“Nothing else can be stated as the aim of our existence except the knowledge that it would be better for us not to exist.”
Lecture Four: Altruism and Self-Sacrifice
Themes: Suffering. Nihilism. Self-interest and selflessness. Egoism, Predation, and Altruism. The Religion of Humanity. Texts: Schopenhauer, The Basis of Morality and The World as Will and Representation. Comte, The Catechism of Positive Religion
About the Instructor
Stephen R. C. Hicks, Ph.D. is Professor of Philosophy and the author of Explaining Postmodernism: Skepticism and Socialism from Rousseau to Foucault, Nietzsche and the Nazis, Entrepreneurial Living, Liberalism Pro and Con, and Eight Philosophies of Education. He has published in Business Ethics Quarterly, Review of Metaphysics, and The Wall Street Journal. His writings have been translated into twenty languages. He has been Visiting Professor of Business Ethics at Georgetown University (Washington, DC), Visiting Professor at the University of Kasimir the Great (Poland), Visiting Fellow at Harris Manchester College (Oxford University), and Visiting Professor at Jagiellonian University (Poland).
About the Course
In this eight-lecture, ten-hour course, Professor Hicks takes us on an engaging journey through the evolution of modern moral philosophy, from the Enlightenment to the 21st century. Major thinkers covered include:
John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Immanuel Kant, John Stuart Mill, Arthur Schopenhauer, Søren Kierkegaard, Auguste Comte, Friedrich Nietzsche, Ruth Benedict, A.J. Ayer, and Philippa Foot.
Trailer and enrollment options at the Peterson Academy site here.
See also Professor Hicks’s Modern Philosophy and Postmodern Philosophy courses.
