The Civil Society Initiative at Washington University in St. Louis will host a public lecture (with brunch) featuring Thomas Kelly, Professor of Philosophy at Princeton University and author of Bias: A Philosophical Study (Oxford University Press, 2022) and numerous articles on disagreement and polarization. Professor Kelly will speak on “Why Political Polarization Will Get Worse If People Are Reasonable." An abstract is below.

All are welcome; please RSVP if you plan to attend:

https://philosophy.wustl.edu/events/civil-society-brunch-%E2%80%9Cwhy-political-polarization-will-get-worse-if-people-are-reasonable?d=2024-10-18

Abstract: On the eve of Trump vs. Harris, Americans seem more polarized than ever. In fact, political scientists report that by some measures Americans are more polarized now than at any time since the Civil War. Why is this happening? In this talk, I apply some of the historical insights and contemporary tools of philosophy to try to gain a better understanding of what we see around us. I conclude by offering some speculations about where we might be headed in the future. A natural idea is that political polarization will get better if people think and act reasonably. Against this, I defend a pessimistic hypothesis: that if people are reasonable, we should expect polarization to get worse rather than better.

The Civil Society Initiative is sponsored by the Frick Initiative and the Weidenbaum Center on the Economy, Government, and Public Policy.