Craig Biddle is cofounder and executive director of Objective Standard Institute, cofounder and editor in chief of The Objective Standard, and executive director of Prometheus Foundation. His books include Loving Life: The Morality of Self-Interest and the Facts that Support It; Rational Egoism: The Morality for Human Flourishing; and the forthcoming Forbidden Facts: Moral Truths Your Parents, Preachers, and Teachers Don’t Want You to Know. His book-in-progress is on thinking in principles.
Program: Objectivity in One Question: A Query for Keeping Your Mind Connected to Reality
Program: Golden Ages and How to Create Them
Africa Brooke is a Zimbabwean-born consultant, developmental coach, speaker, and author of The Third Perspective: Brave Expression in The Age of Intolerance. She is known for her work in overcoming self-sabotage and self-censorship. As the founder and CEO of Africa Brooke International, she provides consulting and coaching to a global audience. She hosts two personal development podcasts and is a frequent guest on TV, podcasts, and radio. Her insights have been featured in publications like The Guardian, and she has delivered keynotes at venues like Cambridge University.
Ely Lassman is founder and chair of Prometheus on Campus, a UK-based educational nonprofit focused on promoting philosophy for freedom and happiness; and quality assurance manager for Prometheus Foundation, for which he audits programs, leads study groups, and teaches philosophy. He earned his degree in economics from University of Bristol, where he also founded the UoB Liberty Society.
Angelica is a fellow at Objective Standard Institute, an assistant editor and writer for The Objective Standard, and an Ayn Rand Fellow with Foundation for Economic Education’s Hazlitt Project. Her roles at OSI include managing the junior fellowship and LevelUp scholarship programs, course administration and development, and mentoring. She is a voracious reader of fiction in her spare time, and writes about the ideas in fictional works at fictionosophy.substack.com.
Program: Character Arcs and the Arc of Your Life: How Fictional Heroes Can Help You Thrive
Thomas Walker-Werth is associate editor at The Objective Standard and a fellow at both Objective Standard Institute and Foundation for Economic Education. He is currently writing his first full-length book, Reason for Living: A Rational, Fact-Based Approach to Living Your Best Life.
Roxana Nicula bio coming soon …
Leszek Balcerowicz bio coming soon …
Program: Panel: Obstacles to Freedom in Europe and How to Overcome Them (other panel participants TBD)
LevelUp Europe 2025: Program Description
Objectivity in One Question: A Query for Keeping Your Mind Connected to Reality
Craig Biddle
Objectivity, you may have heard, is impossible. We can’t know “truth” in absolute terms. We can’t know anything as it “really is.” The best we can do is to “approximate” truth or get closer to it. Conclusive knowledge, in this view, is forever elusive.
Craig Biddle will show what is wrong with such claims. More importantly, he will show that knowledge is not only possible but also widespread—including in your head; and he will show how a particularly powerful question, when properly applied, can help you to see which ideas are grounded in reality, and which are not.
Character Arcs and the Arc of Your Life: How Fictional Heroes Can Help You Thrive
Angelica Walker-Werth
Have you been deeply moved by any fictional characters—whether from novels, movies, or series? If so, why? Did you learn something important from their journeys? Did their choices and experiences help you to think more clearly about your own?
Character arcs can have a profoundly positive impact on our lives—especially if we clearly identify the stages of the arc and what caused the character to change. Angel Walker-Werth will examine a few powerful arcs from great fiction, showing the kinds of observations and questions that can help us get the most from the characters we love.
Creating and Climbing Your Ladder of Happiness
Thomas Walker-Werth
How can you decide what to make of your life? How can you choose among the countless alternatives? And, when you do decide, what must you do to follow through and build a life you love? Answering such questions is essential to making your life the best it can be. And it isn’t easy.
Thomas Walker-Werth will provide a step-by-step plan for deciding what you want, organizing your goals with respect to their relative importance, and achieving a life of happiness.
Sifting the Good from the Sea of Stoicism
Ely Lassman
Stoicism is a deeply mixed philosophy, consisting of a few powerful, reality-based elements that can help us to think clearly and love life—scattered amidst a sea of ideas that are detached from reality and thus harmful if embraced.
Drawing from various philosophers in this broad and increasingly popular school of thought, Ely Lassman will highlight some of the good elements, discuss some of the bad, and provide guidance on how to tell the difference so you can embrace the former and ditch the latter.
Golden Ages and How to Create Them
Johan Norberg
Throughout much of history, oppression and misery have prevailed. But there have also been spectacular episodes of creativity, innovation, and growth—from ancient Athens and Rome to Song China and the Dutch Republic. What made these golden ages possible? Why did they eventually come to an end?
Johan Norberg will examine these periods of prosperity, identifying the ideas and values that can help us to safeguard freedom, foster flourishing, and build a new golden age.
Panel: Obstacles to Freedom in Europe and How to Overcome Them
Leszek Balcerowicz (other panel participants TBD)
Description coming soon …
More talks coming soon …
The program is subject to change.