http://www.discoveryofunknown.com/sammohan-shakti-mantra-for-love/

excellent little summary.

This is all very loosey-goosey and analogical, so I don't expect it to
convince you, but I put this forward as one reasonable way of thinking
about the "intelligibility of nature".

For what it's worth, I don't expect to convince others, either. To me, the value comes from learning about new ways of understanding things. I appreciate your thoughts, and I do think you have offered a good explanation of your position. It has given me something to think about. I hope that my thoughts are of similar value to those I speak with.

Hi loreenlee,

It ought to all form an organic whole. That is part of the beauty of the Aristotelian-Thomistic synthesis (this is not to say that the A-T system is the end-all be-all and that it gets everything 100% correct, since perfect knowledge is not possible in this life).

Natural law has a direct connection to teleology, which is known as "final causality" in the A-T system. What something is (its nature or "formal cause") is based upon the ends towards which it is directed, i.e., its final cause.

Now there is a distinction in how natural law applies to natural inert objects (e.g., rocks, clouds, planets, moons, etc), how it applies to objects created by humans (e.g., computers, cars, knives, etc), and how it applies to living beings (e.g., plants, plankton, penguins, and human persons). But this is only because these are intrinsically different types of objects. But the concept is the same: the type of object it is will dictate the ends towards which it is directed.

Now when it comes to persons with free will there is a further way that we can see natural law at work. Just as we see formal and final causes at work in all those above categories, so we see them at work in human actions in many various ways. Natural law shows us that all reality was created--from top to bottom--to flourish by acting in certain ways that are in line with its nature and final cause. When things are acting in accord with their nature they flourish, when they don't act in accord with their nature, they don't flourish. (Some get hung up here by pointing to evolution and the evolving of species. But that ain't no problem for Aristotle because the type of being it is shows forth what it means for it to flourish. So if a new animal comes into being, then a slightly different nature/form and final cause has also come into existence.)

Now, rocks, planets, plants, plankton, and penguins do not have a conceptional-rational intellect and free will, so they cannot direct themselves in congruence with the proper end of their nature. So when a penguin is not flourishing, it is not a moral issue. It is a moral issue when a human person does something that is not in accord with its nature.

For example--purposely killing an innocent human life undermines the natural end life for that human person. When we take it a step further from secular rational ethics into moral theology, we understand that harming another person also harms oneself. The human person is made to love and give ourselves so others may have life to the fullest. But killing another does not form ourself in the image of love. We deform our very being to the extent that we carry out immoral actions.

So in the end, if we wanna be happy and flourish--follow natural law and seek to unite ourselves with the end that God created for our human nature: unity with God himself in this life and eternally in the next!

Hope this helps some!

Another difficulty I have had with this post (lest I go into another crazy rant) involves a possible definition of natural law, - something perhaps omitted from this OP. I have always! understood natural law to describe? issues of morality. It would thus be distinguished from, and by the same 'measure' conformable to the acceptance of 'developing' theories? of physical laws related to the material universe. Correct me if I am wrong...or help me please, I'm 'falling'????

I understood some recent remarks on this site as suggesting that Catholic doctrine (or dogma) does not arise from 'reason' or natural philosophy, etc. If this is true, is there a conflict/contradiction in the 'use' of Aristotle's philosophy as the basis of 'trans-substantiation' for instance. Please. Have I or have I not discovered? 'another' contradiction?

We don't even 'understand' language - either as a map or 'the' terrain!!!