discussion
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On the Personal Reception of Tradition
A Philosophical Happy Hour discussing how personal relations affect our reception and transmission of tradition, especially intellectual tradition. Intellectual Tradition Recently, I was fortunate enough to attend, along with a number of colleagues and friends, the 2024 Annual Meeting of the American Catholic Philosophical Association. This year’s president was Dr. Mary-Catherine Sommers, Director of the…
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Debate and the Hope of Resolution
We at the Lyceum are strong believers in the fruits of disputation—but does a disputation differ from a debate? What makes something a debate, rather than a disputation? Both, obviously, present a plurality of positions on a singular question. But what differentiates the two? As often the case, the words’ respective etymologies give a provisional…
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The Habit of Conversation
Distracted from distraction by distractionFilled with fancies and empty of meaningTumid apathy with no concentration-T.S. Eliot 1935: “Burnt Norton” (first of the Four Quartets), III. Few poets ever have and likely ever will attain the prescience of T.S. Eliot. I find myself repeating, with increasing frequency, the lines quoted above: not only so that I…