everyone. Such applications to particular events are conclusions, usually guided by derivative and subordinate principles of natural law and of human law, and do not, therefore, have the certitude of science; in fact, nat…Read more
  •  67
    Analogy as a Rule of Meaning for Religious Language
    International Philosophical Quarterly 1 (3): 468-502. 1961.
  •  66
    Aquinas’s Exemplarism; Aquinas’s Voluntarism
    American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 64 (2): 171-198. 1990.
  •  66
    Portraying analogy (edited book)
    Cambridge University Press. 1981.
    The attention of philosophers. linguists and literary theorists has been converging on the diverse and intriguing phenomena of analogy of meaning:the different though related meanings of the same word, running from simple equivocation to paronymy, metaphor and figurative language. So far, however, their attempts at explanation have been piecemeal and inconclusive and no new and comprehensive theory of analogy has emerged. This is what James Ross offers here. In the first full treatment of the su…Read more
  •  64
    On Proofs for the Existence of God
    The Monist 54 (2): 201-217. 1970.
    First, I shall summarize a few points which have been explained and defended elsewhere. Some may find these assumptions unacceptable; but it seems otiose to repeat arguments I cannot at present improve.
  •  60
    Problems and Perplexities
    with Roger Hancock, Donald Walhout, William H. Kane, Charles Landesman, Donald W. Sherburne, and Ajit Kumar Sinha
    Review of Metaphysics 15 (1). 1961.
  •  57
    Metaphysical themes in Thomas Aquinas
    Journal of the History of Philosophy 25 (4): 592-594. 1987.
  •  52
    The Miracle Of Theism (review)
    Review of Metaphysics 38 (3): 657-660. 1985.
    Mackie examines "the arguments for and against the existence of God carefully and in some detail, taking account both of the traditional concept of God and of the traditional 'proofs' of his existence and of more recent interpretations and approaches". He is fairly comprehensive even though, in my opinion, he misses the best versions of some of the best arguments. He does not, as one would hope, give many arguments that God does not exist, beyond considerations from evil and an implicit one from…Read more
  •  43
    An impasse on competing descriptions of God
    International Journal for Philosophy of Religion 8 (4). 1977.
  •  40
    Testimonial evidence
    In Keith Lehrer (ed.), Analysis and Metaphysics, Springer. pp. 35-55. 1975.
    Knowledge through what others tell us not only forms a large part of the body of our knowledge but also originates the patterns of appraisal according to which we add beliefs to our present store of knowledge.1 I do not mean merely that what we add is often accepted from persons who have already contributed to our knowledge; beyond that, we have acquired habits of thought, tendencies to suspect and tendencies to approve both other-person-reports and purported perceptions, from our testimonial re…Read more
  •  40
    A New Theory of Analogy
    Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association 44 (n/a): 70-85. 1970.
  •  36
    Rethinking the Ontological Argument (review)
    American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 81 (1): 147-150. 2007.
  •  36
    The notion of rational certainty[1] had developed a long way in four decades. Many now recognize that even to do science we characteristically claim rational certainty where we lack supporting proof of our own, have not engaged in some balancing of evidence, and have not even undertaken any articulate inquiry. Many further recognize that rational reliance is notably voluntary[2]and that our feelings, especially refined feelings, have indispensable roles in determining our willing reliances and i…Read more
  •  33
  •  33
    The Fate of the Analysis
    Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association 64 (n/a): 51-74. 1990.
  •  33
    Philosophical Theology
    Philosophical Review 81 (4): 509. 1972.
  •  32
    Analogy and the resolution of some cognitivity problems
    Journal of Philosophy 67 (20): 725-746. 1970.
  •  30
    The Logic of Analogy (review)
    International Philosophical Quarterly 2 (4): 633-642. 1962.