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Truth in the Making

Creative Knowledge in Theology and Philosophy

Robert C Miner author

Format:Hardback

Publisher:Taylor & Francis Ltd

Published:25th Sep '03

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Truth in the Making cover

Is knowing a purely passive reception of something concrete outside the mind, or when we know something, are we creating something too?
Spanning more than 500 years of philosophical enquiry from the Middle Ages to the present day, Robert Miner clarifies modern philosophical conceptions of knowing as making or constructing, and contrasts this view with the theological understanding of knowing as a participation in divine creation.
This study demonstrates how 'creative knowledge' has its roots in the theologies of Thomas Aquinas and Nicholas Cusanus. It explores the multiple ways in which this idea influenced the architects of modern philosophy, most notably Francis Bacon, René Descartes and Thomas Hobbes, despite their secular stance. Miner contends that, well in advance of Kant, one of these thinkers, Gaimbattista Vico provided a remarkably succinct formulation of the metaphysical and epistemological core of modernity in his principle verum et factum convertuntur: 'the true and the made are convertible'.
In Truth in the Making, Robert Miner challenges the standard assumption that Kant was the first thinker to conceive of knowing as constructive activity, and shows how contemporary theology can reclaim a concept of knowing that is both creative and participant in divine wisdom.

'The book ... can be recommended as an important historical perspective that is vital to any informed understanding of contemporary discourse concerning the source(s) of our knowing.' - The Expository Times

' ... [Robert Miner] has written a book that is as careful as it is ambitious ... the delight of this book is in the details.' -

' ...Truth in the Makingoffers useful expositions of important thinkers ...' - Church Times

'...Truth in the Making tells a compelling story.'- The Thomist

ISBN: 9780415276979

Dimensions: unknown

Weight: 430g

192 pages