Being

In a debate with his elder siblings about the existence of Santa Claus, my grandson, then 5 years old, triumphantly ended the argument with just two words: “Everything exists!” Was he right? Ju... Read more

When you think of cosmos, do you think of it as something singular or something plural? Is it ‘one’ or ‘many’? Is it an ‘organism’ with many organelles? Or is it an ‘aggregation’ of m... Read more

Around 535 BC, a group of Greek settlers founded a colony on the west coast of Italy, just south of the modern city of Napoli (Naples). The settlement eventually became known as Elea. Read more

Either a ‘thing’ (res), an ‘actual entity’ (per Whitehead), is – or it is not. Take ‘A’, for example. ‘A’ is a thing (or event). It either exists or it does not. Read more

In 2012, renowned physicist and cosmologist, Lawrence Krauss, published A Universe from Nothing. The purpose of the book was to debunk the idea that some sort of transcendent entity (e.g. Read more

These are the final 4 words of the Lord’s Prayer (Mt. Read more

Being Good Beauty            Truth             Justice Love Presence Every important branch of philosophy focuses on one or more of these seven words and/or on the relations... Read more

The British philosopher and mathematician, Alfred North Whitehead, is generally considered the ‘father of process philosophy’. Read more

A 5 year old grandson of mine explained the difference between immortality and eternity in a way that would have made Augustine of Hippo cry. Read more

Jean-Paul Sartre, existentialist philosopher, prolific from 1938 to 1980, is not often linked with Leo XIII, Pope of the Roman Catholic Church from 1878 to 1903. Read more

“Love is patient, love is kind…It does not seek its own interests... It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. Read more

“Anamnesis”; it’s a mouthful…but a very important mouthful. Read more

(This essay is dedicated to Ralph Pred, mentor and friend, who taught me almost everything I know and who would probably disagree with almost everything in this essay. Thank you, Ralph. Read more

In approximately 60 BC, the Roman poet Lucretius wrote On the Nature of Things (De Rerum Natura). In the tradition of Parmenides' On Nature, Lucretius’ poem is an ontological epic. Read more

Reading Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount is a bit like going down a rabbit hole or passing through the looking glass. Nothing is as it should be; everything is turned around or upside down. Read more

For most of us, our first encounter with “morality” comes through our parents (or parent figures). Read more

Deuteronomy, the last book of the Torah, the 5th book of the Bible, consists of 34 Chapters containing on average about 35 verses each. We will focus on just one of those verses (Deut. Read more

The world consists entirely of events. Events have elements but not parts: they are indivisible because they are self-reflective and recursive. Read more

You’re familiar with the Problem of Evil. It is an argument often advanced against the existence of God. Read more

Have you ever been in a fun house? If so, you probably visited the Hall of Mirrors. You enter and all around you are mirrors. Read more

What You See Is What You Get! Or is it? Albert Einstein famously said that the fundamental question of philosophy is whether the universe is on the whole a benevolent place. Read more

In his own words…and in mine! When several predicates are attributed to a single subject and this subject is attributed to no other, it is called an individual substance (monad). Read more

The Judeo-Christian tradition includes upwards of 80 books of scripture (depending on whose cannon you’re following), but I think a strong case can be made that the core theological insight, the in... Read more

"In the middle of the journey of our life I came to myself within a dark wood where the straight way was lost. Ah, how hard a thing it is to tell of that wood, savage and harsh and dense... Read more

Philosophy has traditionally distinguished between the essence of things and the existence of things. Read more

In Roman Catholic liturgy, the Eucharistic Prayer, the central event of the Mass that incorporates the Transubstantiation of bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ (“this is my body…this... Read more

“What alone can our teaching be? – That no one gives a human being his qualities: not God, not society, not his parents or ancestors, not he himself…” “The fatality of his nature cannot b... Read more

The world we live in seems to consist of discrete entities, i.e. objects and events with size, shape and/or duration (in other words, extension) in what we call space and time. Read more

What is real…and what isn’t? It seems at times that this question defines the entire project of our lives. As very young children, we accept everything as real. Read more

What is the most important single work in Western philosophical tradition? Is it Plato’s Timaeus? John’s Gospel? Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason? Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations? ... Read more

“Vanity of vanities. All things are vanity. Read more

What is a ‘thing’? According to the Nicene Creed, God is the creator of “all things, visible and invisible” and according to the Gospel of John, it is through the Logos (Christ) that “all... Read more

It’s 1920. The glow of the Russian Revolution is everywhere and dialectical materialism is the philosophy de jour. Every aspect of life in Russian society is undergoing radical transformation. Read more

If you want to understand what’s special about the Christian world view, travel to London and visit St. Paul’s Cathedral. Read more

“I love you,” perhaps the most famous phrase in all of human speech. But what does it mean? I love many things: my wife and children, a fine bottle of wine, foie gras, London, to name a very few. Read more

I, you, he/she/it, the three persons of verbal conjugation, a staple of nearly every grammar class, be it modern (English), classical (Latin) or exotic (Klingon). Read more