In Ordinatio I, 39 Scotus distinguishes two ways in which the distinction between sensus compostionis and sensus divisionis can be made: According to the first way the „composition and division“ relates to two different (sensus divisionis) or one and the same (sensus compositionis) instants of time; according to the other the distinction is made between an assertion of compossibility of the contradictory predicates in one and the same instant of time (sensus compositionis) and an assertion of actuality of the one and possibility of the other of the contradictory predicates in one and the very same instant of time (sensus divisionis). The author presents a formal logical analysis of all these various senses of modal propositions and shows how Scotus strictly separated modality from temporality, and contingency from mutability.

Saul Kripke denies that the reference of a proper name is mediated through a sense (an intension, a concept), and claims that it has to be immediate for „rigidity“ of a proper name to be saved. On the other hand, the version of the Identity Theory of predication according to which predication is characterised as intentional identification of the conceptual content of the predicate with the object represented by the subject-concept requires that there be a concept (sense of the term) at the places both of the subject and of the predicate. This paper is an attempt to propose a conception that purports to maintain the Identity Theory of predication with its demand for proper names to have senses and respond to Kripkean arguments while retaining the rigidity of proper names. Two main theses are defended: 1) Whether a term refers rigidly or non-rigidly does not depend on the nature of the term (i. e. whether it is a name or a description), but on the intention of the speaker/writer. Consequently, both names and descriptions can be used both rigidly and non-rigidly. 2) There is a „minimal sense“ to any proper name which can generaly be described as follows: „the person who has been given the name so-and-so“. The expression „has been given the name“ describes a „relation of reason“, which must be strictly distinguished from the relation of reference of the name, in order to avoid a vicious circle in reference determination, something against which Kripke warned.

The problem of the intuition of the individual as such, i. e. of its individuality (the „principle of individuation“) gave rise to many controversies. The problem becomes especially urgent in the light of the Christian revelation, since Christianity in the first place relates to the singular and individual (and therefore contingent), whereas the universal assumes only a secondary rôle. John Duns Scotus deals with this theologico-philosophical problem and sets out to defend intellective intuition of the individual as a whole. He distinguishes three kinds within this type of cognition: perfect intuitive intellective cognition which is possible only in patria, direct but imperfect (i. e. not penetrating the principle of individuation) intuitive intellective cognition which relates to contingent truths and spiritual acts, and, finally, imperfect and indirect intuitive intellective cognition, i. e. acts of recalling the past intuitive cognitions. In these three examples the fundamental Scotus’s arguments are exhibited and the extent to which Scotus transgresses the limits of Aristotelian epistemology is made clear.

The New Testament testifies the fact of divine inhabitation in the soul. This raises the question of what philosophical means may be employed in order to explicate such a theological supposition. Irenaeus and Basil the Great seem to suggest that God is present in the soul as a form in a matter. Thomas Aquinas speaks of God in-existing in us as an efficient cause of our existence and of the grace. In accordance with the modern Thomists we may understand the God’s sanctifying inhabitation as an exemplar-efficient causality (the “form” of Basil has to be interpreted in the sense of “exemplar”). This causality does not constitute any new substantial divine presence in the soul. Rather we may conclude that the “old” substantial presence of God as the cause of our existence becomes also cause of our spiritual transformation operated according the “exemplar” of God.

This article deals with Duns Scotus’s solution of the problem of individuation, as it is presented in his Questions on the Metaphysics of Aristotle and, in particular, in the Ordinatio. In the first part of the article, an exposition of the way Scotus understood this problem is given. In the second section, Scotus’s arguments against alternative theories of individuation are summed up. The third part of the paper focuses on the characteristics and ontological status of the entity identified as the principle of individuation by Scotus himself, the “individual difference”; it is argued here in favour of the traditional view that the individual difference is a formal principle. Finally, in the conclusion of the article, two important features of Scotus’s approach to the problem of individuation are emphasized: namely, his insistence on the intelligibility and on the ontological dignity of the individual.

The paper focuses on the positive aspects of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason with respect to the question of metaphysics. Metaphysical value of Kant’s first Critique is not exhausted in its negative, refuting function, based on the conviction that all human knowledge requires empirical intuition. Neither is this value identical with the transcendental theory of conditions of empirical knowledge. The critique, as a specific kind of philosophical investigation, has metaphysical purpose in the traditional scholarly-Wolffian meaning of the word, dealing with the triad freedom, God and immoratality of the soul. The Critique of Pure Reason not only prepares room for this kind of metaphysics by eliminating the claims of pure speculative knowledge, it also shows the direction for its elaboration, which takes the form of rational faith. In this specific epistemic attitude, both theoretical and practical function of reason is employed.

The author divides his reflections on the nature of philosophy or science into three parts. In the first part, he strives to determine the issues in question systematically. By dividing the concept of human activity he uncovers the features common to philosophy and science as well as the features by which these two disciplines are distinguished. The inspiration is found especially in Aristotle’s Metaphysics. In the second part, the same problem is dealt from the historical perspective. By way of a reconstruction of the origins of philosophy and science, the author shows the features by which these disciplines got mutually separated and secluded from the previous trends. In the third part, the author contrasts the presented approaches and highlights why it is reasonable to investigate the nature of philosophy and science from both, systematical and historical point of view.

Martin Le Maistre (1432–1482), also known as Martinus Magistri, was one of the nominalists at the university of Paris from the watershed between medieval and postmedieval scholasticism. This influential logician, moral philosopher and theologian wrote a repeatedly edited treatise on logical consequence Tractatus consequentiarum. The present paper focuses on this treatise where Le Maistre, influenced by late-medieval logicians, develops a theory of validity based upon postulating abstract compound entities as sentential meanings (complexe significabile).

The aim of the article is to compare and critically evaluate Kant’s, Aristotle’s, and von Hildebrand’s approach to the question of the moral accountability of emotions. Notoriously, Kant, in his practical philosophy, leaves hardly any place for the moral value of emotions. The only emotion that he acknowledges to possess a moral value is “Achtung für’s Gesetz”. According to Aristotle, emotions can be object of praise and blame in so far as they are formed by good or bad habits (moral virtues and vices). Von Hildebrand, not objecting to this approach of Aristotle, off ers a fi ne phenomenological analysis of how a “morally conscious” person modifi es emotions while experiencing them by either “sanctioning” or “disavowing” them. This analysis implies that emotions can be morally good or bad in still diff erent sense than the one considered by Aristotle.

According to compatibilism it is possible that an election or volition of A is truly free even if the elector cannot want – ceteris paribus – the opposite alternative (non-A). The version of compatibilism propounded in the paper is “rational” in so much as the admitted unidirectional determining factors of volition are not physical causes but rather rational reasons. We may posit this compatibilism only in case of volitions that we assess to be morally good (since moral obligation to decide diff erently implies real possibility of such diff erent volition, according to “Kantian” dictum). Particularly interesting – within the ethical sphere – is the case of moral commitment, because it constitutes a kind of necessity (obligation). Such a moral necessity (when appropriately cognized by a moral agent) may imply a certain necessity of a corresponding choice. The theory of rational compatibilism allows us to unite moral necessity and human freedom.

The so-called “Trinitarian paralogisms” are apparently legitimate instances of syllogistic inference-schemes with premises and conclusions containing expressions of the language of the Trinity doctrine, which fail to be truth- or acceptability-preserving. The logical problem of the Trinity splits into two levels of analysis. First, the technical aspects of Trinitarian paralogisms are analysed in terms of logical innovations in theories of “suppositio” and “distributio”. Second, the philosophical aspect of Trinitarian paralogisms translates into the question of formality as general applicability of logic. The sixteenth century tradition (represented by Trutfetter, Luther, and Vives) can be reconstructed as a reaction to the fourteenth century nominalist logical analysis. As opposed to post-medieval scholasticism developing the medieval approach, humanism and reformation criticise scholastic logic in terms of diff erent specifi c anthropological theories.

The teachings of Francisco Suárez tend to have the queer quality of being at once transparent and unintelligible. An example of this is his theory of relations. It is clear that, according to Suárez, a categorical relation is both really and modally identical to its foundation; on the other hand, however, the relative denomination does not apply to the foundation unless the terminus of the relation actually exists. One may ask, then: given that the foundation exists but the terminus does not, is the relation actually there, or not? Suárez does not seem to have a clear answer to this query.

This paper investigates what conditions are to be met for sensory perception to occur. It introduces two different theories of perception that were held by two medieval Franciscan thinkers — namely, Roger Bacon (1214/1220–1292) and Peter Olivi (ca. 1248–1298). Bacon analyses especially the causal relation between the object and the sensory organ in his doctrine of the multiplication of species. In his view, a necessary condition of perception is the reception of the species in a fully disposed sensory organ. On the contrary, Olivi stresses the active role of the sensory power. A necessary condition of sensation is the aspectus — i.e. the focus of our power’s attention on the object. Furthermore, the paper investigates whether and how each of the two thinkers can deal with the arguments proposed by his opponent — namely whether Bacon’s theory is able to explain attention and what the causal role of the object in Olivi’s theory is.

P. Sousedík and D. Svoboda, in their paper “Různá pojetí matematiky u vybraných autorů od antiky po raný novověk: Je matematika teoretická věda nebo pouhá technika?”, proposed an interpretation of Aquinas’s understanding of the nature of mathematics which the author regards as unsatisfactory. The purpose of this review article is to point out its problems and to suggest in its stead an adequate interpretation of Aquinas’s mind, on the basis of a detailed analysis of his texts. The author shows that Aquinas was by no means an instrumentalist in mathematics but considered mathematical truths to be directly applicable to “physical matter”. Such an application takes place in sciences like astronomy, harmonics or optics, which, although sometimes subsumed under mathematics broadly conceived, nevertheless form a special category qua the so-called “middle sciences” (viz. situated between mathematics and physics) and are thus no true species of mathematics. The fact that these sciences are also regarded as “arts” does not preclude their scientific character at all, since the two categories are not mutually exclusive, according to St. Thomas.

This paper is concerned with the idea of unity of mankind and the possibilities of its political expression, particularly with respect to the contribution of the Spanish scholastics Francisco de Vitoria and Francisco Suárez, who gave a crucial impetus to the development of the concept of ius gentium. Then it discusses how the issue was developed in the work of Hugo Grotius and how political expression of the unity of mankind was reflected on in modern scholasticism — in the work of Luigi Taparelli and Jacques Maritain. In the conclusion it briefl y evaluates the differences and the potential impact on the social doctrine of the Church and contemporary political thinking in the context of Christian social thought, particularly with regard to the concept of a ‘global political authority’.

In Baroque scholasticism the medieval semantic theory of connotation as a property of terms, originally elaborated by Ockham and others, received an ontological application or re-interpretation in the context of the theory of relations. The main proponent of this ontologized “doctrina de connotatis” seems to have been Suárez. Subsequently, this doctrine was severely criticised by the Jesuits Pedro Hurtado de Mendoza and Rodrigo de Arriaga, but also by the “princeps Scotistarum” Bartholomeo Mastri; whereas another Scotist, John Punch, adopted a theory of relations close to this doctrine. The fates of the original semantic theory of connotation, the ontologized “doctrina de connotatis” and the broader context of the relevant discussions (especially the new res–modus ontology established around 1600) document the complexity of the history of scholastic ideas, irreducible to any simple paradigm (like that of the realism–nominalism strife).