Faith Sommerfield Lecture: “Living Well and Dying Well”
INTRODUCING THE FAITH SOMMERFIELD MEMORIAL LECTURE FEAT. KEYNOTE SPEAKER PETER SINGER
Please join us for this Inaugural Memorial Lecture, featuring the renowned philosopher Peter Singer.
TIMELINE OF EVENTS
Doors open at 5:45PM.
Lecture runs from 6:15PM-7:30PM.
Reception to follow.
This event is free and open to the public.
LECTURE DESCRIPTION
The Faith Sommerfield Memorial Lecture was established at Columbia University School of Professional Studies in partnership with the Program in Bioethics in early 2023 to commemorate the life of Faith Sommerfield, the late Founder of the Completed Life Initiative. This inaugural lecture will feature a presentation by the renowned philosopher Peter Singer.
The Faith Sommerfield Memorial Lecture aims to implement a yearly lecture series on broadening the scope of end-of-life care—specifically, what it means to live a good life and how a person might achieve a good death.
BACKGROUND ABOUT PETER SINGER
Peter Singer has been described as the world’s most influential philosopher. Born in Melbourne in 1946, he has been professor of bioethics at Princeton University since 1999. His many books include Animal Liberation – often credited with triggering the modern animal rights movement – Practical Ethics, The Life You Can Save, The Most Good You Can Do, and Ethics in the Real World. In 2023, he published Animal Liberation Now, a fully revised and updated version of the 1975 original.
Singer’s writings have also inspired the movement known as effective altruism, and he is the founder of the charity The Life You Can Save. In 2021 he was awarded the $1 million Berggruen Prize for Philosophy and Culture, which he donated to nonprofit organizations working for the causes he supports. In 2023 he received the Frontiers of Knowledge Prize for the Humanities, from the Spanish BBVA Foundation.
For more information about the Completed Life Initiative, please visit their website www.completedlife.org
For more information about the Columbia School of Professional Studies Program in Bioethics, please visit www.sps.columbia.edu/academics/masters/bioethics
For event-related questions, please contact spsalumni@columbia.edu.
