Advanced Seminar in Objectivist Epistemology and Philosophy of Mind

The Advanced Seminar in Objectivist Studies program has been set and is posted on the TOC website. The Advanced Seminar is a small, intensive half-week gathering that discusses new research on Objectivism and develops Objectivist methods of scholarship. It will take place June 25-27 at Bentley College, preceding the full summer seminar. Likely participants include advanced undergraduates, graduate students in philosophy and allied fields, and professional and independent scholars.

The Advanced Seminar is offered free of charge to qualified students and professional scholars, including those presenting papers. Non-student participants pay only the cost of room and board for the three nights of the seminar.

The application deadline is April 21, 2003. Admission is strictly limited to qualified students and scholars in order to permit productive discussions. Applicants should possess a systematic understanding of Objectivism and a professional interest in developing and applying objective methods of philosophic analysis. Participants will be expected to prepare for the seminar by reading the seminar papers in advance, and some may be requested to prepare comments on certain papers.

The theme of the 2003 Advanced Seminar is mind and knowledge. The seminar kicks off with orientation and preliminary discussions in the evening of Wednesday, June 25.

The program for Thursday, June 26, focuses on philosophy of mind, with a study by University of Colorado graduate student Diana Hsieh on contemporary analytic theories. How has the analytic tradition of philosophy quartered the ground in studying the mind? What challenges and insights does this work present to an Objectivist approach? These are the issues raised by Hsieh's survey. It is followed by a paper by Roger Bissell, a graduate student at California Coast University. Bissell essays an Objectivist account of mind, arguing for the objectivity of the experience of free will and introspection.

Then the seminar turns to Objectivist epistemology. Thursday's discussions are capped off with a paper by Adam Reed, associate professor of information systems at California State University, Los Angeles, examining the connections between the Objectivist epistemology and Object-Oriented Programming. On Friday, June 27, Stephen Boydstun, founder and former editor of the journal Objectivity, brings his extensive researches in philosophy of science to bear on the nature of measurement as it relates to Rand's "measurement omission" theory of concepts. The seminar concludes with a debate centered on a paper by Fred Seddon assessing the roles of reason and faith in Immanuel Kant's epistemology. A philosopher who teaches at Duquesne University and Pennsylvania State University, Seddon takes issue with Ayn Rand's view of Kant as essentially anti-rational.

TOC's resident epistemologist, David Kelley, will be present to comment on the papers and will also lead a roundtable discussion on TOC's role in Objectivist scholarship and academic activism. The conference is organized and moderated by William Thomas.

The center encourages interested students and scholars to join us for the exciting give and take of Advanced Seminar debate, where the cutting edge of Objectivism is defined and explored.