University Philosophical Society (Trinity College, Dublin)

style="font-size: larger;" | **University Philosophical Society**

Founded	1683
Home Page	TCDPhil.com
Council of the University Philosophical Society, 327th Session
President	Eoin O'Liatháin
Secretary	Lorcan Clarke Sch.
Treasurer	Glen Rogers
Registrar	Ricky McCormack
Debate Convener	David Byrne
Librarian	Seamus Beirne
Steward	Lydia Rahill
School Convenor	Sorcha Finlay
Vice-President	Rosalind Ní Shúilleabháin

The University Philosophical Society, commonly known as The Phil, is a student paper-reading and debating

Debate

Debate or debating is a method of interactive and representational argument. Debate is a broader form of argument than logical argument, which only examines consistency from axiom, and factual argument, which only examines what is or isn't the case or rhetoric which is a technique of persuasion...

society in Trinity College, Dublin

Trinity College, Dublin

Trinity College, Dublin , formally known as the College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity of Queen Elizabeth near Dublin, was founded in 1592 by letters patent from Queen Elizabeth I as the "mother of a university", Extracts from Letters Patent of Elizabeth I, 1592: "...we...found and...

, Ireland

Ireland

Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...

. It is one of the two debating societies in the university. The Phil traces its history back as far as 1683, and is both the oldest student society and the oldest paper-reading society in the world.
The society meets every Thursday during term in the Graduates Memorial Building to discuss a paper, debate a motion or hear an address.

The Society

The Phil's rooms are currently situated in the Graduates' Memorial Building (commonly known as the GMB) in Trinity College, which it has shared with the College Historical Society

College Historical Society (Trinity College, Dublin)

The College Historical Society is one of two main debating societies at Trinity College, Dublin in Dublin, Ireland. It was established within the college in 1770, but traces its origins to the society founded by the philosopher Edmund Burke in Dublin in 1747...

(the Hist) since its construction in 1904. It holds most of its meetings in the GMB's Debating Chamber; meetings with an expected audience above two hundred are held in larger lecture theatres in the college itself.

Like most other Irish collegiate debating societies, the University Philosophical Society is traditionally a paper-reading society, with a meeting consisting of responses to a paper rather than debate on a motion. Unlike those other societies, the Phil still keeps this tradition alive, though it now also organises debates. Each year the writer of the best paper and the best chamber speaker are awarded with medals from the society. In addition to debate, the Phil provides facilities for its members such as games and a conversation room, and organises club nights, sporting events, blood drives, and other social events.

The Dublin Philosophical Society

Dublin Philosophical Society

The Dublin Philosophical Society was founded in 1683 by William Molyneux. It was intended to be the equivalent of the Royal Society in London, with which it maintained cultural ties. Among its most prominent members were William Petty, Archbishop Narcissus Marsh, Archbishop William King and Bishop...

was founded in 1683 by William Molyneux

William Molyneux

William Molyneux FRS was an Irish natural philosopher and writer on politics.He was born in Dublin to Samuel Molyneux , lawyer and landowner , and his wife, Anne, née Dowdall. The second of five children, William Molyneux came from a relatively prosperous Anglican background...

. It was intended to be the equivalent of the Royal Society

Royal Society

The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...

in London, with which it maintained cultural ties. Among its most prominent members were William Petty

William Petty

Sir William Petty FRS was an English economist, scientist and philosopher. He first became prominent serving Oliver Cromwell and Commonwealth in Ireland. He developed efficient methods to survey the land that was to be confiscated and given to Cromwell's soldiers...

, Archbishop Narcissus Marsh

Narcissus Marsh

Narcissus Marsh was an English clergyman who was successively Church of Ireland Bishop of Ferns and Leighlin, Archbishop of Cashel, Archbishop of Dublin and Archbishop of Armagh....

, Archbishop William King

William King

William King may refer to:*Bill King, , American radio announcer*Billy King , Irish cricketer*Willie King , blues guitarist and singer...

and Bishop George Berkeley

George Berkeley

George Berkeley , also known as Bishop Berkeley , was an Irish philosopher whose primary achievement was the advancement of a theory he called "immaterialism"...

. Most of its members were graduates of Trinity College, Dublin, and a number of them were Fellows of the College, but it had closer ties with the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland

Royal College of Physicians of Ireland

The Royal College of Physicians of Ireland , was founded in 1654 and is a postgraduate medical organisation comprising Members and Fellows...

.
It existed for three periods: 1683-1687, 1692-1698 and 1707-1708. Although it in itself played a small role in intellectual Dublin life, it inspired the foundation of the Dublin Society founded in 1731, which became the Royal Dublin Society

Royal Dublin Society

The Royal Dublin Society was founded on 25 June 1731 to "to promote and develop agriculture, arts, industry, and science in Ireland". The RDS is synonymous with its main premises in Ballsbridge in Dublin, Ireland...

in 1820. Molyneux's brother, Thomas Molyneux, was one of the founding members of the Dublin Society. The Phil harkens back to this older society as its progenitor, attributing its founding date as 1683 and recognizing William Molyneux as its first president.

Later Beginnings

In 1843, the Dublin Philosophical Society was founded to cater for those Trinity College students too young to join other societies in Dublin. At the time, undergraduates were not allowed to join most College societies. The DPS became the Dublin University Philosophical Society in 1845 when it was recognized by the college. The target audience of undergraduates was deterred by the gradual take-over of the DUPS by graduate members of College. In 1853, the Undergraduate Philosophical Society was founded, with the Provost of the College as its Senior Patron and protector against the rest of College, a role which the Provost retains to this day. In 1860, the Dublin University Philosophical Society dissolved, and the Undergraduate Philosophical Society changed its name to the University Philosophical Society, incorporating both societies. This makes the Phil the oldest paper-reading society in the world, and the largest such society in Ireland.

1800s

The society served from its beginning as a popular arena of discussion and a training-ground for future notable Irishmen. Among the notable events held in its early years was the demonstration of an early telephone

Telephone

The telephone , colloquially referred to as a phone, is a telecommunications device that transmits and receives sounds, usually the human voice. Telephones are a point-to-point communication system whose most basic function is to allow two people separated by large distances to talk to each other...

by Stephen Yeates in 1865. Presidents in the early years included students who would become classicist and Provost of the College John Pentland Mahaffy

John Pentland Mahaffy

The Rev. John Pentland Mahaffy GBE CVO was an Irish classicist and polymathic scholar.-Education and interests:...

, poet Edward Dowden

Edward Dowden

Edward Dowden , was an Irish critic and poet.He was the son of John Wheeler Dowden, a merchant and landowner, and was born at Cork, three years after his brother John, who became Bishop of Edinburgh in 1886. Edward's literary tastes emerged early, in a series of essays written at the age of twelve...

and Dracula

Dracula

Dracula is an 1897 novel by Irish author Bram Stoker.Famous for introducing the character of the vampire Count Dracula, the novel tells the story of Dracula's attempt to relocate from Transylvania to England, and the battle between Dracula and a small group of men and women led by Professor...

author Bram Stoker

Bram Stoker

Abraham "Bram" Stoker was an Irish novelist and short story writer, best known today for his 1897 Gothic novel Dracula...

. The Society housed the Bram Stoker archive until the foundation of the Bram Stoker Society in the 1980s.

1900s

The Phil suffered with the rest of Trinity College during the First

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

and Second World Wars

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, though one notable President of the early 1940s was lawyer, Nigeria

Nigeria

Nigeria , officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federal constitutional republic comprising 36 states and its Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The country is located in West Africa and shares land borders with the Republic of Benin in the west, Chad and Cameroon in the east, and Niger in...

n and Uganda

Uganda

Uganda , officially the Republic of Uganda, is a landlocked country in East Africa. Uganda is also known as the "Pearl of Africa". It is bordered on the east by Kenya, on the north by South Sudan, on the west by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, on the southwest by Rwanda, and on the south by...

n independence hero and Supreme Court Chief Justice Udo Udoma.
The society admitted women in 1968 (after the resignation of the conservative President and Secretary), becoming the first mixed-sex debating society in Trinity College. A merger with the female-only University Elizabethan Society soon followed; this was a spur towards both increased female membership and increased debating in the Phil. As a symbolic gesture, the highest ranking female officer of the Phil is accorded the honorary title of President of the Elizabethan Society. Recent years saw the presidency of Niall Lenihan, son of then-Tánaiste

Tánaiste

The Tánaiste is the deputy prime minister of Ireland. The current Tánaiste is Eamon Gilmore, TD who was appointed on 9 March 2011.- Origins and etymology :...

Brian Lenihan, remembered as a defender of the Phil's rights of association and free speech during the visit of discredited historian David Irving

David Irving

David John Cawdell Irving is an English writer,best known for his denial of the Holocaust, who specialises in the military and political history of World War II, with a focus on Nazi Germany...

2000s

Recently, the Phil's meetings have been divided between policy-driven paper readings, showpiece debates and interviews with luminaries like Al Pacino

Al Pacino

Alfredo James "Al" Pacino is an American film and stage actor and director. He is famous for playing mobsters, including Michael Corleone in The Godfather trilogy, Tony Montana in Scarface, Alphonse "Big Boy" Caprice in Dick Tracy and Carlito Brigante in Carlito's Way, though he has also appeared...

, Desmond Tutu

Desmond Tutu

Desmond Mpilo Tutu is a South African activist and retired Anglican bishop who rose to worldwide fame during the 1980s as an opponent of apartheid...

, John McCain

John McCain

John Sidney McCain III is the senior United States Senator from Arizona. He was the Republican nominee for president in the 2008 United States election....

and Stephen Fry

Stephen Fry

Stephen John Fry is an English actor, screenwriter, author, playwright, journalist, poet, comedian, television presenter and film director, and a director of Norwich City Football Club. He first came to attention in the 1981 Cambridge Footlights Revue presentation "The Cellar Tapes", which also...

with the result that the Phil is now a noted source of contributors to the Irish media, whether they be its pool of guests or its organising Council.

The Council

The Phil is governed by a Council elected by the members of the society each year. There are eight officers: President, Secretary, Treasurer, Registrar, Debates Convenor, Librarian, Steward, and Schools Convenor. All officers, besides the Schools Convenor, are directly elected. The Schools Convenor is appointed by the newly elected Council each year. In addition to the officers are a number of Members of Council, seven of whom are elected each year. One of these seven is then selected by the Council to serve as Vice President of the society. The newly elected Council can, at its discretion, appoint, or co-opt, up to eight further Members of Council. The Members of Council serve as deputies to the officers and aid in the execution of their responsibilities.

Debating

At times, The Phil has had outstanding competitive debating record, especially in the domestic Irish Times and international Observer

The Observer

The Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...

Mace (later John Smith Memorial Mace

John Smith Memorial Mace

The John Smith Memorial Mace is an annual debating tournament contested by universities in England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales....

) competitions. The society first won the Mace (the premier British and Irish university debating competition) in 1997 when the all-Scottish team of Matthew Magee, Librarian, and Alex Massie

Alex Massie (journalist)

Alex Massie is a Scottish journalist. A former Washington correspondent for The Scotsman, he has also written for The Daily Telegraph, Scotland on Sunday, The New Republic, The Daily Beast, The Los Angeles Times, Foreign Policy, National Review Online, The Sunday Telegraph, The New York Times ,...

, Steward, won the title. A second victory was claimed three years later by Fergal Davis and Robert Cuffe, President. Registrar Kiera Healy & former President Ruth Faller reached the Quarter Finals of the World University Debating championships in UCC in 2009, breaking in 9th position.

The society runs internal debating competitions: the Eamon O'Coine Memorial Maiden Speaker's Competition, for first-time speakers in college, the satirically-titled Margaret Thatcher

Margaret Thatcher

Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher, was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990...

Memorial Debating Competition (or Maggies), a series of impromptu debates, and the John Pentland Mahaffy

John Pentland Mahaffy

The Rev. John Pentland Mahaffy GBE CVO was an Irish classicist and polymathic scholar.-Education and interests:...

Memorial Mace. External competitions include an intervarsity debating competition, the Claire Stewart Trinity IV comprising the Kingsmill-Moore Invitational and the Dean Swift

Jonathan Swift

Jonathan Swift was an Irish satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer , poet and cleric who became Dean of St...

Intervarsity - in association with the College Historical Society, and a secondary schools' public speaking competition, the AIB Phil Speaks.

Honorary Patrons

During its long history, the Society has recorded the presence of many notable guests, the most distinguished of whom are named honorary patrons of the society. Included amongst these are multiple Nobel Prize

Nobel Prize

The Nobel Prizes are annual international awards bestowed by Scandinavian committees in recognition of cultural and scientific advances. The will of the Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, established the prizes in 1895...

laureates, both before and after their receipt of the Prize, such as William Butler Yeats

William Butler Yeats

William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet and playwright, and one of the foremost figures of 20th century literature. A pillar of both the Irish and British literary establishments, in his later years he served as an Irish Senator for two terms...

, Heads of State and of Government, notable actors and musicians, as well as well-known intellectuals. Guests have also included all Irish Taoisigh

Taoiseach

The Taoiseach is the head of government or prime minister of Ireland. The Taoiseach is appointed by the President upon the nomination of Dáil Éireann, the lower house of the Oireachtas , and must, in order to remain in office, retain the support of a majority in the Dáil.The current Taoiseach is...

since Charles Haughey

Charles Haughey

Charles James "Charlie" Haughey was Taoiseach of Ireland, serving three terms in office . He was also the fourth leader of Fianna Fáil...

Political Figures

John Kenneth Galbraith
John Kenneth Galbraith
John Kenneth "Ken" Galbraith , OC was a Canadian-American economist. He was a Keynesian and an institutionalist, a leading proponent of 20th-century American liberalism...

, economist, former US Ambassador to India
John Hume
John Hume
John Hume is a former Irish politician from Derry, Northern Ireland. He was a founding member of the Social Democratic and Labour Party, and was co-recipient of the 1998 Nobel Peace Prize, with David Trimble....

, former leader of the Social Democratic and Labour Party
Social Democratic and Labour Party
The Social Democratic and Labour Party is a social-democratic, Irish nationalist political party in Northern Ireland. Its basic party platform advocates Irish reunification, and the further devolution of powers while Northern Ireland remains part of the United Kingdom...

in Northern Ireland, Nobel Laureate
Valéry Giscard d'Estaing
Valéry Giscard d'Estaing
Valéry Marie René Georges Giscard d'Estaing is a French centre-right politician who was President of the French Republic from 1974 until 1981...

, former President of France
David Trimble
David Trimble
William David Trimble, Baron Trimble, PC , is a politician from Northern Ireland. He served as Leader of the Ulster Unionist Party , was the first First Minister of Northern Ireland , and was a Member of the British Parliament . He is currently a life peer for the Conservative Party...

, former First Minister of Northern Ireland, Nobel Laureate
Newt Gingrich
Newt Gingrich
Newton Leroy "Newt" Gingrich is a U.S. Republican Party politician who served as the House Minority Whip from 1989 to 1995 and as the 58th Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1995 to 1999....

, former Speaker of the US House of Representatives
Craig Murray
Craig Murray
Craig John Murray is a British political activist, former ambassador to Uzbekistan and former Rector of the University of Dundee....

, former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan
FW De Klerk, former President of South Africa, Nobel Laureate
Charles Haughey
Charles Haughey
Charles James "Charlie" Haughey was Taoiseach of Ireland, serving three terms in office . He was also the fourth leader of Fianna Fáil...

, former Taoiseach of Ireland
Desmond Tutu
Desmond Tutu
Desmond Mpilo Tutu is a South African activist and retired Anglican bishop who rose to worldwide fame during the 1980s as an opponent of apartheid...

, Archbishop, Nobel Laureate
John McCain
John McCain
John Sidney McCain III is the senior United States Senator from Arizona. He was the Republican nominee for president in the 2008 United States election....

, US Senator, 2008 Republican Presidential Candidate
Mohamed ElBaradei, IAEA Director-General, Nobel Laureate
Lindsey Graham
Lindsey Graham
Lindsey Olin Graham is the senior U.S. Senator from South Carolina and a member of the Republican Party. Previously he served as the U.S. Representative for .-Early life, education and career:...

, US Senator
Mark Malloch Brown
Mark Malloch Brown
George Mark Malloch Brown, Baron Malloch-Brown, KCMG, PC is a former Minister of State in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office of the British government with responsibility for Africa, Asia and the United Nations...

, former United Nations Deputy Secretary-General
Bob Geldof
Bob Geldof
Robert Frederick Zenon "Bob" Geldof, KBE is an Irish singer, songwriter, author, occasional actor and political activist. He rose to prominence as the lead singer of the Irish rock band The Boomtown Rats in the late 1970s and early 1980s alongside the punk rock movement. The band had hits with his...

, organizer of Live Aid and Live 8
John Bruton
John Bruton
John Gerard Bruton is an Irish politician who served as Taoiseach of Ireland from 1994 to 1997. A minister under two taoisigh, Liam Cosgrave and Garret FitzGerald, Bruton held a number of the top posts in Irish government, including Minister for Finance , and Minister for Industry, Trade,...

, former Taoiseach of Ireland, former EU Ambassador to the United States
James Zogby
James Zogby
James J. Zogby is the author of Arab Voices and the founder and president of the Arab American Institute , a Washington, D.C.–based organization which serves as a political and policy research arm of the Arab American community. He is a senior analyst with his brother's polling firm, Zogby...

, political organizer, member of the DNC
Albert Reynolds
Albert Reynolds
Albert Reynolds , served as Taoiseach of Ireland, serving one term in office from 1992 until 1994. He has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize...

, former Taoiseach of Ireland
Garret FitzGerald
Garret FitzGerald
Garret FitzGerald was an Irish politician who was twice Taoiseach of Ireland, serving in office from July 1981 to February 1982 and again from December 1982 to March 1987. FitzGerald was elected to Seanad Éireann in 1965 and was subsequently elected to Dáil Éireann as a Fine Gael TD in 1969. He...

, former Taoiseach of Ireland
John Ritch, World Nuclear Association Director-General
Ruth Bader Ginsberg, US Supreme Court Justice
Bertie Ahern
Bertie Ahern
Patrick Bartholomew "Bertie" Ahern is a former Irish politician who served as Taoiseach of Ireland from 26 June 1997 to 7 May 2008....

, former Taoiseach of Ireland
Christopher Dodd
Christopher Dodd
Christopher John "Chris" Dodd is an American lawyer, lobbyist, and Democratic Party politician who served as a United States Senator from Connecticut for a thirty-year period ending with the 111th United States Congress....

, US Senator
Haley Barbour
Haley Barbour
Haley Reeves Barbour is an American Republican politician currently serving as the 63rd Governor of Mississippi. He gained a national spotlight in August 2005 after Mississippi was hit by Hurricane Katrina. Barbour won re-election as Governor in 2007...

, Governor of Mississippi, former RNC Chairman
John Negroponte
John Negroponte
John Dimitri Negroponte is an American diplomat. He is currently a research fellow and lecturer in international affairs at Yale University's Jackson Institute for Global Affairs...

, former US Deputy Secretary of State
Peter Sutherland
Peter Sutherland
Peter Denis Sutherland, KCMG is an Irish international businessman and former Attorney General of Ireland, associated with the Fine Gael party . He is a barrister by profession, and is also Senior Counsel at the Irish Bar...

, former Attorney General of Ireland
George Galloway
George Galloway
George Galloway is a British politician, author, journalist and broadcaster who was a Member of Parliament from 1987 to 2010. He was formerly an MP for the Labour Party, first for Glasgow Hillhead and later for Glasgow Kelvin, before his expulsion from the party in October 2003, the same year...

, British politician, author and broadcaster
Trent Lott
Trent Lott
Chester Trent Lott, Sr. , is a former United States Senator from Mississippi and has served in numerous leadership positions in the House of Representatives and the Senate....

, former US Senator
François Bourguignon
François Bourguignon
François Bourguignon is the former Chief Economist of the World Bank. He is the Director of the Paris School of Economics, and was formerly a professor of economics at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris....

, former Chief Economist of the World Bank
Tim Collins OBE, former Colonel 1st Battalion, Royal Irish Regiment

Prominent Academics

Niall Ferguson
Niall Ferguson
Niall Campbell Douglas Ferguson is a British historian. His specialty is financial and economic history, particularly hyperinflation and the bond markets, as well as the history of colonialism.....

, British Historian, Harvard professor
Joseph Nye
Joseph Nye
Joseph Samuel Nye, Jr. is the co-founder, along with Robert Keohane, of the international relations theory neoliberalism, developed in their 1977 book Power and Interdependence. Together with Keohane, he developed the concepts of asymmetrical and complex interdependence...

, international relations theorist, former Dean of Harvard's Kennedy School of Government
George Ritzer
George Ritzer
George Ritzer is a sociologist who studies American patterns of consumption, globalization, metatheory, and modern and postmodern social theory...

, sociologist, Professor at the University of Maryland
Edward Saïd
Edward Said
Edward Wadie Saïd was a Palestinian-American literary theorist and advocate for Palestinian rights. He was University Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University and a founding figure in postcolonialism...

, Palestinian-American literary theorist, former University Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University
A.C. Grayling, British philosopher. founder and first Master of New College of the Humanities, London.

Figures from News Media and Journalism

Germaine Greer
Germaine Greer
Germaine Greer is an Australian writer, academic, journalist and scholar of early modern English literature, widely regarded as one of the most significant feminist voices of the later 20th century....

, feminist journalist
Bill O'Reilly
Bill O'Reilly (commentator)
William James "Bill" O'Reilly, Jr. is an American television host, author, syndicated columnist and political commentator. He is the host of the political commentary program The O'Reilly Factor on the Fox News Channel, which is the most watched cable news television program on American television...

, Fox News presenter
Claudia Rosett
Claudia Rosett
Claudia Rosett is an American writer and journalist. She is journalist-in-residence at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, a policy institute based in Washington, D.C. A former staff writer for The Wall Street Journal, she writes a weekly column for Forbes, blogs for Pajamas Media, and...

, investigative journalist
Greg Palast
Greg Palast
Gregory Allyn Palast is a New York Times-bestselling author and a freelance journalist for the British Broadcasting Corporation as well as the British newspaper The Observer. His work frequently focuses on corporate malfeasance but has also been known to work with labor unions and consumer...

, British journalist and author
John Simpson, BBC News correspondent
Rush Limbaugh
Rush Limbaugh
Rush Hudson Limbaugh III is an American radio talk show host, conservative political commentator, and an opinion leader in American conservatism. He hosts The Rush Limbaugh Show which is aired throughout the U.S. on Premiere Radio Networks and is the highest-rated talk-radio program in the United...

, American conservative news pundit

Literary Figures

William Butler Yeats
William Butler Yeats
William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet and playwright, and one of the foremost figures of 20th century literature. A pillar of both the Irish and British literary establishments, in his later years he served as an Irish Senator for two terms...

, poet, Nobel Laureate
Salman Rushdie, novelist and essayist, Booker Prize Winner
Seamus Heaney
Seamus Heaney
Seamus Heaney is an Irish poet, writer and lecturer. He lives in Dublin. Heaney has received the Nobel Prize in Literature , the Golden Wreath of Poetry , T. S. Eliot Prize and two Whitbread prizes...

, Irish poet and writer, Nobel Laureate
John Banville
John Banville
John Banville is an Irish novelist and screenwriter.Banville's breakthrough novel The Book of Evidence was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize, and won the Guinness Peat Aviation award. His eighteenth novel, The Sea, won the Man Booker Prize in 2005. He was awarded the Franz Kafka Prize in 2011...

, author, Booker Prize Winner
John Boyne
John Boyne
John Boyne is an Irish novelist.- Biography :He was educated at Terenure College, before heading to trinity college, dublin, and studied Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia, where he won the Curtis Brown prize. But it was during his time at Trinity that he began to get published...

, Irish novelist
John Ralston Saul
John Ralston Saul
John Ralston Saul, CC is a Canadian author, essayist, and President of International PEN.As an essayist, Saul is particularly known for his commentaries on the nature of individualism, citizenship and the public good; the failures of manager-, or more precisely technocrat-, led societies; the...

, Canadian author and essayist
Neil Strauss
Neil Strauss
Neil Darrow Strauss , also known by the pen names Style and Chris Powles, is an American and Kittitian author, journalist and ghostwriter...

, author and journalist

Figures from the Performing Arts

Helen Mirren
Helen Mirren
Dame Helen Mirren, DBE is an English actor. She has won an Academy Award for Best Actress, four SAG Awards, four BAFTAs, three Golden Globes, four Emmy Awards, and two Cannes Film Festival Best Actress Awards.-Early life and family:...

, actress, Academy Award Winner
The Edge
The Edge
David Howell Evans , more widely known by his stage name The Edge , is a musician best known as the guitarist, backing vocalist, and keyboardist of the Irish rock band U2. A member of the group since its inception, he has recorded 12 studio albums with the band and has released one solo record...

, guitarist, keyboardist, and main backing vocalist of rock band U2
Johnny Marr
Johnny Marr
Johnny Marr is an English musician and songwriter. Marr rose to fame in the 1980s as the guitarist in The Smiths, with whom he formed a prolific songwriting partnership with Morrissey. Marr has been a member of Electronic, The The, and Modest Mouse...

, guitarist of the bands The Smiths and Modest Mouse
Tom Stoppard
Tom Stoppard
Sir Tom Stoppard OM, CBE, FRSL is a British playwright, knighted in 1997. He has written prolifically for TV, radio, film and stage, finding prominence with plays such as Arcadia, The Coast of Utopia, Every Good Boy Deserves Favour, Professional Foul, The Real Thing, and Rosencrantz and...

, playwright and writer, Academy Award Winner
Gabriel Byrne
Gabriel Byrne
Gabriel James Byrne is an Irish actor, film director, film producer, writer, cultural ambassador and audiobook narrator. His acting career began in the Focus Theatre before he joined Londo's Royal Court Theatre in 1979. Byrne's screen debut came in the Irish soap opera The Riordans and the...

, Irish actor, director and producer
Al Pacino
Al Pacino
Alfredo James "Al" Pacino is an American film and stage actor and director. He is famous for playing mobsters, including Michael Corleone in The Godfather trilogy, Tony Montana in Scarface, Alphonse "Big Boy" Caprice in Dick Tracy and Carlito Brigante in Carlito's Way, though he has also appeared...

, American actor and director, Academy Award Winner
Joanna Lumley
Joanna Lumley
Joanna Lamond Lumley, OBE, FRGS is a British actress, voice-over artist, former-model and author, best known for her roles in British television series Absolutely Fabulous portraying Edina Monsoon's best friend, Patsy Stone, as well as parts in The New Avengers, Sapphire & Steel, and Sensitive...

, British actress and political activist
Oliver Stone
Oliver Stone
William Oliver Stone is an American film director, producer and screenwriter. Stone became well known in the late 1980s and the early 1990s for directing a series of films about the Vietnam War, for which he had previously participated as an infantry soldier. His work frequently focuses on...

, film director, Academy Award Winner
Tommy Tiernan
Tommy Tiernan
Tommy Tiernan is an Irish comedian, actor and writer. He and Hector Ó hEochagáin present The Tommy and Hector Show on i102-104FM. Tiernan also featured in Father Ted.-Early life:...

, Irish comedian
Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Irish actor and model
David Cronenburg, Canadian filmmaker and screenwriter
Jeffrey Archer, actor, playwright and former politician
Jon Voight
Jon Voight
Jonathan Vincent "Jon" Voight is an American actor. He has received an Academy Award, out of four nominations, and three Golden Globe Awards, out of nine nominations. Voight is the father of actress Angelina Jolie....

, American actor and political commentator, Academy Award Winner
Spike Milligan
Spike Milligan
Terence Alan Patrick Seán "Spike" Milligan Hon. KBE was a comedian, writer, musician, poet, playwright, soldier and actor. His early life was spent in India, where he was born, but the majority of his working life was spent in the United Kingdom. He became an Irish citizen in 1962 after the...

, Irish comedian, writer, poet and playwright
Naomi Campbell
Naomi Campbell
Naomi Campbell is a British model. Scouted at the age of 15, she established herself among the top three most recognisable and in-demand models of the late 1980s and early 1990s, and she was one of six models of her generation declared "supermodels" by the fashion world...

, supermodel
Jack White
Jack White (musician)
Jack White , often credited as Jack White III, is an American musician, songwriter, record producer and occasional actor...

, musician, lead vocalist of the White Stripes
Pete Doherty
Pete Doherty
Peter Doherty is an English musician, writer, actor, poet and artist. He is best known musically for being co-frontman of The Libertines, which he reformed with Carl Barât in 2010. His other musical project is indie band Babyshambles...

, singer and songwriter, lead singer of the band The Libertines
Dolores O'Riordan
Dolores O'Riordan
Dolores Mary Eileen O'Riordan is an Irish musician, singer and songwriter. She led The Cranberries to worldwide success and fame for 13 years before the band took a hiatus in 2003. Her first solo album Are You Listening? was released in May 2007...

, lead singer of the band The Cranberries
John C. McGinley
John C. McGinley
John Christopher McGinley is an American actor, most notable for his roles as Perry Cox in Scrubs, Bob Slydell in Office Space, Sergeant Red O'Neill in Oliver Stone's Platoon and Marv in Stone's Wall Street. He has also written and produced for television and film...

, American actor and author
Chris Blackwell
Chris Blackwell
Christopher Percy Gordon "Chris" Blackwell is a British record producer and businessman, who was the founder of Island Records, acknowledged as the most successful and groundbreaking independent record company in history. Blackwell has been a music industry mogul for over fifty years...

, music producer
John C. Reilly
John C. Reilly
John Christopher Reilly, Jr. is an American film and theater actor, singer, and comedian. Debuting in Casualties of War in 1989, he is one of several actors whose careers were launched by Brian De Palma. To date, he has appeared in more than fifty films, including three separate films in 2002...

, American actor and comedian
Courtney Love
Courtney Love
Courtney Michelle Love is an American rock musician. Love is the lead vocalist, lyricist, and rhythm guitarist for alternative rock band Hole, which she formed in 1989, and is an actress who has moved from bit parts in Alex Cox films to significant and acclaimed roles in The People vs...

, American singer song writer and actress.
Sir Christopher Lee, renowned and prolific British actor
Stephen Fry
Stephen Fry
Stephen John Fry is an English actor, screenwriter, author, playwright, journalist, poet, comedian, television presenter and film director, and a director of Norwich City Football Club. He first came to attention in the 1981 Cambridge Footlights Revue presentation "The Cellar Tapes", which also...

, British actor, screenwriter, author, playwright, journalist, poet, comedian, television presenter and film director.
Michael Gambon
Michael Gambon
Sir Michael John Gambon, CBE is an Irish actor who has worked in theatre, television and film. A highly respected theatre actor, Gambon is recognised for his roles as Philip Marlowe in the BBC television serial The Singing Detective, as Jules Maigret in the 1990s ITV serial Maigret, and as...

Irish actor

Business and Technology Leaders

Tommy Hilfiger
Tommy Hilfiger
Thomas Jacob "Tommy" Hilfiger is an American fashion designer and founder of the premium lifestyle brand Tommy Hilfiger.-Early life:...

, American fashion designer and businessman
Tim Draper, American venture capitalist
Jimmy Wales
Jimmy Wales
Jimmy Donal "Jimbo" Wales is an American Internet entrepreneur best known as a co-founder and promoter of the online non-profit encyclopedia Wikipedia and the Wikia company....

, founder of Wikipedia
Matt Mullenweg
Matt Mullenweg
Matthew Charles Mullenweg is an online social media entrepreneur, web developer and musician living in San Francisco, California. He is best known for his development of the free and open source web software, WordPress...

, founder of Wordpress
Craig Newmark
Craig Newmark
Craig Alexander Newmark is an Internet entrepreneur best known for being the founder of the San Francisco-based international website Craigslist.-Biography:...

, founder of Craig's List
Christopher Bailey
Christopher Bailey
Christopher Bailey is a lecturer of English at the University of Brighton and is an occasional screenwriter for television.He wrote the script for the Doctor Who serial Kinda in 1982...

, chief creative director of Burberry
Jack Dorsey, founder of Twitter
JP McManus, entrepreneur
Niklas Zennstrom
Niklas Zennström
Niklas Zennström is an entrepreneur best known for founding several high-profile online ventures with Janus Friis including Skype and Kazaa. More recently he founded the investment group Atomico and has become a significant figurehead for entrepreneurs in the tech sector.-Career:Zennström started...

, founder of Skype
Chad Hurley
Chad Hurley
Chad Meredith Hurley is an American co-founder and former Chief Executive Officer of the popular video sharing website YouTube. In June 2006, he was voted 28th on Business 2.0's "50 People Who Matter Now" list...

, founder of Youtube
Olivier Blanchard
Olivier Blanchard
Olivier Jean Blanchard is currently the chief economist at the International Monetary Fund, a post he has held since September 1, 2008. He is also the Class of 1941 Professor of Economics at MIT, though he is currently on leave. Blanchard is one of the most cited economists in the world, according...

, chief economist of the IMF

Sports Figures

Alex Ferguson
Alex Ferguson
Sir Alexander Chapman "Alex" Ferguson, CBE is a Scottish association football manager and former player, currently managing Manchester United, where he has been in charge since 1986...

, manager of Manchester United football club
Eddie Jordan
Eddie Jordan
Edmund "Eddie" Jordan also known as "EJ" founded and owned Jordan Grand Prix, a Formula One constructor which operated from 1991 to 2005...

, founder and owner of Jordan Grand Prix

Controversies

The Phil has been involved in several free speech controversies. Contributors to its debates included Oswald Mosley

Oswald Mosley

Sir Oswald Ernald Mosley, 6th Baronet, of Ancoats, was an English politician, known principally as the founder of the British Union of Fascists...

during his residence in Ireland. In 1988, the Society invited then-Holocaust denier

Holocaust denial

Holocaust denial is the act of denying the genocide of Jews in World War II, usually referred to as the Holocaust. The key claims of Holocaust denial are: the German Nazi government had no official policy or intention of exterminating Jews, Nazi authorities did not use extermination camps and gas...

David Irving

David John Cawdell Irving is an English writer,best known for his denial of the Holocaust, who specialises in the military and political history of World War II, with a focus on Nazi Germany...

to speak. A large protest by students, staff, Jewish groups, socialists, and anti-Nazi activists resulted in the meeting being relocated to a hotel conference room and held in the small hours of the morning. The traditional vote of thanks to Mr Irving for his paper was defeated, which is rare in the society's history.

More recently, the invitation to Austria

Austria

Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...

n politician Jörg Haider

Jörg Haider

Jörg Haider was an Austrian politician. He was Governor of Carinthia on two occasions, the long-time leader of the Austrian Freedom Party and later Chairman of the Alliance for the Future of Austria , a breakaway party from the FPÖ.Haider was controversial within Austria and abroad for comments...

to address the society in the Graduate Memorial Building (GMB) in late 2002 led to a protest by self-described anti-fascist activists, which continued through the debate, with noise being made outside the chamber and interjections in the society's proceedings within. An invitation to BNP

British National Party

The British National Party is a British far-right political party formed as a splinter group from the National Front by John Tyndall in 1982...

official Tony Wentworth was revoked after threats of physical action by leftist groups.

Another guest to generate controversy was Islamist Anjem Choudary

Anjem Choudary

Anjem Choudary is a British former solicitor, and, before it was proscribed, spokesman for the Islamist group Islam4UK. He is married, has four children, and lives in Ilford, London....

, who hailed the 9/11

September 11, 2001 attacks

The September 11 attacks The September 11 attacks The September 11 attacks (also referred to as September 11, September 11th or 9/119/11 is pronounced "nine eleven". The slash is not part of the pronunciation...

terrorists as martyrs. The former Irish Taoiseach John Bruton

John Bruton

John Gerard Bruton is an Irish politician who served as Taoiseach of Ireland from 1994 to 1997. A minister under two taoisigh, Liam Cosgrave and Garret FitzGerald, Bruton held a number of the top posts in Irish government, including Minister for Finance , and Minister for Industry, Trade,...

threatened to withdraw from a Phil debate later that year over this invitation, which was not withdrawn. Mr Bruton is now an Honorary Patron of the Society, and Anjem Choudary has been invited to speak at the Phil's lectern several times.

Notable former presidents and members

John Pentland Mahaffy
John Pentland Mahaffy
The Rev. John Pentland Mahaffy GBE CVO was an Irish classicist and polymathic scholar.-Education and interests:...

, classicist and polymath scholar
John Butler Yeats
John Butler Yeats
John Butler Yeats was an Irish artist and the father of William Butler Yeats, Lily Yeats, Lollie Yeats and Jack B. Yeats. He is probably best known for his portrait of the young William Butler Yeats which is one of a number of his portraits of Irishmen and women in the Yeats museum in the National...

, artist and father of William Butler Yeats
Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde
Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was an Irish writer and poet. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of London's most popular playwrights in the early 1890s...

, author, playwright and poet
Bram Stoker
Bram Stoker
Abraham "Bram" Stoker was an Irish novelist and short story writer, best known today for his 1897 Gothic novel Dracula...

, novelist and short story writer
Samuel Beckett
Samuel Beckett
Samuel Barclay Beckett was an Irish avant-garde novelist, playwright, theatre director, and poet. He wrote both in English and French. His work offers a bleak, tragicomic outlook on human nature, often coupled with black comedy and gallows humour.Beckett is widely regarded as among the most...

, dramatist and poet, Nobel Laureate
Ernest Walton
Ernest Walton
Ernest Thomas Sinton Walton was an Irish physicist and Nobel laureate for his work with John Cockcroft with "atom-smashing" experiments done at Cambridge University in the early 1930s, and so became the first person in history to artificially split the atom, thus ushering the nuclear age...

, physicist, Nobel Laureate
Mary Robinson
Mary Robinson
Mary Therese Winifred Robinson served as the seventh, and first female, President of Ireland from 1990 to 1997, and the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, from 1997 to 2002. She first rose to prominence as an academic, barrister, campaigner and member of the Irish Senate...

, former President of Ireland
David Norris, Irish Senator
Udo Udoma, former Justice of the Nigerian Supreme Court, former Chief Justice of Uganda
Alex Massie
Alex Massie
Alex C. Massie was a Scottish international footballer of the 1920s and 1930s, who played mainly as a right-half. He was born in Possilpark, Glasgow.-Player:...

, prominent Scottish journalist
Ken Early
Ken Early
Kenneth Early is an Irish journalist and broadcaster. He is Chief Football Correspondent for Newstalk and is the key member of the station's Off The Ball football show....

, journalist and broadcaster
Sarah Carey
Sarah Carey
Sarah Carey is a former Esat Telecom employee and former columnist for The Sunday Times and The Irish Times. She is currently a radio presenter on Newstalk and has presented for TV3...

, journalist and broadcaster

Other notable former council members of recent years include ex-President of the Law Society of Ireland Geraldine Clarke, food critic Tom Doorley, journalists Mary Ellen Synon

Mary Ellen Synon

Mary Ellen Synon is an Irish-American journalist currently based in Brussels. She is a columnist with the Mail on Sunday and a contributor to the Daily Mail in Britain and the Irish Daily Mail, as well as the Irish weekly, The Sunday Business Post. She writes a blog - titled "Euroseptic" - for the...

, Marc Coleman

Marc Coleman

Marc Coleman is Economics Editor of Newstalk 106 to 108 and an economic commentator.Marc Coleman was born in Dublin but lived as a child in Erlangen, Bavaria before returning to Ireland in the mid-1970s. He was a member of Fine Gael in the late 1980s and early 1990s.Coleman became Newstalk's...

, Paul Gillespie, , and Matthew Magee, and broadcasters Ruth McAvinia, Ger Gilroy and Colm O'Mongáin.

External links

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