Summary of Charles Freeman's The Closing of the Western Mind

By IRB Media

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Book Preview:

#1 The fresco in the Carafa Chapel in Santa Maria Sopra Minerva, a Dominican church in Rome, is of the Dominican friar Thomas Aquinas. It shows him crushing a scowling old man beneath his feet, representing evil. The old man is a personification of evil, and he clutches a banner with the Latin inscription Wisdom conquers evil.

#2 The triumph of faith depicted in the fresco is a complex concept that involves trust in what cannot be seen, belief in promises made by God, and a declaration of loyalty or a virtue. It involves some sort of acquiescence in what cannot be proved by rational thought.

#3 The rise of faith over reason occurred in the fourth and fifth centuries A. D. The principles of empirical observation or logic were overruled in the conviction that all knowledge came from God. Yet it was Christianity that began to challenge a well-established and sophisticated tradition of scientific thinking.

• Language: English
• Publisher: IRB Media
• Release date: Jun 2, 2022
• ISBN: 9798822527560

IRB Media

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Insights on Charles Freeman's The Closing of the Western Mind

Contents

Insights from Chapter 1

Insights from Chapter 2

Insights from Chapter 3

Insights from Chapter 4

Insights from Chapter 5

Insights from Chapter 6

Insights from Chapter 7

Insights from Chapter 8

Insights from Chapter 9

Insights from Chapter 10

Insights from Chapter 11

Insights from Chapter 12

Insights from Chapter 13

Insights from Chapter 14

Insights from Chapter 15

Insights from Chapter 16

Insights from Chapter 17

Insights from Chapter 18

Insights from Chapter 19

Insights from Chapter 20

Insights from Chapter 21

Insights from Chapter 1

#1

The fresco in the Carafa Chapel in Santa Maria Sopra Minerva, a Dominican church in Rome, is of the Dominican friar Thomas Aquinas. It shows him crushing a scowling old man beneath his feet, representing evil. The old man is a personification of evil, and he clutches a banner with the Latin inscription Wisdom conquers evil.

#2

The triumph of faith depicted in the fresco is a complex concept that involves trust in what cannot be seen, belief in promises made by God, and a declaration of loyalty or a virtue. It involves some sort of acquiescence in what cannot be proved by rational thought.

#3

The rise of faith over reason occurred in the fourth and fifth centuries A. D. The principles of empirical observation or logic were overruled in the conviction that all knowledge came from God. Yet it was Christianity that began to challenge a well-established and sophisticated tradition of scientific thinking.

Insights from Chapter 2

#1

The Odyssey is a story about the journey home of the Greek hero Odysseus, who washes up on the shore of the land of the Phaeacians after being swept away by the god Poseidon. He is saved by the goddess Leukothea, who gives him a magic scarf that protects him from Poseidon’s fury.

#2

The Greeks had a strong sense of the sacred, and their gods were often personified in human form. They had a variety of festivals, many of which involved games or oracles.

#3

Greek religion was used to mediate political and social tensions. However, political life was not easy, and in the seventh and sixth centuries there were continual clashes between the old aristocratic elites and the newly wealthy traders.

#4

The work of the politician is to shift the city’s affairs into their natural groove of harmony, and he will be sustained by eunomie in achieving this. However, it was also recognized that if the city tended to good order, the universe tended to good order as well.

#5

The Milesians were the first to ask big questions about the world. They believed the world was formed from a single substance water, and that it was balanced by surrounding forces. They also believed that everything came from air.

#6

The Greeks developed a systematic use of reason, which they applied to the natural world and the law courts. They developed the terminology that is still used today.

#7

The process of reasoning was distinguished and segregated in Greek philosophy. The first surviving piece of Greek philosophical reasoning is from the first half of the fifth century, from one Parmenides from the Greek city of Elea in southern Italy.

#8

The next step in the parade of intellectual innovation is to try to isolate the circumstances in which rational argument can be used to achieve certainty without being challenged by what is actually observed by our senses.

#9

The Greeks developed the use of deductive proof, which was based on the use of Aristotelian syllogisms. These postulates were incontrovertible statements that could be used to draw conclusions.

#10

The ancient Greeks were able to deal with the natural world, as it is in a constant state of flux. They were able to identify cause and effect, and they used reason and observation to discard some explanations and formulate others.

#11

The Greeks believed in an order