Professor Owen Flanagan of Duke University will be presenting “A Dialogue with the Dalai Lama about Evolution and the Nature of Consciousness” Thursday as part of Union's Philosophy Speaker Series.
The discussion begins at 5 p.m. in the Everest Lounge and is free and open to the public.
Flanagan joined the Duke faculty in 1993 as Chair of the Department of Philosophy where he also holds appointments in Psychology and Neurobiology and is a faculty fellow in Cognitive Neuroscience. In 1993-94 he was president of the Society for Philosophy and Psychology and has held visiting positions at Brandeis, Princeton and Harvard as well as several fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities.
A prolific publisher, Flanagan has authored nine books on philosophy and the mind. In 1999, he was invited to attend a small conference in Darhamsala, India with the Dalai Lama on the topic of “Destructive Emotions.” In 2001-02, Flanagan was awarded a Fulbright Research Award to study Buddhist and Hindu conceptions of the self. He received his doctorate from Boston University.
Funding has been provided by the Spencer-Leavitt Foundation. For more information contact Raymond Martin, Departmental Chair, at 518-388-8011 or martinr@union.edu.
Following is the remaining schedule for the series, which is sponsored by the Philosophy Department. All talks will be held in the Schaffer Library Phi Beta Kappa Room unless otherwise noted:
Jan. 18 (4:30 p.m.)
Peter Railton, University of Michigan
“Desire, Happiness, and Morality”
Feb. 1 (4:30 p.m.)
Stephanie Beardman, Barnard College (Columbia)
“Emotions and Deliberative Reason”
Feb. 15 (4:30p.m.)
Manfred Kuehn, Boston University
“Kantian Ethics and the Problem of Normativity”
March 1 (6:30 p.m.)
Bas van Fraassen, Princeton University
“Structualism and the Physical World Picture”
Apr. 12 (4:30p.m.)
Sharon Street, NYU
“Objectivity and Truth: You'd Better Rethink It”
Apr. 26 (4:30p.m.)
David Velleman, NYU
“Regarding as Rational”
May 10 (4:30 p.m.)
Steven Ross, CUNY
“When Worlds Collide: Mental State Naturalism and Normative Attribution”
May 24 (4:30 p.m.)
Claudia Card, University of Wisconsin
“Ticking Bombs and Interrogations”