News and Announcements
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Does Thomism have a Future?
A Philosophical Happy Hour on the Past, Present, and Future of Thomism and its philosophy: must it change? Can it? Is it “relevant”? Not including the works of St. Thomas himself, nor of his Latin Age commentators and followers, I have four full shelves of books that one might consider “Thomistic”. These books, written as…
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The Centrality of Noble Goods for Human Flourishing
The Lyceum Institute is delighted to host Dr. Daniel De Haan (Frederick Copleston Senior Research Fellow & Lecturer in Philosophy & Theology in the Catholic Tradition Blackfriars and Campion Hall / Research Fellow, Ian Ramsey Centre for Science and Religion, Faculty of Theology and Religion, University of Oxford) for a colloquium presentation.
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Reading Poetry
A Philosophical Happy Hour on the merits of immersion in the poetic arts. Ποίησις: poiesis, the Greeks named it, the making of something which did not previously exist. The Greek conception extended far beyond the modern notion of “poetry”—but from the most ancient to the latest modern, every successful form of the “poietic” resounds by…
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Foundationalism, Anti-Foundationalism, and the Justification of Belief
A Philosophical Happy Hour on basic questions of our noetic experience. In our conversation, we will examine these different approaches of foundationalism and anti-foundationalism, ask about their merits, demerits, whether they rest upon certain presuppositions, whether these presuppositions have justification—and what is the meaning of belief. In what follows, we provide brief descriptions of the…
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Semiotics, Consensus, and Community
A Philosophical Happy Hour on the role of semiotics in consensus and community. Across many fields, industries, and academia, it has become a popular claim that we must “build consensus”. The Harvard Law Program on Negotiation states: “Consensus building is a process involving a good-faith effort to meet the interests of all stakeholders and seek a unanimous…
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On Habits of Interpretation
A Philosophical Happy Hour on Obstinate Views and the Discovery of Meaning Does it feel sometimes as though the reality you inhabit is not shared with others? A recent Benedictine College commencement speech deemed controversial may well illustrate the point: some saw in these comments (particularly those beginning at 11:49) a demand that women “get…
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On Nature and the Artificial
A Philosophical Happy Hour against the Inversion of our Knowledge What does it mean for something to be natural? We find the word ubiquitous in today’s marketing: all natural bug spray, dog treats, body wash, shampoo, deodorant, laundry detergent, toothpaste, sunscreen. Ironically, of course, none of these products occur by nature. Each is a product…
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2024 Summer: A Thomistic Defense of Democracy
Can democracy be saved? Ours, on both the left and the right, seems to be a world viewed increasingly through post-liberal lenses. Must we return to a strict hierarchy if we are to abandon the “liberal experiment” that has rendered increasing ailment in recent decades—if, that is, we are not to lapse into socialist totalitarianism? …
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2024 Summer: Aristotle’s Physics
Join us on an intellectually rigorous journey through Aristotle’s conception of physics as a scientific discipline in our upcoming Lyceum Institute Seminar. Why study the physics of an ancient thinker? One might think (and many do) Aristotle’s scientific work obsolesced by the discoveries of modernity. In truth, while he may have been mistaken in particular…
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On Arguing God’s Existence
A Philosophical Happy Hour on the Unseriousness of Modern Objectors It has become fashionable for analytic philosophers in recent years[1] to attack arguments for the existence of God. These attacks, though their permutations are quite numerous, ordinarily attempt to show that the conception of God somehow entails a contradiction. These might include some form of…
