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Cartesian Circle
The Cartesian circle (also known as Antoine Arnauld, Arnauld's circle) is an example of formal fallacy, fallacious circular reasoning attributed to French philosopher René Descartes. He argued that the existence of God is proven by reliable perception, which is itself guaranteed by God. The argument Descartes argues – for example, in the third of his ''Meditations on First Philosophy'' – that whatever one clearly and distinctly perceives is true: "I now seem to be able to lay it down as a general rule that whatever I perceive very clearly and distinctly is true" (AT VII 35). He goes on in the same Meditation to argue for the existence of a benevolent God, in order to defeat his skeptical argument in the first Meditation that God might be a deceiver. He then says that without his knowledge of God's existence, none of his knowledge could be certain. The Cartesian circle is a criticism of the above that takes this form: # Descartes' proof of the reliability of clear and disti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Antoine Arnauld
Antoine Arnauld (; 6 February 16128 August 1694) was a French Catholic theologian, priest, philosopher and mathematician. He was one of the leading intellectuals of the Jansenist group of Port-Royal and had a very thorough knowledge of patristics. Contemporaries called him ''le Grand'' to distinguish him from his father. Biography Antoine Arnauld was born in Paris to the Arnauld family. The twentieth and youngest child of the original Antoine Arnauld, he was originally intended for the bar, but decided instead to study theology at the Sorbonne. Here he was brilliantly successful, and his career was flourishing when he came under the influence of Jean du Vergier de Hauranne, the spiritual director and leader of the convent of Port-Royal, and was drawn in the direction of Jansenism. His book, ''De la fréquente Communion'' (1643), was an important step in making the aims and ideals of this movement intelligible to the general public. It attracted controversy by being ag ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cogito Ergo Sum
The Latin , usually translated into English as "I think, therefore I am", is the "first principle" of René Descartes's philosophy. He originally published it in French language, French as , in his 1637 ''Discourse on the Method'', so as to reach a wider audience than Latin would have allowed. It later appeared in Latin in his ''Principles of Philosophy'', and a similar phrase also featured prominently in his ''Meditations on First Philosophy''. The dictum is also sometimes referred to as the cogito. As Descartes explained in a Marginalia, margin note, "we cannot doubt of our existence while we doubt." In the posthumously published ''The Search for Truth by Natural Light'', he expressed this insight as ("I doubt, therefore I am — or what is the same — I think, therefore I am").. Antoine Léonard Thomas, in a 1765 essay in honor of Descartes presented it as ("I doubt, therefore I think, therefore I am"). Descartes's statement became a fundamental element of Western philo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Philosophical Arguments
Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, value, mind, and language. It is a rational and critical inquiry that reflects on its methods and assumptions. Historically, many of the individual sciences, such as physics and psychology, formed part of philosophy. However, they are considered separate academic disciplines in the modern sense of the term. Influential traditions in the history of philosophy include Western, Arabic–Persian, Indian, and Chinese philosophy. Western philosophy originated in Ancient Greece and covers a wide area of philosophical subfields. A central topic in Arabic–Persian philosophy is the relation between reason and revelation. Indian philosophy combines the spiritual problem of how to reach enlightenment with the exploration of the nature of reality and the ways of arriving at knowledge. Chinese philosophy focuses principally on ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ontological Argument
In the philosophy of religion, an ontological argument is a deductive philosophical argument, made from an ontological basis, that is advanced in support of the existence of God. Such arguments tend to refer to the state of being or existing. More specifically, ontological arguments are commonly conceived ''a priori'' in regard to the organization of the universe, whereby, if such organizational structure is true, God must exist. The first ontological argument in Western Christian traditionSzatkowski, Miroslaw, ed. 2012. ''Ontological Proofs Today''. Ontos Verlag. "There are three main periods in the history of ontological arguments. The first was in 11th century, when St. Anselm of Canterbury came up with the first ontological argument" (p. 22). was proposed by Saint Anselm of Canterbury in his 1078 work, '' Proslogion'' (), in which he defines God as "a being than which no greater can be conceived," and argues that such a being must exist in the mind, even in that of the pe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Circular Reasoning
Circular reasoning (, "circle in proving"; also known as circular logic) is a fallacy, logical fallacy in which the reasoner begins with what they are trying to end with. Circular reasoning is not a formal logical fallacy, but a pragmatic defect in an argument whereby the premises are just as much in need of proof or evidence as the conclusion. As a consequence, the argument becomes a matter of faith and fails to persuade those who do not already accept it. Other ways to express this are that there is no reason to accept the premises unless one already believes the conclusion, or that the premises provide no independent ground or evidence for the conclusion. Circular reasoning is closely related to begging the question, and in modern usage the two generally refer to the same thing. Circular reasoning is often of the form: "A is true because B is true; B is true because A is true." Circularity can be difficult to detect if it involves a longer chain of propositions. An example of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Harry Frankfurt
Harry Gordon Frankfurt (May 29, 1929 – July 16, 2023) was an American philosopher. He was a professor emeritus of philosophy at Princeton University, where he taught from 1990 until 2002. Frankfurt also taught at Yale University, Rockefeller University, and Ohio State University. Frankfurt made significant contributions to such fields as ethics and philosophy of mind. The attitude of caring played a central role in his philosophy. To care about something means to see it as important and reflects the person's character. According to Frankfurt, a person is someone who has second-order volitions or who cares about what desires he or she has. He contrasts persons with wantons. Wantons are beings that have desires but do not care about which of their desires is translated into action. In the field of ethics, Frankfurt gave various influential counterexamples, so-called Frankfurt cases, against the principle that moral responsibility depends on the ability to do otherwise. His mo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Andrea Christofidou
Andrea is a given name which is common worldwide for both males and females, cognate to Andreas, Andrej and Andrew. Origin of the name The name derives from the Greek word ἀνήρ (''anēr''), genitive ἀνδρός (''andrós''), that refers to man as opposed to woman (whereas ''man'' in the sense of ''human being'' is ἄνθρωπος, ''ánthropos''). The original male Greek name, ''Andréas'', represents the hypocoristic, with endearment functions, of male Greek names composed with the ''andr-'' prefix, like Androgeos (''man of the earth''), Androcles (''man of glory''), Andronikos (''man of victory''). In the year 2006, it was the third most popular name in Italy with 3.1% of newborns. It is part of the Italian male names ending in ''a'', some others being Elia (Elias), Enea (Aeneas), Luca (Lucas), Mattia (Matthias), Nicola (Nicholas), Tobia (Tobias). In recent and past times it has also been used on occasion as a female name in Italy and in Spain, where it is con ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bernard Williams
Sir Bernard Arthur Owen Williams (21 September 1929 – 10 June 2003) was an English Ethics, moral philosopher. His publications include ''Problems of the Self'' (1973), ''Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy'' (1985), ''Shame and Necessity'' (1993), and ''Truth and Truthfulness'' (2002). He was knighted in 1999. As Knightbridge Professor of Philosophy at the University of Cambridge and Deutsch Professor of Philosophy at the University of California, Berkeley, Williams became known for his efforts to reorient the study of moral philosophy to psychology, history, and in particular to the Ancient Greek philosophy, Greeks.Mark P. Jenkins, ''Bernard Williams'', Abingdon: Routledge, 2014 [2006], 3.Colin Koopman, "Bernard Williams on Philosophy's Need for History," ''The Review of Metaphysics'', 64(1), September 2010, 3–30. Described by Colin McGinn as an "analytic philosophy, analytical philosopher with the soul of a general humanist," he was sceptical about attempts to crea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Syllogism
A syllogism (, ''syllogismos'', 'conclusion, inference') is a kind of logical argument that applies deductive reasoning to arrive at a conclusion based on two propositions that are asserted or assumed to be true. In its earliest form (defined by Aristotle in his 350 BC book '' Prior Analytics''), a deductive syllogism arises when two true premises (propositions or statements) validly imply a conclusion, or the main point that the argument aims to get across. For example, knowing that all men are mortal (major premise), and that Socrates is a man (minor premise), we may validly conclude that Socrates is mortal. Syllogistic arguments are usually represented in a three-line form: All men are mortal. Socrates is a man. Therefore, Socrates is mortal.In antiquity, two rival syllogistic theories existed: Aristotelian syllogism and Stoic syllogism. From the Middle Ages onwards, ''categorical syllogism'' and ''syllogism'' were usually used interchangeably. This article is concern ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marin Mersenne
Marin Mersenne, OM (also known as Marinus Mersennus or ''le Père'' Mersenne; ; 8 September 1588 – 1 September 1648) was a French polymath whose works touched a wide variety of fields. He is perhaps best known today among mathematicians for Mersenne prime numbers, those written in the form for some integer . He also developed Mersenne's laws, which describe the harmonics of a vibrating string (such as may be found on guitars and pianos), and his seminal work on music theory, '' Harmonie universelle'', for which he is referred to as the "father of acoustics". Mersenne, an ordained Catholic priest, had many contacts in the scientific world and has been called "the center of the world of science and mathematics during the first half of the 1600s" and, because of his ability to make connections between people and ideas, "the post-box of Europe". He was also a member of the ascetical Minim religious order and wrote and lectured on theology and philosophy. Life Mersenne was b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Formal Fallacy
In logic and philosophical logic, philosophy, a formal fallacy is a pattern of reasoning rendered validity (logic), invalid by a flaw in its logical structure. propositional calculus, Propositional logic, for example, is concerned with the meanings of sentences and the relationships between them. It focuses on the role of logical operators, called propositional connectives, in determining whether a sentence is true. An error in the sequence will result in a deductive argument that is invalid. The argument itself could have true premises, but still have a false logical consequence, conclusion. Thus, a formal fallacy is a fallacy in which deduction goes wrong, and is no longer a logical process. This may not affect the truth of the conclusion, since validity and truth are separate in formal logic. While a logical argument is a ''non sequitur'' if, and only if, it is invalid, the term "non sequitur" typically refers to those types of invalid arguments which do not constitute formal fa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Existence Of God
The existence of God is a subject of debate in the philosophy of religion and theology. A wide variety of arguments for and against the existence of God (with the same or similar arguments also generally being used when talking about the existence of multiple deities) can be categorized as logical, Empirical research, empirical, Metaphysics, metaphysical, Subjectivity, subjective, or Science, scientific. In Philosophy, philosophical terms, the question of the existence of God involves the disciplines of epistemology (the nature and scope of knowledge) and ontology (study of the nature of being or existence) and the Value theory, theory of value (since some definitions of God include perfection). The Western philosophy, Western tradition of philosophical discussion of the existence of God began with Plato and Aristotle, who made arguments for the existence of a being responsible for fashioning the universe, referred to as the demiurge or the unmoved mover, that today would be c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
