The After Dinner Scholar

America at 250, Episode 6: A Tale of Two Revolutions--American and French with Dr. Joseph Loconte

The French Revolution that began in 1789 like the American Revolution that began in 1776 were both revolts against a king and against despotic rule. Both sought the expansion of human liberty and both intended to form republican governments. But that’s where the similarity stops and the contrast between the American Revolution and the French Revolution could not be starker. What made the difference?

Our guest this week, Dr. Joseph Loconte, addressed this question at a conference at The Institute of Faith and Freedom at Grove City College, Dr. Joseph Loconte, director of The Rivendell Center in New York City in a lecture entitled “Reason, Revelation, and Revolution.”

America at 250, Episode 4: Natural Law and Natural Rights with Dr. Hadley Arkes

The purpose of the Declaration of Independence, wrote Thomas Jefferson, was “to place before mankind the common sense of the subject; [in] terms so plain and firm, as to command their assent, and to justify ourselves in the independent stand we [were] compelled to take.”

To make their case they called on “the laws of nature and of nature’s God,” on a Creator who endows humans with “inalienable rights” including the right to abolish a tyrannical government and replace it.

Natural law and natural rights were central to the founders’ thinking and I know of no one more qualified to help us understand why that’s true than Dr. Hadley Arkes.

Biology, Theology, and Philosophy with Dr. Daniel Shields

The Catechism of the Catholic Church (159) declares

Though faith is above reason, there can never be any real discrepancy between faith and reason. Since the same God who reveals mysteries and infuses faith has bestowed the light of reason on the human mind, God cannot deny himself, nor can truth ever contradict truth.

During their final spring semester in their science course, Wyoming Catholic College seniors consider the theory of evolution. Their professor, Dr. Daniel Shields guides them towards, as the college catalog puts it, “the ultimate goal of achieving a coherent synthesis of faith and reason.”

Aristotle on Friendship with Dr. Pavlos Papadopoulos

“Social connection,” wrote U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy in  his May 2023 “Advisory on our Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation,” “is a fundamental human need, as essential to survival as food, water, and shelter. Throughout history, our ability to rely on one another has been crucial to survival.”

That may come as news to many modern Americans, but back in the fourth century BC Aristotle would have told you the same things. Friendship, he wrote in his Nichomachean Ethics, “is not only a necessary thing but a splendid one. We praise those who love their friends, and the possession of many friends is held to be one of the fine things of life.”

Dr. Pavlos Papadopoulos recently taught The Nichomachean Ethics with our Wyoming Catholic College juniors and looking at, among other things, friendship.

”Leisure the Basis of Culture” with Dr. Michael Bolin

Once every semester at Wyoming Catholic College, we hold an All-School Seminar. For the fall seminar, a week ago, all of our students and faculty read and discussed Pieper’s Leisure: The Basis of Culture. 

Pieper wrote in 1947 in what was a devastated Germany. Everything was damaged or destroyed and workers were a vital necessity at all levels of the culture. It was a world of what he calls "total work," a world he believed would lose its soul without leisure properly understood.

Philosopher Dr. Michael Bolin attended one of student-led seminars and had this to share.

 

Aristotle’s ”Nicomachean Ethics” with Dr. Pavlos Papadopoulos

“Every art and every investigation, and similarly every action and pursuit,” wrote Aristotle at the beginning of his book on ethics, “is considered to aim at some good. Hence the good has rightly been defined as ‘that at which all things aim’.”

We all, Aristotle contends, aim at what we believe is the good. But how do we know what is truly good? And how is it possible as he tells us, that the way to aim at the good has to do with politics?

Dr. Pavlos Papadopoulos is reading Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics with our Wyoming Catholic College juniors. Here's what he had to say about the good.

”Nature and Nature’s God” with Dr. Daniel Shields

…[W]hatever is in motion must be put in motion by another,” wrote St. Thomas Aquinas at the beginning of his Summa Theologiae, “If that by which it is put in motion be itself put in motion, then this also must needs be put in motion by another, and that by another again. But this cannot go on to infinity, because then there would be no first mover, and, consequently, no other mover; seeing that subsequent movers move only inasmuch as they are put in motion by the first mover; as the staff moves only because it is put in motion by the hand. Therefore it is necessary to arrive at a first mover, put in motion by no other; and this everyone understands to be God.”

This proof of God’s existence is the first of five that Thomas presents at the beginning of the Summa. And while that seems simple and convincing to most of us, many scholars are certain that the proof is not at all convincing insofar as it relies on Medieval physics and cosmology.

 In his new book, Nature and Nature’s God: The Scientific and Philosophical Validity of Aquinas’ Proof of an Unmoved Mover Wyoming Catholic College philosopher Dr. Daniel Shields argues that those scholars should take another look at Thomas’ argument.

St. Thomas on Providence with Dr. Michael Bolin

“We know,” St. Paul wrote to the Christians in Rome, “that in everything God works for good with those who love him, who are called according to his purpose.”

Those words from St. Paul can and should comfort us. Nothing happens in our lives or our world that God does not intend to bring about good for His children. His providential care surrounds us. On the other hand, terrible things happen in our lives and in the world around us. Does God will evil? Allow evil? Maybe evil is not what we think it is?

Dr. Michael Bolin has been reading St. Thomas Aquinas’ Compendium Theologiae with our Wyoming Catholic College sophomores considering, among other things, that “all things are governed by divine providence.”

Philosophizing about Nature with Dr. Henry Zepeda

Whether it’s fermions and bosoms or air, earth, fire, and water or nothing but water, the question “What is the world?” has a long history and there have been many answers.

Wyoming Catholic College freshmen discover the many answers in Philosophy 102, going on this semester. Dr. Henry Zepeda has been teaching them the philosophy of nature and the material world and I asked him why student’s journey through philosophy begins here.

Pro-Life After Dobbs 2: The Arguments for Abortion Rights with Dr. Michael Bolin

“Usually when I debate on this topic,” said pro-life advocate Helen Alvare, “I feel like I’m behind a podium speaking French and the other person is behind a podium speaking Finnish. There’s no common ground.”

Part of the reason there is no common ground in the abortion debate is that our pro-abortion family and friends don’t understand our arguments and we don’t understand theirs.

Wyoming Catholic College philosopher, Dr. Michael Bolin allows his students to puzzle over what might be the best philosophical argument for abortion rights: Judith Jarvis Thomson’s “A Defense of Abortion” published in the journal Philosophy & Public Affairs in 1971—about 18 months before Roe v. Wade was decided.