Sadler's Lectures

This lecture discusses the French Existentialist philosopher, Jean-Paul Sartre's play, No Exit, and focuses on on one of the three main characters stuck together in the afterlife, Joseph Garcin, a newspaper man who claims that he was executed for desertion over his being a pacifist. He also cheated on his wife. As it turns out, he is actually at heart a coward. He also proposes solutions for the s...

This lecture discusses the French Existentialist philosopher, Jean-Paul Sartre's play, No Exit, and focuses on the setting of the work, which is a particular version of hell where some of the dead, specifically three people, Joseph Garcin, Inèz Serrano, and Estelle Rigault, are condemned to be for eternity. Each of the three portrays or betrays themselves as being a certain type of person, and the...

This lecture discusses key ideas from the Utilitarian philosopher, Jeremy Bentham's work, Offenses Against Oneself, a posthumously published part of his Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation. Here we examine the range of other perceived sexual offenses Bentham discusses and evaluates, all of which involve the feature "that they consist in procuring certain sensations by means of...

This lecture discusses key ideas from the Utilitarian philosopher, Jeremy Bentham's work, Offenses Against Oneself, a posthumously published part of his Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation. Here we examine some of the problems that arise out of punishing same-sex relationships using what Bentham calls the "political sanction", i.e. legislation and enforcement.. One of these, w...

This lecture discusses key ideas from the Utilitarian philosopher, Jeremy Bentham's work, Offenses Against Oneself, a posthumously published part of his Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation. Here we examine the motive of antipathy, which means feeling pleasure in someone else's pain or feeling pain in someone else's pleasure in Bentham's work, and the role it plays in much of t...

This lecture discusses key ideas from the Utilitarian philosopher, Jeremy Bentham's work, Offenses Against Oneself, a posthumously published part of his Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation. Here we examine some of the arguments that were being made in favor of prohibiting or punishing male-male sexual relationships on the basis that allowing them would in effect deprive women...

This lecture discusses key ideas from the Utilitarian philosopher, Jeremy Bentham's work, Offenses Against Oneself, a posthumously published part of his Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation. Here we examine some of the arguments people make for prohibiting or punishing male-male sexual relationships and activity on the basis of it leading to a decline in population. These argum...

This lecture discusses key ideas from the Utilitarian philosopher, Jeremy Bentham's work, Offenses Against Oneself, a posthumously published part of his Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation. Here we examine some of the common reasons people give in his times and society for prohibiting or punishing male-male sexual relationships and activity. He considers first whether there is...

In this invited lecture at Marist College, hosted by the Catholic Studies Program as part of their Marcelin Lecture Series, I narrate some of the key points and developments in the story of how we ended up with the current list of the Seven Deadly Sins, which are: Gluttony, Lust, Greed, Sloth, Wrath, Envy, and Pride. Originally, these start out as the Eight Capital Vices, a list which includes sad...

In this invited lecture at Marist College, hosted by the Catholic Studies Program as part of their Marcelin Lecture Series, I narrate some of the key points and developments in the story of how we ended up with the current list of the Seven Deadly Sins, which are: Gluttony, Lust, Greed, Sloth, Wrath, Envy, and Pride. Originally, these start out as the Eight Capital Vices, a list which includes sad...

In this invited lecture at Marist College, hosted by the Catholic Studies Program as part of their Marcelin Lecture Series, I narrate some of the key points and developments in the story of how we ended up with the current list of the Seven Deadly Sins, which are: Gluttony, Lust, Greed, Sloth, Wrath, Envy, and Pride. Originally, these start out as the Eight Capital Vices, a list which includes sad...

In this invited lecture at Marist College, hosted by the Catholic Studies Program as part of their Marcelin Lecture Series, I narrate some of the key points and developments in the story of how we ended up with the current list of the Seven Deadly Sins, which are: Gluttony, Lust, Greed, Sloth, Wrath, Envy, and Pride. Originally, these start out as the Eight Capital Vices, a list which includes sad...

This is the recording of my presentation of my paper, "Kierkegaard’s Philosophical Fragments as Gilsonian Christian Philosophy," during the International Etienne Gilson Society satellite session at the American Catholic Philosophical Association 2015 conference. The recording also includes some lively discussion in the Q&A portion following my reading of the paper. In the paper, I discuss key feat...

This lecture discusses key ideas from the medieval Christian philosopher and theologian Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologiae, 1st part of the 2nd part, question 28 "The Effects Of Love", and examines his discussions in article 5, which centers on a question raised not only by literary tropes but also by the Song of Songs. Does the passion of love in some way wound or harm the lover? Thomas notes that...

This lecture discusses key ideas from the medieval Christian philosopher and theologian Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologiae, 1st part of the 2nd part, question 28 "The Effects Of Love", and examines his discussions in article 4, which centers on the question of "zeal" (zelus in Latin, zēlos and zēlotupia in Greek) and whether it is or is not an effect of love. The answer to this depends on what sense...

This lecture discusses key ideas from the medieval Christian philosopher and theologian Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologiae, 1st part of the 2nd part, question 28 "The Effects Of Love", and examines his discussions in article 3, which centers on whether or not ecstasy is something that love produces as an effect. For Thomas as it turns out, it all depends on how we understand that term. If we have in...

This lecture discusses key ideas from the medieval Christian philosopher and theologian Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologiae, 1st part of the 2nd part, question 28 "The Effects Of Love", and examines his discussions in article 2, which centers on the question whether mutual indwelling (mutua inhaesio) is an effect of love. Thomas considers several arguments that seem to rule against this being the cas...

This lecture discusses key ideas from the medieval Christian philosopher and theologian Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologiae, 1st part of the 2nd part, question 28 "The Effects Of Love", and examines his discussions in article 1, which centers on the question whether union is or is not an effect of love. Thomas considers several arguments against union being an effect of love, and then clarifies the w...

This is the recording of my presentation at the Mid-Atlantic Popular & American Culture Association 2011 conference, applying Aristotelian moral theory to reading George R.R. Martin's series Song of Ice and Fire. In it, I argue that Martin articulates a essentially neo-Aristotelian view of human nature, characters, development, ethos and moral qualities, referencing selected events, characters, di...

This lecture discusses key ideas from the 18th century philosopher and essayist David Hume's essay The Natural History Of Religion. It focuses specifically on sections 9-15, where Hume brings his work to a close by comparing polytheism and monotheism, as he understands them, against each other, not just in terms of their belief systems but their effects upon cultures and societies in which they pl...

This lecture discusses key ideas from the 18th century philosopher and essayist David Hume's essay The Natural History Of Religion. It focuses specifically on sections 6-8, where he discusses the development of monotheism (which he calls "theism") out of polytheism, attempting to provide a naturalist perspective on the matters. To support my ongoing work, go to my Patreon site - www.patreon.com/sa...

This lecture discusses key ideas from the 18th century philosopher and essayist David Hume's essay The Natural History Of Religion. It focuses specifically on the development of what he classifies as "polytheism" (contrasting that with "theism", i.e. monotheism). Hume provides an account that views all of the ancient and contemporary polytheistic religions as derived from natural psychological pro...

This lecture discusses key ideas from the 18th century philosopher and essayist David Hume's essay The Natural History Of Religion. It focuses specifically on the overall structure, arguments, and the assumptions of the work, as well as some of the distinctions Hume relies upon in his text. We also examine what Hume means by the term "natural history" and how it can be applied to religion, in his...

This lecture discusses key ideas from the Utilitarian philosopher, Jeremy Bentham's work, Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation Here we examine his discussion of what he calls the "hedonic calculus", which is how a utilitarian applies the principle of utility in practice for moral decision-making. We look at each of the seven factors Bentham includes in this calculus, and apply...

This is part 3 of the the recording of my invited Saint Anselm Lecture, given in 2008 at Saint Anselm College. Here is the abstract of the paper: One important divine attribute Saint Anselm examines and treats is that of simplicity. His treatment brings out some surprising features of simplicity itself which escape the frameworks of the logic of created being, providing us a fuller, albeit still v...