Browsing by Author "Branya, John"
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- ItemAnthropological foundation of the levels of happiness : Robert Spitzer, Abraham Maslow and Leonardo Polo(Miscelanea Poliana, ) Branya, JohnThe purpose of this paper is to see how Leonardo Polo’s Transcendental Anthropology can give a foundation to the levels of happiness of Robert Spitzer, in his work: Healing the Culture and the hierarchy of basic needs of Abraham Maslow. Spitzer distinguishes four levels of happiness according to the inner tendencies of the human being, which he names in Latin as “laetus, felix, beatitudo and gaudio”. Maslow orders the basic human needs from physiological to safety, love, esteem, and finally self actualization. This paper observes that a) both Spitzer and Polo are in agreement with the perennial philosophy views about happiness and b) that Polo gives a trans-metaphysical (transcendental) grounding to a personal consideration of the last two levels analysed by Spitzer and c) that Maslow bases his analysis in dynamic psychology, and tends to mix Spitzers’ last three levels in his three last levels of needs.
- ItemAnthropology for Rebels (A different way of doing philosophical anthropology)(Strathmore University Press, Nairobi, 2015) Branya, JohnAnthropology for Rebels is a highly recommended book for those interested in discovering what our person is and how it has been understood over the centuries. The title reflects the underlining attitude of the author, of not accepting any approach that reduces the human person to something inferior to its total splendor. This attitude contrasts with the common points of view one may find in pseudo–scientific and popular articles that try to reduce the human excellence to the method used to study rocks, plants, animals or numbers. The method to study the person should be above the normal use of the abstractive intelligence, or the intelligence limited to reason. There is a higher level of knowledge to the discursive knowledge, which some authors call intuitive knowledge and that Professor Sellés calls habitual knowledge. The book gives also profound insights on human affections, education, ethics and politics as part and parcel of the world created by the person. Another added advantage of this book is to be a good introduction to the Philosophical Anthropology initiated by the Spanish Philosopher Leonardo Polo and the understanding of the four personal transcendental, which give a deeper vision of the social nature of man, its radical freedom, a new view of the acting intelligence of Aristotle and a profound view of personal love.
- ItemIntroduction to Leonardo Polo's philosophical motivationBranya, JohnThe purpose of this article is to give a brief bird’s eye view of L. Polo highlighting the motivation and originality of his philosophy. We do not intend to assess how original he was and whether his claims are accurate or not. That will require a longer and deeper study which goes beyond the limits of this article.
- ItemStrathmore University social and political philosophy senior students personal development projects 2009(Strathmore University, 2009) Branya, JohnINTRODUCTION This is a collection of Personal Development Projects reports done by some of the 66 evening class students of Principles of Ethics during the 2nd Semester of the year 2009. There are not necesarily the best, but they are significant. They show how «applied philosophy» could benefit all of us. A sound grounding of philosophical concepts improves our way of seeing ourselves, others and our environment. Because actions follows knowledge, proper knowledge of what we are and what we are meant to do, improves our actions, for our own and others benefit. The reports included in this sampler have been modified to preserve the privacy of the authors. Except for names and companies, the rest are «real life» situations, perceptions, actitudes and behaviours. The purpose of this sampler is to help each one of us to «budget our life» seeing how our colleagues do it. For those who want to try I have included the instructions given to the students for the project. The results of these projects are not the consequence of one subject, or one lecturer, but of the sum of efforts of the students themselves, many lecturers, mentors and other personnel who remain, as the authors, anonimous in the background, for example the project methodology was developed by Ms. C. Dean among others. edit this entry delete this entry
- ItemSynderesis according to Leonardo Polo Barrena(Strathmore University, 2016) Branya, JohnThe present work tries to see whether Leonardo Polo´s proposal expands synderesis in a way that, assuming the medieval traditional views, it can be the ontological basis for grounding a personalistic view of ethics.Synderesis seems to be a controversial topic. The human reality behind the term was touched upon by Greek and Latin philosophers but the term was not used in classic philosophy. It was Jerome the first to use this term in his commentary to Ezequiel 1:4-14. This was a theological treatise. Synderesis was a popular term among philosophers in the Middle Ages especially after Peter Lombard included St. Jerome’s commentary in his Sentences. Peter Lombard’s Sentences was a common textbook in most universities and therefore synderesis became a compulsory and therefore well know term in medieval philosophy. Aquinas used it extensively as well as his commentators. Aquinas considered synderesis an intellectual habit responsible for the first principles of morality. For Bonaventura synderesis was the will’s inclination to do good. Ockham does not mention synderesis in his works. Luther in his early works mentions it but later breaks with tradition and no longer accepts synderesis as he defended that nature was totally corrupt after the original sin, and synderesis was seen as an unpolluted remain of the original nature which kept men aware of sins. From there on the topic, with rare exceptions, was only developed by those who followed medieval traditions. It looks as if Leonardo Polo not only regains the traditional view of synderesis but makes it a pivotal topic in anthropology. For him synderesis becomes the innate habit through which the personal act of being activates all human faculties. Synderesis then, is at the root of all human decisions, because it becomes the unifying structure of the intellect and will. Because of this it also becomes the root of ethics because it allows viewing human decisions in their relationship with the human integral good.
- ItemThinking about Thinking (Theory of knowledge)(Strathmore University Press, Nairobi, 2013) Branya, JohnWe are continuously thinking but we are not aware of the process unless we stop what we are doing and pause to think about our thinking. The same hap- pens with breathing. Once we are conscious of our breathing we can start experiment to know our powers: we can try to breathe faster, deeper, stop breathing for a while. We can then change impressions with our friends and even devote time to study the process of breathing as a scientist does. To think about thinking is to pause and try to go as deeper as we can into this tool that makes it possible we think about any other thing than thinking itself. While it is true that we can think very well without stopping to consider