Sunday, April 15, 2018

Heliocentrism, Relativism, Soul

Two related problems that Heliocentrism poses to Medieval Theology are: 1. The former displaces the deity of the latter from its location at the circumference of the universe, and 2. It thereby sunders the contiguity of the deity and terrestrial life, without which the Cosmological Proof is groundless.  Now, a third follows from the Relativism that, as has been previously discussed, constitutes Perception.  For, as Hume and Kant each show, but is not fully developed for another century or so by notably  Durkheim, Dewey, Mead, and Heidegger, the Self might transcend a specific experience, but it is not independent of Experience per se.  In other words, it follows that the concept of the Immortal Soul is also challenged by Heliocentism.  Accordingly, Berkeley's attempt to subjectivize Primary Qualities, and, hence, all Perception, as part of his thesis that they are private signs from a deity, may reflect a Theological commitment, rather than a merely Epistemological variation of Lockean Empiricism.

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