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The May HOS meeting will feature “The Great Labor Savers: Histories of Philosophy from Copleston to Lavine,” a talk by Pete Jamison. The meeting will be held on May 12.
There’s by no means any requirement in Objectivism to be a public advocate for the viewpoint. You can be an Objectivist without telling anybody, since the only requirement to be one is to harbor the distinctive convictions that are characteristic of the philosophy. But if you do wish to aid the spread of Objectivism into today’s culture, you’ll need to be familiar with the history of Western philosophy – in other words, you’ll need familiarity with the competition. Fortunately, a type of nonfiction called a history of philosophy can help, either in ambitious cover-to-cover reading or used encyclopedically (to only look up topics or personalities as needed). To have found this category of literature, however, brings one to a pretty long list of works, as there are at least 100 popular histories in stores today and many more online – and not all available in both places. We’ll look at seven works which I’ll contend are relevant or useful to Objectivists who wish to solidify or extend their knowledge of “the great conversation”, with emphasis on the last one, which offers an array of advantages over the other six.
Alex Epstein has agreed to speak in Houston in October. In addition to speaking to HOS, we would like to arrange other speaking engagements for him. In particular, we would like to arrange opportunities for Mr. Epstein to raise funds for the Center for Industrial Progress. If you know of a professional association, trade group, business, or other organization that may be interested in hosting a talk by Mr. Epstein, please let me know. Also, I am looking for volunteers to assist with contacting groups and making other arrangements.
Audio Recordings Now Available
Audio recordings of two past HOS meetings, including November’s meeting on The Closing of the Muslim Mind, are now available online for purchase. Click here to learn more.
New Book Review
A review of the book, The Emperor of All Maladies, a Biography of Cancer, by Siddhartha Mukherjee, is now available here.