The Philosophy Faculty encompasses the Department of Theoretical Philosophy and Philosophy of Nature and the Natural Sciences, and since 2006 culture studies. It has the highest category granted by the Committee of Scientific Research and is accredited by the University Accrediting Commission. At the moment, the Faculty has 28 chairs and employs full time 28 senior researchers. Moreover, it employs 40 people with PhD and 14 with MA degrees.
The underlying thesis of the research activity of the Department of Theoretical Philosophy is the claim that philosophical thinking should be based on the knowledge of the history of philosophy. Accordingly, studies on the history of philosophy focus on the origins of western philosophy, including the philosophy of Plato and Aristotle. In particular, however, they concentrate on the medieval period, both in its early and developed forms (e.g. St. Thomas Aquinas, John Duns Scotus, William Ockham, and Raymund Lully). The studies on the ancient stages of the history of philosophical thought consider also oriental philosophers (India and China). With regard to the history of modern philosophy, such systems are studied that are significant from the metaphysical point of view (e.g. R. Descartes, N. Malebranche, G.W. Leibniz, and B. Spinoza).
Studies on contemporary philosophy embrace almost its entire spectre from pragmatism, phenomenology, hermeneutics, analytical philosophy, processualism to the philosophy of the mind. Studies are conducted also on the history of philosophy in Poland, especially with regard to a critical edition of medieval philosophical manuscripts, and the philosophical culture of the Enlightenment against the backdrop of the history of education.
The knowledge of the history of philosophy is principally important for the theoretical activity of the Faculty staff. Their goal is to work out the main questions of metaphysics, philosophy of God, religion, and ethics. The emphasis is laid on an integral and realistic vision of reality, a vision that entails the vision of man as person and subject of culture. While maintaining the autonomy of philosophy and religion, we stress at the same time that philosophy is a point of reference for one's outlook. In this sphere exegetic questions are discussed, such that concern the views held by ancient thinkers, especially various forms of Aristotelian and Thomistic tradition; moreover, there are works that are related to the current state of discussion (e.g. the contemporary discussions on the existence and nature of God, the human soul, freedom, and the philosophical reflection on mysticism).
The learned activity in the area of the history of philosophy and in the domains essential for the philosophical foundations of Christianity is supported by metatheoretical awareness. The latter is implied in the knowledge of the contemporary logical and methodological tools. Therefore the Faculty conducts research on the history of logic and its contemporary state (e.g. the question of the relationship between logic and metaphysics and the natural sciences). Analyses are carried out in the general theory of knowledge (e.g. various conceptions of human knowledge, the relationship between thinking and language), methodology of the philosophical, natural, formal sciences, the humanities, and the grounds of computer science.
The questions of ethics are also broadly reflected on in the studies, starting from its status as a science (metaethics) and the history of various ethical systems. The fundamental issue is, however, to define the moral principles of human activity with a special stress on John Paul II's ethical personalism. A rich spectre of acts analysed by particular ethics (e.g. bioethics) is also taken into account, including a rich panorama of ethical problems in the context of various forms of social life and politics.
Historical, metaphysical, and methodological reflection stimulates studies on the philosophy of culture (e.g. various conceptions of culture that were manifested in the history of western philosophy), philosophy of law (e.g. the problem of the relation between natural law and written law), philosophy of the state (person versus society, nation), and philosophy of art (aesthetics).
The staff of the Department of Theoretical Philosophy participate in Polish and international conferences. They also popularise philosophy. Such activities can be seen in their publications in learned papers. The Universal Encyclopaedia of Philosophy is about to be completed. The following periodicals are published: "Roczniki Filozoficzne" [Philosophical Annals], "Acta Mediaevalia," "Ethos," and "Man in Culture."
The Department of Theoretical Philosophy organises cyclical learned conferences: international metaphysical symposiums, e.g. "The Tasks of Contemporary Metaphysics" organised by the Department of Metaphysics; the international symposium entitled "The Future of Western Civilisation," held by the Chair of the Philosophy of Culture; the national symposium "Philosophising in the Context of Theology" organised by the Chair of the Philosophy of Religion; the Aristotelian symposium "The Main Concepts of Aristotle's Philosophy" organised by the Chair of the Philosophy of God, and the symposium "Ethics and Technique," a national event (there have been 49 meetings up to now). Each year eminent philosophers from abroad are invited to deliver two cycles of lectures: The Rev. Stanisław Kamiński Lectures and the Jacek Woroniecki Lectures.
The research conducted by the Department of the Philosophy of Nature and the Natural Sciences is closely linked with the natural sciences, especially with physics, cosmology, and the broadly understood sciences of life. The contents, history, and the philosophical context of these sciences are taken into account. The goal of the majority of research problems addressed in the Department is the philosophical interpretation of results obtained in particular disciplines of sciences. On the one hand we have issues of the philosophy of the natural sciences, their general and particular methodology, the questions concerning classical philosophy of nature and, within a certain scope, the questions concerning so-called artificial intelligence (e.g. studies of the independence of axioms with a support of the methods of artificial intelligence). On the other hand we focus on the relationship between science and faith. The problems of the philosophy of the natural sciences and their methodology deal with the axiology of science, epistemic axiology (the relationship between science, cognitive and non-cognitive values), evolution of the concept of rationality in the contemporary paradigm of science, the sources of the scientific method and philosophy of natural science, the status of the methodology of philosophy pursued in the context of science and the role that is played by the interpretation of learned facts. The staff of the Department of the Philosophy of Nature and the Natural Sciences study also the nature of mathematical knowledge and the axiological and pragmatic problems of how to grasp and create nature in a social manner. Attention is paid to the tasks that philosophers of nature and of the natural sciences may take and the research results they obtain.
The research in the area of the philosophy of cosmology deals on the one hand with the methodological character of this philosophical discipline, and on the other hand it concerns concrete questions implied by the achievements in cosmological research. We mean, for instance, such problems as ontology of time, space and spatial temporal issues; the implications of the theorems of peculiarities, the problems concerning the temporal origin of the Universe, philosophical explication of the cosmic coincidences, anthropism in cosmology, planning and goal of the Universe, and the hypothesis referring to the so-called Big Bang. Detailed studies on cosmology contain the following: evolutionary scenarios of the model with dark energy, empirical and theoretical criteria for the choice of cosmological models, the origin of the Universe according to quantum cosmology. Historical studies concentrate on the history of contemporary cosmology, and in particular on the genesis of contemporary relativistic cosmology, the contexts of the discovery of basic cosmological theories, and the anomalous situations in the development of cosmology.
Studies on biophilosophy contain the following: metadisciplinary questions, as for instance the characterisation of anhydrobiology as a science about the possibility of the origin and duration of life under extreme conditions of dehydration or scarcity of water. Now the research with respect to the sciences of life deal with the results how certain substances react on the properties of lipid membranes, the problem of the smallest unit of life, and the relations between electromagnetic fields and life.
In the area of the philosophy of nature we consider its methodological status in particular the links between philosophy of nature and the natural sciences, the question between science and philosophy, historical questions concerning the history of the philosophy of nature as a philosophical discipline, the issues of the philosophy of inanimate and animate nature. The Department analyses also any relations between science, faith, religion, and theology, in particular methodological questions and some theological questions considered in the context of science and philosophy of science, e.g. the temporal origin of the Universe and creation, theistic and materialistic explication of the theory of the so-called subtle adaptations, the question of the evolution of man, considered from the natural and philosophical point of view, the legitimacy of the so-called argument of the plan on behalf of the existence of God, the problem of possibility formulated by using the results of contemporary cosmology, the argument for the existence of God from the contingency of the Universe.
For seven years the staff of the Department of the Philosophy of Nature and the Natural Sciences have been organising conferences (in November) on the current problems in the philosophy of nature and natural science. The recent three conferences bore the following titles: "The Philosopher Towards Nature," 2003 Polish conference, "The Philosophy of Nature - the Philosophy of Natural Science - Metacosmology," 2005 Polish conference, "Science - Faith. The Role of Philosophy," 2006 international conference. The 2007 conference was devoted to an important problem, also from the social point of view, namely the relations between science and the activity regarded to be on the borders of science, i.e. protoscience, parascience, and pseudoscience.
With regard to culture studies, the research is focused on various types of civilisation, coexistence of cultures, the question of the sources and identity of European culture. In particular, we examine theories of art and the humanities, material culture, its function and artistic forms, its relations with social and religious groups. The studies here concern the problem of the nature of religion, the encounter of various religions, and also their encounter with other domains of culture and with secular culture.
