Pascal & Commitment

A Virtual Talk and Discussion for Berkeley Institute Alumni

The Thoughts (Pensées) of Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) are notes for a book he never wrote; they are by turns brilliant and baffling, inspiring and provoking. Among those that have provoked readers most are some that devalue life in this world and urge a frankly self-interested pursuit of life in the next. But these difficult and unfashionable thoughts are worth looking at more closely: they suggest that a principled and generous commitment to our present life might require both a clear view of its limitations and our self-interest. We'll take a close look at a handful of these passages.

RSVPs are required. Please RSVP below. Questions can be directed to info@binst.org.

Location: Zoom

Time: 12-12:45pm PST Lecture; 12:45-1:15pm PST Discussion

Date: Friday, June 24th

Facilitator: Prof. Steven Justice

This event is part of an ongoing series of programming for Berkeley Institute Alumni. Stay tuned for more events that serve and connect our alumni community. An additional event on Pascal is scheduled for the local Berkeley Institute community in Fall 2022.

  • Steven Justice

    Senior Fellow at the Berkeley Institute and Professor emeritus of English at UC Berkeley, where he taught topics in medieval literary history and literary criticism. Justice has been a fellow at the Stanford Humanities Center and Council of the Humanities Fellow at Princeton University, and has also held fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Huntington Library, and the University of California. He is the author of Writing and Rebellion: England in 1381 (University of California Press, 1994), Adam Usk’s Secret (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015), and numerous essays; he is currently at work on vol. 3 of The Penn Commentary on Piers Plowman.

RSVP

Please RSVP so we can send you a zoom link. Alumni who register by June 14th can receive a free copy of the Pensées with a noted, short selections to read in advance of the meeting. We recommend registering as early as possible and we encourage reading ahead of time.