Forthcoming Papers

"Divisions of Epistemic Labor: Some Remarks on the History of Fideism and Esotericism" Proceedings of the British Academy (forthcoming).

Who can know? Who can merely believe on faith? Who should be kept in the dark entirely? This essay considers various episodes from the history of philosophy -- Locke, Aquinas, Averroes, Maimonides, al-Ghazali -- where one or another such division of epistemic labor has been affirmed. Written for the 2011 Dawes-Hicks Colloquium at the British Academy.

"Philosophical Beauty".

Does philosophy make progress? If so, why bother studying its history? The answer I offer here is that we should study it because it is beautiful. Written for the 2011 PhilProgress symposium at Harvard.

"Mind and Hylomorphism," Oxford Handbook of Medieval Philosophy, ed. J. Marenbon (forthcoming).

An overview of medieval Aristotelian conceptions of soul as substantial form, paying particular attention to the metaphysical uses of substantial form, and the argument that the human soul is a certain kind of substantial form.

“The Latin Aristotle,” in C. Shields (ed.) The Oxford Handbook to Aristotle (forthcoming).

A summary of the fate of Aristotelianism in the hands of medieval Latin authors.

Work in Progress

Unpublished Translations

Siger of Brabant, Questions on De anima Book III

A complete translation, albeit rough and unchecked, including some suggested emendations to the text.

Francisco Suarez, On Quantity (excerpt from Disputationes Metaphysicae XL).

A translation, with facing Latin, of section 2 of Suarez's interesting account of the category of quantity, where he argues against the nominalist's (esp. Ockham's) reductive treatment of quantity, and sketches his own view.

Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on Aristotle's De memoria et reminiscentia

A rough translation of chapters two and three, based on the Leonine edition.

Peter John Olivi, Questions on the Sentences, Book II

These translations are revised versions of what appears in the appendix of my dissertation.

• Question 72: Can bodies act on the spirit and on its apprehensive powers?
• Question 74: Is the effective principle of a cognitive act a species, a habit, or the cognitive power?

Peter Auriol, Does an accident have an essence and reality that is bounded and complete? (IV Sent. d.12 q.1 a.1)

A dense but rewarding discussion of the ontological status of accidents.

 

Unpublished Texts and Notes

Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae 1a 75-89.

A revised text, with notes on variant readings.

Notes on some potential sources for Aquinas's De anima Commentary.
In effect, a brief survey of works on the soul published after Aristotle and before Aquinas.

Last revised September 1, 2011.