Posts about reasoning

On Making Distinctions

A Philosophical Happy Hour on distinctions, the doctrine of their kinds, and the importance making them correctly. The failure to make good distinctions characterizes the stupidity of our age.  Observe the social networks and see how few distinctions are proposed, how unquestioning the categories, how obstinate every adherent to his or her ideology!  How many […]

Seminar: Steps toward Dialectical Logic [Fall 2025]

Announcement of our Fall 2025 seminar, “What Kind of Certainty?: Steps Toward Dialectical Logic”—have we overlooked an important Aristotelian text and tradition in our understanding of reasoning? Description Details All Lyceum Institute seminars include weekly readings, lectures, and live discussion sessions. The discussion sessions are recorded. This seminar includes extensive readings, but does not require […]

How and Why We Study Logic

Excerpted from the lectures given to the Lyceum Institute Trivium: Art of Logic Course. “What more can be said about logic?”  I am acutely aware, as I pen these words that I pen them not to be read (even if someone other than myself might and does indeed read them), but to be spoken; to […]

John Deely on the “Practical Value” of Logic

Peirce rightly speaks of the practice of boasting of the utility of this or that science as a “nauseating custom” (1898a, alt. ver. : CP 1.667). This is because the practice in question almost invariably is indulged in for purposes quite unrelated to the true character of the science in question or to the advance […]

Trivium: The Art of Logic 2023

On 1 May 2023, we will begin our second Trivium course of the year: The Art of Logic. Our first discussion session will take place on 8 May 2023 at 6:00pm ET. This course is open to all enrolled Lyceum Institute members; having taken Grammar is not a prerequisite. If you would like to sign-up and take […]

I.M. Bochenski on the Concept of Formal Logic

Preliminary definition of the subject matter of the history of logic is hard to come by. For apart from ‘philosophy’ there is perhaps no name of a branch of knowledge that has been given so many meanings as ‘logic’. Sometimes the whole history of philosophy, and even knowledge in general, has been thus named, from […]

Trivium: Logic

Beginning the week of January 10, all Lyceum Institute members will have access to a 13-week course in traditional Logic. Discussion sessions will be held twice per week: Mondays at 6:00-6:45pm and Thursdays at 11:45am-12:30pm (subject to change). Each week there will be an assigned reading, problem set, and brief lecture. Discussion sessions will cover […]

Beyond the University

Twelve people: that is how many faculty teach for the Lyceum Institute. In a world of billions, it is a very small number. But as history attests, twelve people can make profound and lasting changes in the world. Our faculty teach philosophy, languages, the Trivium, and more. They guide students in asking questions that matter, preserve the things worth remembering, and demonstrate the order of an intellectual life. In every seminar and every course, they show that education is not just preparation for life, but rather a fuller way of living.

This fall (from October 15 through 31 December), we are seeking to raise $48,000—enough to provide each of our faculty with a modest stipend of $4,000. These stipends are not salaries (which we hope to provide through our Endowment, which you can learn about here), but signs of gratitude and support for the dedication that makes the Lyceum Institute possible. Your gift does not prop up buildings or bureaucracy but sustains our people in the noble task of educating.

By giving today, you share in their work. Your contribution helps build a community where habits of thinking are not only taught, but lived.

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