(Class 14) 26 November KUL only: Necessity and Possibility
Text Link and Alternate Text Link
Part 1: Avicenna on Necessity and Possibility
KUL-8: Rayan Dabous, Nougeanne Kumaily & Nele Vanmechelen. Handout of absolutely not more than 6 pp. + 2 pp bibliography due Tuesday 5 pm US Central Time/ midnight Leuven. Thursday at class: 8-10 min. oral presentation followed by discussion.
Required: (i) Avicenna, Metaphysics Bk 1, Ch. 5-6; Bk 8, Ch. 4, from The Metaphysics of “The Healing”. A parallel English-Arabic text translated, introduced, and annotated by M.E. Marmura, Brigham Young University Press, Provo, Utah 2005; (ii) O. Lizzini 2020, “Ibn Sina’s Metaphysics,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, particularly section 4; (iii) A. Bertolacci 2008, “‘Necessary’ as Primary Concept in Avicenna’s Metaphysics”in Conoscenza e contingenza, S. Perfetti (ed.), Pisa: Edizioni ETS, pp. 31–50.
Recommended: (i) A. Bertolacci, 2012, “The Distinction of Essence and Existence in Avicenna’s Metaphysics: The Text and Its Context”, in F. Opwis and D. C. Reisman (eds.), Islamic Philosophy, Science, Culture, and Religion: Studies in Honor of Dimitri Gutas, Leiden: Brill, 257–288; (ii) O. Lizzini, 2014, “A mysterious order of possibles, Some remarks on the views of Avicenna and Aquinas on creation: al-Ilāhiyyāt, the Quaestiones De potentia and Beatrice Zedler’s interpretation”, American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly, 88: 237–270; (iii) J. McGinnis 2010, Ch. 6, Avicenna, Oxford: Oxford University Press; (iv) J. McGinnis 2012, “Making Something of Nothing: Privation, Possibility and Potential in Avicenna and Aquinas”, The Thomist, 76: 1–25. Note: J. Janssens of KULeuven has published a bibliography with two supplemental volumes on the vast array of publications on Ibn Sina / Avicenna: An annotated bibliography on Ibn Sînâ (1970-1989) : including Arabic and Persian publications and Turkish and Russian references, Leuven : Leuven University Press, 1991; An annotated bibliography on Ibn Sīnā : first supplement (1990-1994), Louvain-la-Neuve [Belgium] : Fédération internationale des instituts d’études médiévales, 1999; An annotated bibliography on Ibn Sīnā : second supplement (1995-2009), Tempe, Arizona : ACMRS, 2017.
Part 2: Aquinas on Possibility and Necessity
KUL-9: Andy Yan. Handout of absolutely not more than 6 pp. + 2 pp bibliography due Tuesday 5 pm US Central Time/ midnight Leuven. Thursday at class: 8-10 min. oral presentation followed by discussion.
Required: Thomas Aquinas, (i) Expositio super Job ad litteram, cap. 5; (ii) Contra Gentiles, Book II, cap. 30; (iii) Expositio libri Peryermenias, Book I, lectiones 13-15; (iv) In Physicorum libros, Book 2, lectio 12. See https://isidore.co/aquinas/.
Recommended: (i) W. A. Wallace, Albertus Magnus on Suppositional Necessity in the Natural Science, in James A. Weisheipl (ed.), Albertus Magnus and the Sciences. Commemorative Essays, Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1980, pp. 103-128; (ii) J. M. Christianson, The Necessity and Some Characteristics of the Habit of First Indemonstrable (Speculative) Principles, «The New Scholasticism», 62(1988), pp. 249–296.