Stephen R.C. Hicks's Blog, page 35

David Kelley new essay on Concepts, Propositions, and Truth

Philosopher David Kelley (Ph.D., Princeton) is author of The Evidence of the Senses, A Realist Theory of Perception (LSU, 1986), a work on foundational issues in epistemology, and The Art of Reasoning: An Introduction to Logic (W.W. Norton, 1st edition 1990, 5th edition 2020), a widely used textbook. He has published a new essay, “Concepts […]

Which important leftist said this?

(No peeking at the answer below.) “I want everyone to keep the property that he has acquired for himself according to the principle: benefit to the community precedes benefit to the individual. But the state should retain supervision and each property owner should consider himself appointed by the state. It is his duty not to […]

Telecommunications — the FCC’s ‘Fairness Doctrine’ [Business Ethics Cases series]

My video lecture on the Federal Communications Commission’s controversial “Fairness Doctrine,” part of the Business Ethics Cases series. Contents:1. The early days of radio and a tragedy of the commons.2. What is fairness? Two competing answers.3. The argument for the “Fairness Doctrine.”4. The argument against the “Fairness Doctrine.”5. Related issues: whether politics is special, whether […]

Great Books — My Recommended Reading List

Great Books: Seven categories. Five only in each. Works that I love or learned from or influenced me or that I return to regularly. LiteratureVictor Hugo, Les Misérables (1862)Edmond Rostand, Cyrano de Bergerac (1897)L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables (1908)Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead (1943)Elliott Arnold, White Falcon (1958) Historical FictionMary Renault, The Persian Boy [Alexander the […]

Plato on games and educating for rule-following

The Laws is Plato’s last book. Its dialogue is set in Crete and led by an Athenian who is never identified. He converses with a citizen from Sparta and a politician from Crete. The politician has been given the authority to create laws for a new colony, so he asks the Athenian for advice, and […]

“The Doctrine of Fascism” | Mussolini and Gentile | *Philosophers, Explained* series by Professor Stephen Hicks

Who are the great philosophers, and what makes them great? Episodes: The full playlist. Stephen R. C. Hicks, Ph.D., is Professor of Philosophy at Rockford University, USA, and has had visiting positions at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., the University of Kasimir the Great in Poland, Oxford University’s Harris Manchester College in England, and Jagiellonian […]

Obedience vs. freedom in education in 1700s Germany

In Britain and America in the 1700s, the most influential philosopher of education was John Locke, with his Some Thoughts Concerning Education. In France, it was Jean-Jacques Rousseau with his Emile. But in the German states, it was Johann Georg Sulzer, with his 1748 An Essay on the Education and Instruction of Children. Sulzer’s fundamental […]

Why liberal capitalism opposed imperialism and colonialism

Imperialism and colonialism are older than human history, and across the centuries virtually every culture in every part of the world practiced it. Until the Enlightenment of the 1700s. At which point a few voices began arguing that we should only trade with people rather than conquer them and take their stuff — and that […]

“Egoism in Nietzsche and Rand” now online

My essay “Egoism in Nietzsche and Rand” is a 43-page study published in The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies (2009). Text version. Audiobook version: Part One, Part Two. The abstract: “Philosophers Friedrich Nietzsche and Ayn Rand are often identified as strong critics of altruism and arch advocates of egoism. In this essay, Stephen Hicks argues […]

“Wean Yourself” by Rumi

Wean Yourself By Mevlâna Jalâluddîn Rumi Little by little, wean yourself.This is the gist of what I have to say. From an embryo, whose nourishment comes in the blood,move to an infant drinking milk,to a child on solid food,to a searcher after wisdom,to a hunter of more invisible game. Think how it is to have […]