Radical Thoughts on Human Nature: Stephen Blackwood at Hillsdale College
Release Date: 06/25/2024
We Live in the Flicker: T. S. Eliot and Dante on the Spaces Between
The Ralston College Podcast
Ralston College presents a talk by Christopher Snook, Lecturer in the Department of Classics at Dalhousie University, on the influence of Dante’s Purgatorio on two of T.S. Eliot’s most important works: The Waste Land and Four Quartets. Mr Snook attends, in particular, to how Eliot’s treatment of fragments represents at once both a departure from and a return to medieval understandings of the whole. This medieval understanding is evidenced in the “manifold articulation” of particulars within the architecture of the Gothic cathedral, the literary shape of the Divine Comedy, and the...
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The Other Side of Despair: The Search for Meaning in T.S Eliot’s “The Waste Land”
The Ralston College Podcast
Ralston College presents a talk by Christopher Snook, Lecturer in the Department of Classics at Dalhousie University, on T.S. Eliot’s modernist masterpiece The Waste Land. The lecture explores the personal, historical, and literary contexts of Eliot’s poem. Through an engagement with the Western tradition that is simultaneously rich and fragmented, The Waste Land confronts cultural and personal crises that have atrophied both memory and desire. Snook finds in Eliot’s work a mournful modernism that serves as a serious and searching rejoinder to the more frivolous and enervated...
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Jay Parini on Why Poetry Matters
The Ralston College Podcast
A conversation between Dr Jay Parini, a prolific author and the D.E. Axinn Professor of English and Creative Writing at Middlebury College, and Dr Stephen Blackwood, the founding president of Ralston College, recorded on the occasion of the release of a Ralston College short course, “Robert Frost: The American Voice,” taught by Dr Parini. Dr Parini discusses the film adaptation of his most recent book Borges and Me (2020), shares stories of his friendships with literary figures including Jorge Luis Borges, W. H. Auden, and Iris Murdoch, explains why poetry matters, and shares the fruits of...
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Polytheism and the Polis: The Drama of the Individual Before the Self with Paul Epstein | Ralston College
The Ralston College Podcast
Dr Paul Epstein is a distinguished classicist and Professor Emeritus of Classics at Oklahoma State University, renowned for his extensive knowledge of Greek and Latin literature. In this lecture and discussion—delivered in Savannah during the x term of the inaugural year of Ralston College’s MA in the Humanities program—classicist Dr Paul Epstein considers how Sophocles’s tragedy Women of Trachis and Aristophanes’s comedy Frogs arise from—and reflect upon—the polis-centered polytheism of ancient Greece as it appeared during the Athenian flourishing of the fifth...
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Levels of Intelligibility, Levels of the Self: Realizing the Dialectic with Dr John Vervaeke | Ralston College
The Ralston College Podcast
Dr John Vervaeke is a cognitive scientist and philosopher who explores the intersections of Neoplatonism, cognitive science, and the meaning crisis, focusing on wisdom practices, relevance realization, and personal transformation. Ralston College presents a lecture titled “Levels of Intelligibility, Levels of the Self: Realizing the Dialectic,” delivered by Dr John Vervaeke, an award-winning associate professor of cognitive science at the University of Toronto and creator of the acclaimed 50-episode “Awakening from the Meaning Crisis” series. In this lecture, Dr Vervaeke identifies...
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Knowing God in the Book of Job | Dr David Novak with Ralston College
The Ralston College Podcast
Dr David Novak is a distinguished professor at the University of Toronto, renowned theologian, and esteemed rabbi. He has authored numerous books, delivered the prestigious Gifford Lectures, and bridges ancient philosophical traditions with modern ethical issues. Recorded live at Ralston College in Savannah, GA in November of 2022. Dr David Novak—Professor of Philosophy and Jewish Studies at the University of Toronto—offers a lecture on the Book of Job followed by an extended question and answer session with students enrolled in Ralston College’s Master’s in the...
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Unlocking Consciousness with Dr Stephen Wolfram: AI & Philosophy | Ralston College
The Ralston College Podcast
Dr Stephen Wolfram is a renowned computer scientist, physicist, and entrepreneur who earned his PhD in particle physics at 20 and became the youngest MacArthur Fellow at 21. As the founder of Wolfram Research, he has developed groundbreaking technologies widely used by university researchers in engineering, physics, mathematics, and computing. How can computational thinking and philosophy together unlock the mysteries of human consciousness and the universe? In this Q&A session, conducted in February 2024 with students enrolled in Ralston College’s MA in the Humanities...
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From Homer to Gutenberg: Ancient Greek and Its Afterlives with Dr David Butterfield
The Ralston College Podcast
David Butterfield is a renowned classicist and Senior Lecturer at the University of Cambridge. His work centres on the critical study and teaching of classical texts. How did the Renaissance revival of Greek language study transform Western Europe's intellectual landscape and shape our modern understanding of the Classics? In this talk, delivered on the island of Samos in Greece in August 2023 as part of Ralston College’s Master’s in the Humanities program, Dr. David Butterfield—Senior Lecturer in Classics at the University of Cambridge—charts how Western Europe came to appreciate the...
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Education without Indoctrination: Can It Exist? Stephen Blackwood, John Vervaeke & David Butterfield
The Ralston College Podcast
Stephen Blackwood is the founding President of Ralston College, with advanced degrees in Classics and Religion and visiting positions at Harvard, Toronto, and Cambridge. David Butterfield is a renowned classicist and Senior Lecturer at the University of Cambridge. His work centres on the critical study and teaching of classical texts. John Vervaeke, PhD, is an award-winning professor of psychology, cognitive science, and Buddhist psychology at the University of Toronto. What are the fundamental principles required to cultivate an educational environment free from ideological...
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Self and Story: In Conversation with Gregg Hurwitz
The Ralston College Podcast
Gregg Hurwitz, the New York Times bestselling author of the Orphan X series and a storyteller whose work spans many mediums and genres, in conversation with Stephen Blackwood, the founding president of Ralston College, and with students enrolled in the inaugural year of the College’s MA in the Humanities program. In this live event—recorded on [date] at Ralston College—Hurwitz discusses the concrete details of his own writing practice and explains how his training in literature and psychology have informed his craft. He reflects on how storytelling helps us to understand the self and on...
info_outlineIn this lecture, delivered on March 30, 2023, as part of the Drummond Lecture Series at Hillsdale College, Dr. Stephen Blackwood—the founding president of Ralston College—argues that we must first understand something’s nature before we can properly care for and cultivate it. This principle holds true for all living things—including plants and animals—but it is seen in its fullest complexity in human beings as they seek to realize their unique potential through the concrete challenges and conditions of their individual lives. Drawing richly upon both text and images, Dr. Blackwood explains that the actualization of our potential is not inevitable but instead relies upon us being rooted in a culture that can nurture, sustain, and challenge us as we seek to orient our subjective and finite experiences of the world toward eternal and infinite realities. Dr. Blackwood’s lecture is a call to action for both individuals and institutions, reminding us of our sacred duty to both realize our own gifts and to accompany and support others as they seek to do the same.
Resources
Ralston College
Website: https://www.ralston.ac/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@RalstonCollegeSavannah
X: https://twitter.com/RalstonCollege
Ralston College Humanities MA:
https://www.ralston.ac/humanities-ma
Authors, Ideas, and Works Mentioned in this Episode
radix (Latin, “root)
William Shakespeare, Hamlet
The Biblical book of Ezekiel
Ugo da Carpi
cultus, (Latin, “cultivation, culture, education, devotion”)
Aristotle, De Anima
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics
St. Augustine
Anthony Daniels / Theodore Dalrymple
thaumazein (θαυμάζω) (Ancient Greek, “wonder”)
Sigrid Undset, Kristen Lavransdatter
Gerard Manley Hopkins, “The Leaden Echo and the Golden Echo”
Homer, Odyssey
Pythagoras
Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy
Cal Newport, Deep Work
Cal Newport, Digital Minimalism
Gerard Manley Hopkins, “As Kingfishers Catch Fire”
Quotes
“Life can only be lived for itself. And only you can live that life." - Stephen Blackwood [00:15:54]
"We need a true radicalism. A return to root as both anchor and nourishing source." - Stephen Blackwood [00:16:07]
"You must string the bow, the bow of your soul, and let it sing. That irreducible particularity, that finite smallness of you, the intricacy and difficulty of your own life, is also where the greatness is. I encourage you, with everything I've got, to go out and find it." - Stephen Blackwood [00:53:15]
Chapters
00:00:00 - Introduction: Realizing Human Potential through Education: A Vision for Culture and the Human Person
00:06:30 - Hillsdale's Outsized Influence: How a Small College Cuts Through Noise to Seek Truth
00:09:00 - Rediscovering the True Meaning of Radical: Uncovering the Fundamentals of Human Nature
00:17:10 - Realizing Potential: The Dynamics of Growth in Natural Beings
00:28:30 - The Quest for Self-Knowledge: Exploring the Depths of Human Nature
00:35:00 - Transcending Self: The Search for Meaning Beyond the Empirical
00:40:00 - Integrating Self and Transcendence: Navigating Human Complexity and Connection
00:50:40 - Conclusion: The Infinite Particularity: Embracing the Unique Symphony of the Soul
00:54:10 - Q&A Session: Providence, Self-Determination, and Cultural Meaning at Hillsdale College