Schenectady, N.Y. (Jan. 10, 2002)
– Theodore Sider, associate professor of philosophy at Syracuse University, will speak on “Vagueness and Hell” to open the Philosophy Department's Winter Colloquia on Friday, Jan. 18, at 4:15 p.m. in Humanities 213 at Union College.
This and other lectures in the Winter 2002 Philosophy Colloquia are free and open to the public.
Sider describes his talk as “a kind of goofy but fun paper arguing against the
traditional Christian doctrine of hell based on considerations of vagueness.”
His research and teaching interests include metaphysics and philosophy of language. Sider is the author of Four-Dimensionalism: An Ontology of Persistence and Time(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2001), which defends the thesis that the material world is composed of temporal as well as spatial parts.
The series continues with Ann Bumpus of Dartmouth College on “Actors Without
Intentions” on Friday, Jan. 25, at 4:15 p.m. in Humanities 213. Bumpus, a 1983
Union graduate, earned her Ph.D. from MIT. She will explore the nature of
intentions, how they are related to beliefs and desires, and whether every case of human action involves an intention.
Rachel Brown of McGill University will speak on “What's the Good of Consistency? A Look at Ethical Theory and Applications” on Friday, March 2, at 4:15 p.m. in Humanities 213.
For more information, call 388-6376.