Natural Hearing (Aristotle's Physics)
27. Contradiction in Science and Theology: Planck, Bohr, Einstein, Augustine and Thomas, plus Q&A
https://berquistcourse.com/course/philosophy/3-natural-hearing/027-contradiction-in-science-and-theology-planck-bohr-einstein/

[0:00] go to science here now. And my first reading here is from Max Planck. Now, Max Planck has the title of the father of modern physics, meaning the physics of the 20th century. And it's because in December of 1900 he proposed the quantum hypothesis. And so it's kind of a nice date, right, at the dawn of the 20th century, right? And five years before Einstein proposed the special relativity, right?

[0:31] But in 1905 Einstein made use of Planck's theory to explain the photoelectric effect for which he got the Nobel Prize at that time, right? Now, what's interesting about Max Planck they say he's a man now who knows something about discovery, right? But if you read the the life of Planck, he went to enroll in university in physics in the latter part of the 19th century, right? He was told that physics is complete in his principles, There are details to be filled out, right?

[1:04] But the basic principles are there. If you want to go into something, you know, where fundamental discoveries and so on, go into biology or something, right? Okay. Well, Planck nevertheless was interested in physics, right? So here's a man who was told there's nothing really fundamentally discovered, and he's the man who starts modern physics, huh? And Heisenberg, you know, in the that same chapter about the history of quantum theory there in the Gifford lectures, he speaks of how Planck, when he discovered the quantum, he went for a walk in the park with his son, right?

[1:37] And said, I think I discovered something as important as Newton, right? And then five years later, Einstein showed you can't understand light without the quantum. And then 13 years later, in 1913, Bohr showed you couldn't understand the atom. So nothing in the physical world, another big world, nothing, either matter nor light could be understood without the quantum. So this is a very fundamental discovery, right? And led eventually to the greatest change in physics from the beginning.

[2:06] It led to the rejection of that principle of determinism in the thinking of physicists. It was Heisenberg who especially brought that out. So Planck should know something about the way discoveries. He's a man who's told it's going to be discovered. He's a man who discovered something very important. But notice what what Planck says then. The first impulse towards a revision and reconstruction of a physical theory is nearly always given by the discovery of one or more facts which cannot be fitted into the existing theory.

[2:39] That means it contradicts it, right? And how many facts always form a central point about which the most important theories hinge? But now the key sentence here: nothing is more interesting to the true theorist than a fact which directly contradicts the theory. Generally accepted up to that time. For this is his what particular work.

[3:08] Now Gamow was a Russian physicist who came and studied under Niels Bohr at Copenhagen, and then eventually came to the United States. And he got the Nobel Prize for explaining some very strange things that the quantum physicists uncovered, right? Where things apparently do what they don't have enough energy to do. But anyway, we'll get to that. Okay. But this particular book, I suppose, being a Russian, the title suggested by the you know the the ones of the communist books.

[3:45] But he's talking about the development of quantum physics. It started in 1900 with Max Planck, right? But quantum theory was not really perfected until the late 20s, so it's almost like 30 years. And the the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum theory was the very controversial thing, right? And the physicists were discussing it in these international meetings and the Solvay Congresses they're called. and the final showdown came in 1927, right?

[4:19] When Niels Bohr refuted Einstein and finished Einstein, you know. And that that kind of led to the general you know acceptance of the Copenhagen interpretation. But notice Gamow reflected upon all these different developments that took place in those 30 years and so on, and science in general, he says staggering contradiction. You know, we saw the thing, the apparently hopeless contradiction, right? Staggering contradictions between theoretical expectations on the one side and observational facts, or even common sense, on the other, are the main factors in the development of what.

[4:58] Science, right? Okay. Once again, another witness, Okay. Now the one from Niels Bohr is is and the ones of Einstein, of course, as I say, are the most important because these two thinkers are really most central, right?

[5:20] And Bohr learned a lot from Einstein, but eventually in the interpretation of quantum theory, they what broke, right? Huh? And if you if you get the the three volumes of Bohr there, essays on atomic physics and so on, he has a very interesting account of the conversation with Einstein, right? But you get it from other scientists and so on, huh? And Einstein didn't want to go along with the Copenhagen interpretation because it involved the rejection of determinism, right?

[5:50] And that had been the absolute principle of modern science, as we mentioned when we were studying the Sipis, right? And Einstein would would invent these thought experiments to try to refute it, and then Bohr would stay up all night and come back the next day, next day and show the defect in Einstein's objection. And I guess the last one was that Einstein proposed in the 1927 one, quite a devastating one, and he really had Bohr worried, right?

[6:16] They say they have a picture. I see the picture of the two of them leaving the thing, you know, Einstein's rock, you know, you know, they're you know, kind of you know smug look at his face, and Bohr is coming after him, kind of worried, right? Yes. And of course, again, Bohr had a sleepless night, right? But he came back the next day and used Einstein's theory of relativity to refute Einstein.

[6:37] He used Einstein's own theory. Einstein overlooked a consequence of his own theory, and that was the last time that Einstein publicly ever tried to, you know, refute the thing. But anyway, both great scientists and and Bohr always speaks of the great respect, you know, of Einstein, you know, and how much we learn from Einstein even when we, you know, have disagreements, right? But there's really something. Now I was talking about Bohr's early hypotheses here about the atom, right?

[7:11] Bohr's hypothesis. The Bohr is the man who started the modern atomic theory, right? In 1913, when he applied, started to apply the quantum to the atom. And Heisenberg, you know, describes the first time he met Bohr in the early 20s there when Bohr came to Germany, and he gave a series of lectures on the atom, and everybody considered Bohr to be the man who understands the atom more than anybody else.

[7:34] And the German physicists called this the Bohr Festival, you know, it's a great thing. Okay. Anyway, Bohr's hypotheses were only of a provisional character, his first ones, inasmuch as they presented a mixture of Planck's ideas with the old mechanics, right? Nobody was aware of the situation more than Bohr himself. Thus, in a lecture on the new theory which he gave to the Danish Physical Society in December 1913, in which he himself rightly considered one of his best and clearest lectures, he emphasized this aspect of the problem in the following fine conclusion.

[8:13] Note these very words there that are important. Before closing, I only wish to say that I hope I have expressed myself sufficiently clearly, so that you have appreciated the extent to which these considerations conflict, right, with the admirably coherent group of conceptions which have been rightly termed the classical theory of thermodynamics. So there was something I discovered that contradicted, right? Okay, the conflict. But on the other hand, I have tried to convey to you the impression that just by emphasizing this conflict, right, by bringing this conflict out, it may be also possible in the course of time to discover a certain coherence, which again means freedom of the conflict join. right In the new ideas, right?

[9:05] You have to insist upon that contradiction, right, in order to discover what a hidden harmony is. The great Heraclitus would say, right, a certain coherence of new ideas. This is taken from this volume there of scientists who work with Bohr, right, and they're often quoting him and taking making observations about him. This one here is very interesting. His turn of mind, Bohr's turn of mind, was essentially dialectical rather than reflective.

[9:33] A dialectic, of course, goes back to the Greeks there, right, where you're arguing on opposite sides, right, raising problems. Although he did, of course, spend long hours in solitary thought, often during sleepless nights, he needed the stimulus of some form of dialogue to start off his thinking. I read all of these physicists who sat at his feet there, you know, and it was like being with Socrates.

[9:56] That's what they compared it to, right? If the proposer of the doubt was at hand, the dialogue could be lively enough. For as soon as Bohr saw his way to the elucidation of the matter, he would make his point with unbounded eagerness and tenacity, not at all to get the better of his opponent, right, but rather to get him to share his own exhilaration at solving the difficulty.

[10:19] So intensely did he want everyone around him to share them with him, huh? Even after many years, he would remember every detail of the argument's progress, and he would repeatedly tell the story with the same freshness and animation. Now, this last part is the most, you know, important for our purposes. It was characteristic for these unforgettable conversations, so clearly revealing the essentially dialectical form of his thinking that he would never try to outline any finished picture, but would patiently go through all phases of the development of a problem, right?

[10:54] But what are those? Starting from some apparent paradox, starting from an apparent what? Contradiction, right? And gradually leading to what The elucidation of that. That's the way he proceeded. It's very clear. You know, they talk about how Chesterton often writes in a paradoxical way, right, to get you to start thinking, you know.

[11:20] Something's worth doing. It's worth doing badly. Okay. Now, this next text is even more revealing. Logical analysis was not for him, Bohr, a mere verification of consistency. He's not just looking to see that what he's saying or what we're thinking is free of contradiction, right? What you want it to be eventually, but now this is the key thing here. But a powerful, constructive tool, orienting the groping mind in the right direction.

[11:57] To know where you're going, as Aristotle said, right? Okay. Then he saw the heuristic power of logic in his logical character. Now, heuristic comes from what? The Greek word "heurisko huh

[12:16] And then you've got a huh," you know, And that's the Greek word to what? Discover, right? Okay, find. So he's talking about the what? The power of logic in his logical character, the power of dialectic in his ability to bring out what? Contradictions, right? Has a what? Heuristic power, a power of discovery, exactly what Heraclitus and Aristotle have been saying huh That he saw the heuristic power of logic in his logical character is illustrated by the striking comment he made on more than one occasion on his own early experience of scientific discovery.

[12:54] They want to get it from the horse's mouth, right? You know, and here's a man who made a great discovery. The decisive point about Rutherford's atom model, you know, He had gone over to England to study with Rutherford, right? And Rutherford had an atomic model, you know, kind of a solar system model of the atom and so on. But the decisive point about Rutherford's atom model was that it made quite clear that atomic stability could in no way be accounted for by the classical physical laws.

[13:25] That means Newtonian physics, huh? They call the physics of the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries if you read these guys classical physics. Don't mean the Greeks or the Latins, but they mean the 17th, 18th, and 19th. They'll call either classical physical or Newtonian physics, right? And they'll call the physics of the 20th century modern physics. Okay, that's just a common way.

[13:53] So it made quite clear that atomic stability could in no way be accounted for by the classical physical laws. There was contradictions there, and thereby pointed, you see, going the right direction. Right? Aristotle says, right? And thereby pointed to the quantum postulate, right? As the only possible escape from the acute dilemma, right? But that dilemma, of course, is a contradiction, right? And he says, just the sharpness of the contradiction that he was what going to resolve, right?

[14:25] By applying the quantum to the atom, made me absolutely confident of the truth of quantum postulate because it made that sharp contradiction what disappear. It started to disappear, see? And also the two are are tied there that Aristotle said in that second paragraph, right? That seeing the difficulties, the contradictions, tells you where to go, and then when you arrive, see, because you're going in the direction of untying those contradictions, and you know you've arrived when the contradictions are untied, right?

[14:57] The same way here, right? It pointed to the quantum postulate, right? You know, he applied the quantum postulate to the atom, and that's the way he's he was able to explain or start to explain the stability of the atom. He could also start to explain the the the radioactive emissions too, and their jump-like character, which both of which contradicted, you know, the classical physics, huh? And it also made him confident that he'd arrived at the truth, right?

[15:27] See, because the contradiction was so sharp that he had what resolved by doing this exactly the same two things Aristotle. They kind of tied together. We'll see a text of Einstein there on where the two are tied together, right? Know where you're going and know when you're going to arrive, right? Pointed, confident in the truth. Now, right? He was still remembering this lesson when, in one of his last conversations, he observed that the reason why no progress was being made in the theory of the transformations of matter occurring in very high energy is that we have not so far found among these processes any one exhibiting a sufficiently violent contradiction.

[16:05] Right? It's like the sharpest the contradiction that in itself, right? With what could be expected from current ideas to give us a clear and unambiguous indication of how we have to modify these ideas, huh? We're looking at that passage here in comparison to expecting the unexpected, right?

[16:27] But notice why no progress is being made. Father of the progress of the human mind, you know, Heraclitus saw that they were all contradictions.

[16:38] Now, in the last reading from Bohr, difficulties which involve contradictions were for him Bohr merely the external appearance of new knowledge, like the outer shell of a, you know, orange or something, right? Huh? You see, and in an apparently hopeless contradiction, he conceived the seed, the germ of wider and more comprehensive order and harmony. Right? That's the hidden harmony which is better, right, than the harmony you had before, right?

[17:08] You had some kind of order and harmony before, but now you have a more comprehensive order and harmony, right? That takes in much more, right? That's hidden though at first, right? Say, but the seed of that is the apparently hopeless contradiction, right? What's only the great mind can maybe untie, right? Okay. Now we looked pretty

[17:32] much at the at the text there from Heisenberg, right? Okay, but there I was doing particularly emphasize the fact of what going in the right direction by asking the right question, right? And how far it takes you, but that the right questions came out of the apparent contradictions between the experiments, right? And some of which, you know, might behave like a particle, other ones that didn't behave like a particle behave like a a wave, right?

[17:59] And then Louis de Broglie showed the same thing was true about electrons, which behave like particles, but they also, if you did the right experiment, behave like a wave. So you had apparent contradictions between these pinpointed particles and these spread out waves, and so on.

[18:15] Now, the evolution of physics is perhaps the nearest thing to a little sketch of the history of physics. By Einstein, he takes some of the principal ideas down through history, right? Starting with Galileo and going down to his own work and the quantum physicists. But in his first reading, he's talking about his own what theory? Now again, we're going to get from the horse's mouth, right? How did this arise?

[18:43] It arose from necessity. And why does he say necessity? Because the mind cannot accept a contradiction, right? Okay. As he goes on to explain, from serious, right, and deep, he didn't say apparently hopeless, but strong words, right? From serious and deep. contradictions,in the old theory, from which there seemed no escape. It arose from contradictions, then, right?

[19:11] Now, the strength of the new theory lies in the consistency, which means, you know, free from contradictions, right? Eliminated it, and the simplicity with which it solves all these difficulties using only a few very convincing assumptions. So, Aristotle said, you know, you've arrived, and you can what? Untie, right? So, as Bohr said, just the sharpness of the contradiction that he untied made him confident of the quantum postulate, right?

[19:39] And he says, the strength of the new theory, right, the reason why one would tend to accept it, right, lies in the consistency. It's what freeing us from those contradictions. We know we've arrived in some way, right? The contradictions disappear. We discovered something. Now, the second paragraph, as you say, Einstein was a little bit unhappy with the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum theory, right? But notice his observation about contradiction there.

[20:09] One of the most fundamental questions raised by recent advances in science is how to reconcile the two contradictory views of matter, matter particles, right, and wave. It is one of those fundamental difficulties, right? But the contradiction there, right, which once formulated must lead in the long run to scientific progress. See, it's one of those fundamental what? Contradictions when brought out, right, must lead in the long run to scientific progress.

[20:36] Magnificent, right? Physics has tried to solve this problem. What's happened with? Who do you want to ever accept, right? Want to hold on to determinism, right? But Zarathustra, I'm ashamed of you, Einstein. You know, you can't refute it, and you won't accept it. You don't want to accept it.

[20:55] Yeah. Yeah. The future must decide whether the solution suggested by modern physics is enduring or temporary. I was looking at the recent book there. Have you seen it? Called The Elegant Universe. You know, it's by a physicist working in string theory. It's out in the bookstores and he's got to ask him. You know, but to him, it's pretty clear now that Einstein was mistaken. You know, the struggle is over.

[21:19] But there's still a few people, you know. Bridgman compared, you know, to what Joe said, right? He can't quite get away from these things.

[21:33] These mechanical views and so on. Now, the reading on page 264 of Einstein is, or Eadrisson now, right? He got his statement of his own theory, right? But now he's saying in general, science forces us to create new ideas, new theories. That can be stated more clearly. It's not science is forcing us; it's the contradiction that's forcing us, right? Okay. It's like what he said before that this relativity theory arose of necessity, right?

[22:02] From serious and deep contradictions, right? So my cannot accept. But now it's beautiful when Einstein describes this. He says their aim. Think what Aristotle said, right? If you can aim, you know where you are going, in a sense, right? And Aristotle says, when you see the contradiction, you know where you are going because you are trying to what? Untie the contradiction, right? Einstein has a little different metaphor, but it's the same idea.

[22:28] Their aim is to break down the wall of contradictions, right? Which frequently blocks the way of scientific progress. So Einstein has has the image there of the contradictions being like a wall that you have to knock down to go forward, right? We knock down the walls when it was you go forward. Aristotle compares the contradictions to what? You know, have your feet tied, and you have to unloose the knot so you can go forward, right?

[22:53] But it's the same idea. Okay. But notice the the choice of word there. Their aim, right? Is if you know where you are going, you able to aim. And now he makes what in logic we call universal affirmative statement. All the essential ideas of science were born in this way, right? Dramatic conflict between reality and attempts at understanding. It's interesting to use the word dramatic because I mentioned before when Aristotle says the good plot of a drama consists of tying the knot and then untying it, right?

[23:28] There is a likeness between that and philosophy and science, huh? Now let's go to theology, right? What's kind of amazing is to see, despite all the many differences there are between philosophy and science and theology, how they proceed, how contradiction plays a very fundamental role in all, right?

[23:54] The first reading is from I think probably the greatest authority I could take, right? Now while the Pharisees were gathered round, Jesus put to them this question: What is your opinion about the Christ? Whose son is he? And they said, David. They told him, right? Then how is it? He said, that David, moved by the Spirit, calls him Lord, where he says, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand, I'll put your enemies under your feet.

[24:25] If David can call the Lord, then how can he be his son? There is an apparent contradiction between two what? Passages in Scripture. One says that Christ is the son of David, right? And the other that Christ is the Lord of David, right? Well, the son is apparently not the Lord of his father, right? So Christ cannot be the son of David, but he is, right? Okay.

[24:54] Now notice now there's an enormous difference here. in what Heisenberg was talking about, but Heisenberg was talking about the strange apparent contradictions between two experiments in science, right, which lead us to ask the right question, right? Here, our Lord is pointing out a strange apparent contradiction between two passages of Scripture, okay? And now here it's a little bit like an examination discussion that we talked about, huh?

[25:25] Because Christ is showing that they don't understand what they claim to know, right? Scripture, right? Because they have this contradiction, huh? So he says, no one could think of anything to say in reply, and from that day, no one dared to ask him any further questions, right? But notice, hidden under that strange apparent contradiction, is this what truth that Christ is both God and man. And as God, he's very much the Lord, right, of David, huh?

[25:55] But as man, he can be descended from David and so on, right? But if you don't expect the unexpected, you'll never find it, for it's hard to be found, right? But that apparent contradiction would make you expect something unexpected about Christ, is something about Christ that's rather unique, whatever that is, right? You know. And you can find that you know another passage in Scripture, right? You know, the Father is greater than I, and the Father and I are one, right?

[26:25] I mean, was equal to him or not? You know, well, some is. I mean, as as man, the Father is greater than him, right? But as God, he and the Father are one, equal, and so on. Now, it's definitely this this particular passage here is like Socrates too, because if you go back to the division of the Gospel of Matthew, chapter twenty two is a number of about three chapters, if I remember rightly, where Thomas says Matthew's presenting why they wanted to put him to death, right?

[26:58] And here the reason is something similar to the way they wanted to put what Or why they wanted to put Socrates to death, right? Because he was showing men who claimed to know something that they didn't know what they claimed to know, right? So that's one of the reasons why I put Christ to death, but that's one of the reasons.

[27:21] So notice what Christ is showing there, right? You see, we can proceed from sacred Scripture, divinely revealed as it is, right, divinely written, right, and bring out what seem to be contradictions, huh? And the untying that will be a great what discovery, right? The hidden harmony, right? Okay. Now, I go from our Lord there. To Saint Augustine, right, and Saint Augustine is perhaps the greatest mind among the what Church Fathers, right?

[28:02] Okay, and as we'll see in in this decree from the Second Vatican Council, you know, if you look at that just for a second, if we look at Augustine, and this is the decree on priestly training where the order of dogmatic theology is given, he says dogmatic theology should be so arranged that these biblical themes are proposed first of all, right? And so I start with the example from the Gospel of Matthew, right?

[28:29] Next, there should be opened up to the students what the fathers of the Eastern and Western Church have contributed to the faithful transmission development of the individual truth revelation, and so Augustine is one of the greatest what fathers, right? Perhaps the greatest mind among them, certainly in the Western Church. So look at this one particular passage from Augustine. But even the heretics yield an advantage to those who make proficiency, right?

[28:56] According to the Apostle Saint Paul, saying there must also be heresies that they which are approved may be made manifest among you. Whence too it is elsewhere said that the son who receives instruction will be wise, and he uses the foolish as his servant. right? Now, what sense is the heretic a servant of of Augustine? Say, huh? See, where he goes on to explain why that. For while the hot restlessness of heretics, right, stirs up questions about many articles of the Catholic faith, the necessity—that's the word that we saw in Einstein, right—the necessity of defending them forces us, right, the same two words we saw in Einstein.

[29:44] Now, when the heretic right takes something from Scripture to contradict an article of the faith, or something like from philosophy, right, now the Church fathers were forced to defend that article of faith, right, against that misuse of Scripture or philosophy, right, okay. And in refuting that error, that's the way they themselves came to a deeper what understanding, right? You know. And Thomas, you know, I think he's talking about Augustine.

[30:12] Augustine is authoritative in many things, but you know, one thing that the Church has singled out is Augustine teaching on grace, right? You know, one that I think one of the Pope say, you know, that that the mind of Augustine on grace is the mind of the Church on grace, right? But Thomas, you know, in discussing what Augustine says, says that you know after the Pelagian these heresies arose, Augustine spoke much more carefully, you know, and and exactly about these things, right?

[30:38] And you have to be aware of the fact that Augustine's understanding is developing as he refutes these these heretics on. Okay. So for while the hot restlessness of heretics stir up questions about many articles of the Catholic faith, the necessity of defending them forces us both to investigate them more accurately, to understand them more clearly, and to proclaim them more earnestly. And the question mooted by an adversary becomes the occasion of instruction.

[31:06] If you look at the works of Augustine, even the titles of the works, you'll find a predominance of titles like contra Celsum, contra contra contra contra, right? You know. In other words, there is an individual article of faith. It may be the Incarnation, may be grace, it may be predestination, whatever

[31:27] it might be. But a heretic has denied this particular article, and so we have to defend this particular article, right? Okay. And so there is, to some extent, in in the fathers of the Church, a kind of ad hoc, you might say, right, character, because of replying to this particular, you know, heresy that has risen at this time, right. And therefore, if you look at the third reading here now, which is going to lead us up to Thomas, huh?

[31:57] But if you look at the second paragraph again. Next, there should be opened up to the students what the fathers of the Eastern and Western Church have contributed to the faithful transmission development of the individual truths of revelation. That's touching upon the ad hoc character, right? In other words, Augustine accepts the whole of faith, right, but he takes up and defends those articles of faith that are being denied by this or that heretic in his time, right?

[32:29] Okay, but eventually the heretics got around to deny everything, right? So you are building up, right? You know this, but there still is a kind of ad hoc character in any one church father, right?

[32:43] He has something like that in the in the third paragraph. The further history of dogma should also be presented, account being taken of its relation to the general history of the church. So you go to the Council Trent, where they're dealing with heresies of Luther or somebody else, maybe about the sacraments, you know, and about justification, so on. And so those mysteries of the faith are what defended and illuminated, right, and got into more, but they're forced to because of the prevalent ones at that time, right?

[33:13] So again, it has something of the ad hoc character, right? Okay, But in the earlier councils maybe there was about the the Mother of God, right? I mean, somebody gets up and says you shouldn't call her the Mother of God; you call her the Mother of Christ. They started throwing things at him, but but you also have to, you know, refute this, right, and show why she should be called the Mother of God, right?

[33:36] You know, in a sense, his denying that she was a Mother of God was in a way a dividing Christ into two persons rather than one person who was both God and man.

[33:50] Now, finally, comes down to to Thomas, and notice the way the Scripture speaks It's very strong Not scripture, but the Second Vatican Council. Next, in order that they may illumine the mysteries of salvation as completely as possible, that's an awfully strong phrase, right? Okay. The students should learn to penetrate them more deeply with the help of speculation under the guidance of Thomas. They go to Thomas, say in the Summa Theologiae, and even more fully in the Quaestiones Disputatae, and he's always what every article starts in a way with a contradiction, right?

[34:26] And he's untying it, and it's saying you should follow Thomas there in order to illumine the mysteries of salvation as complete as possible. What does Thomas do? Well, he's always raising these what difficulties, right, and then resolving them, see one after another. So that's a very clear text on that, right? And the the last thing it says there that you learn from Thomas too is to perceive their interconnections, because in Thomas you have kind of the Summa Theologiae, looking at all the articles of faith in a sense, okay, and so you kind of.

[35:04] Read them all together in an orderly way, right? What you don't have in the church fathers in most cases because it's that ad hoc character, right? So there's two things that they see that one should be guided by Thomas, and one is to illumine the mysteries of salvation as complete as possible, and to perceive their interconnections, right? But both of those are what

[35:28] is seen in the Summa Theologiae, It's always starting with what contradictions, right? So go on, you know. The role of contradiction there is to illuminate the mysteries of faith as much as possible, right? It leads to that, you know. It's interesting, you know, when you read Thomas too, and I always think of Thomas and Augustine when Thomas is giving the reasons for the incarnation, right? Huh? And he's he's quoting Augustine, right?

[35:59] You know, like Cajetan said in his famous commentary in the Summa Theologiae, Thomas seems to have inherited the mind of all the church fathers because he so reverenced them, right? Well, in the

[36:14] incarnation, you know, Augustine has his beautiful kind of dialectic. A little bit, he says he's talking about the suitability of the incarnation, right? Not the only way God could have redeemed us, but the most appropriate way. And Augustine will say, you know, God should be followed, but he can't be seen. Man can be seen, but he's not a perfect model to follow. Well, you got a problem.

[36:37] What you do? Well, God became man, right? So you got a perfect model to follow, right? You see, or he'll say, man sinned in a way, committing an infinite crime, right? Because he he rejected God, right? Who's infinite and good, right? So man can't what do an infinite reparation, right? God can do that, but God didn't sin, right? You know, so how do you make the one who sinned do something in a way infinite?

[37:11] Well, God became man, right? You know, but the very way of Augustine speaking, and then Thomas is, you know, just just quoting Augustine, really, is starting with a kind of what paradox or a kind of contradiction, right? Huh? Man sinned and there should be reparation, but man can't really do it. You see, God could do it, but he's not the one who should do it. You know, so God became man, so that what man in a way could what you know make reparation for man.

[37:44] But being both God and man, he can do this, right? Do sufficient enough. Okay. So that's a little introduction there to the role of contradiction, development of our knowledge, right? But we saw it. In two very clear examples in the course, there one was in tying the contradiction, apparent contradiction between the statement of what Anaxagoras that reason is or mind is self-ruling, right, and a statement that the ruler must be separated from the world, right.

[38:24] And then the other one here about what change, right? Okay. But there are many other contradictions. Those are two striking ones, right? Okay. Let's at least go on and stop. It's about a quarter to five.

[38:43] Do you think we could finish? We could finish by five, or? No, I wouldn't want to go that fast. Yeah, then let's wait. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I have a problem next week because this is exam week now. Like I'm giving an exam next Tuesday and one on Thursday and one on Friday and so on on Saturday. So I'll be you know giving exams and and enjoying. correcting them So I don't know if we can meet next week, you know.

[39:07] But do you want to meet the Tuesday following that? Would that be the? Is that too close to Christmas? I don't know if it is Tuesday. I probably won't make it. Putting together the newsletter. Yeah. Includes a lot of hard work Yeah.

[39:23] I could come up this week on Thursday this week too, but but you know, before the exams hit me, you know. But you usually, you know, I got to be there, kind of, for students who are, you know, afraid of their exam on Saturday. Want to. Come see me, you know, come on Thursday afternoon. But next week I say is kind of bad because I say actually Tuesday I'm giving an exam on Tuesday afternoon, and then uh, and then on Thursday and on Friday, so.

[39:52] on Saturday. So either either we could meet Thursday this week if you want. That that's too soon or not. You know. Okay. But but next week is not really good, you know. Okay. Sure. Okay. You can make it next Thursday or what? I'd rather do it this week because as I get pressure to finish other things. Yeah, I mean Thursday of this week. Yeah. Yeah. We had a track up on Thursday at the same time.

[40:22] Okay, then we'll we'll we'll finish this eleventh reading, right? And we'll do the next reading, but not for all yet, you know. Okay. Read Thomas there. and uh what is it the Ephesians that they're called the pillars of the church. It's kind of unusual because usually you find the apostles called the pillars of the church, right? But but the Ephesians he says just got through the read the order of the epistles.

[40:57] The Galatians, you know, Thomas is always criticizing them for their their defects and so on. But the Ephesians he's more praising them. He wants to confirm them. They're they're much better Christians, apparently than the Galatians are, right? You know, they're like oh insensati galate, you know, you senseless Galatians, you know, and so on. He's really really upbraiding them a lot, you know. So I think it's the Ephesians there.

[41:20] He's praising them the pillars of the church, right? And Thomas says by this he means by faith, hope, and charity, right? But then he speaks of three pillars in the Old Testament. There was the the pillar that was like a cloud, right? And then there's the pillar which was of smoke, and there's another one of the prophetic books there. And then there's a pillar of fire, right?

[41:46] And the the pillar called the cloud, right? He represents faith, right? Because we see God in the mirrors where darkly, as Saint Paul says, you know, the cloud of unknowing, like in in the mystic. And so that's that's that's our faith, right? They're a pillar because they're a pillar of what? Cloud, because they have the faith, right? Where we see God, but the darkly is in the mirror, and

[42:14] then of course the the the fire, of course, is what the charity, right? But the one of smoke, he ties it up with hope, and it's because fire is rise to smoke, right? And so charity is what really you know perfects our hope, right? And so that's what they they the pillars of the church, right? But it's kind of interesting the way he works out those those three.

[42:40] Where there's smoke there's fire Yeah yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That doesn't mean our hope will end up in smoke. you see, You got, I mean, the thing about about metaphors, you see, is that metaphors are what two edged swords. I mean, you can use for good or for bad, right? So fire can be a metaphor for charity, can be a metaphor for for lust, right? And the lion can be a metaphor for Christ, the lion of the tribe of Judah, and it can be a metaphor for the devil, like the lion goes around, you know, seeking who we can, yeah, yeah, crawling around, right?

[43:14] And just be careful with metaphors. See, so the metaphor of hope, we didn't mean that hope is up in smoke. you know, hope's up in smoke. we say that sometimes, but the smoke arises from fire, right? So you know, when love comes along, it strengthens the hope and. The smoke is like prayer for instance. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a good point too. Yeah, because hope is tied up with prayer, especially.

[43:38] Yeah, so Augustine, you know, and there and Thomas, when they divide theology according to faith hope and charity, they take up prayer with hope, right?

[43:52] So I think he's thinking very dialectically dialectically most of the time, like William of Ockham. Oh yeah, oh yeah. These contradictions. It seems there is beauty. Yeah, but it's a contradiction in a way because there is this love hate relationship with them that puts your mind in a bind. But then, when you solve it, what is the beauty of it? But then, yeah, this is really interesting stuff.

[44:18] These contradictions. I mean, it seems like you should really purposefully think up all these disputes all the time. You know, if you want to come to these clarities of different things here. So, yes, it's a good basis for finding truth. Yeah, these major steps forward, right? Yeah. I mean, you know, as you go through the philosophy of nature, I always tell the students, "I don't know what good it does, " I keep telling them anyway.

[44:52] You really think they're very fundamental, you know, not just for the philosophy of nature, but for your whole development of your mind. and... I mean, it's something that you kind of know, but boy, now you know it specifically, especially. Yeah, this was untied by Aristotle and all. that. Um, wow, boy, what a tool!

[45:12] You see, Aristotle in the book on Sophistical Refutations right? He gives a distinction of four kinds of philosophical conversation or an argument, and he distinguishes the demonstrative conversation or the teaching conversation, and then the dialectical conversation and the examination one, and then the sophistical one, right? Yeah. But when he describes dialectic there, he says it's reasoning from probable opinions to contradictory conclusions. So, and he's kind of taking, you know, the full breadth of it.

[45:44] You don't always reason to contradictory things, but you know, it's kind of the ultimate thing, right? And in that way, you can see how dialectic is a tool of discovery. If contradiction is that important for discovery. It's really like a hinge there too, you know, knowing the per accidens and you know the as such. Yeah, yeah. Because I guess that's where most errors lie. But it's funny because I, you know, I, usually when I teach the introduction to philosophy, I start with the Meno as far as the dialogues, and then go to Euthyphro, right?

[46:15] And the Euthyphro teaches us to ask the right question. Euthyphro defines the pious as what pleases the gods. Socrates says, "Well, is it pious because it pleases the gods, or does it please the gods because it's pious? " But then I like to ask that question about the good, right? Which it kind of anticipates the Meno. There, everybody wants what is good for themselves. I say, "Well, is something good because it's wanted, or is it wanted because it's good?

[46:43] " Right? And eventually we show that it's wanted because it is good, right? So you're defining the good by its effect, but even a definition by effect has to be, as we learn in the Meno and the Euthyphro, it's got to be convertible with the thing being defined, and it has to separate from everything else. So, how can the good is what all desire be a definition if the bad is sometimes desired, right?

[47:14] And therefore, it doesn't separate the good from the bad. Well, the solution to that is that it's the good as such that is desired, and the bad as such is not desired. We desire the bad because it appears to be good, or because of the good in it, we don't see the bad in it, right? And even that crazy guy in in crime and punishment, right? Who he's going to, you know, kill the woman He's got no reason to kill.

[47:44] He doesn't have anything in for her, right? But it's it's the false appearance of good, right? That he wants to show that he's above the law, right? Not subject to the law. Well, the rest of you guys are under the law, and I'm above the law. I'm above all the rest of you. I seem to have a certain superiority, you know. But but it's obviously crazy, you know, a distorted idea of what of what excellence is, right?

[48:05] He's really becoming worse than all the rest by committing this senseless murder, right? But what's attractive to him is the idea of what freedom, right? You know, and being above the law, right? It's in false appearance of, uh, of of the good, Are there some exercises that you go to? Because this is like a real art to do this, to be able to see, you know, or to come up with contradictions as you begin to.

[48:32] I mean, reflecting on things, but yeah, the only Plato had, you know, that ability. But I wonder how many years it takes to really develop that into a good art. But even these puns that you have, you know, Shakespeare is always, you know, been criticized for all the puns, right? But the puns, in a way, produce a kind of paradox, right? You know, I, you know, even my mother would say, you know, I see through the blind man, but he couldn't see at all.

[48:58] But there's a apparent contradiction there, right? You know, kind of paradox, not a big deep one, right? But it does make you stop. and examine the meaning of the what The word right huh? You know All humor I guess involves a contradiction. Yeah yeah Um

[49:17] Yeah. the Catholic faith is seems to be steeped so I guess contradiction would be yeah what you have the example of the Gospel of Saint Matthew is that one passage of Scripture can appear to contradict another one right And our Lord is showing. constantly throughout the Scripture seems even though you know you know it's not contradicting truth but it makes you you stop you know and think what's hidden there they didn't understand right Mm-hmm.

[49:44] Because Augustine says there's more things they didn't understand in Scripture than they didn't understand right but each of these things you know leads the mind. how many students do you have in these classes where you'll be having to correct Oh maybe It could be anywhere from twenty to thirty you know you know I just get kind of bored you know with it you know

[50:06] I was correcting these papers you know for for the introduction to philosophy you know and so I managed to get through by putting on Zaide by Mozart you know and then putting on the percussion of the Seraglio you know just letting it distract you a little bit you know for years I used to always play harpsichord music which is kind of monotonous correcting exams you know they wouldn't distract me too much from the correcting of it you know There's always a joke between my wife and I you know they used to put on the harpsichord music you know but now I've been putting the operas on lately you know you know and you all the rest of your teeth so you don't pay too much

[50:37] of that stuff you know and then you know you get a little more correction done and the Mozart coming in you kind of you know have you ever listened to Gorecki What Gorecki No A modern composer, Polish Uh-huh. he's had this one

[50:53] this one this one, this Miserere, Great Amen it's like 15 minutes long and it's just an Amen being sung over by a choir and if you don't want to fall asleep you listen to that because it'll lull you and then the voices I mean it's just the most amazing piece I've ever heard you know just tremendous if you ever I mean I don't know maybe see I might not be the best expert we'd never get out of

[51:27] the choir here if we sung as many Amens as we do so Mozart's masses you know he had a bishop there who liked short masses and what Thomas did I mean what Mozart would do with some of them right He'd make it very short to get to the Amen it's like that you go on on on because the bishop would think, you know that's a nice short piece you know, it's just about over you know and all of a sudden it goes on and on And I think he does it purpose to annoy the

[51:56] I heard that Saint Thomas once said he was sorry that they burned the books of the heretics so long because. they could have learned so much more. Yeah, yeah, yeah. If your mind is free, right? Otherwise, you'll end up in despair. That's not too absurd. Beautiful or tragic I hope it's beautiful. in life So we'll see you on Thursday, then, right? Okay, same same time, same station as they do.

[52:36] Thank you very much. You visiting, or you're? I'm a observer for this month. I was given the option of coming, in and I was very glad You're welcome.

[52:56] Somewhere down the line, studying philosophy. I was reading it here. The tempest the other day, you know, and you know the the souls fraught in the ship there, you know, on the water, right, are rousing the compassion of Miranda, right? You know, that's a beautiful example of Shakespeare using that synecdoche, right? He's caught caught the men out on the ship there, right? The the souls, right? Because you have it in scripture, you see.

[53:27] You know, sometimes you know, man is called a soul, and sometimes flesh. but in either case, it's a synecdoche, right? Giving the name of the part to the whole. Do you want these, or can I keep these? Yeah. If you want, you can keep those. Okay, because

[53:48] I don't know if you. I know you didn't expect me to come. here If you, yeah, if you don't mind. From the beginning, there's one difficulty I can't untie with this answer that

[54:18] there had to be a God that had to become man to make a reparation had to be infinite. Yeah. Because the sin was infinite because it offended God. Yeah. Now, why can't you say that? Well, then

[54:35] it's infinite because it was toward God, who was infinite. So if I make reparation to God, it can be infinite in the same respect. Because the humanity is an instrument of divinity, right? But just man himself, yeah. If I've offended God.

[54:59] Well, if I do something to make it up, it's infinite in the same respect that the offense was. They're both to God, who's infinite. It seems like the the answer is taking infinite in a different sense, as if I have to be infinite. But I wasn't infinite when I made the infinite offense, but it was God who was infinite. But that's like the old thing we said there, you know, before that.

[55:26] God is chiefly responsible for the good you do, right? But you're chiefly responsible for the evil you do. And it seems quite unfair, right? You know, he should get credit for the good I do, mainly. Not me, but I get credit. I just want to say credit responsibility for the evil I've done, mainly. But wasn't the infinite sin was the original sin. That's what you were talking about.

[55:55] Well, since any mortal sin has a kind of infinity to it too, you see, because you're rejecting an infinite good, there, right? You know, but that's not that's surprising, right? I mean, um, um, I could murder you, right?

[56:14] And that'd be rather bad thing to do, right? But could I do something good as much as that as bad? That would be murder, though. Well, no, but a good thing. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I mean, if I've murdered you, I mean, what can I do? I can't bring you back, right? I can do more harm to you than I can do good to you, right? I can take away your life, but I couldn't restore your life.

[56:47] So once I've done that, you know, I can make reparation as far as you're concerned, anyway. So in the case of mortal sin, I'm the one who's died, spiritually. I killed myself in a way.

[57:15] I separated myself from God. Life of my soul. Because there's that nice proportion, right? huh? The soul is the body, right? Body dies. God leaves the soul. The soul is dead. It's kind of proportion there, right? The soul, God is the life of the soul in a way. The soul is life of the body. It's not, you know, to be identified exactly, but there's a likeness there.

[57:49] Would it have something to do with that? We rejected the infinite. I mean, we had the grace, and then we rejected it, so we can't get it back. Yeah, we did.

[58:02] Um what are you saying But you're saying that we're talking about murder right now. Yeah, yeah. To to to commit a murder, the murderer is more

[58:19] dead in a sense than the one who was killed. As long as the one who was killed was in a state of grace, because the one who did the murder committed a mortal sin. Yeah. Is that what you're saying? That because of the mortal sin, God is not there. I mean, if we capture Bin Laden over there, right? Right. You bring him back and have him reconstruct the thing and put him back in there that got killed and so on, right?

[58:45] You know, you can't redo it, right? If you had to change your heart, right? No, but that's that. I mean, we're saying that those people and and assuming that they're innocent. Well, no, but what I'm saying is is my rejection of God is worse, really, than my my rejection of you when I kill you. Right, You see that's okay. That's how that kind of involves subjection of God too, right?

[59:10] I mean, there is something irreparable about certain certain evils, right? You know, I mean, this you know, read? This tragedy by Shakespeare, you know, was it called Othello, right? I mean, you know, I remember first reading Othello, one of the first tragedies I read by myself. You know, I wasn't spoiled in class in high school. You know, I mean, you mean imagine, you know, Othello when he realizes that his wife is really innocent, right?

[59:37] And he's killed his innocent wife, right? And you know, that's when he kills himself, right? Eventually, I mean, you know, he's thinking, you know, he's asking all the devils to to roast him and so on, right? You know, like he can't be forgiven for what he's done, right? You know, and how can you ever be forgiven for this, right? Well, because you know, he can't be forgiven for anything, but in this life, but I mean, it seems to be like you know, there is no way he could possibly what you know, he's lost his happiness, his earthly happiness, right?

[1:00:08] Any way, he's been put punishment for what he's done. You know, it's really, really, extremely pitiful, right? So there are some things you know that we can't really overcome, right?

[1:00:25] It's the old thing, you know, they say if you want to want to be angry at somebody, you know, tell them off verbally. Don't don't write a note. There's something permanent about writing a note, right? And and and you are going to have much harder time ever reconciling. You know, if you say some hot words, I mean, that can be harmful too, you know. But if you take the time to sit down, and write a note.

[1:00:49] And they want to see you again. And they want. There is no excuse that it was just my temper. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You have a little time to think about it, presumably. Yeah, you brought that up. It was premeditated, I think. Yeah, yeah. yeah So there's something that you just can't repair you know Mm hmm I'm having a problem misunderstanding the sense of a word. I think I have to show my ignorance to explain it.

[1:01:17] Okay, this sense of the words, thing. I mean, I was reading over my notes and it just how important that is. I mean, it's really the most common mistake in thinking. So I've been doing a lot thinking about that, and one of the things I was thinking about was nature. You know, knowing it by the effects. Yeah. And that's all we can see is the effects, and I, yeah, I kept coming up with the words properties, characteristics, attributes, and that, and then I would look them up, and they all seem to point to quality, attribute being more inherent, characteristics being more distinguishing quality, and property being more of an essential quality.

[1:01:59] Yeah. And then I went back to the notion quality, and that I got from a class, and that was like the senses of passions. Ability or inability, disposition, habit, and the last one is the one that it says shape or form, and and then when I think of shape or form, I think isn't that quantity I can't get past that? What quality about quantity? Yeah, all fourth species.

[1:02:29] Yeah, it is. It is. It's just quality about quantity, though the shape of the object, right? Okay, so maybe I'm not misunderstanding. Yeah, shape or figure is a fourth species of quality in the categories. Yeah, it's tied up with the determination of quantity. All determination. Okay, so I I wasn't making misunderstanding, right?

[1:02:53] Okay, determination. As you can define what's contained by limit or limits, right? You know the figure, right? What's the limits of quantity, right? Kind of quality about quantity. Okay, so it's the limits of quantity is what we're talking about. Yeah, I see. See when Euclid would show that certain what different shaped figures, right, can be what equal, right? When you first start out in geometry, you know you have to kind of place one figure upon the other and they coincide, and therefore you know they're equal, right?

[1:03:28] Then later on, he gets to what show equality of figures that don't have the same shape, and you have to show that in a different way than what by placing one upon the other, right? So they have the same quantity, but but their what shape is different, huh? Yeah. And it's like like the you know between parallel lines, right? They have triangles in parallel lines, and the triangle is half of the what parallelogram.

[1:04:05] Parallelogram the same one, right? Well, then you can figure out a way of making a parallelogram equal to a what to a to triangle, right? Just take take a half the

[1:04:17] the base, right? And you get the rectangle. That's we'll see it, which is equal to the triangle then, right? It's a triangle half of a... The theorem I don't know if you got that far there, but the theorem is where you have Mhm. triangles and parallel grams Mhm. between parallel lines, right? And you know you could show us that all triangles on the same base, right, and the same parallels are what equal, and same with parallelograms.

[1:04:48] But then later on, you can you can see that what a parallelogram on the same base would be twice as big as a triangle on the same base, huh? So if you you divide in half the the base of the triangle and make a parallelogram on the half one, then it must be what. Equal to the triangle, but you don't know that by direct of those two figures anyway.

[1:05:14] Putting one on top of the other, right? Yeah, we use that in Proposition Forty Seven, the one. I use that. Yeah, I've got to use that twice. Yeah, yeah. So the difference in quality, although the quantity is the same, how much would be the same, right?

[1:05:41] The shape would not be the same, so the quality is different. So, Okay. You're arguing there about about pasta in the house, see, because my wife likes the spaghetti and and my son Marcus likes the ziti, right? So more, you know, I don't know whether to see some of these things is. I mean, it's partly shape, you know. The ziti gets a little more chewy than the spaghetti, but I mean, basically, I mean, you go in the supermarket and get all these different shapes pastas, you know, and you know, and they're really basically the same matter but different form, right?

[1:06:24] And it's funny how sometimes things can taste better in one shape than another. I don't know why they should. My son Marcus went down to help my son Paul, his brother there, you know, move. He's stationed in El Paso. Paul's the captain of the army there, but he's going to go down to Florida and teach ROTC, I guess, at the Florida Institute of Technology or something like that.

[1:07:02] So they're going across, you know, quite a few long drive there. But Marcus will be going down in one flight, coming down a different way, right? So he bought one way ticket, right? Well, the suspicion is now people buying one way tickets. So my mother, my mother, my wife had made a big box of presents for the the grandchildren there for Paul and for Paul Elizabeth and so on.

[1:07:27] All the big box, so they made him open up that thing. They went through everything, you know. But happened about two or three times because he had you know a couple of changes, and every time they checked him again. So I said, "That doesn't pay to buy a one way ticket, you know." I mean, it just

[1:07:45] makes you a bomb suspect, you know. I don't know. I mean, I mean, some people don't see them any problem at all, but people, you know, they they go after for some reason. You never. You go out of the month, and when I went to my wedding, anniversary, they checked me twice. I mean, they checked me every time, but. In Boston, you know, I had to go online for about an hour.

[1:08:07] You can say, "Play for ourselves in purgatory now." This was always just a question, kind of like that. I recommend you you save a little money and invest on those. What's the the Gregorian province there? You know how many masses? Oh, thirty. Thirty. Just, just. I, I, I do that sort of thing, you know, or else. I just was wondering because you know, outside of it, yeah, we're talking about time briefly.

[1:08:34] Yeah. Yeah. There used to be the history down through history, right? That they would endow, right? These wealthy men endow a church, right? Chantry they