Author Archives: Steven Yates

About Steven Yates

I have a Ph.D. in Philosophy, taught the subject at a number of universities around the American Southeast, then became disillusioned in the profession, moved to Chile in 2012. I am the author of Civil Wrongs: What Went Wrong With Affirmative Action (1994), Four Cardinal Errors: Reasons for the Decline of the American Republic (2011), What Should Philosophy Do? A Theory (2021), and most recently, So You Want to Get a PhD in Philosophy? (2025). I've also published around two dozen articles & reviews in academic journals, and hundreds online on numerous topics ranging from pure philosophy to political economy. My Substack publication is Navigating the New Normal. I currently live near Concepcion, Chile, with my wife Gisela and our two spoiled cats.

My Kantian-Kierkegaardian Christianity

Posted on October 2, 2015 by Steven Yates

In accordance with my standing as an outsider, I’ve been increasingly inclined over the years to make up my own mind about matters of philosophical theology, attendance of religious ceremonies, and matters of faith. I am unimpressed by the tenured … Continue reading →

Posted in Christian Worldview, Philosophy | Tagged "God is dead", A Free Man's Worship, agnosticism, arguments for God's existence, atheism, Bertrand Russell, black swans, Christian God, Christianity, Dostoevsky, Einstein, Feyerabend, God, higher dimensions, Intelligent Design, Kant, Kierkegaard, metaphysics, Nietzsche, Philosophy, positivism, proofs of God's existence, realism, Transcendental philosophy | 1 Comment

Theses on Political Economy (Pre-Meltdown of 2015?)

Posted on August 22, 2015 by Steven Yates

A borderline-panic has gripped U.S. markets, which experienced their worst two-day drop since 2008 (roughly 890 points). This may be just a prelude of things to come. Before going on: I sincerely hope this analysis is wrong! It may not … Continue reading →

Posted in Political Economy, Where is Civilization Going? | Tagged capitalism vs. socialism, central banks, Chinese economy, consumption, corporatism, corporatocracy, Crash of 2015, critical thinking, decentralization, Donald Trump, Dow plunging, economics, Federal Reserve, fiat money, financial crisis, financialization, Greece, Hayek, higher education, Keynes, Leopold Kohr, libertarianism, Meltdown of 2008, Mises, money printing, political class, political economy, production, Rockefeller Foundation, Rockefellers, skills building, superelite, technofeudalism, two-day drop, welfare state | 1 Comment

Worldviews and Christianity: What the Loss of the “Culture War” Means

Posted on July 5, 2015 by Steven Yates

It is Sunday, but I didn’t make it to church this morning. When we lived in Las Condes, our church, San Marcos, was just a few bus stops down the road. Now, it’s over an hour away, and the public … Continue reading →

Posted in Christian Worldview, Culture, Where is Civilization Going? | Tagged Christian Worldview, Christianity, culture war, gay marriage, homophobia, homosexual, homosexuality, materialism, persecution of Christians, progressive, racism, secularism, sexism, Supreme Court, worldviews | 1 Comment

Modern Moral Philosophy (Part Two—Is the Libertarian Non-Aggression Principle Adequate As the Foundation for a Systematic Morality)

Posted on May 22, 2015 by Steven Yates

In Part One (two weeks ago) we surveyed such questions as: are there such things as knowable moral facts, or is morality a cultural artifact? I argued that the former claim makes better sense of what we use ethical language … Continue reading →

Posted in Libertarianism, Political Economy | Tagged anarchism, anarchocapitalism, elder care, Ethics, free market competition, free trade, harm principle, homo economicus, John Stuart Mill, libertarian, libertarianism, minarchism, moral philosophy, NAP, non-aggression principle, Oligarchy, On Liberty, our actions affect others, plutocracy, plutocratic oligarchy, political economy, property rights, protectionism, Rockefeller, statism, third party problem | Leave a comment

Modern Moral Philosophy (Part I, Being a Longwinded Inquiry into Whether There Are Any Such Things As Moral Facts, Preliminary to Our Investigation of the Libertarian Non-Aggression Principle (NAP))

Posted on May 8, 2015 by Steven Yates

Introduction: this post was inspired by a thread on Facebook in which I participated. It raised issues that couldn’t be handled without more depth than is possible in one or two already-lengthy comments. The main topic was the viability and … Continue reading →

Posted in Culture, Libertarianism, Philosophy | Tagged analytic philosophy, cognitivism, emotivism, ethical relativism, Ethics, ethics as opinion, Hume's fork, libertarianism, moral facts, moral realism, non-aggression principle, noncognitivism, prescriptivism, relativism | 1 Comment

Not-Quite-Random Thoughts on Conservatism, Anarchism, and the Breakdown of Modern Civilization

Posted on April 30, 2015 by Steven Yates

Yesterday I found myself outlining an article entitled “Needed: A New Russell Kirk.” Russell Kirk (1918 – 1994) was a conservative philosopher & author of The Conservative Mind (1953), The Roots of American Order (1991) and other books including some … Continue reading →

Posted in Political Economy, Where is Civilization Going? | Tagged anarchism, civil unrest, Clinton vs. Bush, collapse, conservatism, decline of civilization, economic point of view, free market, globalization, hedonism, Leopold Kohr, moral subjectivism, neoconservatism, Russell Kirk | Leave a comment

What Is a Liberal Arts Education For?

Posted on April 18, 2015 by Steven Yates

Liberal arts education has suffered from increasing neglect for a very long time — for at least 40 years, possibly longer. While it continues to exist in a few private liberal arts colleges, obviously, it long ago ceased to be … Continue reading →

Posted in Higher Education Generally | Tagged Aristotle, Bertrand Russell, civil unrest, elites, Fareed Zakaria, free your mind, Kuhn, liberal arts, liberal arts education, Morpheus, Occupy movement, power elite, quadrivium, STEM education, Tea Party, The Matrix, Thomas S. Kuhn, trivium | Leave a comment

A “Rape on Campus”? Radical Feminism & the Rolling Stone Fiasco

Posted on April 11, 2015 by Steven Yates

[Note: I’d planned on doing a piece entitled “What Is a Liberal Arts Education For?” But the culmination of the events described here, and their implication for the sorry state of both higher education and popular journalism today, seemed more … Continue reading →

Posted in Culture, Higher Education Generally | Tagged A Rape on Campus, academic feminism, academic leftism, campus rape statistics, campus sexual assault statistics, Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, Haven Monahan, Phi Kappa Psi, political correctness, radical feminism, rape hoaxes, Rolling Stone, University of Virginia | Leave a comment

How Higher Education in the U.S. Has Slowly Self-Destructed

Posted on April 3, 2015 by Steven Yates

There can be little doubt that at one time, the U.S. had the best higher education system in the world — rivaled only by, perhaps, by institutions in Great Britain such as Oxford and Cambridge. It still lives on that … Continue reading →

Posted in Higher Education Generally, Where Is Philosophy Going? | Tagged Adjunct, Brian Leiter, free market, Harry Frankfurt, Herbert Marcuse, higher education decline, Lost Generation, Marcusans, MOOCs, National Adjunct Walkout Day, Neoliberalism, Philosophy, political correctness, Powell Memorandum, student loan debt crisis | Leave a comment

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