Aquinas’ De malo and the Ostensibly Problematic Status of Natural Evil as Privation

Arguments concerning the nature of natural evil vary in their conclusions depending on the particular approach with which they commence inquiry; one of the most contested conclusions regards evil as privation, sourcing its justification primarily from Aquinas’ metaphysical conception of good as being and evil as non-being. It should be of no surprise, then, that the dismissal of natural evil’s privative nature comes about when the understanding of natural evil favours a phenomenological approach rather than a metaphysical one. Proponents of said dismissal generally centre their claims around the notion of pain and suffering as substantially contentful – as in, non-privative – experiences of evil. On the other hand, theorists espousing the privation account generally argue that characterisations of pain and suffering as necessarily evil do not consider the context of orientation towards individual wellbeing within which pain/suffering experiences naturally function. Furthermore, some of the arguments for the privation account’s dismissal seem to disregard completely the Thomistic sense of the form and hierarchy of the good, which ends up straw-manning the privation account to a point where it can no longer reconcile the awfulness of experienced pain and suffering with these experiences not being necessarily evil. The importance of understanding this Thomistic sense is further emphasised in its capacity to explain why a divine and fully good Creator would involve the world with such evil. Thus, this paper first considers the account of evil given in question one of Aquinas’ De malo, along with contemporary arguments for the nature and purpose of evil as privation; second, these are then used as resources to help make sense of, one, the general nature of pain and suffering, and two, some of their specific expressions as found in disease and depression, and throughout evolutionary history

Evil as Privation and Leibniz's Rejection of Empty Space

I argue that Leibniz's treatment of void or empty space in the appendix to his fourth letter to Clarke conflicts with the way he elsewhere treats (metaphysical) evil, insofar as he allows that God has created a world with the one kind of privation (evil), while insisting that God would not have created a world with the other kind of privation (void). I consider three respects in which the moral case might be thought to differ relevantly from the physical one, and argue that none of them succeed in removing the inconsistency. Rather than denying the existence of void, Leibniz should have been led by his treatment of evil to realize that the arguments he deploys in this appendix are dubious, and that the principles to which he appeals do not rule out empty space any more than they rule out evil, darkness, cold, or any other privations

Reality and the Meaning of Evil: On the Moral Causality of Signs

ABSTRACT: “Evil is really only a privation.” This philosophical commonplace reflects an ancient solution to the problem of theodicy in one of its dimensions: is evil of such a nature that it must have God as its author? Stated in this particular way, it also reflects the commonplace identification of the real with natural being—the realm of what exists independently of human thought and perspectives—as opposed to all that is termed, by comparison, “merely subjective” and “unreal”. If we stick with this way of construing the meaning of “reality”, then by the excellent arguments of the tradition we are also stuck with defending the sufficiency of privation as a response to what evil “really is”. In this article, we argue against both ways of being stuck. We argue, first, that a one-sided focus upon the being of nature blocks an adequate understanding of the world we actually live in: the semiotically constituted lifeworld that is the proper locus of human realities, including moral evil. We argue, second, that the positivity of moral evil consists not only, nor even primarily, in the positivity of “action” as such, but in structures of objectivity engendered by creative reason that oppose the due end, and that involve a specific genus of pure object which we call a mystical daydream. Like any objects, these objects are communicable and formative in relation to the lifeworld, within which they in turn engender further interpretants for both those who do and those who suffer evil, thanks to the causality of signs

Two type-theoretical approaches to privative modification

In this paper we apply two kinds of procedural semantics to the problem of privative modification. We do this for three reasons. The first reason is to launch a tough test case to gauge the degree of substantial agreement between a constructivist and a realist interpretation of a procedural semantics; the second is to extend Martin-Lof's Type Theory to privative modification, which is characteristic of natural language; the third reason is to sketch a positive characterization of privation

Are Potency and Actuality Compatible in Aristotle?

The belief that Aristotle opposes potency (dunamis) to actuality (energeia or entelecheia) has gone untested. This essay defines and distinguishes forms of the Opposition Hypothesis—the Actualization, Privation, and Modal—examining the texts and arguments adduced to support them. Using Aristotle’s own account of opposition, the texts appear instead to show that potency and actuality are compatible, while arguments for their opposition produce intractable problems. Notably, Aristotle’s refutation of the Megarian Identity Hypothesis applies with equal or greater force to the Opposition Hypothesis. For Aristotle, then, potency and actuality are compatible

\u3cem\u3eMāyā\u3c/em\u3e, \u3cem\u3eĀṇava Mala\u3c/em\u3e and Original Sin: A Comparative Study

“The longing for grace in Hinduism,” argues Bishop Sabapathy Kulandran, “springs more often from the desire to solve a metaphysical problem than from an agony tearing at one’s inmost being.” For this reason, a Hindu seeks liberation from a metaphysical situation, a feeling of impurity, rather than redemption from sin. Yet as Christian thinking on the doctrine of original sin has developed, it has more and more come to understand original sin as denoting first and foremost a cosmic reality, a metaphysical situation, in some ways very similar to the metaphysical impurity of the Śaiva Siddhānta notion of āṇava mala. And so Klaus K. Klostermaier states concerning āṇava: “Āṇava, beginningless and eternal, is the primal bondage of the souls; it is something like an ‘original sin.’” There is thus a certain point of contact – alongside clear points of distinction and differentiation – between the Christian doctrine of original sin and the Śaiva Siddhānta doctrine of āṇava mala. This essay will trace those points of contact, beginning with a discussion of māyā and āṇava mala and concluding with a comparative analysis of original sin. For explication of the Śaiva Siddhānta teaching, this essay will look primarily to the philosophical explanations of K. Sivaraman. It will then employ briefly the thought of Augustine, Thomas Aquinas and, in particular, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin in order to discuss those points of contact with āṇava mala found in more contemporary discussions of original sin

Le bien-être psychologique des francophones et des anglophones : le rôle des points tournants de l’histoire du Québec

La privation relative temporelle est le sentiment de menace ressenti par les individus suite à des comparaisons négatives entre la situation actuelle de leur groupe d'appartenance et la situation de leur groupe dans le passé. Les travaux empiriques antérieurs sur la privation relative temporelle ont identifié un lien prédictif modéré négatif entre la privation relative temporelle et le bien-être psychologique. Traditionnellement, les chercheurs qui ont évalué la privation relative temporelle demandaient aux individus de comparer la situation actuelle de leur groupe avec un seul point de comparaison dans le passé. L’objectif principal du présent texte vise à reconceptualiser la théorie de la privation relative temporelle dans le contexte québécois des anglophones et des francophones où plusieurs points tournants de l’histoire du Québec seront considérés.Temporal Relative Deprivation is the distressing feeling experienced by individuals following negative comparisons between the current and past situations of the group they belong to. Previous empirical studies on Temporal Relative Deprivation identified a modest negative predictive link between Temporal Relative Deprivation and psychological well-being. Traditionally, researchers who evaluated Temporal Relative Deprivation asked people to compare their current group situation with one single point of comparison in the past. The main objective of the present paper is to re-conceptualize Temporal Relative Deprivation Theory in the context of Quebec for Anglophones and Francophones, considering the key periods in Quebec’s history, being several points of comparison in the past

An Exposition of Augustine\u27s Theodicy: From Its Influences to Its Modern Application

This paper delineates the thrust of Augustine\u27s theodicy against the broader background of his Christian Neoplatonic outlook. We examine Augustine\u27s initial Manichean influences and see how these beliefs carry over to his mature thought, which is evident in the seventh book of the Confessions. After Augustine\u27s time with the Manicheans, we look at how he was so influenced by the books of the Platonists (libri platonicorum). Although Augustine\u27s position regarding the problem of evil shifts, his idea of the primacy of the soul is still evident in his thought process. To wit, Augustine posits that evil must be considered a privation of the Good, so much so as to reach the point of complete nonentity. Human beings\u27 ability to be corrupted by evils rests in their position as being created ex-nihilo by God. With this creation also comes an inherent mutability. Due to human mutability, Augustine believes that God is not responsible for such evil actions. This paper also contrasts this belief with modern empiricist David Hume\u27s idea regarding God\u27s responsibility for human actions. Hume argues that the volition of all human actions rests in God as Creator of the world. As creator, Hume claims that God places human beings in a position to act. If humans are predisposed to perform evil actions, they cannot be faulted. Augustine would counter that argument by claiming that evil is not a substance. Not being a substance, evil is there not ascribable to God. Ultimately, Augustine\u27s theodicy is based upon the goodness of God

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: Does Plato Make Room for Negative Forms in His Ontology?

Plato seems to countenance both positive and negative Forms, that is to say, both good and bad ones. He may not say so outright, but he invokes both and rejects neither. The apparent finality of this impression creates a lack of direct interest in the subject: Plato scholars do not give negative Forms much thought except as the prospect relates to something else they happen to be doing. Yet when they do give the matter any thought, typically for the sake of a prior concern, they try either to support the textual evidence or to contradict it, indicating that the evidence does not stand on its own. The purpose of this paper is to determine why they tend to affirm or deny the obvious, how they try to confirm or dispute it, and what this says about Plato’s position. The strategic vehicle is a comparative case study. The confirmation comes from Debra Nails (2013), who needs to embrace negative Forms to demonstrate that the unhypothetical first principle of the all is not identical to the Form of the good, something she cannot do unless Plato recognizes negative Forms. The contradiction comes from Holger Thesleff (2013), who needs to reject negative (Ideal) Forms because the defining feature of his (Ideal) Forms is the possession of positive intrinsic value, which cannot be predicated of anything negative. Despite defending opposite views, or perhaps because of this, they jointly make up for any lack of interest in the scholarly community. I appreciate both yet side with Thesleff