The Philosophers In The Midst of History Series

learn about historical context that shaped great philosophers and how they contributed to that history!

In 2016, we started the first year of the Philosophers in the Midst of History quarterly talk series. This set of lectures and discussions I provided to the general public, was hosted at the beautiful Frank Weyenberg Library in Mequon, Wisconsin. The plan was to introduce participants to four philosophers each year — one ancient, one medieval, one early modern, and one late modern (19th-20th century).

Things went on quite well for the first four years of the series. And then Covid-19 arrived. In 2020, we managed to get one of these talks in before the libraries were closed in March of that year. We had to put the series on hold for nearly two years, but with prudent and widespread inoculations, masking up, and a well-ventilated room to present in, we were able to start the series back up. We have been meeting regularly for quarterly sessions at the library since then.

Twenty-Five Talks in the Series So Far

If you’d like to watch them, and find out more about these thinkers and their historical context, videorecordings of each of the earlier sessions are available at the links below.

Ancient Philosophy

• Socrates, The Ancient World, and Philosophical Lives

• Plato, Athenian Democracy, and the Greek Enlightenment

• Aristotle, Athens, and Alexander the Great

• Epicurus and the Epicureans in the Ancient World

• Cicero, Greek Philosophy, and the Fall of the Roman Republic

• Lucius Annaeus Seneca, The Roman Empire, and Stoic Philosophy

• Epictetus, Slavery, Stoicism, and the Roman Empire

• Plutarch, Greeks and Romans, and Moral Philosophy

Medieval Philosophy

• Augustine of Hippo, Struggles in the Church, and Rome’s Fall

• Boethius, King Theodoric, and the Middle Ages

• Anselm of Canterbury, The Catholic Church, and the Norman Conquest

• Peter Abelard, Medieval Scholasticism, and Heloise of Argenteuil

• Bonaventure, The Franciscan Order, and The High Middle Ages

• Thomas Aquinas, The Mendicant Orders, and the High Middle Ages

Early Modern Philosophy

• Rene Descartes, Early Modernity, and the Wars of Religion

• Thomas Hobbes, English Civil War, and Modern Political Theory

• John Locke, Absolute Monarchy, and Constitutional Government

• Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Barbarism, Civilization, and the Revolution

• David Hume, Mitigated Skepticism, and the Scottish Enlightenment

• Immanuel Kant, The Enlightenment & German Idealism

Later Modern Philosophy

• G.W.F. Hegel, Germany & France, and Human Development

• Friedrich Nietzsche, the Apex of the West, and the Threat of Nihilism

• Maurice Blondel, The Catholic Church, and Modern Thought

• Hannah Arendt, Totalitarianism, and the Holocaust

• Albert Camus, an Absurd World, and Resistance to Evil

• Simone de Beauvoir, French Existentialism, and Women’s Place in Society

Now that we’re back up and running, you can check the ReasonIO calendar for more details about upcoming sessions. If you’re in the Greater Milwaukee area (or feel like taking a trip), and are looking for intellectually stimulating conversations about philosophers and their historical context, plan to stop on in for some conversations about these great thinkers. In the meantime, enjoy the videos of the twenty-five sessions we have held so far!