Words, Concepts, Reality: Aristotelian Logic for Teenagers

Words, Concepts, Reality: Aristotelian Logic for Teenagers

Words, Concepts, Reality: Aristotelian Logic for Teenagers

By Thaddeus Kozinski, Ph.D.

When we hear the word logic, we tend to think of arguments, premises and conclusions, claims and evidence for claims. But this is only half of it. Arguments are made of words, and words are symbols or signs of concepts, the building blocks of human thought. The study of the concept, the most fundamental aspect of logic, was once an essential part of liberal education, and to aid in its recovery is the goal of this book. This is a must-have for any introductory logic course.

Paperback $14.95 | Kindle $9.99

TESTIMONIALS

“There are two kinds of logic:  mathematical logic, for computers, to deal with abstractions, and ordinary language logic, for human beings, to deal with things in the real world.  Neglect of the second kind of logic is one of the main reasons why students today can’t read or think as well as previous generations.  This logic text is a fine beginning to reverse that decline.  It’s also an excellent introduction to common-sense philosophy.” — Dr. Peter Kreeft, professor of philosophy at Boston College and The King’s College, and author of Socratic Logic: A Logic Text using Socratic Method, Platonic Questions, and Aristotelian Principles, Edition 3.1

“In an age in which truth has lost its natural and compelling self-evidence, we have to go back to the “first things” in our programs of education.  Thaddeus Kozinski helps meet this need with the present book, which offers something much rarer than it ought to be: a logic textbook designed for young minds, and indeed one that understands that the purpose of logic is not just to make formally valid arguments, but to articulate what is.  Highly recommended!” — Dr. David C. Schindler, Professor of Metaphysics and Anthropology, Pontifical John Paul II Institute

“While aimed at teenagers, this introduction to Aristotelian logic as it concerns the grasp and formation of concepts will be of benefit to many others, whether already learned in Aristotle or not. Its straightforward and uncomplicated presentation gives ready insight into a form of logic that, despite or perhaps because of its lack of modern ‘algebraisized’ sophistication, is more immediately intuitive and useful. Its direct, simple, and assertoric style of presentation, its clever use of examples from elementary grammar, its avoidance of philosophical polemic, as well as its use of dialog boxes, simple questions and exercises, make it eminently suited to its purpose. The mastery of the elements of Aristotelian logic is of great value in and of itself independently of its relation to other and more modern ways of teaching logic, especially as these other ways do little to promote appreciation of and mastery in the art of concept formation. This book will do much to make up for such deficiency, and at an age when direct, assertoric presentation, without distraction into controversy and alternatives, is both more suitable and more useful.” — Dr. Peter Simpson, Professor of Philosophy and Classics at the City University of New York Graduate Center

“In a comment crazed culture that forms instantaneous judgements and opinions based on slogans, memes, headlines, sound bites, and emotion, the paucity of our society’s logical skill has never been more evident. The need for a solid education in how to reason well has become all the more urgent, and Kozinski’s book starts right where it needs to: the very foundation of logical thought. Words, Concepts, Reality is an accessible and timely work for assisting young minds, and older minds that are still young in ability, become well-ordered and efficient in fulfilling their purpose: truth.” — Matt D’Antuono, physics teacher and author of A Fool’s Errand: A Brief, Informal Introduction to Philosophy for Young Catholics and other works

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dr. Thaddeus Kozinski taught philosophy and humanities for ten years at Wyoming Catholic College, where he also served as Academic Dean. He is an advocate of Catholic liberal education and the Socratic method of teaching, and has authored a number of articles and books, including The Political Problem of Religious Pluralism: And Why Philosophers Cannot Solve It and Modernity as Apocalypse: Sacred Nihilism and the Counterfeits of Logos. He developed and taught a course on Reason in the Theology of St. Thomas at Holy Apostles College & Seminary in Cromwell, CT. At present, he teaches philosophy for Memoria College and John Adams Academy. He is the author of Modernity as Apocalypse: Sacred Nihilism and the Counterfeits of Logos (Angelico Press) and Words, Concepts, Reality: Aristotelian Logic for Teenagers (En Route).

 

 

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The Right Way to Live: Plato’s Republic for Catholic Students by Richard Geraghty

The Right Way to Live: Plato’s Republic for Catholic Students by Richard Geraghty

The Right Way to Live: Plato’s Republic for Catholic Students

by Richard Geraghty

Plato’s philosophical dialogues provide a solid understanding of Catholic moral principles. Geraghty shows within these pages how the truths of the old sage are both delightfully and challengingly perennial.

Paperback: $19.95 | Kindle: $9.99

TESTIMONIALS

“Does it matter if a virtue is a means or an end? Geraghty masterfully shows how Plato’s Republic framed the answer to that question two and a half millennia ago in a way that still makes sense for us in today’s modern world.” – Dr. Sebastian Mahfood, OP, co-author with Ronda Chervin of Catholic Realism: A Framework for the Refutation of Atheism and the Evangelization of Atheists

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

As a professor of philosophy for many decades, Richard Geraghty has been rated the most popular of teachers because of his gift not only for simplifying difficult concepts, but also for expounding them with brilliance and humor.

Until his death in 2017, Richard served as a professor of philosophy at St. Joseph’s House of Studies, the college-level facility of the Franciscan Missionaries of the Eternal Word at EWTN.

Over the course of his career, Richard taught philosophy at the University of Dayton, Providence College, St. John’s College Seminary, and Holy Apostles College & Seminary.

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Soulful Organizational Leadership by Arthur William McVey

Soulful Organizational Leadership by Arthur William McVey

Soulful Organizational Leadership

by Arthur William McVey

In the “Postmodern” organizational era, the concept of soul, spirituality, rationality, telos, virtue, happiness, and meaning is becoming increasingly a mainstream component in scientific psychology. This situation presents a promising challenge for a Thomistic, organizational faculty-behavioral-psychology. As contemporary organizations emerge into hierarchical-heterarchical structures, it is argued that a return to a premodern Aristotelian-Thomistic, faculty-behavioral-psychology is the most appropriate organizational psychology for the digital-disruptive culture in quest of an executive-exemplar realist leadership. In responding to this cultural situation, we will develop a psychology of soulful organizational leadership grounded on a Thomistic, organizational faculty-behavioral-psychology.

Paperback: $29.99 | Kindle: $9.99

TESTIMONIALS

“Similar to all Western organizations today, all the institutions within the Catholic Church are suffering from a leadership deficit. Most often, like their secular counterparts, when confronted by the problem of leadership training within the organizational Church, Church leaders get their philosophy and psychology of organizational leadership from secular “philosophers” and “psychologists” whose understanding of the human person is one that denies the reality of the human soul and is, therefore, soul-less. Hence, when attempts are made to apply them to reality, these principles tend to generate anarchy. As an alternative to this, Catholic philosopher Bill McVey provides readers with
 
  • an in-depth understanding of Thomistic faculty psychology of the human soul, in which human habits and intellectual and moral virtues (principles of leadership excellence) are situated and develop, and
  • the means of concrete leadership examples and case studies, and how to apply these within the context of for-profit and non-profit organizations.

Thomistic organizational psychology is an organizational metaphysics that explains Thomistic metaphysics, moral psychology, and faculty psychology in a way that not only fills in the gaps in the teachings of contemporary great organizational, seminal scholars like Chester Bernard, W. Edwards Deming and Peter Drucker, but transcends them!” – Dr. Peter Redpath, author of The Moral Psychology of St. Thomas Aquinas and A Not-So-Elementary Christian Metaphysics, Vol. 1 and Vol. 2.

“McVey’s application of organizational metaphysics and behavioral psychology in such a practical manner has been a game changer for me in my rethinking my work in both educational technology leadership, a field in which I’ve developed many courses for the benefit of teacher preparation programs, and priestly and lay ministerial leadership, a field I’ve helped frame through my contributions to standards revision and assessment processes. If I can see these applications in my two fields, then I can surmise the absolute value McVey’s soulful organizational leadership may have on all fields.” – Dr. Sebastian Mahfood, OP, author of Among the Marvelous Things: The Media of Social Communications and the Next Generation of Pastoral Ministers

ABOUT THE AUTHOR 

Arthur William McVey graduated from St. Paul’s College, University of Ottawa, Canada, with a Bachelor of Scholastic Philosophy and Theology. He completed his MA in Religion and Culture, focusing particularly on the subject matter of social behavior, symbolic interactionism, and secular rituals, at the school of Religion and Culture at Wilfrid Lauier University in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. After graduation, McVey left Canada, and moved to the USA. After a major spiritual experience, he returned to Christ and became an Episcopal priest. Over time, he began a study of Charles Sanders Peirce that guided him back to a serious study of Thomas Aquinas. Eventually, he became more and more dedicated to Thomistic philosophy and theology, being especially motivated by the scholarship of Peter Redpath and deciding to do a Ph.D. in Aristotelian-Thomistic philosophical psychology at Abat Oliba University in Barcelona, Spain. McVey did his doctoral research and dissertation on organizational leadership and the nature of Aristotelian-Thomistic Behavioral Organizational Psychology. After he received his Ph.D., McVey answered the call to revert back to Rome, the Church of his birth.

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A Reader in Recent Catholic Philosophy, ed. by Dr. Alan Vincelette

A Reader in Recent Catholic Philosophy, ed. by Dr. Alan Vincelette

A Reader in Recent Catholic Philosophy: The Twentieth Century

Ed. by Alan Vincelette

This presentation of readings in Catholic philosophy in the twentieth-century reveals a remarkable diversity of views. Dr. Vincelette presents this diversity in the selection of resources that serve as a companion to his Recent Catholic Philosophy: The Twentieth Century. This is Catholic thought expressed in its finest way, raw and unsaturated, across the intellectual fabric of forty-nine important philosophers whose thought has shaped our current century.

Paperback: $29.99 | Kindle: $9.99

1. Romanticism, Fideism, Integralism, and Voluntarism

Chateaubriand
Bautain
Newman
Blondel

2. Phenomenology

Scheler
Von Hildebrand
Stein
Henry
Spaemann
Dussel
Chrétien
Falque

3. Neo-Thomism

Garrigou-Lagrange
Gilson
Maritain
Pieper
Wojtyła
Haldane

4. Transcendental Thomism

Rousselot
Maréchal
De Lubac
Lonergan

5. Existentialism

Lavelle
Marcel
Ulrich

6. Analytical Philosophy

Duhem
Geach
Anscombe
Dummett
MacIntyre
Taylor
Van Fraassen

7. Postmodernism

De Certeau
Caputo
Marion
Lacoste
Kearney

INTERVIEWS

REVIEW

Recent Catholic Philosophy:

The Twentieth Century
by Alan Vincelette
En Route Books & Media
 
What a wonderful resource this turned out to be, along with Dr. Vincelette’s accompanying work A Reader in Recent Catholic Philosophy. For the purposes of this review I will look at some of my own personal favourite recent Catholic philosophers.
 
To begin with, Dr. Dietrich Von Hildebrand. Humanly speaking, I owe him so much. I read his books in the eighties and it made so much sense, especially with regard to the current crisis in the Church. Some might accuse him of an undue pessimism. I think he was right in his analysis. He is surely one of the great defenders of the Catholic Faith in our age. His book Ethics is an attack on moral relativism. Dr. Vincelette notes that the phenomenology adopted by Von Hildebrand is a suitable means to demonstrate the error of relativism, as phenomenology rejects any explanation which fails to do justice to our experiences. We are not limited by the senses as we can also reflect on mental experience. To claim that only what is physically experienced by the senses, as Hume and the Positivists do, is to limit what we mean by experience.
 
For Von Hildebrand, something has value independent of our need for pleasure. To delight in a value is a sort of added extra. A value has intrinsic goodness. It calls us to transcend self-centeredness. Our response to value means being called to reverently submit to something greater than ourselves. We are obliged to give it an adequate response, to do good and avoid evil. Thus morality comes to a fundamental choice which is above the subjectively satisfying. Von Hildebrand is thus a moral realist.
 
I had the privilege of listening to Peter Geach a few years before he died. When I asked him a question after his talk, he responded by quoting from Dr. Faustus! He was one of the earliest Catholic analytical philosophers. He challenged the views of many of his predecessors, including Bertrand Russell. It was Geach who invented the problem of the “stuck potholer.” Is it wrong to intentionally kill a rotund individual blocking the entrance to a cave in order to save other lives? Yes, it is. Geach also wrote a philosophical explanation of why God does not change in himself when he hears our prayers and acts accordingly.
 
Geach was married to Elizabeth Anscombe, one of the most outstanding philosophers of the twentieth century. I attended some of her lectures in the eighties, when she was suitably attired in a manly suit. She was a student of Wittgenstein and his literary executer. She was a courageous defender of the unborn. Her great work Modern Moral Philosophy helped to launch contemporary virtue ethics. Dr. Vincelette notes that the work is often misunderstood by those who claim it rejects natural law theory. Actually, she argues that if you reject the existence of God, you should also give up on concepts like moral obligation. The main problem with modern moral philosophy, according to Anscombe, is in its embrace of a utilitarian point of view that rejects the principle of intrinsically evil acts.
 
Etienne Gilson was an outstanding historian of philosophy in the Thomist tradition, although he did not consider himself a Neo-Thomist. He was critical of the subjectivism of Descartes. If we proceed from thought to the world, we are unable to avoid being trapped in our own minds. We must begin with being. There is no need to make the existence of the world a postulate that needs to be proven. The realist  knows.
 
Like Anscombe, Alasdair MacIntyre is highly critical of modern moral philosophy as it has focused on utility. Morality must return to the Aristotelian idea of virtue. True virtue requires acting for the sake of a genuine human end. Such a virtue-based ethic requires being situated in a social setting and in a narrative tradition.
Dr. Vincelette has given us a splendid overview of some of the great recent Catholic philosophers. A work to return to again and again.
 
– Pravin Thevathasan, Editor, Catholic Medical Quarterly

ABOUT THE AUTHOR 

Dr. Alan Vincelette is the Wilfred L. and Mary Jane Von der Ahe Chair of Philosophy at St. John’s Seminary in Camarillo, California. In addition, he serves as an Adjunct Professor of Philosophy at Holy Apostles College and Seminary in Cromwell, Connecticut.

Dr. Vincelette specializes in ethics and the philosophy of love as well as the history of Catholic philosophy, having written on such topics for the New Catholic Encyclopedia, the Continuum Encyclopedia of British Philosophy, and the Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of Philosophers, among other works, and he continues to teach in these areas for seminarians and laity of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, the Diocese of Norwich, and nearby dioceses.

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Recent Catholic Philosophy: The Twentieth Century

Recent Catholic Philosophy: The Twentieth Century

Recent Catholic Philosophy: The Twentieth Century

by Alan Vincelette

This presentation of Catholic philosophy in the twentieth-century reveals a remarkable diversity of views. Dr. Vincelette presents this diversity in an expository manner without applying the kind of interpretive framework that is often used in critical commentaries to shape the reader’s judgment inside of a particular paradigm. This is Catholic thought expressed in its finest way, raw and unsaturated, across the intellectual fabric of forty-two important philosophers whose thought has shaped our current century.

Paperback: $39.95 | Kindle: $9.99

Chapter 1: Phenomenology

Max Scheler (1874-1928)
Dietrich Von Hildebrand (1889-1977)
Edith Stein (1891-1942)
Henry Duméry (1920-2012)
Michel Henry (1922-2002)
Enrique Dussel (1934- )
Emmanuel Falque (1963- )

Chapter 2: Neo-Thomism

Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange (1877-1964)
Étienne Gilson (1884-1978)
Jacques Maritain (1882-1973)
Karol Wojtyła [John Paul II] (1920-2005)
John Haldane (1954- )

3. Transcendental Thomism

Pierre Rousselot (1878-1915)
Joseph Maréchal (1878-1944)
Henri De Lubac (1896-1991)
Karl Rahner (1904-1984)
Bernard Lonergan (1904-1984)

4. Personalism

Ferdinand Ebner (1882-1931)
Emmanuel Mounier (1905-1950)
Maurice-Gustave Nédoncelle (1905-1976)
Robert Spaemann (1927-2018)
John Crosby (1944- )

5. Existentialism

Louis Lavelle (1883-1951)
Gabriel Marcel (1889-1973)
Xavier Zubiri y Apalátegui (1898-1983)
Leonardo Polo (1926-2013)
Ferdinand Ulrich (1931- )

6. Analytical Philosophy

Peter Geach (1916-2013)
Gertrude Elizabeth Margaret Anscombe (1919-2001)
Michael Dummett (1925-2011)
Nicholas Rescher (1928- )
Alasdair MacIntyre (1929- )
Charles Margrave Taylor (1931- )
Francis Jacques (1934- )
Bas Van Fraassen (1941- )

7. Postmodernism

Michel De Certeau (1925-1986)
John Caputo (1940- )
Jean-Luc Marion (1946- )
Jean-Yves Lacoste (1953- )
William Desmond (1951- )
Richard Kearney (1954- )
Claude Romano (1967- )

INTERVIEWS

REVIEW

Recent Catholic Philosophy:

The Twentieth Century
by Alan Vincelette
En Route Books & Media
 
What a wonderful resource this turned out to be, along with Dr. Vincelette’s accompanying work A Reader in Recent Catholic Philosophy. For the purposes of this review I will look at some of my own personal favourite recent Catholic philosophers.
 
To begin with, Dr. Dietrich Von Hildebrand. Humanly speaking, I owe him so much. I read his books in the eighties and it made so much sense, especially with regard to the current crisis in the Church. Some might accuse him of an undue pessimism. I think he was right in his analysis. He is surely one of the great defenders of the Catholic Faith in our age. His book Ethics is an attack on moral relativism. Dr. Vincelette notes that the phenomenology adopted by Von Hildebrand is a suitable means to demonstrate the error of relativism, as phenomenology rejects any explanation which fails to do justice to our experiences. We are not limited by the senses as we can also reflect on mental experience. To claim that only what is physically experienced by the senses, as Hume and the Positivists do, is to limit what we mean by experience.
 
For Von Hildebrand, something has value independent of our need for pleasure. To delight in a value is a sort of added extra. A value has intrinsic goodness. It calls us to transcend self-centeredness. Our response to value means being called to reverently submit to something greater than ourselves. We are obliged to give it an adequate response, to do good and avoid evil. Thus morality comes to a fundamental choice which is above the subjectively satisfying. Von Hildebrand is thus a moral realist.
 
I had the privilege of listening to Peter Geach a few years before he died. When I asked him a question after his talk, he responded by quoting from Dr. Faustus! He was one of the earliest Catholic analytical philosophers. He challenged the views of many of his predecessors, including Bertrand Russell. It was Geach who invented the problem of the “stuck potholer.” Is it wrong to intentionally kill a rotund individual blocking the entrance to a cave in order to save other lives? Yes, it is. Geach also wrote a philosophical explanation of why God does not change in himself when he hears our prayers and acts accordingly.
 
Geach was married to Elizabeth Anscombe, one of the most outstanding philosophers of the twentieth century. I attended some of her lectures in the eighties, when she was suitably attired in a manly suit. She was a student of Wittgenstein and his literary executer. She was a courageous defender of the unborn. Her great work Modern Moral Philosophy helped to launch contemporary virtue ethics. Dr. Vincelette notes that the work is often misunderstood by those who claim it rejects natural law theory. Actually, she argues that if you reject the existence of God, you should also give up on concepts like moral obligation. The main problem with modern moral philosophy, according to Anscombe, is in its embrace of a utilitarian point of view that rejects the principle of intrinsically evil acts.
 
Etienne Gilson was an outstanding historian of philosophy in the Thomist tradition, although he did not consider himself a Neo-Thomist. He was critical of the subjectivism of Descartes. If we proceed from thought to the world, we are unable to avoid being trapped in our own minds. We must begin with being. There is no need to make the existence of the world a postulate that needs to be proven. The realist  knows.
 
Like Anscombe, Alasdair MacIntyre is highly critical of modern moral philosophy as it has focused on utility. Morality must return to the Aristotelian idea of virtue. True virtue requires acting for the sake of a genuine human end. Such a virtue-based ethic requires being situated in a social setting and in a narrative tradition.
Dr. Vincelette has given us a splendid overview of some of the great recent Catholic philosophers. A work to return to again and again.
 
– Pravin Thevathasan, Editor, Catholic Medical Quarterly

ABOUT THE AUTHOR 

Dr. Alan Vincelette is the Wilfred L. and Mary Jane Von der Ahe Chair of Philosophy at St. John’s Seminary in Camarillo, California. In addition, he serves as an Adjunct Professor of Philosophy at Holy Apostles College and Seminary in Cromwell, Connecticut.

Dr. Vincelette specializes in ethics and the philosophy of love as well as the history of Catholic philosophy, having written on such topics for the New Catholic Encyclopedia, the Continuum Encyclopedia of British Philosophy, and the Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of Philosophers, among other works, and he continues to teach in these areas for seminarians and laity of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, the Diocese of Norwich, and nearby dioceses.

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The Destructive Doctrines of our Age by Gerard M. Verschuuren

The Destructive Doctrines of our Age by Gerard M. Verschuuren

The Destructive Doctrines of Our Age

by Gerard M. Verschuuren

There are many doctrines around that try to change and mold our minds—doctrines such as relativism and secularism, to name just a couple, but this book discusses 13 more. These doctrines are rather dictatorial and don’t allow for any other views than their own. Doctrines portray to be very reliable and solid, but in fact they turn out to be floating and fleeting opinions that have no foot to stand on. They are shaky ideologies disguised as solid doctrines. It’s their disguise that lures you in. Let this book open your eyes.

Paperback: $18.99 | Kindle: $9.99

TESTIMONIALS

“A compelling critique of false ideas that disturb our minds even when we don’t even know they are infiltrating them! In 50 years of teaching why the errors refuted in this book are false, I have never come upon a more concise explanation than Verschuuren’s.” – Ronda Chervin, Professor Emerita, Holy Apostles College & Seminary, Cromwell, CT

“Phenomenal engagement of the most relevant issues of our day! A must-read for our students and graduates!” – Dr Sebastian Mahfood, OP, Trustee of Aquinas Institute of Theology, St Louis, MO

ABOUT THE AUTHOR 

Gerard M. Verschuuren is a human geneticist who also earned a doctorate in the philosophy of science. He studied and worked at universities in Europe and the United States. Currently semi-retired, he spends most of his time as a writer, speaker, and consultant on the interface of science and religion, faith and reason.

Currently, while semi-retired, he writes about issues at the interface of

  • science and religion,
  • science and creation,
  • faith and reason.

All his books can be found at: www.where-do-we-come-from.com

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