The ramblings of a rationalist
 
 
I have resisted creating a website for many years for a simple reason: I didn’t have anything worth saying. (Spoiler alert: I still don’t.) But, armed with my first Macbook, I discovered that saying nothing on the web could be accomplished with so little effort and so much (generic, template-based) style, that I could no longer avoid the allure of indulging in self-fascination. So here we go. I’m a philosopher by training (Yale) and trade (Notre Dame). The main purpose of this site is to provide an easy way to disseminate drafts of works in progress in the Papers section. I’ve also posted pre-final versions of a couple published pieces. Comments on anything there are welcomed, so long as they don’t begin with personal insults. (Save those for your conclusion.) Under Teaching I’ve posted a couple course syllabi for those who may be interested in such dreadful things. (If you’re an ND student looking for actual course material, click here.) Least importantly, I’ve thrown some photos and such about myself as well as some relevant links under About Me. Inevitably, most of it will be woefully out of date. Lastly, I’ve included fuller contact info and some relevant links under, you guessed it, Contact and Links. I can be reached at snewlands [a-t] nd [d-o-t] eduhttp://www.yale.edu/philos/index.htmlhttp://philosophy.nd.edu/Papers.htmlTeaching.htmlhttp://concourse.nd.eduAbout_me.htmlContact_and_Links.htmlshapeimage_2_link_0shapeimage_2_link_1shapeimage_2_link_2shapeimage_2_link_3shapeimage_2_link_4shapeimage_2_link_5shapeimage_2_link_6
Papers Curriculum Vitae Teaching About Me Contact and LinksPapers.htmlPapers.htmlVitae.htmlTeaching.htmlAbout_me.htmlContact_and_Links.htmlshapeimage_4_link_0shapeimage_4_link_1shapeimage_4_link_2shapeimage_4_link_3shapeimage_4_link_4shapeimage_4_link_5
“I cannot assign to the Theodicy...any other merit than that it later gave rise to the immortal Candide of the great Voltaire. In this way, of course, Leibniz’s oft-repeated and lame excuse for the evil of the world, namely that the bad sometimes produces the good, obtained proof that for him was unexpected.” - Schopenhauer
“We arrived in fairlyland long before the final steps of our theory.” - Hume
“Nihil est sine ratione.” - Leibniz
welcome to the pages of sam newlands
NEWS FLASH: Check out the latest activities for “the problem of evil in Modern and Contemporary Thought” project that I’m co-directing at evilandtheodicy.comhttp://evilandtheodicy.comshapeimage_14_link_0