John Duns Scotus

Duns Scotus, John (1265?–1308?), Scottish philosopher and theologian. He joined the Franciscans in 1280, was ordained in 1291, and taught at Cambridge, Oxford, Paris, and Cologne. His system of thought, embodied chiefly in his commentary on Peter Lombard's Sentences, was adopted by the Franciscans and was highly influential. Typical of his scholasticism, and contrary to the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas, he asserted the primacy of love and the will over reason. He was the first in the West to defend the Immaculate Conception.

See also: Scholasticism.