Monday, March 29, 2010

A little about Jeremy Bentham.

Jeremy Bentham was born in a little city of London in 1748. A child prodigy from the start, he attended several prestigious throughout his early life. In 1776 when the United States presented their Declaration of Independence, John Lind wrote their rebuttal. Inside of an essay by Bentham himself mocking and attacking the declaration.

I know, I know. But don't dismiss him just yet. Jeremy Bentham actually strived to reform social change. He advocated for the end of slavery, equal rights for women, the seperation of chuch and state, rights for homosexuals, and more. He was quite liberal infact.

Among other things he is sometimes associated with the creation of the University of London. It was the first English college to admit all, regardless of race or political standing, and without the inspiration from Bentham, it might not have been created.

He was also a philosopher, and as we all know, philosopher's love to write. He created many works of literature across his lifespan including Elements of the Art of Packing, Not Paul but Jesus, and Emancipate your Colonies. Although his main motivation in life was utilitarianism which he outlined in The Principles of Morals and Legislation.

Bentham wanted a complete ulitarian code or law and morals. With his idea, people should create laws or act on things knowing it would do the greatest good for the most amount of people. He even came up with a way of judging the morals of any action using a 'felicific caluclus'. John Stuart Mill eventually refined and made his own type of ultilitarianism known.

Jeremy even dabbled in economics and animal rights (in fact, he was one of the first proponents of them). He even wrote a book Offences Against One's Self which argued for making homosexuality legal, although he didn't approve of homosexual acts themselves and never published the book during his lifetime.

One of the most fascinating things about this philosopher's life is actually his death -- or what happened after his death. Bentham's will stated that his body was to be used in an anatomy lecture and then preserved in a wooden box dressed in his own clothes. And it surprisingly happened. You can find him at the University College London on display, although his head has been replaced by wax after some student pranks.

Jeremy Bentham is quite the complax guy and introduced us to some mind-boggling theories on morals and law. Which, you really can't be a philosopher if you don't boggle some minds along the way, right?

Sunday, March 14, 2010

Aquinas' Five Ways

So in my class we're currently reading about philosophy and religion, mainly how different philosopher's in the past have attempted to prove God's existance. One I have found most compelling and fascinating is the work of Thomas Aquinas. He was a theoligist in the 13th century who found many break-throughs in the world of philosophy and theology.

In his huge handbook entitled Summa Theologiae he presented his 5 reasons that God must exist. His argument is a posteriori which means he relies a lot on the senses. This tends to create a very strong argument that many people can relate to, and therefore, believe in. 

A couple of his 'ways' talk about cause and effect. If there is an effect, there must be a cause. Or at least that's how the human mind understands things to happen.  Aquinas places God as this ultimate source of cause. In another 'way', he says that God must be the perfection of qualities that all humans have in common, like beauty and truth. In yet another he argues that if all things are contigent (dependent), then not-existing is a possibility. Yet we do exist, so there must be some necessary source of existance (God).

In his most famous argument, he talks about design. We understand everything to have a designer, so the universe must as well. It's silly to think it doesn't...right? Because most things are goal-directed beings, there must be some intelligent designer of it all. Evolution could explain most of it, but that theory was not around in Aquinas' day.

It's extremely hard to understand his view without actually reading his literature, so I'll leave that part alone for now. What I'd like to explain next is it's affect on me personally.

I've always been on the edge with regards to religion. I'm so grounded in science and logic, that just having faith in something without proof is a step I haven't been able to take. And while Aquinas by no means converted me to believe in the traditional God, he gaves me some ideas. Maybe there's an ultimate state of truth, beauty, justice, goodness, etc in the universe. Not a being, but just a state. It's something to strive for and respect. Of course in my opinion religion should be a personal thing, so take my views with a grain of salt.

Basically what I'm getting at though is Aquinas' argument is really strong and would be a great use to those wanting to prove God's existence without the use of pure faith. Although it's doubtful if a God-type being will ever be proven to 100% certainty.

Tuesday, March 2, 2010

Check these books out!

Okay, so before I get started into the really good stuff, I thought I'd share with you these books. They are where I get most of my information, and are just generally very interesting reads.

Fundamentals of Philosophy by David Steward, H. Gene Blocker, and James Petrik. This is the text book we use in my class. I really enjoy the writing style and how the authors use a lot of examples. Placing philisophical ideas into real world context makes understanding the theories so much easier.

The Philosophy Gym - Stephen Law. It's '25 Short Adventures in Thinking'. This is phenomenal! The author discusses everything from God to aliens. Even if you don't think you like philosophy, I bet you will enjoy this book.