Philosophy’s Restoration & the Return to Common Sense, by Dr. Donald DeMarco

By Dr. Donald DeMarco, Catholic Exchange, Aug. 2, 2021

Dr. Donald DeMarco is Professor Emeritus, St. Jerome’s University and Adjunct Professor at Holy Apostles College. He is a regular columnist for St. Austin Review and is the author of thirty-nine books. …

“Since the modern world began in the sixteenth century,” wrote G. K. Chesterton, “nobody’s system of philosophy has really corresponded to everybody’s sense of reality; to what, if left to themselves, common men would call common sense”. The prolific British essayist wrote these words in his book Saint Thomas Aquinas: The Dumb Ox, where he elucidated and affirmed the Angelic Doctor’s common sense philosophy.

Although Aquinas has not been forgotten, various philosophies of uncommon nonsense have dominated the intellectual landscape since the medieval period. Philosophy lost its intimate connection with reality and became either too pragmatic to be considered wisdom or too abstract to be taken seriously.  …