Stephen R.C. Hicks's Blog, page 19

Koertge and the mis-uses of science

A good interview with philosopher of science Noretta Koertge. She was a student of Karl Popper’s at the University of London and became editor of the academic journal Philosophy of Science. She was also a member of my Ph.D. dissertation committee at Indiana University. Upon the publication of this excellent collection of articles — A […]

Je suis Henri

Ennui and emptiness. Meet Henri, le chat existentialiste. Revisiting this now-classic humor series. Related: My close reading of the most famous and un-humorous Existentialist:

Epistemology and Education: What is Knowledge? [Lecture 3 of Philosophy of Education course]

By Professor Stephen R.C. Hicks, Rockford University, USA. Lecture 3: If education is about the transmission of knowledge, then what is knowledge? Or if education is about training young people’s habits of mind, then what about alertness to evidence, skill with logic, and a commitment to reason? Does faith work? Is everything just opinion? Previous […]

“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 […]