Compared to my usual diet of scholarly articles and books, Newman’s writings stood out for what appeared to me as their meandering character. Unlike most contemporary works, Newman does not state upfront what he is going to say and then take the reader through the motions of a demonstration delivered blow by blow. He begins, instead, with a puzzle, or a question, that he brings before his audience; he unfolds his thinking slowly, almost searchingly, from his initial questions; he also frequently refrains from tying up his argument, leaving whatever he said simply to “air” with the reader.
Newman scholars interested in philosophy should take note of Daniel J. Pratt Morris-Chapman’s recent book, Newman in the Story of Philosophy: The Philosophical Legacy of Saint John Henry Newman. While standard histories of philosophy tend to make no mention of Newman as a philosopher, Pratt Morris-Chapman thinks this is a mistake. This is not only because he takes Newman to have a body of philosophical work that is worthy of our attention, but because he takes Newman’s thought to have played an important role in the development and progress of philosophy in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
This essay seeks to clarify the nature of science. It examines popular approaches to science, these approaches’ potential effects, and the perspective that theology can provide to our potential misunderstandings of science.
In the scholarly literature, John Locke (1632–1704) features as a formative influence on Newman’s philosophical thought. What usually gets highlighted, for example in the Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent, are Newman’s criticism of Locke’s notion of degreed assent and his call for a broader and more nuanced account of the rationality of religious belief. However, some have argued that the Grammar largely focuses on the psychological conditions of religious belief.
This article argues that Newman’s notion of a philosophical habit of mind can provide a helpful conceptual framework for navigating conversations about reading, appropriating, and extending his philosophical thought.
