I am a philosopher, and when I’m on the job I have been known to read literary works as “premises with feet.” Despite that occupational hazard I am also fascinated with how some great fiction writers can seamlessly integrate abstract philosophical themes with concrete literary portrayals. When I teach Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead, my focus […]
Roark and Keating: first meetings Read More »
The essayist Joseph Epstein tells a story about going to his high school reunion. As the participants took their seats at the dinner tables, they each found a note left there anonymously. The note contained a poem: “It’s not the world. And what I have to say to those who don’t fit in is, don’t
My theme will be the relationship between art and liberal cultures, focusing on economically free cultures especially.
Is capitalism bad for art? Read More »
The Center for Ethics and Entrepreneurship has published its eighth issue of Kaizen [pdf], focusing on the theme of Education and Entrepreneurship. It features my interview with Steve Mariotti, founder of the excellent Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE), an organization dedicated to providing entrepreneurship education to low-income youths. Also featured are guest speakers David Mayer,
Kaizen Issue 8 published Read More »
I am organizing a session for on “The Ethics of the Financial Crisis” for the Association for Private Enterprise Education conference to be held April 11-13, 2010 in Las Vegas, Nevada.
The Ethics of the Financial Crisis Read More »
I am organizing a session for the Association for Private Enterprise Education conference to be held April 11-13, 2010 in Las Vegas, Nevada. The theme is “Reason in Hayek and Rand.” Here we have two giants of twentieth-century thought, but few comparative studies have been done. So as a start I have chosen Reason as
Hayek and Rand on reason Read More »
Prior to the discovery of germ theory and antiseptic, women frequently died of puerperal fever in the maternity ward at the University of Vienna Hospital. Enter Ignaz Semmelweis, a Hungarian-born physician working at the Vienna hospital, one of the world’s leading medical establishments. Carl Hempel’s account of Semmelweis’s false starts, failed hypotheses, and eventual success
In class: Semmelweis as epistemological hero Read More »
Click on the image to see a larger map of the nearby universe, with us at the center. As described by Gregg Easterbrook: “The map contains about 100,000 dots. The dots are not stars; each dot represents a galaxy, and galaxies are thought to average about 100 billion stars each. Thus the area depicted contains
The universe near us Read More »