Levinas vis-à-vis the Other Essay

God is defined as a spirit or being that has great power, strength, knowledge, that can affect nature and the lives of people. Many individuals around the world believe in the existence of a higher being known as God. The dilemma of God existing has troubled and people for thousands of years. Labeling “God” for most people is not an easy task because everyone has their own concept of who and what God means to them. In this paper, I would like to show that there is a God and he is not dead. The two arguments in favor of the existence of God are reason and experience. The Teleological and Ontological are two moral arguments that effect reasoning in connection to experience. Reason is an ontological argument by St. Anselm of Canterbury in the

Throughout the history of metaphysics the question, What is? has always been answered in an incomplete,unsatisfactory or complicated manner, but Spinoza tried to answer this question in an exceptional way simply by describing God and His essence. Based on Spinoza’s views, God’s qualities can be referred to as attributes and modes are merely affections of a substance. This paper will provide a detailed view of Spinoza’s key ontological definition of God as the only substance, his attributes, and their co-relations. The study goes further to explore the major scholarly argument between Spinoza and Descartes, in regard to their view of substance, and its attributes.

One burning and enduring problem in philosophy to which we have given considerable examination is the question of the existence of God--the superlative being that philosophers have defined and dealt with for centuries. After reading the classic arguments of St. Anselm and St. Thomas Aquinas, the contentious assertions of Ernest Nagel, and the compelling eyewitness accounts of Julian of Norwich, I have been introduced to some of the most revered and referenced arguments for and against God's existence that have been put into text. All of them are well-thought and well-articulated arguments, but they have their holes. The question of God's true existence, therefore, is still not definitively answered and put to rest; the intensity of this

So in the end, Thomas Aquinas and Rene Descartes both attempted to prove the existence of God, but they differ in respect to the different thought processes to obtain the existence of God. An still to this day both Philosophers are regarded as key factor in the world of philosophy and their arguments were so influential that they were able to land a spot in our textbook “THE GREAT CONVERSATION”. But thanks to these gentlemen and their contributions to their works were able

Descartes’ ontological argument is an echo of the original ontological argument for the existence of God as proposed by St. Anselm in the 11th century. To illustrate the background of the ontological argument, Anselm’s argument works within a distinct framework of ontology that posits the existence of God as necessity by virtue of its definition. In other words, for the mind to conceive of an infinite, perfect God, ultimately implies that there must indeed be a perfect God that embodies existence, for perfection cannot merely exist as a mental phenomenon. God is, according to Anselm, self-evident in the mind. Criticisms to this argument can be found in Anselm’s contemporary, Gaunilo, who argues that such an argument can be used to - put

‘Cogito Ergo Sum,’ - ‘I think therefore I am ‘ one of the most famous and well known quotes or arguments in all of modern philosophy; a phrase instantly recognizable to all those studying in the field of philosophy. This phrase refers to an attempt by Descartes to prove with absolute certainty his own existence; a systematic way to philosophize. The argument, while first proposed by ancient philosophers such as Aristotle and Saint Augustine, was utilized as an argument by French philosopher Rene Descartes in his influential text “Meditations on First Philosophy“. This argument appears in the books second meditation and provides the cornerstone for Descartes argument in the following five meditations and serves as the basis for Descartes overall metaphysical thesis, without which Descartes reasoning system would collapse. Throughout this paper I will

Another interesting feature of Walden University is their focus on "student-centeredness"--which means that the university seeks to build their curriculum around the work ethic of the students. Students are expected to be self-motivated and are rarely reminded of an upcoming assignments or tests. For some, this may sound like an excuse for professors to be disinterested. For others, especially self-driven individuals, not having a professor breathing down your neck may be a breath of fresh air.

Martin Heidegger stated, criticizing the “wrong” path that western philosophy deviated to, that people understood “being” only in the superficial sense. The advancements in mathematics and natural sciences along the millennia always pre-assumed that being was a known phenomenon and never bothered to explore its true nature; bypassing the herculean task, we never delved into what “Ontos” really

In Meditations on First Philosophy, Descartes takes the reader through a methodological exercise in philosophical enquiry. After stripping the intellect of all doubtful and false beliefs, he re-examines the nature and structure of being in an attempt to secure a universally valid epistemology free from skepticism. Hoping for the successful reconciliation of science and theology, Descartes works to reconstruct a new foundation of absolute and certain truth to act as a catalyst for future scientific research by “showing that a mathematical [rational-objective] physics of the world is attainable by creatures with our intellectual capacities and faculties” (Shand 1994, p.

This question defines the nature of Aristotle’s inquiries, at least for a large part of the Metaphysics, and it thus offers a fourth account of the study or science of metaphysics.“The science of first principles, the study of being qua being, theology, the investigation into substance – four compatible descriptions of the same discipline? Perhaps there is no one discipline which can be identified as Aristotelian Metaphysics? And perhaps this thought should not disturb us: we need only recall that the metaphysics was composed by Andronicus rather than by Aristotle. But the four descriptions do have at least one thing in common: they are dark and obscure” (Ross, 1996, p174).

Anselm’s ontological argument is historically important because it was among the first arguments for proving the existence of God. His argument had a considerable influence on the populace at the time and received both praise and criticism. His argument also led to the development of counterarguments and other theories for God’s existence or non-existence from other philosophers. Anselm’s ontological argument is still relevant today because it allows us to have a glimpse into the mindset of one of history’s most influential philosophers, and it allows us to develop our own arguments from that.

One of the most controversial topics in modern philosophy revolves around the idea of non-human animals being considered human people. Controversy over what makes up an actual person has been long debated. However, society deems it as a set of characteristics. The average person normally does not realize how complicated a question this is, and in fact many scientists, philosophers, and individuals will side differently on this specific topic. I personally do not believe that animals are capable of being human people, but throughout this argumentative paper I will address critical views presented from multiple philosophers on why this seems to be the case.

Throughout the course of this essay we shall examine two of the major philosophical arguments for the existence of God. The arguments that we are going to focus on shall be the Design argument and the Ontological argument. We shall compare, evaluate and discuss both the Design (or teleological) argument for the existence of God and the Ontological Argument for the existence of God, as well as highlighting philosophical criticisms of both theories too. By doing so, we shall attempt to draw a satisfactory conclusion and aim gain a greater understanding of the respective theories and their criticisms of each theory.

Aristotle and Heidegger have conflicting views on what a human or beings are. Although, there are some similarities to each of their set of ideas. Aristotle has a clear hierarchical framework classifying the differences between humans, animals, and plants. Heidegger opposes this strict definitions by discussing this idea of “Dasein” which states of being there. Although, their approaches to this topic are different with the types of question one asks and how they theorize about what is a being. There is key similarities that they discuss almost two thousand years apart. Aristotle and Heidegger are two philosophers that have tackled the enormous question, what is it to be a being? This paper discusses the two different approaches to defining this long standing question.

Sartre’s Being and Nothingness is a Phenomenological Ontology. Ontology means the study of being; and phenomenological relates to perceptual consciousness (in short it takes human conscious experience as its subject, and its point of departure). Its descriptive method moves from the most abstract to the highly material. It starts by analysing two different and complex categories or kinds of being: the “in-itself” and the “for-itself”, or more