Stephen R.C. Hicks's Blog, page 16

“I was ready to love the whole world, but no one understood me, and I learned to hate.”

On the widespread phenomenon of frustrated and angry young men becoming hateful and destructive: “I was ready to love the whole world, but no one understood me, and I learned to hate” is a line from Mikhail Lermontov’s 1840 novel, A Hero of Our Time. I’ve frequently wondered, given the timing, how much the young […]

Who is the most loathsome philosopher in history?

More precisely: Who is the most loathsome philosopher in his or her personal life? Let me set the bar high by naming my top two candidates. 1. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who fathered several children and had them abandoned to orphanages, and of whom David Hume wrote in a letter to Adam Smith: “Thus you see, he […]

Howard Roark and Peter Keating: first meetings

I’m a philosopher, and on the job I ‘ve been known to read literary works as “premises with feet.” Despite that occupational hazard I’m also fascinated with how great fiction writers can seamlessly integrate abstract philosophical themes with concrete literary portrayals. When I teach Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead, my focus in class is philosophical, but […]

Why Foucault as “basically a Nazi”?

Returning to this graphic’s placement of Michel Foucault on the spectrum between Marx and Heidegger. Why? Recall Foucault’s own words:: “I am simply a Nietzschean.” And: “Heidegger has always been for me the essential philosopher.”* Heidegger was a member of the National Socialist Party in the 1930s and 1940s. Foucault was a member of the […]

Australia’s Tyson Popplestone interviews Stephen Hicks

Tyson Popplestone interviews Dr. Hicks on how cultural and political ideologies shift over time, with an emphasis on how intellectual movements and academia have influenced society’s values and further downstream, political movements. Dr. Hicks criticises several major movements but expresses a cautious optimism for the near future, emphasizing the potential for cultural renewal through entrepreneurism, […]

Rose Blumkin | Entrepreneur

A charming story from Martin Fridson’s How to Be a Billionaire about Rose Blumkin, founder of an Omaha furniture store that Warren Buffett eventually purchased: “Barely literate in English, the Russian-born immigrant parlayed a $500 investment into Nebraska Furniture Mart, the nation’s largest furniture store, with an astounding two-thirds of the total market in Omaha. […]

Metaphysics and Education: What is Reality? [Lecture 2 of Philosophy of Education course]

By Professor Stephen R.C. Hicks, Rockford University, USA. Lecture 2: If education is about basic facts and truths about reality, then what is reality? Is it the natural world—or also a world beyond nature? Is it cause-and-effect—or random or sometimes miraculous? Is it finite in space and time—or infinite spatially and eternal? Previous lectures in […]

ABSURDITY AND MEANINGLESSNESS? JEAN-PAUL SARTRE and ALBERT CAMUS. Lecture 3 of Postmodern Philosophy [Peterson Academy course]

Suppose that God really is dead. Then, Sartre says “there is no human nature, because there is no God to have a conception of it.” Camus asks whether we are then like Sisyphus, “the absurd hero.” Themes: The decline of religion? The reality of war. Depression and the Depression. The pointlessness of existence? Existence precedes […]

A Short Story about the Conservative Reaction to the Enlightenment

A Short Story about the (or a) Conservative Reaction to the Enlightenment Two children grew up in a cave. They were taught that the outside world is and dangerous and sinful and that the Cave God protected them. Yet as growing children and curious about the rest of the world, they asked their elders many […]

‘The Truth About the Nazis’ with Stephen Hicks (Triggernometry interview)

Konstantin Kisin and Francis Foster interview Stephen Hicks on the philosophers, intellectuals, and widespread support for the National Socialists. Related: The book the interview is based on: text version, and audio version below: Also at Triggernometry: ‘Postmodernism Explained’ by Professor Stephen Hicks.