[Update 5/9: see below for new pricing and participant caps.]
Beginning next month, I will be conducting two online seminars:
Thomas Aquinas: Wisdom and Synthesis
To understand the thought of Thomas Aquinas is to grasp concepts far removed from the ways of thinking common today. In few issues is this more obvious than Thomas’ cosmological vision: which is not, as Enlightenment-inspired detractors would claim, dependent upon an outdated cosmology, but rather a vision which sees the inherent teleological ordering of all things within the universe.
This seminar will primarily use Aquinas’ Summa contra Gentiles and Summa Theologiae; all required materials being available for free, online. The discussions here will be suitable both for beginning students of Aquinas as well as for those who have some familiarity with his thought but would like to know and understand how Aquinas’ teleological understanding of the universe remains valid today.
The full syllabus can be viewed here: Thomas Aquinas: Wisdom & Synthesis.
Martin Heidegger: Phenomenological Method
The term “phenomenology” has received a multitude of meanings over the past several centuries but today refers primarily to the loose collection of approaches initiated by Edmund Husserl with his 1900 (and revised in 1913) Logichse Untersuchungen, or Logical Investigations. Yet these approaches, while all see in phenomenology something foundational about how it is that human beings know, vary widely. Prominent among them, and very frequently misunderstood, is the phenomenological approach advocated by Martin Heidegger—who, although perhaps the best-known of Husserl’s students, departs most radically from his one-time teacher.
The primary text for this seminar is Heidegger’s Being and Time, in the 1963 Macquarrie and Robinson translation (available here from Amazon in both paperback and hardcover). Additional selections will be provided by the instructor (though a copy of Pathmarks may also be worth having for those who prefer physical copies). These discussions will presume some familiarity with phenomenology, though not necessarily with that of Heidegger.
The full syllabus is available here: Martin Heidegger: Phenomenological Method
If you are interested in participating in either seminar, please contact me here. Space is limited (a maximum of 15 participants per seminar), so reservations will be on a first-come, first-serve basis. Because this is the first set of Continuum seminars, pricing is at a special discounted price of $70 per person. Anyone who signs up for both seminars will pay only $120 total.
Each seminar will include, in addition to the session, reading notes and questions for each assigned reading, a full seminar report (including instructor’s summaries for readings, sessions) in PDF, as well as participation in an instructor-moderated Slack group for on-going textual discussion throughout the week.
These seminars will be conducted via Skype for Business, so all anyone will need is a web browser, microphone, and camera (if desired). As of right now, the schedule is as follows (time and dates subject to change):
Thomas Aquinas: Wisdom & Synthesis
7:30-8:30pm ET Thursdays
June 6-August 15 (no session July 4)
Martin Heidegger: Phenomenological Method
3:30-4:30pm ET Saturdays
June 8-August 17 (no session July 6)
If there is sufficient interest, a second Aquinas seminar will be added to Saturdays from 5:00-6:00pm.
If you are interested in participating in either seminar or would like to know more please contact me here. You can also send questions via direct message to my Twitter account, @realbriankemple.
Continuum Philosophical Insight 