🎯 Key Takeaways for quick navigation: 00:00 🌍 The world is filled with diverse, irreducible natural kinds of things, and these are referred to as essences. 02:10 🧩 In all things, there is a combination of form and matter, where form organizes and makes sense of the material parts. 03:08 🌟 Essence defines the nature of a thing, while existence answers the question of whether it exists, and existence is something common to all things. Made with HARPA AI
The format of these videos is outstanding: crisp clear language; not excessively long; well supported by digital imagery; good sound and digital effects; witness to religious vocation (wearing the Dominican habit in the videos); not getting caught up in "Church politics" but staying focused on communicating the most important truths - helping us understand who we are and who God is. This is REAL Thomism meets QUALITY online instruction - the New Evangelization in spades. You might very well be inviting vocations to the Dominicans if you keep this up! Very well done - I honestly can't get enough of these videos.
This video demonstrates a fascinating look at what a genius could make of the world during the middle- ages. Appealing to common sense and Aristotle’s ideas was reasonable then but common sense told us the world was flat and that approach has generally proven a bad guide for understanding reality as it is. It still has a strong appeal but that does not make it any more accurate. Common sense saw the human race as the center of entire universe and defined how it worked in relation to us. Literally decided that the sun moved around us, the stars moved around us because it just looked that way. As we have grown and become less self-centered we realized that the universe does not revolve around us. Almost the entire known universe appears to be lethal to us. We share a great commonality with other earthly animal life forms and quite a bit with other life forms down to viruses. Viruses reproduce by tricking our cells to reproduce and make more viruses. This is possible only because we share much with all life on earth. I don’t feel if a brilliant guy like Aquinas was around today he would hold the same views he did back then. He would probably be using cutting edge knowledge just as he did then, but it would not be Aristotle’s ideas, it would be genetics and maybe quantum mechanics.
Wow, what a beautiful treat this is! Succinct, rich and crystal clear. Our beloved Doctor must be really happy knowing how you guys are carrying out the fruits of his endeavor. Thank very much. God bless you all!
0:45 scientific reduction doesn't mean that human beings are "just" molecules and atoms. There are different levels of explanation one does not exclude the other. More over materialism doesn't only deal with matter but also includes energy and even information that doesn’t have to be in a physical medium.
it is called; Synecdoch: the name of a part is used to designate the whole or the name of the whole is used to designate the part. it is a rhetorical device.
Philosophy starts with the Greeks and "stopped" with Aquinas, after that they are just empiricism (side of the natural sciences) and relativism (side of the humanities), some other or few things have value in the human science but only the area that it developed well was natural science. The problem with modern natural sciences is only complete empiricism without philosophy, in fact, they act only in observation and not in intellect. Our church built the world, but these lies about the dark ages destroyed civilization.
Ehm... No. There have been plenty of advances in philosophy outside of the positivist/empiricist realm. Also in the social sciences (you might be interested in the Austrian School of economics, for example).
@@cheapguitarbeginnertutoria5356I would agree that Aquinas must have made some small mistakes or errors as he was human, however, because he was Divinely inspired, those small errors would have been, just that, small; not so small as to be so insignificant that they do not matter, yet, not so great that it would call his teachings into question. I would be interested to see where you would believe Aquinas was wrong, not so much to show where I believe you are wrong, but to see your point of view
What an appetising taster, Fr White to the banquet I believe awaits us. Gratitude to Fr Verrall of Fisher House, Cambridge, England for getting me started.
Can someone please tell me what existence looks like, if I can get that or wrap my mind around that, then I can kind of follow Aquinas. It is there that I stumble. Existence, itself, apart from anything. The very existence itself, what does it look like?
One would reply “Existence of what?” See there isn’t a thing out there called “existence” that exists. Rather things exist, like people and planets. The planet exists as a sphere (and many other descriptions) and people exist as humans (as well with other descriptions)
This is how I understand it. Existence is an attribute of things and refers to a specific thing. If I speak about this presenter, I am referencing the presenter. My words are not the presenter but they represent the presenter. So when you say the existence of something, you mean the thing.
@@polarbear1713 Well, this is how I have come to understand this, Aquinas is saying, in God, his very existence is his nature, in the fact that God doesn't get his existence from something outside of himself, so his existence has to be a part of his very nature, yes the mind boggles at a subject that has life in himself, or itself, but God has to be that way because there has to be at least one of that category, otherwise nothing at all would exist, because nothing can create itself, that is a contradiction. And yet here we are existing, so God has to have existence as part of his very nature.
This is not true: 4:09 "Existence is something common to all the various kinds of things that are, no matter how different they are." Something which is "common" is a lack of difference.
I actually was always aware of this and this is how I preface God to any science driven individual keen on disproving religion: How come my foot became my foot and brain became the brain? Why can't my foot switch places(kind of my way of saying function) with the brain? How come my foot is sentenced to its respective life and not the luxury of the brain? My questions more or less provoke a train of thought that once Recognized should enlighten an individual the Grand Processes of life is literally embodied in body.....
I spoke with someone also Catholic about this and I probably didn't explain it as well as this video or a scholar/theologian but the person responded it's doesn't matter. I didn't want to press on but I don't agree. It does matter because the person is saying it doesn't matter to him, which is quite true because he already believe in God. But when we speak with different people with different perspective, background, spiritual level, God as "the act of sheer existence" makes sense. People ask who created God all the time. Trinity is easier to understand because we can know that God is Father first (and not Creator first) and Jesus has always been the Son and not only when he was incarnated. Dismissing to know God in a deeper level just because "we can't truly understand Him enough" doesn't sit well with me. We can't stop TRYING to know Him. Granted we have different ways to do so, like praying, studying, praise and worship, but philosophy is also a very important way that many Christians try to skip just because "its the thing of Aristotle and Plato" or "weird" or "not Christian".
A reflection inspired by your stimulating program. It is tempting to align the essence/existence distinction with the two discussed earlier (act/potency and form/matter). As Fr. Brent explained, the matter of something is its potency, while its form is its act whereby potency turns to actuality. Suppose we now say that essence is the form of a thing and existence is its matter: things are if and only if they have a material constitution. This sounds like a materialist position and obviously can't be the right way of reading Aquinas, since God exists eminently and yet is complete actuality without matter/potency. What about the opposite view: existence is the act/form of a thing while its (mere) essence is its matter or potency for existing? This aligns with an earlier comment below that existence is the actus essendi or the light of actualization. It would seem that existence has an intimate connection with the form of a thing, its actuality. A thing exists the more fully the more its potency is transformed into actuality under the influence of the unmoved mover. With God, his essence is fully existence - he is pure act. Whereas in all creatures there is a real distinction between essence and existence, such that not all of a created being's essence is actualized at any given moment. Some of it always remains as potential yet to be realized. To know God is thus to be ever in process of realization of one's potential essence under the influence of His pure act of existence. The materialist prejudice can be appealing because of its simplicity: to be is to be matter. Existence is the brute facticity of matter determined by necessary mathematical laws. Anything non-material can be dismissed as fantasy, fiction, nonsense, etc. But in fact materialism misses the deeper meaning of what it means to exist. As creatures, we are inherently incomplete and feel a need and a longing towards fulfillment of our deepest potential. Existence is the act and process whereby our potential to be is realized in relationship with the actus essendi of the Unmoved Mover. Nor is the relationship with God a merely passive contemplation of his essence, as in the Platonic tradition. Since God is act, our relationship with Him is not just passive and receptive but also active and actualizing, that is, existential. And yet this is not the existentialism of Sartre, where existence precedes essence and we are quickly led to materialism once again. Rather existence is the actualization of potential essence into active reality (growth, development, unfolding of purpose) under the guidance of God's existential light. Essence isn't primary as in Platonism, nor is it preceded by existence as in existentialism, but the two work together in actualizing our distinctly human being. Perhaps we could say that when we are actualizing our potential under God's active influence, we resemble by analogy and in a finite way His being wherein essence and existence are one.
I struggle with this tension in Thomas: the essence is the intelligible part of a being, and that suggests we can intellectually "see" it when our reason is working; on the other, the essence is an idea in the mind of God and we finite creatures cannot possibly grasp it in its entirety. So latter seems to bring interpretation into the understanding of essences, the hermeneutic circle. Thus the essence of anything seems an open process, not a closed concept like Greek tragedy but something of which our understanding can be almost infinitely deepened. How does Thomism relate to hermeneutics? Are essences more like closed concepts or theories - I think of how socialist realism was the unquestioned framework for understanding literature in the former Soviet countries - or are they more like understanding a great poem outside of all theoretical blinders?
Here is a philosophical critique of some of the key metaphysical ideas presented in the video "Essence and Existence (Aquinas 101)" from an analytic perspective: The video helpfully introduces Aquinas' important distinction between a thing's essence (what it is) and its existence (that it is). However, philosophers debate whether essence truly precedes existence in reality or if this ordering is conceptual. Some argue essentialism is an outdated metaphysical framework as we lack direct epistemic access to fixed essences. On this view, essence and existence are interdependent in a process of dynamical becoming. The contention that God's essence just is his existence remains hotly disputed. Critics argue this conflates logic with metaphysics or that divine simplicity is ultimately incoherent. Asserting composites require a cause of their existence to be joined to essence assumes causation runs strictly in one direction. But emergence challenges neat hierarchies of strong ontological dependence. Alternative philosophical paradigms like existentialism question whether essences, rather than open-ended existence, should be considered metaphysically primary. While clarifying Aquinas' perspective, the video does not sufficiently acknowledge interpretive challenges or place his view within broader debates. A more comprehensive critique would situate his metaphysics among alternatives. The video introduces key Thomistic concepts but could better balance explanation with acknowledging difficulties and highlighting Aquinas' arguments as historically situated rather than definitive conclusions to complex philosophical problems.
As a follow up, there seems a tension between the kind of intellectual seeing of the essence and the aspects of the essence that reveal themselves only to the whole human being, including emotional response. The attitude toward trees and the different intelligible emotions evoked by trees in Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, for instance, seem to be part of the essence of trees. (cf. Peter Kreeft, The Philosophy of Tolkien). So my question: Is there a tension between the idea of intellectual seeing and grasping the essence? Aren't essences open-ended for finite creatures - rather like a novel discloses new aspects and possibilities over time? Thank for the videos!
How Aquinas could think the function of environment in the creation of an ens ? Indeed a flower is obviously dependent of all the ecosystem which makes it flower (grass, sun, water, pollinators and so on). How accordingly Aquinas can we associate this fact with this ontology ? (I gladly accept philosophical articles). Thank you for your work. A french philosophy teacher
So if the essence is what the thing is. How about the essence of the essence (does the essence exists ? And if so what is the essence of the essence ?)
So my question, on essence specifically rather than existence, is- how does clarifying essence in its diversity (showing that they aren't all simply defined or reduced to a single umbrella like a foundational element or fire, water etc) help us in this life? If I was to answer myself I guess I can say that it would help direct science from wasting their time like telling someone don't bother trying to use chocolate to make shoes out of, we just found out it will melt easily, and so would steer careers away from research based on searching for that all encompassing unifying source that reduces and explains all essences. But outside of that possibility, what good does it do us to understand the distinction made in this video? (Asking seriously and not with sarcasm) As in- does this distinction segway into deeper revelations on life that maybe I missed? I was just waiting for the importance of the distinction and then the video seemed to end without wrapping up the "why it matters"
Practically speaking it doesn’t matter unless you care about an afterlife. Living your life as an ordinary person you’ll never need to know this at all. I mean why should you? The majority of people don’t. Yet religions expect people of all types to just believe in God, yet you supposedly need education like this to really believe in one.
Well, essence answers to what a thing is and existence answers to that a thing is. Insofar as a thing can be considered antecedent to considerations of its existence, then essence is prior. But, insofar as existence actualizes essence and is formal with respect to essence, then existence is prior.
Nice video! Is there any difference between the existence in general and what St Thomas called act of being? Or they are just synonyms? There's a phylosopher in Spain, Leonardo Polo, who speaks about the personal act of being, the one of persons, as different from the act of being of simple material things. Is there any Thomistic basis for that, or is it just a mere phenomenologic personalist pretension? Thanks in advance
@Sam Lowry Thank you so much for your answer Sam! As it usually happens in these matters, far from ending the conversation, it opens a lot of new questions. Any reading you can suggest about it?
St. Thomas describes this principle as existentia (existence), esse (the infinitive of the verb 'to be'), and actus essendi (the act of being). St. Thomas goes on to describe how being is said analogically, and this observation can be applied to existence. For a person 'to be' and for a 'rock' to be says something partially alike and partially diverse. The higher we ascend in the order of being, the more there is of life, interiority, integrity, unity, etc. And, the act of being of each creature gives expression to its distinct essence. So, yes, there is grounds for what he says.
@@ThomisticInstitute Thanks! Great answer. I still don't get the difference between existentia and actus essendi... I'd appreciate so much if you can clarify that a little more. Cheers
@@franciscoojeda5553 Sure thing. Short answer is that there is no significant difference, they just name the same thing under different lights. With actus essendi, the word connotes actuality . . . the emphasis is on the light being lit up or present or realized or actualized. With existentia, the emphasis is on the thing "stepping forth" or appearing or presenting itself for cognition or intelligibility. They name the same phenomenon, but just under different aspects.
Your videos are great, keep up the good work! Quick question about essence and existence. To what extent could this principle be applied to an immaterial thing rather than a natural thing, such as the human mind? Could I say that my mind cannot impart existence to itself, and therefore relies on pure existence itself (God) outside of me to make my mind exist?
Take the angels, for example: there is a distinction between an angel's essence and an angel's existence. WHAT an angel is is distinct from the fact THAT an angel is. It is only in God that essence and existence are identical.
It's a mistake to speak of existence as "common". The act of existence is diverse, not different (see F. F. Centore: On Diversity and Difference, Thomist Review). When we speak of being as "common", we reduce it to a concept, thus a genus.
Although Aquinas says being is not strictly a genus (ST I, 3, 5), he also said being can still be called a genus in a loose way (Commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard, 2, d. 34, q. 1, a. 2., reply to objection 1).
So Aristotle was a nonreductionist, because he perceived an object to be a composite of a whole, the whole just being the main feature of an object. The existence of an object is an emergent phenomena, because of how reductionally, it doesn't technically exist. It's existence is predicated on it's essence, hence essence precedes existence. Basically: A= B + C+D. without one of the terms, A disappears. It is essential that all terms exist to construct A, because A depends on the existence of all terms presented to be A. This applies to biological and psychological sex (gender) we construct as a culture. God constructed a Universe, this Universe Being a composite of objects, without these objects, the universe doesn't exist. It's as good designed everything to be interdependent, which might explain why Even if evolution is true, it still carries a Teleological feel where change is dependent on the components and relation of those components that make up object. The Natural is the eternal laws that produce those relations between objects that construct the universe, man, animal etc, hence the essence.
Both essence and existence are; Difference. You can not separate "That" from "What". The only reason That something exists is What exists and vice versa. Essence and existence are therefore The Same.
Essence and existence are only the same in God. For everything else, they are separate and distinct. We have many examples of knowing the "what" of a thing, but also know that that same thing does not exist. Take for example a unicorn. We all know its essence, what it looks like, what it does, etc. But it does not have existence. The same could be said for extinct species of animals. So many things have a known essence, but do not have existence. Therefore, essence and existence are not the same.
"...it cuts against the grain of common sense." Oh boy! (Face palm) As if the intuition of the uneducated masses has a higher explanatory value than hypotheses made by experts in the field after studying an immense number of careful experiments.
@@TheKaiwind Ehh, not really. But if the goal is to obtain a status quo where ancient philosophical woo still is seen as having equal explanatory power as hypotheses constructed after studying a large amount of data, then I see the allure of it. And I understand the emotional comfort this position gives to a lot of people. The actual scientific value is sadly nowhere to be found. 😔
This makes so much sense and so easily. I really enjoy these videos.
Delighted to hear. There's quite a bit about essence and existence on the Thomistic Institute podcast if you want to hear more.
🎯 Key Takeaways for quick navigation:
00:00 🌍 The world is filled with diverse, irreducible natural kinds of things, and these are referred to as essences.
02:10 🧩 In all things, there is a combination of form and matter, where form organizes and makes sense of the material parts.
03:08 🌟 Essence defines the nature of a thing, while existence answers the question of whether it exists, and existence is something common to all things.
Made with HARPA AI
The Dominicans that are creating and distributing these videos are doing a wonderful thing. I am impressed by every one that I watch.
Thanks! Glad you're watching.
The format of these videos is outstanding: crisp clear language; not excessively long; well supported by digital imagery; good sound and digital effects; witness to religious vocation (wearing the Dominican habit in the videos); not getting caught up in "Church politics" but staying focused on communicating the most important truths - helping us understand who we are and who God is. This is REAL Thomism meets QUALITY online instruction - the New Evangelization in spades. You might very well be inviting vocations to the Dominicans if you keep this up! Very well done - I honestly can't get enough of these videos.
Thanks!
Angelic Doctor right on. I cannot agree more with you!
Awesome video! :D One of the most important distinctions for Thomistic philosophers, especially the Existential Thomists.
And super important for understanding some of St. Thomas's arguments for the existence of God . . .
@@ThomisticInstitutewhere could I go to learn more about how this is used for showing the existence of God?
@@branver1172 go out in life would be my best thought put forth
This video demonstrates a fascinating look at what a genius could make of the world during the middle- ages. Appealing to common sense and Aristotle’s ideas was reasonable then but common sense told us the world was flat and that approach has generally proven a bad guide for understanding reality as it is. It still has a strong appeal but that does not make it any more accurate.
Common sense saw the human race as the center of entire universe and defined how it worked in relation to us. Literally decided that the sun moved around us, the stars moved around us because it just looked that way. As we have grown and become less self-centered we realized that the universe does not revolve around us. Almost the entire known universe appears to be lethal to us. We share a great commonality with other earthly animal life forms and quite a bit with other life forms down to viruses. Viruses reproduce by tricking our cells to reproduce and make more viruses. This is possible only because we share much with all life on earth.
I don’t feel if a brilliant guy like Aquinas was around today he would hold the same views he did back then. He would probably be using cutting edge knowledge just as he did then, but it would not be Aristotle’s ideas, it would be genetics and maybe quantum mechanics.
Thank you, may our Lord Jesus Christ bless you!
Wow, what a beautiful treat this is! Succinct, rich and crystal clear. Our beloved Doctor must be really happy knowing how you guys are carrying out the fruits of his endeavor. Thank very much. God bless you all!
0:45 scientific reduction doesn't mean that human beings are "just" molecules and atoms. There are different levels of explanation one does not exclude the other. More over materialism doesn't only deal with matter but also includes energy and even information that doesn’t have to be in a physical medium.
If forms don’t exist, then how are there distinct ways in which the atoms and molecules are organized?
You’re conflating the purpose of metaphysics. The purpose of metaphysics isn’t to explain the various processes of the natural world.
it is called; Synecdoch: the name of a part is used to designate the whole or the name of the whole is used to designate the part.
it is a rhetorical device.
I was wondering, can a being lose its essence?
I'd say yes? If it changes from a substantial form to another?
Philosophy starts with the Greeks and "stopped" with Aquinas, after that they are just empiricism (side of the natural sciences) and relativism (side of the humanities), some other or few things have value in the human science but only the area that it developed well was natural science. The problem with modern natural sciences is only complete empiricism without philosophy, in fact, they act only in observation and not in intellect. Our church built the world, but these lies about the dark ages destroyed civilization.
Ehm... No. There have been plenty of advances in philosophy outside of the positivist/empiricist realm. Also in the social sciences (you might be interested in the Austrian School of economics, for example).
Nope. Aquinas made mistakes too , but we can learn a lot from him
@@cheapguitarbeginnertutoria5356I would agree that Aquinas must have made some small mistakes or errors as he was human, however, because he was Divinely inspired, those small errors would have been, just that, small; not so small as to be so insignificant that they do not matter, yet, not so great that it would call his teachings into question.
I would be interested to see where you would believe Aquinas was wrong, not so much to show where I believe you are wrong, but to see your point of view
What an appetising taster, Fr White to the banquet I believe awaits us. Gratitude to Fr Verrall of Fisher House, Cambridge, England for getting me started.
The TI, and Dominicans in general, is/are awesome! Keep up the great work!!
Glad you're enjoying the videos! God bless you.
I'm so happy I discovered this channel.
So are we! God bless you.
Very good explanation of Esse and Essence!
the videos are short, compact, concise, precise. Thank you for this
How do I use this knowledge? Is it irrefutable?
Can’t you reduce everything down to existence?
I think therefore i exist. Rene Descartes Renaissance period
Can someone please tell me what existence looks like, if I can get that or wrap my mind around that, then I can kind of follow Aquinas. It is there that I stumble. Existence, itself, apart from anything. The very existence itself, what does it look like?
One would reply “Existence of what?” See there isn’t a thing out there called “existence” that exists. Rather things exist, like people and planets. The planet exists as a sphere (and many other descriptions) and people exist as humans (as well with other descriptions)
This is how I understand it.
Existence is an attribute of things and refers to a specific thing. If I speak about this presenter, I am referencing the presenter. My words are not the presenter but they represent the presenter. So when you say the existence of something, you mean the thing.
@@polarbear1713 Well, this is how I have come to understand this, Aquinas is saying, in God, his very existence is his nature, in the fact that God doesn't get his existence from something outside of himself, so his existence has to be a part of his very nature, yes the mind boggles at a subject that has life in himself, or itself, but God has to be that way because there has to be at least one of that category, otherwise nothing at all would exist, because nothing can create itself, that is a contradiction. And yet here we are existing, so God has to have existence as part of his very nature.
This is not true: 4:09 "Existence is something common to all the various kinds of things that are, no matter how different they are." Something which is "common" is a lack of difference.
Great video!
I actually was always aware of this and this is how I preface God to any science driven individual keen on disproving religion: How come my foot became my foot and brain became the brain? Why can't my foot switch places(kind of my way of saying function) with the brain? How come my foot is sentenced to its respective life and not the luxury of the brain?
My questions more or less provoke a train of thought that once Recognized should enlighten an individual the Grand Processes of life is literally embodied in body.....
I spoke with someone also Catholic about this and I probably didn't explain it as well as this video or a scholar/theologian but the person responded it's doesn't matter. I didn't want to press on but I don't agree. It does matter because the person is saying it doesn't matter to him, which is quite true because he already believe in God. But when we speak with different people with different perspective, background, spiritual level, God as "the act of sheer existence" makes sense. People ask who created God all the time. Trinity is easier to understand because we can know that God is Father first (and not Creator first) and Jesus has always been the Son and not only when he was incarnated. Dismissing to know God in a deeper level just because "we can't truly understand Him enough" doesn't sit well with me. We can't stop TRYING to know Him. Granted we have different ways to do so, like praying, studying, praise and worship, but philosophy is also a very important way that many Christians try to skip just because "its the thing of Aristotle and Plato" or "weird" or "not Christian".
A reflection inspired by your stimulating program. It is tempting to align the essence/existence distinction with the two discussed earlier (act/potency and form/matter). As Fr. Brent explained, the matter of something is its potency, while its form is its act whereby potency turns to actuality. Suppose we now say that essence is the form of a thing and existence is its matter: things are if and only if they have a material constitution. This sounds like a materialist position and obviously can't be the right way of reading Aquinas, since God exists eminently and yet is complete actuality without matter/potency.
What about the opposite view: existence is the act/form of a thing while its (mere) essence is its matter or potency for existing? This aligns with an earlier comment below that existence is the actus essendi or the light of actualization. It would seem that existence has an intimate connection with the form of a thing, its actuality. A thing exists the more fully the more its potency is transformed into actuality under the influence of the unmoved mover. With God, his essence is fully existence - he is pure act. Whereas in all creatures there is a real distinction between essence and existence, such that not all of a created being's essence is actualized at any given moment. Some of it always remains as potential yet to be realized. To know God is thus to be ever in process of realization of one's potential essence under the influence of His pure act of existence.
The materialist prejudice can be appealing because of its simplicity: to be is to be matter. Existence is the brute facticity of matter determined by necessary mathematical laws. Anything non-material can be dismissed as fantasy, fiction, nonsense, etc. But in fact materialism misses the deeper meaning of what it means to exist. As creatures, we are inherently incomplete and feel a need and a longing towards fulfillment of our deepest potential. Existence is the act and process whereby our potential to be is realized in relationship with the actus essendi of the Unmoved Mover.
Nor is the relationship with God a merely passive contemplation of his essence, as in the Platonic tradition. Since God is act, our relationship with Him is not just passive and receptive but also active and actualizing, that is, existential. And yet this is not the existentialism of Sartre, where existence precedes essence and we are quickly led to materialism once again. Rather existence is the actualization of potential essence into active reality (growth, development, unfolding of purpose) under the guidance of God's existential light. Essence isn't primary as in Platonism, nor is it preceded by existence as in existentialism, but the two work together in actualizing our distinctly human being. Perhaps we could say that when we are actualizing our potential under God's active influence, we resemble by analogy and in a finite way His being wherein essence and existence are one.
I struggle with this tension in Thomas: the essence is the intelligible part of a being, and that suggests we can intellectually "see" it when our reason is working; on the other, the essence is an idea in the mind of God and we finite creatures cannot possibly grasp it in its entirety. So latter seems to bring interpretation into the understanding of essences, the hermeneutic circle. Thus the essence of anything seems an open process, not a closed concept like Greek tragedy but something of which our understanding can be almost infinitely deepened. How does Thomism relate to hermeneutics? Are essences more like closed concepts or theories - I think of how socialist realism was the unquestioned framework for understanding literature in the former Soviet countries - or are they more like understanding a great poem outside of all theoretical blinders?
tetszett :-)
Here is a philosophical critique of some of the key metaphysical ideas presented in the video "Essence and Existence (Aquinas 101)" from an analytic perspective:
The video helpfully introduces Aquinas' important distinction between a thing's essence (what it is) and its existence (that it is). However, philosophers debate whether essence truly precedes existence in reality or if this ordering is conceptual.
Some argue essentialism is an outdated metaphysical framework as we lack direct epistemic access to fixed essences. On this view, essence and existence are interdependent in a process of dynamical becoming.
The contention that God's essence just is his existence remains hotly disputed. Critics argue this conflates logic with metaphysics or that divine simplicity is ultimately incoherent.
Asserting composites require a cause of their existence to be joined to essence assumes causation runs strictly in one direction. But emergence challenges neat hierarchies of strong ontological dependence.
Alternative philosophical paradigms like existentialism question whether essences, rather than open-ended existence, should be considered metaphysically primary.
While clarifying Aquinas' perspective, the video does not sufficiently acknowledge interpretive challenges or place his view within broader debates. A more comprehensive critique would situate his metaphysics among alternatives.
The video introduces key Thomistic concepts but could better balance explanation with acknowledging difficulties and highlighting Aquinas' arguments as historically situated rather than definitive conclusions to complex philosophical problems.
As a follow up, there seems a tension between the kind of intellectual seeing of the essence and the aspects of the essence that reveal themselves only to the whole human being, including emotional response. The attitude toward trees and the different intelligible emotions evoked by trees in Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, for instance, seem to be part of the essence of trees. (cf. Peter Kreeft, The Philosophy of Tolkien). So my question: Is there a tension between the idea of intellectual seeing and grasping the essence? Aren't essences open-ended for finite creatures - rather like a novel discloses new aspects and possibilities over time? Thank for the videos!
How Aquinas could think the function of environment in the creation of an ens ? Indeed a flower is obviously dependent of all the ecosystem which makes it flower (grass, sun, water, pollinators and so on). How accordingly Aquinas can we associate this fact with this ontology ? (I gladly accept philosophical articles).
Thank you for your work.
A french philosophy teacher
Exodus 3:14 "what" was/is/will be is essence and "that" was/is/will be is existence.
the essence of Humanity is the sum of strucured matter and processes within our bodies. We call that particular arrangement human.
How can a changing thing be reduced to a non-changing thing? A process be reduced to one of its results?
Thomas Aquinas, as far as I am aware, derived this from Ibn Sīnā, the great Islamic philosopher.
😅🤣
@@joehouston2833 That is a fact, so you obviously haven't read any Aquinas
@@bayreuth79
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Saint Thomas derived it from Aristotle's Metaphysics.
So if the essence is what the thing is. How about the essence of the essence (does the essence exists ? And if so what is the essence of the essence ?)
Cacti
'for different ends' Yes, there was a teleological aspect to this perspective I remember.
Essence is about both form and matter.
Essence explains what that is.
I need more details about essence and values of nature. I didn't know yet.
Can we say numbers exist only in essence but not in form?
So my question, on essence specifically rather than existence, is- how does clarifying essence in its diversity (showing that they aren't all simply defined or reduced to a single umbrella like a foundational element or fire, water etc) help us in this life? If I was to answer myself I guess I can say that it would help direct science from wasting their time like telling someone don't bother trying to use chocolate to make shoes out of, we just found out it will melt easily, and so would steer careers away from research based on searching for that all encompassing unifying source that reduces and explains all essences. But outside of that possibility, what good does it do us to understand the distinction made in this video? (Asking seriously and not with sarcasm) As in- does this distinction segway into deeper revelations on life that maybe I missed? I was just waiting for the importance of the distinction and then the video seemed to end without wrapping up the "why it matters"
Practically speaking it doesn’t matter unless you care about an afterlife. Living your life as an ordinary person you’ll never need to know this at all. I mean why should you? The majority of people don’t. Yet religions expect people of all types to just believe in God, yet you supposedly need education like this to really believe in one.
Does essence precede existence?
Well, essence answers to what a thing is and existence answers to that a thing is. Insofar as a thing can be considered antecedent to considerations of its existence, then essence is prior. But, insofar as existence actualizes essence and is formal with respect to essence, then existence is prior.
@@chosenskeptic5319 rent free
@@ThomisticInstitute my brain hurts 😓
Nice video! Is there any difference between the existence in general and what St Thomas called act of being? Or they are just synonyms? There's a phylosopher in Spain, Leonardo Polo, who speaks about the personal act of being, the one of persons, as different from the act of being of simple material things. Is there any Thomistic basis for that, or is it just a mere phenomenologic personalist pretension? Thanks in advance
@Sam Lowry Thank you so much for your answer Sam! As it usually happens in these matters, far from ending the conversation, it opens a lot of new questions. Any reading you can suggest about it?
St. Thomas describes this principle as existentia (existence), esse (the infinitive of the verb 'to be'), and actus essendi (the act of being). St. Thomas goes on to describe how being is said analogically, and this observation can be applied to existence. For a person 'to be' and for a 'rock' to be says something partially alike and partially diverse. The higher we ascend in the order of being, the more there is of life, interiority, integrity, unity, etc. And, the act of being of each creature gives expression to its distinct essence. So, yes, there is grounds for what he says.
@@ThomisticInstitute Thanks! Great answer. I still don't get the difference between existentia and actus essendi... I'd appreciate so much if you can clarify that a little more. Cheers
@@franciscoojeda5553 Sure thing. Short answer is that there is no significant difference, they just name the same thing under different lights. With actus essendi, the word connotes actuality . . . the emphasis is on the light being lit up or present or realized or actualized. With existentia, the emphasis is on the thing "stepping forth" or appearing or presenting itself for cognition or intelligibility. They name the same phenomenon, but just under different aspects.
@@ThomisticInstitute Thank you so much!
The cleverest line in this video is the last one.
Excellent video. Thank you for this series
Really appreciate this video.
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3:24 Australian flag redesign
Your videos are great, keep up the good work! Quick question about essence and existence. To what extent could this principle be applied to an immaterial thing rather than a natural thing, such as the human mind? Could I say that my mind cannot impart existence to itself, and therefore relies on pure existence itself (God) outside of me to make my mind exist?
Take the angels, for example: there is a distinction between an angel's essence and an angel's existence. WHAT an angel is is distinct from the fact THAT an angel is. It is only in God that essence and existence are identical.
It's a mistake to speak of existence as "common". The act of existence is diverse, not different (see F. F. Centore: On Diversity and Difference, Thomist Review). When we speak of being as "common", we reduce it to a concept, thus a genus.
By diverse you mean a different mode of existence, distinct from other existent beings?
Although Aquinas says being is not strictly a genus (ST I, 3, 5), he also said being can still be called a genus in a loose way (Commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard, 2, d. 34, q. 1, a. 2., reply to objection 1).
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Cacti
thanks for this vid!!
You're welcome! Thanks for watching.
So Aristotle was a nonreductionist, because he perceived an object to be a composite of a whole, the whole just being the main feature of an object. The existence of an object is an emergent phenomena, because of how reductionally, it doesn't technically exist. It's existence is predicated on it's essence, hence essence precedes existence.
Basically: A= B + C+D. without one of the terms, A disappears. It is essential that all terms exist to construct A, because A depends on the existence of all terms presented to be A.
This applies to biological and psychological sex (gender) we construct as a culture.
God constructed a Universe, this Universe Being a composite of objects, without these objects, the universe doesn't exist. It's as good designed everything to be interdependent, which might explain why Even if evolution is true, it still carries a Teleological feel where change is dependent on the components and relation of those components that make up object.
The Natural is the eternal laws that produce those relations between objects that construct the universe, man, animal etc, hence the essence.
Both essence and existence are; Difference. You can not separate "That" from "What". The only reason That something exists is What exists and vice versa. Essence and existence are therefore The Same.
Essence and existence are only the same in God. For everything else, they are separate and distinct. We have many examples of knowing the "what" of a thing, but also know that that same thing does not exist. Take for example a unicorn. We all know its essence, what it looks like, what it does, etc. But it does not have existence. The same could be said for extinct species of animals. So many things have a known essence, but do not have existence. Therefore, essence and existence are not the same.
@@denisevankuiken2918 'What'(essence) refer only to 'That'(existence). In the presence, in the past, in the future or in imagination.
@@denisevankuiken2918 When we say God is identical to his essence. Can we also say humans are identical to their essence? What exactly does that mean?
"...it cuts against the grain of common sense."
Oh boy! (Face palm)
As if the intuition of the uneducated masses has a higher explanatory value than hypotheses made by experts in the field after studying an immense number of careful experiments.
unironically yes.
@@TheKaiwind Ehh, not really. But if the goal is to obtain a status quo where ancient philosophical woo still is seen as having equal explanatory power as hypotheses constructed after studying a large amount of data, then I see the allure of it. And I understand the emotional comfort this position gives to a lot of people. The actual scientific value is sadly nowhere to be found. 😔
Philosophical word-games junk