Sadler's Lectures

This lecture discusses key ideas from the 20th century African-American philosopher, theologian, and civil rights leader, Martin Luther King Jr.'s work "Letter From A Birmingham Jail"

This episode examines King's depiction and analysis of racism and segregation as fundamentally wrong and illegitimate forms of inequality in America

To support my ongoing work, go to my Patreon site - www.patreon.com/sadler

If you'd like to make a direct contribution, you can do so here - www.paypal.me/ReasonIO - or at BuyMeACoffee - www.buymeacoffee.com/A4quYdWoM

You can find over 3500 philosophy videos in my main YouTube channel - www.youtube.com/user/gbisadler

You can find the Letter From A Birmingham Jail here - https://www.africa.upenn.edu/Articles_Gen/Letter_Birmingham.html

This is the recording from my invited talk on philosophical resources for understanding and managing anger, which was part of my alma mater Lakeland University's Thinkhaus talk series, given up at the Mead Public Library in Sheboygan, WI. The original recording from 2017 was made by a local high school AV club, which unfortunately didn't do a great job with sound, lighting, video, or editing, so I didn't release it at the time, but I've subsequently remastered it to improve all of those.

In the talk, I discuss how ideas drawn from Plato, Aristotle, and Epictetus can help us to deal productively with the anger that we inevitably encounter or experience. Specifically, from Plato we learn how to identify the sorts of conflicts that are likely to lead to anger, from Aristotle how to assess our own anger responses, and from Epictetus how to shift our feeling of anger into a different feeling by reminding ourselves of why people do things that we take as wrong or offensive.

This is my relatively short talk given during the 2025 Plato's Academy multidisciplinary conference: The Philosophy of Love And Relationships. I was invited to approach the topic of the difficulties involved in the highest, fullest, and most paradigmatic form of friendship that Aristotle

In the course of my presentation, I discuss the importance and influence of the distinction between three different kinds of friendship based on utility, pleasure, and the good or noble. I note that this distinction does not capture every sort of relationship or friendship Aristotle discusses. Then we briefly look at each of these three sorts of friendship, and discuss some of the difficulties involved in developing and sustaining the highest form of friendship.

We then discuss the question of how virtuous Aristotle would require us to be in order to be a partner in the highest type of friendship, the answer to which is that we don't need to have all of the virtues, and we could be on our way to developing them. After that, we turn briefly to three later thinkers who engage with Aristotle's ideas and take them a bit further on the matter of friendship, looking for useful resources for understanding how we can best approach this matter of a true or genuine friendship

The thinkers and works I reference and discuss in this presentation include:

Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Eudemian Ethics

Cicero, On Friendship

Seneca, Letters 3, 9, 109

Plutarch, On Having Many Friends, How To Tell A Flatterer From A Friend

This lecture, discussing the nature of "moral choice" or "deliberate choice" in Aristotle's moral theory, was delivered during the 7th Felician Ethics Conference at Felician College (Rutherford, NJ). In it, I discuss what I label the "Standard Interpretation" of prohairesis, which ties it explicitly to deliberation about means towards ends -- an interpretation stemming from focusing on Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics book 3 discussion of prohairesis.

I then discuss a number of passages from across Aristotle's body of work which provide a broader context for understanding what prohairesis could be. I conclude by arguing that the Standard Interpretation, while correct in what it asserts, is far too restrictive to account for these other passages, so that prohairesis must be understood as a complex and more fundamental concept in Aristotelian moral theory.

This is the invited presentation I provided for the attendees of the Stoicon-X Brisbane conference in Australia held in October 2019. It discusses Epictetus' advice to remind ourselves that we want to maintain or keep our "prohairesis" - our faculty of choice - in accordance with nature.

For those who would like more information about Epictetus' conception of prohairesis, or about the Stoic notion of "in accordance with nature", I have two longer talks:

Stoicism and "In Accordance With Nature" | A Center for Ethics and Entrepreneurship Lecture - https://youtu.be/NyHUMD2_ghQ?si=Ge0aYdjR-jFXFoi6

Prohairesis in Epictetus' Stoic Moral Theory - Midwest Seminar in Ancient and Medieval Philosophy - https://youtu.be/EWS4QR1PM58?si=Gx_HNZfsuar8wsbf

This is the recording of my short presentation and the Q&A at the second Conversations With Modern Stoicism event, hosted in June 2025 by Phil Yanov. Asked to give a short and provocative presentation about an issue that arises in the everyday applications of Stoicism, we decided on the topic of grief and grieving

I first discuss what we can call a "standard Stoic take" on grief, which they understand as belonging to the broader emotional category of pain or distress, and therefore being something bad for us. We then look briefly at some of the treatments of grief and grieving in Epictetus and Seneca.

Texts mentioned in this talk:

Marcus Aurelius' Meditations - https://amzn.to/3osPFNF

Epictetus' Discourses and Enchiridion - https://amzn.to/37G6bE0

Seneca's Letters - https://amzn.to/3dZQrNk

Cicero's Tusculan Disputations - https://amzn.to/3L1WoxY

This is the talk I was invited to provide for Stoicon-X New England 2020. I take the recent case of a fired Lidl communications worker who claimed that he was unjustly fired on account of his Stoicism. I use this case as a starting point to discuss what sorts of conduct would actually be characteristic of a follower of Stoicism in the workplace, and what resources and advice Stoic philosophy can provide us.

Texts mentioned in this talk:

Marcus Aurelius' Meditations - https://amzn.to/3osPFNF

Epictetus' Discourses and Enchiridion - https://amzn.to/37G6bE0

Seneca's Letters - https://amzn.to/3dZQrNk

Cicero's On The Ends - https://amzn.to/3mmgJMB

This lecture discusses key ideas from the 19th century philosophers and social theorists, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, articulated in their work The Communist Manifesto.

This episode examines the Marxist critique of other forms of Socialism articulated in the third part of the Communist manifesto, as well as the Marxist argument that only their program can adequately address the condition of the Proletariat

To support my ongoing work, go to my Patreon site - www.patreon.com/sadler

If you'd like to make a direct contribution, you can do so here - www.paypal.me/ReasonIO - or at BuyMeACoffee - www.buymeacoffee.com/A4quYdWoM

You can find over 3500 philosophy videos in my main YouTube channel - www.youtube.com/user/gbisadler

You can find the Communist Manifesto free online here https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/

This lecture discusses key ideas from the 19th century philosophers and social theorists, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, articulated in their work The Communist Manifesto.

This episode examines what Marx and Engels envision the role of the Communist Party to be in relation to leadership of, and the development of class consciousness in, the Proletariat. They also address some of the objections made against the Communist program, and set out what their particular goals are.

To support my ongoing work, go to my Patreon site - www.patreon.com/sadler

If you'd like to make a direct contribution, you can do so here - www.paypal.me/ReasonIO - or at BuyMeACoffee - www.buymeacoffee.com/A4quYdWoM

You can find over 3500 philosophy videos in my main YouTube channel - www.youtube.com/user/gbisadler

You can find the Communist Manifesto free online here https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/

This lecture discusses key ideas from the 19th century philosophers and social theorists, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, articulated in their work The Communist Manifesto.

This episode examines Marx and Engel's description of the formation and emergence of the revolutionary class in industrial capitalism, the Proletariat

To support my ongoing work, go to my Patreon site - www.patreon.com/sadler

If you'd like to make a direct contribution, you can do so here - www.paypal.me/ReasonIO - or at BuyMeACoffee - www.buymeacoffee.com/A4quYdWoM

You can find over 3500 philosophy videos in my main YouTube channel - www.youtube.com/user/gbisadler

You can find the Communist Manifesto free online here https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/