Lecture by Prof. Edward Feser of Pasadena City College

Free and open to the public. Catholic Community @ Stanford hosts the Thomistic Institute.

The idea of a law of nature is central to scientific explanation. Laws themselves are often said to be explicable in terms of more fundamental laws. But what about the most fundamental laws? Why is the world governed by those particular laws rather than by other laws or no laws at all? And what exactly is a law of nature in the first place? Are these questions that science itself can answer, or is there a role for philosophy in answering them?

Edward Feser is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Pasadena City College in Pasadena, California.  He has been a Visiting Assistant Professor at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles and a Visiting Scholar at the Social Philosophy and Policy Center at Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio.  He holds a Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of California at Santa Barbara, an M.A. in religion from the Claremont Graduate School, and a B.A. in philosophy and religious studies from the California State University at Fullerton. His primary academic research interests are in metaphysics, natural theology, the philosophy of mind, and moral and political philosophy.