"This book does nothing less than to set new standards in combining philosophical with political theology.

A Thomistic metaphysics of participation in being offers an account of rationality that is more complete and coherent than that of nonreductive physicalism. It is a reasoned understanding of how an embodied intellectual subject shares in being and intellectual life. This metaphysical framework supports an understanding of rationality as a participated power, and an essential property of human nature empowering persons to know reality and make choices accordingly. Human fulfilment in truth and love is a consequence of the grounding of (...) the transcendentals of truth and goodness in being. In contrast, nonreductive physicalism reduces rationality to processes and subjective experiences and can offer no priority between human material and spiritual fulfilment. Although a Thomistic metaphysics of participation in being has been effectively absent from Anglo-American hylomorphic philosophy of mind, this paper suggests it is time to reassess the benefits it offers. (shrink)

This article seeks to advance a Thomistic metaphysics of creation in light of certain claims made by Stephen Hawking on the beginninglessness of the universe. I start with an exploration of Hawking's proposal that a beginningless universe entails an uncreated universe. This propels me into Aquinas's contention that a created beginningless universe is indeed possible, and thence I consider the metaphysics behind Thomas's position in this regard. Given this metaphysics of creation, I contend that there follow some interesting conclusions with (...) regard to our notion of a creator God and the means for establishing the existence of such. (shrink)

Se examinan algunas cuestiones relacionadas con el devenir causal de los seres creados -en particular, los seres espirituales-, sobre la base de la noción metafísica de participación desarrollada por Tomás de Aquino. La aproximación parte de las exégesis y comentarios de Cornelio Fabro a las doctrinas tomistas. In the present paper, some issues related to the causal becoming of created beings -in particular, spiritual beings- will be examined, on the basis of the metaphysical notion of participation developed by Thomas Aquinas. (...) The approach starts from Cornelio Fabro's exegesis and comments to thomistic doctrines. (shrink)