Love and Philosophy: Plato, Aristotle, and Ayn Rand
Thursday, February 12, 2009 at 7:30pm
UCLA Campus: Franz 2258A
What is the role of philosophy in love, sex, and romance?
How do our values shape to whom we're attracted?
Would a person of self-esteem be sexually promiscuous?
Philosophy professor Allan Gotthelf will answer these questions by illustrating the practical consequences of holding a certain philosophy. He will show how an individual's philosophic convictions--conscious or implicit--affect one's view of love and sex, and ultimately, one's romantic choices. In particular, Dr. Gotthelf will contrast the influences of Plato and Aristotle, and endorse the fundamentally Aristotelian nature of Ayn Rand's view, as expressed in her philosophy, Objectivism.
7:30pm: Lecture
8:30pm: Q&A
Professor Gotthelf is the author of "On Ayn Rand", the best-selling book in the Wadsworth Philosophers series (2000) and has written extensively on Aristotle's biology and philosophy of science. He is emeritus professor of philosophy at The College of New Jersey, and has taught on a visiting basis at Oxford University, Tokyo Metropolitan University,the University of Texas at Austin, and since 2003 at the University of Pittsburgh. He is a life member of Clare Hall Cambridge, and was a visiting member of the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton. Professor Gotthelf knew Ayn Rand personally and studied with her in the 1960s and 1970s.
