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An introduction to metaphysics of knowledge
When this book was first published more than half a century ago, one noted reviewer introduced his evaluation as follows: "Works dealing with the ontological problems of knowledge are rare these days...While every once in a while someone dares to enter the domain of philosophical psychology proper, the sector of the ontology of knowledge is carefully avoided. iYves Simon/i has opened it again for discussion with remarkable assurance. He boldly recognizes its many difficulties, and one cannot but admire both the precision of his formulation of its problems and the tight dialectic of his exposition and justification of his interpretation."
- GenresPhilosophy
180 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1990
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September 29, 2024
This is a translation of a 1934 French book which was written within the neo-scholastic tradition. That means that it approaches issues from the viewpoint of Thomas Aquinas, and its analysis of ideas tends to be in the context of other neo-scholastic writers and commentators.
The book focuses mainly upon describing and explaining Aquinas’ (and Aristotle’s) metaphysics. It does engage occasionally with science and wider schools of thought (as they were in the 1930s) and in doing so it offers some interesting insights. The author is a committed neo-scholastic but he is not afraid to ask some difficult questions of Scholasticism, (such as how concepts like matter and form are supposed to translate into modern science). He is also not afraid to urge some caution with simply importing medieval thinking into the modern era. He accepts, for example that modern experimental sciences should be contributing to a discussion of how the senses work (p.37), although there is not much evidence of that actually occurring in this particular book…
What this means is that the book recognises that philosophy needs to do more than just regurgitating its medieval scholastic sources. Yet there is nevertheless a lot of citing and quoting of its medieval sources, which the book struggles to get beyond. The author’s breadth of knowledge is impressive and he shows that he really does know his scholastic commentators. He draws from sources across the full breadth of six centuries, and he presses differences between the commentators in some very learned discussions.
One of the problems in reprinting older scholastic books like this is that they are always 'out of date' in the sense that they cannot engage with later books which have critiqued specific understandings of Aquinas. They also do not engage with the important (later) philosophical questions raised by analytic philosophy, especially as we find it in the more Analytic Thomism which has developed since the 1970s.
Another issue which readers need to be aware of is that there were some subtle but important differences in how Aquinas was read by people like Maritain, Gilson and the author. Consequently, later books (such as Knasas' 2003 Being and Some Twentieth Century Thomists) can give a clearer exposition of the philosophical issues, as they compare and contrast the viewpoint in this book, with the interpretations of other Thomists.
Ideally, when older books like this are reprinted they need to be edited with additional notes to help modern readers properly engage with an older text. It is disappointing that this has not happened in this case. There is a good example of what can be done in the well-edited reprinting of the 1936 Thomistic Common Sense by Garrigou-Lagrange. Without a similar level of editing, this book has ended up being less than it could otherwise have been.
Overall, the level of complexity in this book means that it will be enjoyed most by graduate readers with a background in scholastic thought, and who also have a sufficiently broad expertise in wider philosophical issues, so that they are properly aware of the questions which the book was unable to probe. The book's engagement with medieval commentators is excellent, and so it is a useful overview of those sources. But it is also a book that is severely limited by its age, and the lack of notes to help readers bridge the academic gaps which that inevitably creates for contemporary readers.
The book focuses mainly upon describing and explaining Aquinas’ (and Aristotle’s) metaphysics. It does engage occasionally with science and wider schools of thought (as they were in the 1930s) and in doing so it offers some interesting insights. The author is a committed neo-scholastic but he is not afraid to ask some difficult questions of Scholasticism, (such as how concepts like matter and form are supposed to translate into modern science). He is also not afraid to urge some caution with simply importing medieval thinking into the modern era. He accepts, for example that modern experimental sciences should be contributing to a discussion of how the senses work (p.37), although there is not much evidence of that actually occurring in this particular book…
What this means is that the book recognises that philosophy needs to do more than just regurgitating its medieval scholastic sources. Yet there is nevertheless a lot of citing and quoting of its medieval sources, which the book struggles to get beyond. The author’s breadth of knowledge is impressive and he shows that he really does know his scholastic commentators. He draws from sources across the full breadth of six centuries, and he presses differences between the commentators in some very learned discussions.
One of the problems in reprinting older scholastic books like this is that they are always 'out of date' in the sense that they cannot engage with later books which have critiqued specific understandings of Aquinas. They also do not engage with the important (later) philosophical questions raised by analytic philosophy, especially as we find it in the more Analytic Thomism which has developed since the 1970s.
Another issue which readers need to be aware of is that there were some subtle but important differences in how Aquinas was read by people like Maritain, Gilson and the author. Consequently, later books (such as Knasas' 2003 Being and Some Twentieth Century Thomists) can give a clearer exposition of the philosophical issues, as they compare and contrast the viewpoint in this book, with the interpretations of other Thomists.
Ideally, when older books like this are reprinted they need to be edited with additional notes to help modern readers properly engage with an older text. It is disappointing that this has not happened in this case. There is a good example of what can be done in the well-edited reprinting of the 1936 Thomistic Common Sense by Garrigou-Lagrange. Without a similar level of editing, this book has ended up being less than it could otherwise have been.
Overall, the level of complexity in this book means that it will be enjoyed most by graduate readers with a background in scholastic thought, and who also have a sufficiently broad expertise in wider philosophical issues, so that they are properly aware of the questions which the book was unable to probe. The book's engagement with medieval commentators is excellent, and so it is a useful overview of those sources. But it is also a book that is severely limited by its age, and the lack of notes to help readers bridge the academic gaps which that inevitably creates for contemporary readers.
Displaying 1 of 1 review