An Exploration into Classical Theism, Part 4: Word Salad

As we discovered last time, the philosophy of Thomism has some major issues with basic epistemology. It pretends to know things that cannot possibly be known, and then it constantly obsesses over answers that have no discernable difference either way. This would all be bad enough on its own, and it immediately disqualifies Thomism from any serious conversation in the philosophical arena. In the realm of Christian philosophy, however, this level of failure is just the warm up act for an ever-expanding heap of continuous failures.

A perfect example of this phenomenon is the very the writing style of Thomas Aquinas. It’s terrible! It is not the work of someone who is thinking rigorously about his arguments and then editing them for clarity. Rather, you get the distinct impression that Aquinas just scribbled words onto paper in an unfiltered stream of consciousness.

To demonstrate, consider the following paragraph, which I honestly plucked entirely at random from the Summa Theologica (pp. 522). In response to the question of Whether the five exterior senses are properly distinguished, Aquinas says:

Size, shape, and the like, which are called "common sensibles," are midway between "accidental sensibles" and "proper sensibles," which are the objects of the senses. For the proper sensibles first, and of their very nature, affect the senses; since they are qualities that cause alteration. But the common sensibles are all reducible to quantity. As to size and number, it is clear that they are species of quantity. Shape is a quality about quantity. Shape is a quality about quantity, since the notion of shape consists of fixing the bounds of magnitude. Movement and rest are sensed according as the subject is affected in one or more ways in the magnitude of the subject or of its local distance, as in the movement of growth or of locomotion, or again, according as it is affected in some sensible qualities, as in the movement of alteration; and thus to sense movement and rest is, in a way, to sense one thing and many. Now quantity is the proximate subject of the qualities that cause alteration, as surface is of color. Therefore the common sensibles do not move the senses first and of their own nature, but by reason of the sensible quality; as the surface by reason of color. Yet they are not accidental sensibles, for they produce a certain variety in the immutation of the senses. For sense is immuted differently by a large and by a small surface: since whiteness itself is said to be great or small, and therefore it is divided according to its proper subject.

With all due respect to the “sophisticated” philosophical traditions of classical theism, this entire paragraph is nothing more than a frantic expulsion of incomprehensible word salad. This is not the writing of someone who knows what he’s talking about. It is the writing of someone who is trying to trick you into thinking that he knows what he’s talking about.

It’s important to understand that is not just a mere matter of me failing to understand the jargon. What we are witnessing here is a fundamental inability of Thomas Aquinas himself to formulate coherent thoughts. There are thousands more examples of this stuff littered all throughout his writing. It’s a textbook example of classical a philosophical principle known as bullshit---the use of pretentious-sounding language designed to sound impressive while simultaneously avoiding any tangible claims [1]. Noam Chomsky famously captured the essence of this phenomenon with his sentence, Colorless green ideas sleep furiously. It illustrates the distinction between syntax and semantics, in that merely constructing a grammatically valid sentence does not necessarily guarantee of a meaningful thought.

In an ideal world, this sort of gibberish nonsense would be squashed into oblivion, but the Thomists seem to treat this as one of its greatest selling points. It’s the philosophical security blanket all over again, whereby any criticism can be dismissed outright with a casual wave of their hands. After all, if you don’t find Aquinas’ arguments compelling, then obviously you just don’t understand Aquinas, and therefore you’re in no position to offer any serious rebuttals. Thomas Aquinas is, after all, the greatest philosopher who ever lived, and we should all be glad to grow closer to God by studying his work.

The really sad thing about all this incomprehensible babbling is that it isn’t just bad philosophy; it’s bad theology! Nobody wants to attend a church that glorifies the distinction between common sensibles versus accidental sensibles. They want to feel the spirit and learn how to behave like better people in their community. So in what logical universe does it make any sense for the Catholic church to embrace the writings of Thomas Aquinas as official doctrine? I should not need a magic decoder ring just to make sense out of this stuff. If you cannot learn to communicate effectively, then even the best ideas in the world cannot be distinguished from no ideas at all. 

Continue to Part 5.

Notes/References

1. Frankfurt, H. On Bullshit, ‎ Princeton University Press (2005) [link]

An Exploration into Classical Theism, Part 3: Thomas Aquinas

After experiencing a sizable body of classical theist media, it is pretty safe to say that the community loves Thomas Aquinas. The guy is, after all, a literal saint in the eyes of the Catholic church, and his writings have been elevated to the status of near scripture. Thus, in the eyes of classical theism, Thomas Aquinas is officially the greatest super-genius who ever walked the Earth [1,2,3,4,5]. It’s almost cultish how much they adore the guy, and it reminds of how Mormons tend to think of Joseph Smith [6]. Modern classical theism is, for all practical purposes, synonymous with Thomism, and so any exploration into the subject requires us to get familiar with Thomas Aquinas.

The first thing about Thomism that immediately stands out to me is the sheer volume of literature involved. The Summa Theologica, for example, is generally considered to be Aquinas’ magnum opus, and the document is over 4000 pages in length. After that, you have the Summa Contra Gentiles, which is another 700 pages, followed by the Commentaries on the Gospel of John, which adds yet another 1000 pages on top of that. The Complete Works of Thomas Aquinas is available on Kindle, and it boasts over 17-thousand pages of documentation [7]; only it’s not really a “complete” collection, because it’s still missing the Disputed Questions on Truth (1300 pages), The Disputed Questions on Virtue (420 pages), and On Evil (560 pages).

It’s not just Aquinas that appears to be in love with the sound of his own voice. In an apparent desire to emulate his master, Thomist Philosopher Edward Feser has likewise produced a substantial volume of his own literature in excess of 2000 pages and counting [8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15] (and that’s not even including his regular blog!). It’s almost comical how bloated the literature is on this stuff, and I can’t help but feel reminded of the famous quote by Winston Churchill:

This report, by its very length, defends itself against the risk of being read.

Granted, mere word count alone is not some automatic deal breaker, but it can be gigantic red flag. In the world of classical theism, the enormous volume of literature almost serves as a kind of security blanket. Anyone who dares to refute some particular aspect of Aquinas’ first way, for example, can simply be ignored on the grounds that they are not yet properly educated on the foundations of rigorous theology. Unless you’ve completely digested the requisite introduction of six full-length books plus seven journal articles, then you are not even worthy of a proper rebuttal [16]. They do this sort of thing all the time, even when other PhD theologians are the ones giving the actual critique [17].

But hey, if that’s how you want to play it, then fine. Let’s take a look at Aquinas, shall we? What sort of topics were so important to the good philosopher that he honestly needed over 17,000 pages of documentation? To answer that question, we need look no further than the table of contents. In the Summa Theologica alone, we find hundreds upon hundreds of pages devoted to such thrilling topics as:

• Whether angels assume bodies?
• Whether the angels exercise functions of life in the bodies assumed?
• Whether an angel is in a place?
• Whether an angel can be in several places at once?
• Whether several angels can be at the same time in the same place?
• Whether an angel can understand many things at the same time?
• Whether the movement of an angel is instantaneous?
• Whether an angel’s act of understanding is his substance?
• Whether an angel knows himself?
• Whether an angel knows another? 
• Whether one angel speaks to another?
• Whether local distance influences the angelic speech?
• Whether the orders of the angels are properly named?
• ... and so on, and so forth.

You may be familiar with the question, “How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?” That question is a direct mockery of the scholastic tradition typified by people like Thomas Aquinas. The guy had absolutely no problem with writing dozens of detailed essays over topics that were simultaneously irrelevant and unknowable. It reminds me of a popular debate topic among sci-fi nerds that asks whether or not the USS Enterprise could defeat an Imperial star destroyer in space battle. It’s a totally meaningless question for which there is no objectively correct answer, and it offers no practical distinction even if there were. Yet, for some strange reason, the internet is full of highly passionate nerds arguing their pet theories anyway [18].

This is a gigantic embarrassment, and it betrays a number of utterly dismal failures in the entire classical theist philosophy. The most immediate failure is the tendency to derive unwavering conviction over questions that cannot possibly be answered with certainty. On the topic of angels, for example, Aquinas explores dozens of questions about their physical composition, biological functions, intellectual capacity, and even their social structure. It really makes you wonder: How in the hell could he possibly know any of this information? Has he even seen an angel? Does he interact with them regularly? Did he conduct any field studies with documented observations? What experimental tests did he perform to validate his theories against empirical predictions?

Obviously, he didn’t do any of that stuff. Everything Thomas Aquinas pretended to know about angels was derived entirely through pure, armchair philosophy---as in literally, he thought really hard about it for a while and then wrote down whatever he decided the answers must be. It’s basically the philosophical equivalent to making shit up out of nothing and then hiding that fact under a veil of pretentious rationalizations. It’s a dead giveaway that Thomas Aquinas, and by extension all of his modern proponents, have no understanding of how basic epistemology works. They honestly believe that if they just close their eyes and concentrate hard enough, then the power of reason will magically endow them with rote facts about objective reality; not just mere hypotheses, mind you, but absolute certainties beyond all rational dispute.

Barring that failure, let’s suppose we’re feeling generous and just grant anyway that local distance indeed influences angelic speech. Now what? What am I supposed to do with that information? Do I need to account for that in any way? Can I measure some sort of time the delay between prayer and response? Do I need to pray more loudly if I'm further way from angels so that they can hear me?

Or better yet, what if the opposite conclusion were true? What changes? Does this mean instantaneous communication is possible? Can I exploit that to send information backwards in time? No? Then what difference does it make? What decisions can I now make in the real world with real, empirical consequences, that will manifest under the expectation of a spatial independence on angelic speech? Please enlighten me.

The obvious problem is that it makes absolutely no difference either way. Angels, according to Thomism, are "immaterial" beings and thus cannot be observed or quantified in any empirical capacity. So even if we grant entirely that angels exists (which we don't), then there's nothing we can ever possibly do about it. It’s another profound failing of the entire Thomist tradition, in that they love to obsess endlessly over trivially irrelevant information that carries no distinction between truth and falsehood.

A classic example of this behavior is the so-called doctrine of Divine Simplicity, which basically holds that God is perfectly simple in his composition. That is to say, God is without parts, and the very being of God is identical to the attributes of God (whatever that means). So let's ask a simple question: What if, hypothetically, this doctrine turned out to be mistaken? Say, for instance, God was actually comprised of two parts rather than one. How exactly would that change anything? Do you suddenly stop going to church over this? Would you pray less, or pay any less tithing? Do you stop marveling at the beauty of the universe? Do you love your neighbors any less?

Clearly, the answer is no. Nothing actually changes if this doctrine happens to be wrong, yet you still find Thomist philosophers wasting hours of our lives about it anyway [19,20,21]. It’s as if the Thomist community is completely clueless how basic Christianity operates. Remember that God is supposed to be an all-loving being who desperately wants to build a deep, personal connection with all of his human children. We will literally be damned if we fail to build this relationship, so presumably it ought to be easy to connect with God directly and get to know Him. Yet, according to the classical theists, we cannot even hope to have a coherent discussion about God’s very existence without first studying a mountain of literature in excess of the Bible itself. 

Is it any wonder why the Catholic church is hemorrhaging members? It should not require a PhD in theology just to demonstrate basic religious facts. A God that hides Himself behind a wall of bloated ivory-tower literature is hardly a God that deserves any serious consideration, let alone devotion.

Continue to Part 4.

Notes/References

1. Brian Holdsworth, “Why St. Thomas Aquinas is so Important” (2020) [link]
2. Bishop Robert Barron, “Bishop Barron on St. Thomas Aquinas” (2009) [link]
3. Bishop Robert Barron, “Bishop Barron on Thomas Aquinas’ Writing” (2011) [link]
4. EWTN, “St, Thomas Aquinas---Who is St. Thomas Aquinas” [link]
5. “The Thomistic Institute exists to promote Catholic truth in our contemporary world by strengthening the intellectual formation of Christians at universities, in the Church, and in the wider public square. The thought of St. Thomas Aquinas, the Universal Doctor of the Church, is our touchstone.” – The Thomistic Institute [link]
6. “Joseph Smith, the Prophet and Seer of the Lord, has done more, save Jesus only, for the salvation of men in this world, than any other man that ever lived in it.” – John Taylor, Third President of the LDS Church
7. The Complete Works of Thomas Aquinas, Kindle Edition [link]
8. Feser, E., Five Proofs of the Existence of God, 336 pages (2017) [link]
9. Feser, E., Aquinas: A Beginner’s Guide (2009), 224 pages [link]
10. Feser, E., Scholastic Metaphysics: A Contemporary Introduction, 290 pages (2014) [link]
11. Feser, E., Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science, 515 pages (2019) [link]
12. Feser, E., Philosophy of Mind: A Beginner’s Guide, 276 pages (2006) [link]
13. Feser, E., Locke, 196 pages (2013) [link]
14. Feser, E., The Last Superstition: A Refutation of the New Atheism, 312 pages (2010) [link]
15. Feser, E., On Nozick, 104 pages (2003) [link]
16. Feser, E., “A Clue for Jerry Coyne” (2011) [link]
17. Feser, E., “Classical Theism and the Nature of God" (2019) [link] (being at timestamp 34:00)
18. “USS Enterprise-D vs Imperial II Star Destroyer | Star Trek vs Star Wars: Who Would Win” [link]
19. Feser, E., "Distinguishing Classical Theism from Theistic Personalism," Southern Evangelical Seminary YouTube Channel [link]
20. "Robert Barron vs. William L. Craig - Divine Simplicity," YouTube [link]
21. Mathoma, “A Defense of Classical Theology (Part 2): God is not a god," YouTube (2018) [link]
    

An Exploration into Classical Theism, Part 2: The Community

There are many influential figures in the world of Christian apologetics. At present, the most popular names appear to include William Lane Craig, Alvin Plantinga, Frank Turek, Lee Strobel, John Lennox, plus a number of popular YouTube personalities. They’re a pretty productive bunch, churning out regular videos, essays, and podcasts at an impressive pace. They work very hard to give you the impression of a rich, intellectual tradition that supports the ultimate reality of God’s existence as understood by the doctrines of traditional Protestant theology.

Not to be outdone, the Thomist community also has its own collection of influential figures who serve as the public face for their philosophy. The most prominent names appear to include Robert Barron and Edward Feser, plus a number of minor personalities and anonymous YouTube channels. They’re not nearly as popular as their Protestant counterparts, but they do seem to have a significant and dedicated following.

One the first things to jump out at me as I began my research into Thomism is the community itself. To be perfectly frank, this community is overrun with some the most pretentious philosophical snobs I have ever had the misfortune to encounter. I’m talking about the kind of people who take every opportunity to name-drop philosophical figures like Sartre and Nietzsche, or who unironically use the word “metaphysics” in every other sentence. They act as if Thomism is the ultimate paragon of philosophical sophistication, and they make it out as if Christianity is the only logical conclusion one can draw from sincere evaluation of the arguments [1]---not just “mere” Christianity, mind you, but very specifically their own brand of classical theism in the Catholic tradition.

One classic manifestation of this attitude is the way in which Thomists go out of their way to talk trash about the so-called New Atheism. It’s weirdly consistent how they do, too, as if they’re all following some sort of secret playbook. Read any book, watch any lecture, or listen to any podcast on classical theism, and it is very likely that you will be subjected to a brief tirade about the philosophical ineptitude of the entire New Atheist movement [2,3,4,5,6]. They especially seem to enjoy picking on Richard Dawkins, as if he were some sort of holy patron saint to modern atheism [7,8,9,10]. It almost comes off as a goofy form of projection, in that they universally venerate Thomas Aquinas as their philosophical overlord, and so they just take it for granted that the entire atheist community would naturally think the same way about Dawkins. Either that, or they literally have nothing else to go on, and so they’re really just that excited to see their man Aquinas get acknowledged.

It’s important to understand that Thomist philosophy is not exactly well-respected in mainstream philosophical circles. I don’t mean in the sense that a bunch of atheist philosophers are sitting around the water cooler telling jokes to each other about how lame Thomism is. I mean it’s basically ignored. I’ve been engaging openly with popular Christian philosophy for over a decade now, and I’ve only barely just become aware of their existence. The simple fact of the matter is that Protestant Evangelical Christianity is the loudest and most politically active force in American culture, and so it is only natural that the majority of secular backlash would be focused against their particular school of thought.

It’s extremely bizarre to watch the Thomist community process this information. On the one hand, classical theism stands in direct opposition to theistic personalism, and so it is only natural for them to stand with us atheists in denouncing it publicly. On the other hand, standing with us atheists would require them to…. well… stand with atheists. And since atheists are the greatest dummy-heads in the universe, they cannot bear to tarnish their image by having any such association. The result is thus an extremely ham-fisted contortion of reality where atheists are simultaneously 100% right and 100% stupid in their criticism of mainstream religion.

One of the most blatant manifestations of this catch-22 can be found in a 2015 speech by Robert Barron entitled, “Aquinas and Why the New Atheists Are Right” [2]. In it, he very deliberately paints a picture of theistic personalism as some kind of fanciful concoction of the New Atheist movement. He knows perfectly well that hundreds of millions of Protestants around the world happily endorse this theology, but he still cannot help but accuse atheists of fabricating a “Straw God.”

Barron is not alone in this behavior, either, and there are numerous examples of other classical theists following a very similar playbook. Edward Feser, for example, is notorious for his portrayal of modern atheists as a gaggle of imbeciles who have no grasp on how “proper” theology really works [6]---as if the entirety of all Protestant Christianity is merely “unsophisticated” and therefore not even worth mentioning. Catholicism, it seems, is the undisputed champion of all Christian intelligentsia, and you cannot possibly hope to do “serious” philosophy without directly tackling their particular brand of theology. It’s a very pompous attitude that only indicates a fragile little core of highly delicate egos. You almost get the impression that, on some deeply subconscious level, even the classical theists themselves are not entirely confident in their own arguments.

Continue to Part 3.

Notes/References

1. Edward Feser, "The Road From Atheism," (2012) [link]
   
2. Bishop Barron on the New Atheists (2009) [link]
3. Fr. Robert Barron, “Aquinas and Why the New Atheists are Right" (2015) [link]
4. Fr. Pine, “Explaining Thomas Aquinas’ Proofs,” Pints With Aquinas [link]
5. A Defense of Classical Theology (Part 1): The New Atheism and the Cosmological Arguments [link]
6. Edward Feser, “What We Owe the New Atheists” (2014) [link]
7. Pints with Aquinas, "Edward Feser Explodes Richard Dawkins’ “Refutation” of Aquinas’ 5 Ways" (2017) [link]
8. Pints with Aquinas, "Edward Feser Continues to Refute Richard Dawkins’ Objections to Aquinas’ 5 Ways" (2017) [link]
9. Pints with Aquinas, “Aquinas v Dawkins on God’s Existence" (2019) [link]
10. Mark McNeil, “Dawkins vs Aquinas, Part One” (2013) [link]
    

An Exploration into Classical Theism, Part 1: Introduction

I’ve received a number of requests to give a secular analysis of a philosophical tradition known as Classical Theism. I was initially hesitant to get too involved in this stuff, due to the relatively minor influence it carries in mainstream media. By far, Protestant Evangelical Christianity is the dominant force within American politics and culture, so it seemed kind of pointless to pick on a such a fringe group. However, as I exposed myself to more of their literature, I began to realize that this community indeed carries weight over a significant number of believing Christians. It also appears that the secular community has done very little to break down their arguments for a lay audience. The sheer immensity of it all can come off as quite intimidating to a doubting Christian youth, and there are likely many millions of them being manipulated by the destructive ideas it teaches. So for better or for worse, I’ve finally committed myself to a detailed analysis of classical theism, as well as a thorough debunking of their more popular arguments.

For those of you who have never heard of classical theism, it is an ancient philosophical tradition that defines God as the ultimate being. He is not a thing in the universe, per se, nor is He a person in the strictest sense. Rather, God exists as a kind of ipsum esse subsistens, which is generally described with bizarre phrases like “the subsistent act of to be itself [1].” It is arguably one of the first failings of the entire tradition, in that it cannot even define "God" in coherent terms. Their literature is teeming with similar bits of nonsensical gibberish, too, and I'll have a lot more to say on this later. Suffice to say, it's the sort of language that sounds deep and intellectual at first, but fundamentally doesn't mean anything.

The most commonly cited opposition to classical theism is a view known as theistic personalism. Under personalism, God is a being who exists as a thing in reality with various parts coming together into one, divine whole [2]. It's the sort of distinction that, from a purely secular perspective, almost feels like a gigantic exercise in hair-splitting, and very little of this stuff seems to have relevance to the average, pew-sitting Christian. Nevertheless, the classical theists are extremely adamant about these sorts of things, and there is a strong community of PhD theologians who love to debate about it from their ivory towers.

In principle, classical theism is a highly nuanced philosophy with many competing schools of thought among prominent theologians. In practice, however, anyone who honestly cares enough to personally identify with the label of “classical theist” will almost universally be Catholic. Indeed, the Catholic church has openly embraced classical theism as its official doctrine, and the debate against theistic personalism is apparently just a squabble between Catholics and Protestants. So if you ever get the impression that classical theists have a bit of chip on their shoulder, then this seems to explain why.

Another recurring theme in the classical theist community is the universal veneration they seem to have for St. Thomas Aquinas. The very word Thomism even refers directly to the collective philosophical views of Aquinas himself, and I have yet to encounter a single living classical theist who wasn’t also a Thomist. It’s hard to overstate the adoration this community seems to have for the guy. After listening to the classical theists, you get the impression that Thomas Aquinas was the greatest embodiment of pure, philosophical genius who ever graced God’s green Earth. This is hardly surprising, however, once you realize that the Catholic church has formally accepted the writing of Aquinas as its own, second only in significance to the Holy Bible itself [3]. Thus, for all practical purposes, the terms classical theism, Thomism, and Catholicism may as well all be synonymous with each other, and you can pretty much use them interchangeably without much confusion.

At this point, my initial reaction towards the philosophy of classical theism was an overpowering sense of boredom. Perhaps some of you are even feeling it right now. I genuinely do not care about the subtle distinctions between Catholic and Protestant theology, and it’s not like these dudes are winning any popularity contests. According to survey after survey, American religiosity has been steadily declining since the 1990s, and it shows no sign of stopping any time soon [4]. The Catholic church is hemorrhaging members at a record pace, so why even bother with yet another analysis of a bunch of convoluted rhetorical arguments?

 

Despite their decline in overall relevance, I think it is important to remember that the Catholic church is still a highly potent force in American politics and culture. They also continue to hold huge sway internationally, enjoying total dominance over entire continents like Central and South America. They claim over a billion members on their roles worldwide, and significant growth appears to be happening in both Africa and Asia. I find it hard to shake the image of so many poor classrooms full of naive Catholic youth being forced to sit through yet another uncomfortable tirade about the evils of masturbation, or yet another cover-up of sexual misconduct in the clergy [5]. There almost certainly exist millions of trapped youth who struggle to find the right words for articulating their doubts, and it is blogs like this that often give them the resources to break free.

So to all of you doubting young Catholics, just hang in there. This series is for you.

Continue to Part 2.

Notes/References

1. Bishop Barron on Who God Is & Who God Isn't (2013) [link]
   
2. Edward Feser, "Distinguishing Classical Theism from Theistic Personalism" [link]
   
3. “Thomism,” New World Encyclopedia (2020) [link]
   
4. “In US, Decline of Christianity Continues at a Rapid Pace,” Pew Research Center (2019) [link]
5. "Catholic clergy in France abused more than 10,000 child victims, independent commission estimates," The Washington Post (March, 2021) [link]