Reading: Introduction to Ontology

A philosophy of Being or Ontology

This week we are going to ponder the philosophical issue of, “What does it mean to
exist?” What makes a thing a thing? In the beginning, the bible tells us that God brought all
the animals to Adam to “see what he would name them.” Have you ever stopped to ponder
what it means to have genesis 2 in the Bible? Read this passage again and ask yourself what
that means to us.
And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help
18

meet for him.

And out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air;
19

and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called
every living creature, that was the name thereof.
And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field;
20

but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him.

Mankind sees a thing, and it is in our very nature as the image of God to want to give it a
name. It was not that God had made the lion and thought himself, “This is a fine lion.” No,
according to God’s Word, God made a great animal and brought it to Adam to see what he
would name it. And that name was great as far as God was concerned.
So throughout human history, mankind has been a race of name givers. In the English
language we call these names of things “nouns.” The definition I learned as a young boy in
school still remains as a solid definition of noun. “It is a word (other than a pronoun) used to
identify any of a class of people, places, or things.” The issue before us this week then, is, what
constitutes a thing which needs a name? What does it require for a thing to be a thing? That
study is called ontology.

Reading: A Reading from a philosophy textbook

The following is from Philosophy: The Power of Ideas, Moore & Bruder, 2011,

The Nature of Being

When a philosopher asks, What is the nature of being? He or she may have in mind any
number of things, including one or more of the following:

• Is being a property of things, or is it some kind of thing itself? Or is there some third
alternative?

• Is being basically one, or are there many beings?

• Is being fixed and changeless, or is it constantly changing? What is the relationship

between being and becoming?
 • Does everything have the same kind of being?

• What are the fundamental categories into which all existing things may be divided?

• What are the fundamental features of reality?

• Is there a fundamental substance out of which all else is composed? If so, does it
have any properties? Must it have properties?

• What is the world like in itself, independent of our perception of it?

• What manner of existence do particular things have, as distinct from properties,

relations, and classes? What manner of existence do events have? What manner
do numbers,minds,matter, space, and time have? What manner do facts have?

• That a particular thing has a certain characteristic—is that a fact about the thing? Or is
it a fact about the characteristic?

Several narrower questions may also properly be regarded as questions of metaphysics, such
as:
Does God exist?
Is what happens determined?
Is there life after death?
Must events occur in space and time?

Some of these questions are none too clear, but they provide signposts for the directions a
person might take in coming to answer the question, What is the nature of being? or in
studying metaphysics. Because the possibilities are so numerous, we will have to make some
choices about what topics to cover in The Nature of Being.
Moore and Bruder, p 21.

In Aristotle’s opinion, to be is to be a particular thing. And each thing, Aristotle maintained, is a

combination of matter and form. A statue, for example, is a chunk of marble with a certain form.
It is the same with other things too. There is some stuff out of which each thing is made, and
there is the particular form this bit of stuff takes. Without the stuff, the thing would not exist,
because you cannot have a thing made out of nothing. Likewise, without form, the thing would
not exist. Without form, the stuff would not be some particular kind of thing; it would just be
stuff. The form determines what the thing is; it is the essential nature of the thing.
For example, the marble of the statue is the same marble as it was when it was cut into a block
at the quarry. But now it has a new form, and that form is what distinguishes the marble now
from the marble in the block in the quarry. Yes, the marble has always had some form or other,
but its transformation to this particular form is what makes it a statue. Thus, the form is what
determines what a thing is, and for this reason Aristotle equated a thing’s form with its
essence.
According to Aristotle, you need both form and matter to have a thing, and, with the exception
of god (discussed later), neither form nor matter is ever found in isolation from the other.
Things do change, of course: they become something new. Thus, another basic question is,
What produces a change? In Aristotle’s opinion each change must be directed toward some
end, so just four basic questions can be asked of anything:
1. What is the thing? In other words, what is its form? Aristotle called this the formal
cause of the thing. We do not use the word cause that way, but Aristotle did, and we just have
to accept that.
2. What is it made of? Aristotle called this the material cause.
3. What made it? This Aristotle called the efficient cause, and this is what today we
often mean by “cause.”
4. What purpose does it serve? That is, for what end was it made? This Aristotle called
the final cause.
Consider again a statue, Michelangelo’s David, for example. What it is, (1), is a statue. What it
is made of, (2), is marble. What made it, (3), is Michelangelo (or Michelangelo’s chisel on the
marble). And (4), it was made for the purpose of creating a beautiful object. Of course, natural
objects were not made by humans for their purposes, but they still do have “ends.” The end of
an acorn, for instance, is to be a tree.
But consider the acorn example more closely. The acorn is not actually a tree, only potentially
so, correct? Change can therefore be viewed, according to Aristotle, as movement from
potentiality to actuality. Because actuality is the source of change, pure actuality is the ultimate
source of change. Pure actuality is the unchanged changer or unmoved mover or, in short,
god. It should be noted that the pure actuality that Aristotle equated with god is not God, the
personal deity of the Jewish or Christian religions.
It sometimes is difficult to perceive the ancient Greek metaphysicians as all being concerned
with the same thing. But Aristotle explained that his predecessors were all concerned with
causation. Thales, for example, was concerned with the stuff from which all is made: the
material cause of things. Empedocles and Anaxagoras were concerned with why there is
change, with efficient causation. In his Theory of Forms, Plato considered formal causation. It
remained for Aristotle himself, Aristotle thought, to present an adequate explanation of final
causation. So Aristotle gave us a handy way of integrating (and remembering) ancient Greek
metaphysics.
Aristotle delineated the different kinds of imperfect, changing beings in terms of possibility and
actuality. At one extreme is matter, which consists only of possibility. Matter, as we saw, is that
which must be moved because it cannot move or form itself.
At the other extreme is god as pure actuality, which can only move things without god being
moved or changed in any way. God is the unmoved mover. Any movement on god’s part would
imply imperfection and is therefore impossible.
Nature (physis) and all the things of the universe exist between these two poles. Things move
and are moved as a process of actualizing some of their potentialities.
There is a penchant in each being to take on ever-higher forms of being in an effort to
approach the unmoving perfection of god. It is things’ love of and longing for perfection or god
that moves the universe. God remains the unmoved mover.
Aristotle maintained that the stars, having the most perfect of all shapes, were beings with
superhuman intelligence. Being much closer to god in the hierarchy of beings, they are
incarnated gods unto themselves. Because their actions are much more rational and
purposeful than those of the lower order beings on the earth, stars exercise a benevolent
influence on earthly matters. Today many people read their astrology charts in the newspaper
every day, and some political leaders even organize their programs around them. In this
regard, Aristotle has not been the only one seeing stars.
To Aristotle, the earth is a mortal sphere. Things on it come to be and then cease to be. Earthly
things are in a constant, unsettled state of becoming. As a consequence, earthly things and
earthly matters long for the fixity and quietude that perfection allows. And although they strive
mightily to become as perfect and godlike as possible, they never exhaust their own
potentiality. Since god alone is pure act and perfect actualization, changes in the natural world
go on without ceasing.
Moore and Bruder, p 64-66.

Reading: The Ontology of George Berkeley

We arrive now at a consideration of ontology from the point of view of a Christian named
George Berkeley. Mr. Berkeley lived from 1685 to 1753. He attempted to give a careful
explanation of the way we know about a thing. In what follows, I have excerpted a variety of
paragraphs from his works and from what others have said about him.

Hence, human knowledge is reduced to two elements: that of spirits and of ideas
(Principles #86). In contrast to ideas, a spirit cannot be perceived. A person's spirit, which
perceives ideas, is to be comprehended intuitively by inward feeling or reflection
(Principles #89). For Berkeley, we have no direct 'idea' of spirits, albeit we have good reason to
believe in the existence of other spirits, for their existence explains the purposeful regularities
we find in experience. ("It is plain that we cannot know the existence of other spirits otherwise
than by their operations, or the ideas by them excited in us", Dialogues #145). This is the
solution that Berkeley offers to the problem of other minds. Finally, the order and
purposefulness of the whole of our experience of the world and especially of nature
overwhelms us into believing in the existence of an extremely powerful and intelligent spirit that
causes that order. According to Berkeley, reflection on the attributes of that external spirit leads
us to identify it with God. Thus a material thing such as an apple consists of a collection of
ideas (shape, color, taste, physical properties, etc.) which are caused in the spirits of humans
by the spirit of God.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Berkeley
A TREATISE CONCERNING THE PRINCIPLES OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE
1. It is evident to anyone who takes a survey of the objects of human knowledge, that they are
either ideas actually imprinted on the senses; or else such as are perceived by attending to the
passions and operations of the mind; or lastly, ideas formed by help of memory and
imagination- either compounding, dividing, or barely representing those originally perceived in
the aforesaid ways. By sight I have the ideas of light and colors, with their several degrees and
variations. By touch I perceive hard and soft, heat and cold, motion and resistance, and of all
these more and less either as to quantity or degree. Smelling furnishes me with odors; the
palate with tastes; and hearing conveys sounds to the mind in all their variety of tone and
composition. And as several of these are observed to accompany each other, they come to be
marked by one name, and so to be reputed as one thing. Thus, for example a certain color,
taste, smell, figure and consistence having been observed to go together, are accounted one
distinct thing, signified by the name apple; other collections of ideas constitute a stone, a tree,
a book, and the like sensible things- which as they are pleasing or disagreeable excite the
passions of love, hatred, joy, grief, and so forth.
In this first paragraph, Berkeley introduces us to his basic thought about ontology: everything
has some sort of characteristic that I can perceive with my senses. I can see hear, taste, smell,
or touch something. When that happens I know it is there and I know something about that
particular thing. Now it is the collection of these sensory elements that leads me to know that
this is what we have given the name of apple. His basic insistence is that apart from my
perceiving the sensory characteristics of an object, it does not exist, unless I have come to that
idea by the exercise of my mind as I consider carefully what another has informed me of.
2. But, besides all that endless variety of ideas or objects of knowledge, there is likewise
something which knows or perceives them, and exercises diverse operations, as willing,
imagining, remembering, about them. This perceiving, active being is what I call mind, spirit,
soul, or myself. By which words I do not denote any one of my ideas, but a thing entirely
distinct from them, wherein, they exist, or, which is the same thing, whereby they are
perceived- for the existence of an idea consists in being perceived.
Did you notice that he said that the existence of an idea consists in being perceived? Without
the perceptions and without the mind that perceives an item, it does not really exist. A form of
this might be that a tree in a forest does not exist in my mind until I perceive it. Our ability to
name a thing depends on our being able to use our perceptions to grasp its reality.
3. That neither our thoughts, nor passions, nor ideas formed by the imagination, exist without
the mind, is what everybody will allow. And it seems no less evident that the various sensations
or ideas imprinted on the sense, however blended or combined together (that is, whatever
objects they compose), cannot exist otherwise than in a mind perceiving them.- I think an
intuitive knowledge may be obtained of this by any one that shall attend to what is meant by
the term exists, when applied to sensible things. The table I write on I say exists, that is, I see
and feel it; and if I were out of my study I should say it existed- meaning thereby that if I was in
my study I might perceive it, or that some other spirit actually does perceive it. There was an
odor, that is, it was smelt; there was a sound, that is, it was heard; a color or figure, and it was
perceived by sight or touch. This is all that I can understand by these and the like expressions.
For as to what is said of the absolute existence of unthinking things without any relation to their
being perceived, that seems perfectly unintelligible. Their esse is percepi, nor is it possible they
should have any existence out of the minds or thinking things which perceive them.
Here in paragraph 3, Berkeley is insisting that if a thing is not IN the mind of someone it cannot
exist. His insistence is that apart from a mind, there is nothing. The essence of the thing – no
matter if it is an object, idea, or concept –is in its perception. This is an important aspect of
Berkeley’s thought. What do you make of that? As we will see in the paragraphs which follow,
Berkeley insist that this necessitates the existence of God whose mind encompasses all things,
thereby giving all things their existence.
4. It is indeed an opinion strangely prevailing amongst men, that houses, mountains, rivers,
and in a word all sensible objects, have an existence, natural or real, distinct from their being
perceived by the understanding. But, with how great an assurance and acquiescence soever
this principle may be entertained in the world, yet whoever shall find in his heart to call it in
question may, if I mistake not, perceive it to involve a manifest contradiction. For, what are the
fore-mentioned objects but the things we perceive by sense? and what do we perceive besides
our own ideas or sensations? and is it not plainly repugnant that any one of these, or any
combination of them, should exist unperceived?
Berkeley in paragraph 4 is pointing out a fallacy of the thinking of others. That is that things
which we perceive to exist by our senses could actually exist without such a perception. How
can it be, he asks, that my house exists simply by itself? How can it be that my house has an
existence that does not require me to give it reality? He says that those who insist that things
exist apart from their perception to be engaging in a clear contradiction?
5. If we thoroughly examine this tenet it will, perhaps, be found at bottom to depend on the
doctrine of abstract ideas. For can there be a nicer strain of abstraction than to distinguish the
existence of sensible objects from their being perceived, so as to conceive them existing
unperceived? Light and colours, heat and cold, extension and figures- in a word the things we
see and feel- what are they but so many sensations, notions, ideas, or impressions on the
sense? and is it possible to separate, even in thought, any of these from perception? For my
part, I might as easily divide a thing from itself. I may, indeed, divide in my thoughts, or
conceive apart from each other, those things which, perhaps I never perceived by sense so
divided. Thus, I imagine the trunk of a human body without the limbs, or conceive the smell of a
rose without thinking on the rose itself. So far, I will not deny, I can abstract- if that may
properly be called abstraction which extends only to the conceiving separately such objects as
it is possible may really exist or be actually perceived asunder. But my conceiving or imagining
power does not extend beyond the possibility of real existence or perception. Hence, as it is
impossible for me to see or feel anything without an actual sensation of that thing, so is it
impossible for me to conceive in my thoughts any sensible thing or object distinct from the
sensation or perception of it.
Do you hear Berkeley taking on the “ideas” of Plato? Recall that Plato posited that there were
perfect ideas of every possible thing’s qualities that we can perceive. These did not exist on
the earth, but in the realm of the God’s. So Berkeley is engaging in one of the chief activities of
the philosopher – to debate those who have written and thought about these some concepts in
previous generations.
6. Some truths there are so near and obvious to the mind that a man need only open his eyes
to see them. Such I take this important one to be, viz., that all the choir of heaven and furniture
of the earth, in a word all those bodies which compose the mighty frame of the world, have not
any subsistence without a mind, that their being is to be perceived or known; that consequently
so long as they are not actually perceived by me, or do not exist in my mind or that of any other
created spirit, they must either have no existence at all, or else subsist in the mind of some
Eternal Spirit- it being perfectly unintelligible, and involving all the absurdity of abstraction, to
attribute to any single part of them an existence independent of a spirit. To be convinced of
which, the reader need only reflect, and try to separate in his own thoughts the being of a
sensible thing from its being perceived.
Here Berkeley is beginning to make his argument for the existence of God. In fact, not just an
argument for God’s existence, but the very necessity of the existence of God whose mind can
perceive all things at all times so that, I might say, my house will not disappear just because I
am not thinking about it. God always has my house in his mind.
7. From what has been said it follows there is not any other Substance than Spirit, or that
which perceives. But, for the fuller proof of this point, let it be considered the sensible qualities
are color, figure, motion, smell, taste, etc., i.e. the ideas perceived by sense. Now, for an idea
to exist in an unperceiving thing is a manifest contradiction, for to have an idea is all one as to
perceive; that therefore wherein color, figure, and the like qualities exist must perceive them;
hence it is clear there can be no unthinking substance or substratum of those ideas.
8. But, say you, though the ideas themselves do not exist without the mind, yet there may be
things like them, whereof they are copies or resemblances, which things exist without the mind
in an unthinking substance. I answer, an idea can be like nothing but an idea; a color or figure
can be like nothing but another color or figure. If we look but never so little into our thoughts,
we shall find it impossible for us to conceive a likeness except only between our ideas. Again, I
ask whether those supposed originals or external things, of which our ideas are the pictures or
representations, be themselves perceivable or no? If they are, then they are ideas and we
have gained our point; but if you say they are not, I appeal to any one whether it be sense to
assert a color is like something which is invisible; hard or soft, like something which is
intangible; and so of the rest.
In the preceding two paragraphs, Berkeley is taking on objections to his ontology. He clearly
represents those who contradict his position and gives his answer. This is excellent
philosophical writing. It takes account of those who have a different point of view and gives a
reasoned response to those objections.
There are several more paragraphs which Berkeley uses to make his argument. I have
included them below, but I only note that you can read them if you so desire. Our purpose is
served by what we have looked at and what follows in paragraphs 26, 28, 29, and 30.
26. We perceive a continual succession of ideas, some are anew excited, and others are
changed or totally disappear. There is therefore some cause of these ideas, whereon they
depend, and which produces and changes them. That this cause cannot be any quality or idea
or combination of ideas, is clear from the preceding section. I must therefore be a substance;
but it has been shown that there is no corporeal or material substance: it remains therefore that
the cause of ideas is an incorporeal active substance or Spirit.
In paragraph 26, Berkeley makes a further statement regarding his ontology. He says, for me
to have this continual series of perceptions there must be a cause of them. It is not that the
things exist on their own, but that a substance or Spirit is making them “real.” It is that reality
produced by the mind of the Spirit that comes into my senses and causes me to be able to
function.
28. I find I can excite ideas in my mind at pleasure, and vary and shift the scene as oft as I
think fit. It is no more than willing, and straightway this or that idea arises in my fancy; and by
the same power it is obliterated and makes way for another. This making and unmaking of
ideas doth very properly denominate the mind active. Thus much is certain and grounded on
experience; but when we think of unthinking agents or of exciting ideas exclusive of volition, we
only amuse ourselves with words.
29. But, whatever power I may have over my own thoughts, I find the ideas actually perceived
by Sense have not a like dependence on my will. When in broad daylight I open my eyes, it is
not in my power to choose whether I shall see or no, or to determine what particular objects
shall present themselves to my view; and so likewise as to the hearing and other senses; the
ideas imprinted on them are not creatures of my will. There is therefore some other Will or
Spirit that produces them.
In paragraph 29, Berkeley shows that our senses are not under our control at all. We cannot
decide to see, or to hear or to have a sense of touch. It is just how we are. So there must be a
different Will or Spirit that produces these things which I in turn perceive.
30. The ideas of Sense are more strong, lively, and distinct than those of the imagination; they
have likewise a steadiness, order, and coherence, and are not excited at random, as those
which are the effects of human wills often are, but in a regular train or series, the admirable
connexion whereof sufficiently testifies the wisdom and benevolence of its Author. Now the set
rules or established methods wherein the Mind we depend on excites in us the ideas of sense,
are called the laws of nature; and these we learn by experience, which teaches us that such
and such ideas are attended with such and such other ideas, in the ordinary course of things.
http://18th.eserver.org/berkeley.html

9. Some there are who make a distinction betwixt primary and secondary qualities. By the
former they mean extension, figure, motion, rest, solidity or impenetrability, and number; by the
latter they denote all other sensible qualities, as colours, sounds, tastes, and so forth. The
ideas we have of these they acknowledge not to be the resemblances of anything existing
without the mind, or unperceived, but they will have our ideas of the primary qualities to be
patterns or images of things which exist without the mind, in an unthinking substance which
they call Matter. By Matter, therefore, we are to understand an inert, senseless substance, in
which extension, figure, and motion do actually subsist. But it is evident from what we have
already shown, that extension, figure, and motion are only ideas existing in the mind, and that
an idea can be like nothing but another idea, and that consequently neither they nor their
archetypes can exist in an unperceiving substance. Hence, it is plain that that the very notion of
what is called Matter or corporeal substance, involves a contradiction in it.
10. They who assert that figure, motion, and the rest of the primary or original qualities do exist
without the mind in unthinking substances, do at the same time acknowledge that colours,
sounds, heat cold, and suchlike secondary qualities, do not- which they tell us are sensations
existing in the mind alone, that depend on and are occasioned by the different size, texture,
and motion of the minute particles of matter. This they take for an undoubted truth, which they
can demonstrate beyond all exception. Now, if it be certain that those original qualities are
inseparably united with the other sensible qualities, and not, even in thought, capable of being
abstracted from them, it plainly follows that they exist only in the mind. But I desire any one to
reflect and try whether he can, by any abstraction of thought, conceive the extension and
motion of a body without all other sensible qualities. For my own part, I see evidently that it is
not in my power to frame an idea of a body extended and moving, but I must withal give it
some colour or other sensible quality which is acknowledged to exist only in the mind. In short,
extension, figure, and motion, abstracted from all other qualities, are inconceivable. Where
therefore the other sensible qualities are, there must these be also, to wit, in the mind and
nowhere else.
14. I shall farther add, that, after the same manner as modern philosophers prove certain
sensible qualities to have no existence in Matter, or without the mind, the same thing may be
likewise proved of all other sensible qualities whatsoever. Thus, for instance, it is said that heat
and cold are affections only of the mind, and not at all patterns of real beings, existing in the
corporeal substances which excite them, for that the same body which appears cold to one
hand seems warm to another. Now, why may we not as well argue that figure and extension
are not patterns or resemblances of qualities existing in Matter, because to the same eye at
different stations, or eyes of a different texture at the same station, they appear various, and
cannot therefore be the images of anything settled and determinate without the mind? Again, it
is proved that sweetness is not really in the sapid thing, because the thing remaining unaltered
the sweetness is changed into bitter, as in case of a fever or otherwise vitiated palate. Is it not
as reasonable to say that motion is not without the mind, since if the succession of ideas in the
mind become swifter, the motion, it is acknowledged, shall appear slower without any alteration
in any external object?
19. But, though we might possibly have all our sensations without them, yet perhaps it may be
thought easier to conceive and explain the manner of their production, by supposing external
bodies in their likeness rather than otherwise; and so it might be at least probable there are
such things as bodies that excite their ideas in our minds. But neither can this be said; for,
though we give the materialists their external bodies, they by their own confession are never
the nearer knowing how our ideas are produced; since they own themselves unable to
comprehend in what manner body can act upon spirit, or how it is possible it should imprint any
idea in the mind. Hence it is evident the production of ideas or sensations in our minds can be
no reason why we should suppose Matter or corporeal substances, since that is acknowledged
to remain equally inexplicable with or without this supposition. If therefore it were possible for
bodies to exist without the mind, yet to hold they do so, must needs be a very precarious
opinion; since it is to suppose, without any reason at all, that God has created innumerable
beings that are entirely useless, and serve to no manner of purpose.
23. But, say you, surely there is nothing easier than for me to imagine trees, for instance, in a
park, or books existing in a closet, and nobody by to perceive them. I answer, you may so,
there is no difficulty in it; but what is all this, I beseech you, more than framing in your mind
certain ideas which you call books and trees, and the same time omitting to frame the idea of
any one that may perceive them? But do not you yourself perceive or think of them all the
while? This therefore is nothing to the purpose; it only shews you have the power of imagining
or forming ideas in your mind: but it does not shew that you can conceive it possible the
objects of your thought may exist without the mind. To make out this, it is necessary that you
conceive them existing unconceived or unthought of, which is a manifest repugnancy. When
we do our utmost to conceive the existence of external bodies, we are all the while only
contemplating our own ideas. But the mind taking no notice of itself, is deluded to think it can
and does conceive bodies existing unthought of or without the mind, though at the same time
they are apprehended by or exist in itself. A little attention will discover to any one the truth and
evidence of what is here said, and make it unnecessary to insist on any other proofs against
the existence of material substance.
24. It is very obvious, upon the least inquiry into our thoughts, to know whether it is possible for
us to understand what is meant by the absolute existence of sensible objects in themselves, or
without the mind. To me it is evident those words mark out either a direct contradiction, or else
nothing at all. And to convince others of this, I know no readier or fairer way than to entreat
they would calmly attend to their own thoughts; and if by this attention the emptiness or
repugnancy of those expressions does appear, surely nothing more is requisite for the
conviction. It is on this therefore that I insist, to wit, that the absolute existence of unthinking
things are words without a meaning, or which include a contradiction. This is what I repeat and
inculcate, and earnestly recommend to the attentive thoughts of the reader.
25. All our ideas, sensations, notions, or the things which we perceive, by whatsoever names
they may be distinguished, are visibly inactive- there is nothing of power or agency included in
them. So that one idea or object of thought cannot produce or make any alteration in another.
To be satisfied of the truth of this, there is nothing else requisite but a bare observation of our
ideas. For, since they and every part of them exist only in the mind, it follows that there is
nothing in them but what is perceived: but whoever shall attend to his ideas, whether of sense
or reflexion, will not perceive in them any power or activity; there is, therefore, no such thing
contained in them. A little attention will discover to us that the very being of an idea implies
passiveness and inertness in it, insomuch that it is impossible for an idea to do anything, or,
strictly speaking, to be the cause of anything: neither can it be the resemblance or pattern of
any active being, as is evident from sect. 8. Whence it plainly follows that extension, figure, and
motion cannot be the cause of our sensations. To say, therefore, that these are the effects of
powers resulting from the configuration, number, motion, and size of corpuscles, must certainly
be false.

Reading: Advice to Christian Philosophers by Alvin Plantinga

So the Christian philosopher has his own topics and projects to think about; and when he
thinks about the topics of current concern in the broader philosophical world, he will think about
them in his own way, which may be a different way. He may have to reject certain currently
fashionable assumptions about the philosophic enterprise-he may have to reject widely
accepted assumptions as to what are the proper starting points and procedures for
philosophical endeavor. And-and this is crucially important-the Christian philosopher has a
perfect right to the point of view and prephilosophical assumptions he brings to philosophic
work; the fact that these are not widely shared outside the Christian or theistic community is
interesting but fundamentally irrelevant. I can best explain what I mean by way of example; so I
shall descend from the level of lofty generality to specific examples.
II.Theism and Verifiability
First, the dreaded "Verifiability Criterion of Meaning." During the palmy days of logical
positivism, some thirty or forty years ago, the positivists claimed that most of the sentences
Christians characteristically utter-"God loves us," for example, or "God created the heavens
and the earth"-don't even have the grace to be false; they are, said the positivists, literally
meaningless. It is not that they express false propositions; they don't express any propositions
at all. Like that lovely line from Alice in Wonderland, "T'was brillig, and the slithy toves did gyre
and gymbol in the wabe," they say nothing false, but only because they say nothing at all; they
are "cognitively meaningless," to use the positivist's charming phrase. The sorts of things
theists and others had been saying for centuries, they said, were now shown to be without
sense; we theists had all been the victims, it seems, of a cruel hoax-perpetrated, perhaps, by
ambitious priests and foisted upon us by our own credulous natures.
Now if this is true, it is indeed important. How had the positivists come by this startling piece of
intelligence? They inferred it from the Verifiability Criterion of Meaning, which said, roughly,
that a sentence is meaningful only if either it is analytic, or its truth or falsehood can be
determined by empirical or scientific investigation-by the methods of the empirical sciences. On
these grounds not only theism and theology, but most of traditional metaphysics and
philosophy and much else besides was declared nonsense, without any literal sense at all.
Some positivists conceded that metaphysics and theology, though strictly meaningless, might
still have a certain limited value. Carnap, for example, thought they might be a kind of music. It
isn't known whether he expected theology and metaphysics to supplant Bach and Mozart, or
even Wagner; I myself, however, think they could nicely supersede rock. Hegel could take the
place of The Talking Heads; Immanuel Kant could replace The Beach Boys; and instead of
The Grateful Dead we could have, say, Arthur Schopenhauer.
Positivism had a delicious air of being avant garde and with-it; and many philosophers found it
extremely attractive. Furthermore, many who didn't endorse it nonetheless entertained it with
great hospitality as at the least extremely plausible. As a consequence many philosophers-both
Christians and non-Christians-saw here a real challenge and an important danger to
Christianity: "The main danger to theism today," said J. J. C. Smart in 1955, "comes from
people who want to say that 'God exists' and 'God does not exist' are equally absurd." In 1955
New Essays in Philosophical Theology appeared, a volume of essays that was to set the tone
and topics for philosophy of religion for the next decade or more; and most of this volume was
given over to a discussion of the impact of Verificationism on theism.
Many philosophically inclined Christians were disturbed and perplexed and felt deeply
threatened; could it really be true that linguistic philosophers had somehow discovered that the
Christian's most cherished convictions were, in fact, just meaningless? There was a great deal
of anxious hand wringing among philosophers, either themselves theists or sympathetic to
theism. Some suggested, in the face of positivistic onslaught, that the thing for the Christian
community to do was to fold up its tents and silently slink away, admitting that the verifiability
criterion was probably true.
Others conceded that strictly speaking, theism really is nonsense, but is important nonsense.
Still others suggested that the sentences in question should be reinterpreted in such a way as
not to give offense to the positivists; someone seriously suggested, for example, that Christians
resolve, henceforth, to use the sentence "God exists" to mean "some men and women have
had, and all may have, experiences called 'meeting God'"; he added that when we say "God
created the world from nothing" what we should mean is "everything we call 'material' can be
used in such a way that it contributes to the wellbeing of men." In a different context but the
same spirit, Rudolph Bultmann embarked upon his program of demythologizing Christianity.
Traditional supernaturalistic Christian belief, he said, is "impossible in this age of electric light
and the wireless." (One can perhaps imagine an earlier village skeptic taking a similar view of,
say, the tallow candle and printing press, or perhaps the pine torch and the papyrus scroll.)

Reprinted from Faith and Philosophy: Journal of the Society of Christian Philosophers vol. 1:3,
(253-271), permanently copyrighted October 1984. Used by permission of the Editor. New
preface by author. Journal web site: www.faithandphilosophy.com
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Reading: A Philosophical lecture on the Ontology of a contemporary

Christian
Below we have the contents of a speech given Henk Geertsema at a symposium honoring
Philosopher Nicholas Wolterstorff. In it, Geertsema gives us a good introduction to the ontology
of a contemporary Christian philosopher. In it you will find a discussion of the nature of reality,
especially as it relates to the concept of God speaking. It is a very intriguing lecture. I have
excerpted only a short part of the whole which can be found at the link given in the citation
below.
Wolterstorff and the philosophy of religion. About being and creation
Introduction In the context of the symposium in honor of Nicholas Wolterstorff I am asked to
say something about his philosophy of religion. I am happy to do so. I will try to characterize it
in general terms with the history of Western philosophy as a background. My leading question
will be: should Wolterstorff’s philosophy of religion, or his ontology, be characterized as onto-
theology? I am aware that because of this approach I will not do justice to the important
contribution Wolterstorff has rendered to the philosophy of religion. My discussion will be about
his method and general approach, not about specific topics. Yet, I will relate to an issue which
is almost unique for Wolterstorff, the question whether God is able to speak, which is central to
his book Divine discourse. Philosophical reflections on the claim that God speaks (1995). The
way Wolterstorff deals with this question reminds me of a discussion between him and Henk
Hart years ago in Philosophia Reformata (1979, 1981). It relates to the final section of his
book On Universals. An Essay in Ontology(1970) and concerns the scope of the relation
Creator – creature. Is this relation all-encompassing and the most fundamental or is it possible
that structures exist which are even more encompassing and more fundamental? I will pick up
on this discussion. How this relates to onto-theology will, I hope, become clear in the course of
what follows.
Thinking and being
To give a first impression of what I mean by onto-theology I start with a characterization of
ontology. I guess Wolterstorff will agree with the following description: ontology is the
philosophical analysis of the basic characteristics of reality, or, rather, of all there is. Onto-
theology implies that this analysis includes the being of God. In this sense onto-theology goes
at least back to Parmenides who connects thinking and being in an all-encompassing way.
Plato, Aristotle, but also Thomas Aquinas, Kant and Hegel follow in his steps. Sometimes
thinking and being are closely related to language. In this respect the method of contemporary
analytic philosophy, which, taken in a broad sense, is also practiced by Wolterstorff, seems
rather similar to that of Aristotle. Be it as it may, in onto-theology questions about God are
discussed within the framework of a general theoretical analysis of being in terms of concepts
which are well defined and relations that are analyzed by means of the general rules of logic. It
seems clear that Wolterstorff as far as his ontology is concerned is part of this tradition. I only
have to refer to the Epilogue of On Universals. I quote:
The predicable / case / exemplification structure holds for all reality whatsoever – necessarily
so. Everything whatsoever is either a predicable, a case of a predicable, or an exemplification
of a predicable. ... Nothing is unique in that it falls outside this fundamental structure of reality.
God too has properties; he too acts. So, he too exemplifies predicables. The predicable / case /
exemplification structure is not just the structure of created things. … It is a structure of reality,
of what there is. (299)
Wolterstorff is saying here that the most general and fundamental structure of reality, of what is
there, also applies to God. Philosophical thought in its theoretical analysis of what is does not
face a boundary when it is directed to God. It is able to discover structures to which God
Himself is subjected. The discussion between Wolterstorff and Hart was about the question
whether this claim takes account of the fact that God is the Creator of all there is. Does God’s
being the Creator of all there is not imply that every structure that can be discovered is
dependent upon Him instead of God being dependent on such a structure Himself? If this
dependence of all things on the creator is denied, as Wolterstorff’s claim seems to do, are the
boundaries of our thinking not being transgressed? In other words, does he take into account
that our thinking itself is always creational? If our thinking is indeed creational, then, it seems,
we cannot take a stand outside of the relationship of creature – Creator. Does not Wolterstorff
ignore this state of affairs when he claims that God is dependent on certain structures that we
discover by way of theoretical analysis? Does this contention not pretend that in our thought
we can take a stand outside of that relationship and thus ignore the boundaries of our own
creatureliness?
………..
My point of discussion here is this relation between being and meaning. An essential element
of onto-theology seems to be that ‘being’ is not a neutral term. It is loaded with meaning. That
starts even as early as Parmenides, who places (true) being over against the illusionary world
of appearances. The tradition is continued by Plato with his world of forms in which the Idea of
the Good has a central place. But also in Aristotle the essence or substance of things, which is
known by the intellect or reason, is deeply connected with their inner destination, their … telos.
For him theology is the highest science (scientia) because it is directed to the highest being.
Medieval philosophy carries on with this tradition. God is the highest being or being itself.
Everything else is because in one way or another it participates in the divine being. Being is
therefore understood as intrinsically good. The medieval transcendental ideas of being, truth,
goodness and beauty are deeply interrelated. That is why ontology as onto-theology can cause
a feeling of excitement and joy. It relates to the inner meaning and destination of humankind
and the world.
…..
By Henk G. Geertsema

http://www.allofliferedeemed.co.uk/Geertsema/HGGWolterstorff.pdf
As we read this lecture, a couple of things stand out for me:

1. 1. Onto-theology, as it is called, has to do with the fundamental nature of what it

means to be real. The nature of reality and the very character of being itself both are
focused on the nature of God and God’s personhood.
2. 2. A good philosophical work always takes into account the history of philosophy so
that we can trace the development of ideas over the centuries.
3. 3. The concept of something or someone being the subject of a sentence with a
predicate (which is good English grammar, but may not be so in every language under
the sun) means that such a thing “exists ” to the extent that we can make sense when
we use words in that manner. Of course, one can always try to say things that are
nonsense or that are lies; that is, statements which do not conform to reality as we know
it.
4. 4. Geertsema asks an interesting question when he wonders if trying to speak of God
with the same terms as we use in the discussion of created reality might overstep the
boundary between Creator and Creature.
5. 5. The final paragraph included in our excerpt points toward a topic which we will not
even delve into in this course – that is, what is the purpose of the creation? Toward what
end or telos do we exist? What is the primary, indisputable reason that we are alive?
That is a huge question and we will not even have the opportunity to discuss it during
our time together.