Summer Seminars for Students
of the Witherspoon Institute:
Summer 2007 Press Release (and Student Feedback)
The Witherspoon Institute is pleased to announce the successful conclusion of another summer of the First Principles and Thomistic Seminars, its annual offerings for undergraduate and graduate students. The number and quality of applications to the seminar, as well as praise from faculty and staff, confirm that the demand for quality instruction in natural law and Thomistic philosophy is as great as ever.
“I would have never come across most of these readings in my standard graduate education, so reading everything for the Thomism Seminar broadened my education and exposed me to a lot of new important ideas,” remarked one doctoral candidate in philosophy.
Now in its third year of administration by the Witherspoon Institute, the First Principles Seminar aims to introduce graduate and advanced undergraduate students to the rudiments of natural law philosophy. Few universities in America or abroad teach this subject, though its prominence in the history of Western thought is considerable. For two weeks participants are guided by philosophers Thomas D’Andrea of the University of Cambridge and Christopher Tollefsen of the University of South Carolina. Dr. D’Andrea and Professor Tollefsen treated natural law’s implications for political theory and bioethics respectively.
Guest lecturers probed natural law’s impact on contemporary and historical issues. Highlights included talks by Professor Hadley Arkes of Amherst College on natural law and jurisprudence, Dr. Carolina Armenteros of the University of Cambridge on moral education during the French Revolution, Professor Robert George of Princeton University on public morality, Professor Daniel Robinson of the University of Oxford the politicization of bioethics, and Professor Geoffrey Vaughan of the University of Maryland on the relationship between education and democracy.
“The quality and quantity of speakers were amazing,” commented an Ivy League undergraduate, “as I am at pains to recall a moment when something that one of the many erudite professors discussed did not occupy my mind outside of the classroom.”
Running alongside First Principles for its second year, the Thomistic Seminar considers the relevance of traditional Thomism to modern-day analytic philosophy. David Gallagher, formerly of Catholic University of America, Gyula Klima of Fordham University, Robert Koons of the University of Texas at Austin, Anselm Mueller of the University of Trier, and David Oderberg of the University of Reading led students in an intensive exploration of the intersection of Thomistic and analytic theory. This year’s seminar was titled “Teleology and Goodness: Metaphysics, Mind, and Action,” and explored such issues as causation, normativity, self-consciousness, and practical knowledge.
One philosophy graduate student reported, “I felt like I got an entire graduate seminar’s worth of study out of my one week at Princeton, and several of the sessions directly influenced and improved my thinking on topics I am currently working on.”
The Witherspoon Institute screened a large pool of applicants for those candidates best equipped to handle the rigor of the summer seminars. First Principles brought together undergraduate and graduate students representing some of the world’s most prestigious schools, including the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, and Brown University. Lawyers and teachers attended as well, adding the weight of real-world concerns to the seminar’s more theoretical questions. Participants in the Thomistic Seminar represented a number of the country’s top-ten philosophy programs, including the University of Pittsburgh, Princeton University, Harvard University, and UCLA.
Student Feedback: Witherspoon Institute Summer Seminars 2007
Time and again the Witherspoon Institute receives high praise from students participating in its summer seminars, which now number three: the flagship First Principles seminar, the Thomistic Seminar, and new in 2007, the Marriage and the Social Sciences seminar. Students point to the quality of instruction, the spirit of academic collaboration, the camaraderie that develops in the course of the seminars, and the uniqueness of the subject matter compared to what academia offers as primary attractions of the seminars. Among the highest compliments is the fact that seminar participants return summer and after, confident, as one participant remarked, that “we could not better invest our time.”
“The Witherspoon Seminar on Marriage and the Social Sciences was by far the most helpful seminar I have attended during my time as a graduate student. I came away with plans for two new papers related to marriage and family, and with a set of new contacts among my graduate student peers. The seminar was uniquely imbued with a sense of camaraderie generated by knowing that we all had a shared concern for the condition of marriage in society. That kind of camaraderie is unusual in academia to say the least, if not typically absent.”
- Harvard University graduate student in Economics,
Marriage and Social Sciences Seminar
“Participating in this seminar helped me realize that there is a broad audience for this kind of research, and that this research is of vital importance to policymakers and real-life practitioners (marriage counselors, clergy, social workers, etc.) who are going to be primarily responsible for halting the decline in marriage.”
- UC–Berkeley doctoral candidate in Economics,
Marriage and Social Sciences Seminar
“I have been to three consecutive First Principles seminars. I came to the first one having never read anything by Thomas Aquinas or John Finnis and having little idea what natural law is. I am now in the middle of a Ph.D. program wherein I’m studying natural law and legal philosophy intensely and will write a dissertation at the intersection of the two. First Principles has profoundly affected the shape of my academic career, and without the program it is highly unlikely I would have been exposed to the deep body of thought the natural-law tradition represents. I want to thank the donors who made my experience possible and who continue to do so for other students. Their generosity is helping to create a community of scholars and public thinkers who will influence the debate on the most important issues we face as a country and a civilization.”
- UT–Austin doctoral candidate in Political Science, First Principles
“My life has been indelibly marked by my experience at this year’s First Principles Seminar in Princeton. Not only was the quality of information exceptionally high, but the conversation, community and camaraderie amongst the participants was stirring. What a unique opportunity to meet like-minded (although not so like-minded as to be unchallenging or homogeneous) individuals who challenge one’s thinking through their very life-stories: Lawyers working on Ph.D.s in philosophy, business students working on ethics, philosophers hoping to go into politics, etc. … This summer I was given access to a new horizon of political thought that will both mark my scholarship and challenge my sense of vocation for years to come.”
- Fordham University doctoral candidate in Philosophy, First Principles
“I am one of the increasing number of international students who attend the First Principles seminar … For international students, this opportunity is especially valuable. First, we can learn more about the way in which the tradition has developed in the English-speaking world, which in some cases differs significantly with what has taken place elsewhere. Second, many of us come from countries where the academic community is less vibrant, and in some cases almost nonexistent or not interested in the Natural Law tradition. Seminars like First Principles then acquire a whole new importance, as they can help one become part of and interact with an intellectual community that would otherwise be less accessible.”
- Ecuadorean lawyer, First Principles
“I would have never come across most of these readings in my standard graduate education, so reading everything for the Thomistic Seminar broadened my education and exposed me to a lot of new important ideas.”
- Indiana University doctoral candidate in philosophy, Thomistic Seminar
“The Thomistic Seminar is a brilliant idea; it plays an irreplaceable role in the productive engagement of the philosophical tradition often neglected in contemporary philosophical work on important topics in the foundations of ethics and philosophical anthropology.”
- University of Pittsburgh doctoral candidate in philosophy,
Thomistic Seminar
“The chance to study with this group of scholars was extraordinary. As the week built towards explicitly metaethical discussions, we heard specialists in essentialism, teleology, and the intentionality of mental states. Carefully looking into these metaphysical issues with an eye towards the ethical (and vice versa), and carefully thinking about St. Thomas’s work with an eye toward the contemporary discussions (and vice versa) was exhilarating. Puzzles that had troubled me were teased out in arguments between sides that I had not been able to articulate for myself. Usually there are not enough people with Thomistic sympathies in one place to get past arguing for the basics and into hashing through deeper issues where there is still confusion and unclarity about just how to bring Thomas into contemporary discussions. Thank you for this opportunity.”
- Georgetown University doctoral candidate in philosophy,
Thomistic Seminar
Posted September 5, 2007