Michael Torre’s Colloquium Dinner

Professor Michael Torre will speak of what has centrally occupied his research from graduate school to the present: the person and work of Fr. Francisco Marín-Sola, OP, of whom he will begin by speaking (since his work created a "scandal" in the Dominican order, which is interesting to relate). The work Professor Torre particularly studied was Marín-Sola’s account of free creatures being the first cause of their immoral acts. The context for this account was the typical teaching of Dominicans concerning the nature of free choice; his published work only refers to this tangentially, but some (albeit relatively brief) account of it is necessary to his later account of moral evil, and so it will be given first, following the introduction to him and to the controversy his work provoked. That account (of moral evil) was provocative because some could not see how it could be reconciled to traditional doctrine concerning God as the first cause of all the good acts of free creatures. The summary of his teaching will then end by attending to how he thought his views could be reconciled to such doctrine. To put his work in a slightly different framework, it looked to some as though he were proposing there was a way to avoid the classic opposition of "libertarians" and "compatibilists": the Jesuits being the classic Catholic advocates of the first and the Dominicans the classic Catholic advocates of the second. This is in fact just what he was proposing. His "solution" will be sympathetically exposed. Those who attend Professor Torre’s "brown bag" seminar of October 28th will have seen in it the ancient and medieval background to the doctrine Marín-Sola defends; attending it will enrich this colloquium, but the account "on offer" is complete in itself.

Catering will be served!

This event is free and open to the public, and has been generously supported by the Mortimer Fleischhacker fund and the Philosophy Department at the University of San Francisco.

If you have any questions, please reach out to the Program Assistant for the Philosophy Department, Brandon Marsh, at bmarsh@usfca.edu.