Stephen Hicks

“The Birth of the Modern” (free sample lecture)

introducing my eight-lecture Modern Philosophy course. What makes modern philosophy revolutionary? How does Francis Bacon propose a forward-looking philosophy of discovery? Other philosophers covered in the course include Descartes, Locke, Voltaire, Rousseau, Hume, Kant, Hegel, Marx, Mill, and Nietzsche. The full course can be accessed here, along with my other courses, Postmodern Philosophy, The Philosophy […]

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Modern man’s terrible predicament? Cheap shots and straw men

Perhaps you’ve seen this silly quotation: “Modern man is in a terrible predicament. He is helplessly enamored with the beauty of what the old world built, yet despises the beliefs that inspired them to build it.” It’s usually acribed to author Jeremy Tate and paired with an image of a wonderful old building. Here are

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Frederick Douglass and Adam Smith

Frederick Douglass’s connection to the British Enlightenment. Via David Henderson and David Beito, here is an excerpt from a letter Douglass wrote on November 17, 1864: “The old doctrine that the slavery of the black, is essential to the freedom of the white race, can maintain itself only in the presence of slavery, where interest

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Why do so many successful people continue to work?

My article on the meaning of work—contrasting those who love their work with those who hate it—and asking why that contrast has persisted across millennia. “Why Work? Our Ages-Old, Always-New Question” Published as part of a symposium on Mike Rowe of “Dirty Jobs.” At the Reason Papers site. Related: “What Business Ethics Can Learn from

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Our Revolutionary Business Culture — Lecture 1 of BUSINESS ETHICS LEADERSHIP

Lecture 1. Business Revolution In our introductory lecture, Dr. Hicks examines the revolutionary transformation of business over the past 200–300 years, highlighting dramatic gains in life expectancy, wealth, and technology. We explore how entrepreneurship, science, religion, and culture drove economic growth, while discussing personal values and responsibility in a diverse global marketplace. About the Course

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Marx’s philosophy and the *necessity* of violent politics

In my Modern Philosophy course we focus on the younger Marx and discuss Marx and Engels’s The Communist Manifesto. One question we raised is why Marx and Engels reject achieving socialism by democratic and reformist methods. Why the insistence upon violent revolution? Here’s Marx in an 1848 newspaper article: “there is only one way in

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