Summary - PHIL 101

## Part I — Metaphysics (11 topics) Being, causation, and the structure of reality — the foundational vocabulary everything else builds on. 1. **Introduction** — what A-T philosophy is and why it holds together as one system 2. **Act and Potency** — how change is possible without things ceasing to exist 3. **The Four Causes** — material, formal, efficient, final (with a labeled diagram) 4. **Chance and Fortune** — why "accidents" don't disprove purposeful causation 5. **Hylomorphism** — matter and form as the two principles of physical substances 6. **Prime Matter in Depth** — pure potentiality and the principle of individuation 7. **Substance and Accident** — what exists in itself vs. what exists in another 8. **The Ten Categories in Depth** — all nine accidents mapped around substance (with a wheel diagram) 9. **Essence and Existence** — Aquinas's key addition distinguishing God from creatures 10. **The Transcendentals** — being, unity, truth, goodness, beauty 11. **The Analogy of Being** — univocal vs. equivocal vs. analogical language, including attribution vs. proportionality ## Part II — Philosophy of the Human Soul (13 topics) Cognition, appetite, and the powers of living things. 12. **The Soul and Its Powers** — vegetative, sensitive, rational (with a hierarchy diagram) 13. **Proving the Immortality of the Soul** — the full step-by-step argument 14. **Sense Cognition in General** — proper vs. common sensibles 15. **The Internal Senses** — common sense, imagination, the estimative/cogitative power, memory 16. **Sense Knowledge: Material and Immaterial** — why sensing is a form of knowledge 17. **Natural Mutation vs. Spiritual Mutation** — how the senses receive form without matter 18. **Immanent vs. Transitive Actions** — why cognition perfects the knower rather than changing the world 19. **Appetite: Natural vs. Sensitive** — concupiscible and irascible appetite 20. **The Will and Free Choice** — why the will is free, and how intellect and will move each other 21. **The Passions** — are they morally good or evil? 22. **The Passions in Detail** — all eleven named passions (love/hate, hope/despair, etc.) 23. **The Order Between Cognition and Passion** — which comes first, and the feedback loop between them 24. **The Three Acts of the Mind** — simple apprehension, judgment, reasoning ## Part III — Epistemology (5 topics) Truth, reasoning, and the grounds of knowledge. 25. **Truth as Correspondence** — Aquinas's definition of truth 26. **First Principles of Demonstration** — non-contradiction, excluded middle 27. **Epistemology: Abstraction, Deduction, and Induction** — how universal knowledge is possible 28. **The Problem of Universals** — realism vs. moderate realism vs. nominalism 29. **How We Know Something Is a Rational Being** — the signs of rationality ## Part IV — Ethics (4 topics) Happiness, human action, and the moral life. 30. **Beatitude and the Ultimate End** — why all action aims at happiness 31. **The Structure of the Human Act** — object, intention, circumstances 32. **Natural Law and Virtue Ethics** — the four cardinal virtues 33. **Conscience** — synderesis vs. conscientia ## Part V — Natural Theology (5 topics) What reason alone can conclude about God. 34. **Essentially vs. Accidentally Ordered Causal Series** — sharpening the Five Ways (with a chain diagram) 35. **The Five Ways** — all five of Aquinas's proofs, explained step by step 36. **The Eternity of the World Debate** — Aquinas vs. Bonaventure 37. **Divine Attributes** — simplicity, immutability, eternity, omniscience, and more 38. **The Problem of Evil as Privation** — why evil doesn't disprove God's goodness ## Plus: - **39. Glossary** — every key Latin term defined in one place for quick review - 40. Review Questions — 40+ essay/exam-style prompts covering every topic - Custom illustrations throughout: a cover design, 5 illustrated Part-divider pages, and 4 explanatory diagrams (Four Causes, Ten Categories wheel, Soul hierarchy, Causal chain)