Ignatius,

Thanks for taking a break from the Big Chief tablets to join us! Sorry, just getting to this now. That's right, soul and the active intellect are the same thing. But the active intellect is a faculty of the soul, which contradicts David's implication that Aristotle had no concept of separable existence of any kind.

Your above comment just came to me again, via Disqus. And yes, the 'as if', is an 'under grounding', so it's not something we make time for, as I suggested in a previous comment. That's also, in accord with your schemata, what makes faith, hope, and charity, theological virtues. In this sense the difficulty of sorting out the Kantian Transcendental Ideal from the Catholic Reality, is to see that our ideas/ideals and our way of life, in themselves, are very 'real'. Thanks again.

I'm sorry, I don't understand your comment. What am I bifurcating? What is the Cartesian soul? I don't see this explained anywhere in your piece.

I apologize if I was intemperate. Perhaps celebrating Eddie Redmayne's Oscar win together can heal any frayed emotions. :)

Faith does have practical norms. It doesn't establish goodness vis a vis the demands of justice. It might inspire one to exceed those demands, such as with mercy, forgiveness, charity --- all which are means ordered to another end, love, but happen to be suitable to that end we call justice. At least, that's my parsing.

Gee I wish I could 'unpack' all of your comments. Just with respect to Kant''s 'as if' and faith. I have found that the 'as if' does not work within practical situations. I cannot even think of the required universal and necessary constraints upon any moral (or satirical) attitude, action, or thought I 'might' take. But why is it that faith is regarded as something that demands a specific religious affiliation. (Catholic criteria of theological virtues, for instance). Yes, I understand the 'metaphysics' of this concept. That it is specifically a 'state of being' is not so widely discussed. I like for instance what Kierkegaard said about this: i.e. living within the sphere of paradox. That, at least 'theoretically' (pun not intended) allows me to be 'open' to the many alternatives of faith and non faith, from the different religious perspectives, to the 'lack' thereof. In this respect, where as faith might be characterized as an internal stance, hope (as per others, and what might happen to my body in the grace over billions of light years, and the possible betterment of mankind, etc. are area of hope. The first I associate with beauty, Holy Ghost, what have you. The second with truth or Jesus, within Catholic/even Kantian 'doctrine'. Thus, from my understanding of your philosophical thesis, I am not in agreement with respect to the arrival of Goodness, independent from the interaction of faith and hope - to love or Goodness, which to quote the bible, is that which belongs to 'God' alone. (Still want to read up on Scotus, et al, though, especially since Kant, it is the will rather than truth which dominates most philosophy?) Thanks again.

As I said, I can't help myself. Usually I 'see the irony' only after I have committed that 'deadly sin'. Don't know how this fits into your criteria of being 'authentic', but then the treatment of this question varies, as usual, between such philosophers as Heidegger and Sartre. So perhaps I can be 'sincerely, ironical'.

Usually we employ standards of evidence and burdens of proof. While the rules of evidence remain the same, what we can reasonably expect to do with that evidence will vary.

As I view things, as far as evidence is concerned, we're all in the same boat. So, we don't really differ, believers vs nonbelievers, in how we gather evidence or admit evidence. At least, I don't feel we should. Epistemology is epistemology is epistemology. How we describe reality remains a constant. No NOMA. Same HOWs of epistemology.

A question arises regarding our ultimate concerns and primal realities, different WHATs, that recede over the horizon of the axioms of our systems, per Godel's implications for TOEs per Hawking, Jaki, Polkinghorne, et al. There are a number of reasonable suspicions regarding same, many very suggestive, none decisive. Beyond this descriptive stalemate, then, a normative question arises, what is called an existential disjunction, which means a decision "to live as if " this is the case or that.

The same thing happens even regarding proximate realities when
insufficient evidence is available, notwithstanding the fact that sufficient methodologies are, or when methodological constraints do impinge. For example, many throughout the world are deliberating about the present and/or future value of stocks and bonds in the energy sector, given the price of oil. All are equipoised, faced with equiprobable interpretations of the same facts that are plausible, yet need to make decisions to hold or sell. Not to decide is to decide, for it's a forced choice with vital financial consequences, informed by several live options.

Beyond our best empirical and rational efforts, then, practical and pragmatic concerns arise. These have been variously addressed by William James (will to believe), Pascal (wager), JS Mill (license to hope) but require, too, the preambles of faith (Aquinas) so as not to fall prey to a vulgar pragmatism or fideism.

So, the best philosophers of religion have determined that faith is eminently reasonable and existentially actionable even though not metaphysically demonstrable. To that extent, it enjoys epistemic parity with other stances toward ultimate reality, like the materialist monisms. That's why the UN Declaration of Human Rights and the US Bill of Rights and long-established jurisprudence of many countries around the world respect and protect religious liberty, free exercise, nonestablishment and such.

Humankind, then, has in the largest measure sanctioned religious freedom and valued the contributions of religion, socially and culturally. Greater ranges of freedom are extended to our modes of interaction with God or other conceptions of primal reality than are granted in our interactions with one another in our temporal reality.

Our interactions with one another, morally, economically, politically, etc are transparent to human reason without recourse to special divine revelations.

The amount of evidence required for religious exercise requires a lower burden of proof throughout the world. The amount required for matters of conscience, morally, are much higher, requiring a higher burden of proof because others' freedoms are in play. It takes more evidence to stop, even more to search, much more to arrest, very much more to hold liable and a whole lot more to convict. Same rules for gathering and presenting evidence, different burdens of proof, depending on what one hopes to do with it, especially as it impinges on or coerces other people --- morally, economically, politically.

In my opinion, more quarrels should be had regarding epistemology and moral reasoning, while we leave each other alone regarding religion vis a vis creedal affirmations. Epistemology and morals are transparent to human reason and do not rely on religious foundations. Those who reason from faith to morals aren't helping matters. That's bad epistemology, though, not flawed religion. Those who fly planes into towers are morally corrupt. Their "morality" doesn't enjoy free exercise, only their devotionals.

Those who are militantly atheological are often well intended in trying to purge immoral impulses. Most of the world suspects they have chosen the wrong culprit (evaluative dispositions of believers) and sociological and historical evidence bears this out, so they don't gain much traction academically or in the world's parliaments, only in popular and social media.

I get the irony. Well done. :)

I did read his essay that you graciously cited.. Indeed I have and read many of his books