Alfonso Ganem

PhD candidate - 1st cohort
1 - 2023
Lateinische und mittelalterliche Philosophie

I am a Mexican philosopher currently working on my PhD in the GRK 2792 - Autonomie heteronomer Texte in Antike und Mittelalter at the Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena. I studied my BA at the Universidad Panamericana (UP) in Mexico and my MA at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM), in both cases specialising in classical Arabic philosophy. During these years I studied the Greek reception of logic in thinkers such as al-Fārābī and Averroes. One of my main interests at that time was to analyse how Muslim authors adapted Greek philosophy in theological and religious discussions.

Alfonso Ganem

Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena
GRK 2792 (Theologische Fakultät)
Fürstengraben 6
07743 Jena

Research project

My doctoral research, under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Mathias Perkams, aims to study Philoponus' use of logic and mereology in his philosophical, polemical and Christological texts. In particular, I am interested in exploring how Philoponus adapted these tools of analysis to elaborate a novel miaphysite Christology against the diophysite Christology of the Chalcedonians. In these texts, Philoponus incorporates many philosophical arguments into the theological debates of his time and also demonstrates new applications of his criticisms of Neoplatonic philosophy.

Although the theology of Philoponus has attracted increasing interest in various scholarly circles, it has not been sufficiently studied in contemporary scholarship. I hope that my doctoral research will shed some light on the role of Philoponus' Christological treatises within the rest of his philosophy and his disruptive criticism against Aristotle and Proclus.  

Curriculum Vitae

Seit 02/2024

PhD-Candidate (FSU). Supervisor: Prof. Matthias Perkams, Prof. Rainer Thiel, Prof. Johannes Johannes Zachhuber

02/2013 - 12/2014

Master of Philosophy (Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México)

08/2007 - 07/2011

Bachelor of Philosophy (Universidad Panamericana)

Positions at University
01/2017 - 12/2023

Academic Coordinator of Social Philosophy and Contemporary Philosophy at the Institute of Humanities in Universidad Panamericana

01/2017 - 12/2023

Full time professor at the Institute of Humanities in Universidad Panamericana

01/2011 - 12/2015

Assistant Professor of Intellectual History and Western Tradition

01/2011 - 12/2015

Assistant Professor of Ethics and Anthropology at the Institute of Humanities in Universidad Panamericana

Presentations

05/2024

Forschungskolloquium, GRK 2792, participation with the paper “A Whole Puzzle of Parts: A Reconstruction of John Philoponus´Mereology”

07/2024

New Editions and Actual Research on Syriac and Armenian Philosophical Texts, GRK 2792, participation with the paper “Three-dimensional as the substance of bodies: the Syriac Afterlife of De Aeternite Mundi XI”

09/2024

Human Nature and Religion, ESPR Conference, participation with the paper “Soul and body are not part of us: A Mereological Analysis of Human Nature”

03/2025

Participation in the Symposium Syriacum Bambergense with the paper Greek Criticism in Syriac against Dyophysite Theology and the Council of Chalcedon: A Survey of the Tmêmata of John Philoponus

04/2025

Forschungskolloquium, GRK 2792, participation with the paper “"In" Two Natures or "out of" Two Natures: The Philosophical Use of Prepositions in the Christological Treatises of John Philoponus”

03/2026

conference, 'Neoplatonism in the Christological Debates of Late Antiquity: Influences, Interferences and Contrasts' with a paper “Who do yo say I am Philoponus on Homonymous Proper Names”

06/2026

Forschungskolloquium, GRK 2792, participation with the paper “Darkening Reason and Perverting Judgement: A Theo-Logical Gaze into the Eye of the Soul”