After an introduction to key features of the life and works of St. Thomas Aquinas in relation to the perennial Catholic and Dominican intellectual traditions, this course covers the philosophical contributions of the Angelic Doctor in the major systematic areas of the discipline, treating St. Thomas’ basic approach to the theory of human knowledge, nature, the human person (philosophical anthropology), Ethics, and First Philosophy or Natural Theology (metaphysics).
- Faculty: DANIEL WAGNER
This course treats the post-modern philosophical tradition of phenomenology with a primary focus on the work of its founder, Edmund Husserl. Contributions from Edith Stein, Martin Heidegger, and Karol Wojtyła will also be considered. Having reviewed key texts of Descartes, Hume, and Kant, which set up the historical context necessary for understanding the phenomenological movement in general, the most significant texts of Husserl will be treated. Attention will be given to the phenomenological method (ἔποχή/epoche), intentionality, noetic-noematicanalysis, transcendenceand immanence, and the phenomenon of empathy as a basis for Objectivity or philosophical realism.
- Faculty: DANIEL WAGNER