The impact of continental philosophy has been tremendous, infusing the humanities with a strange brew made up of energy and insight combined with absurdity and meaninglessness. This program delves deeply into concepts and thought processes that fueled the inquiries of the era's major exponents: Hegel's dialectic, Marx's dialectical materialism, Kierkegaard's lone individual standing before God, Nietzsche's declaration that God is dead, Husserl's intentionality,...

During the 16th century, a new breed of thinker arose, equal parts philosopher and scientist, that threw off the received wisdom of the past and started afresh. In this program, Paul Guyer, of the University of Pennsylvania; Rutgers University's Colin McGinn; and Princeton University's Kwame Anthony Appiah and Daniel Garber address the major philosophical currents of that era-and the explosive controversies surrounding them. Bacon's Novum Organum,...

Does science explain the world, or does it simply describe it? Can science ever be truly objective? What is the boundary between science and non-science? Does nature have laws? This program seeks to answer questions such as these through the insights of Princeton University's Daniel Garber; Hilary Putnam, of Harvard University; and Barry Loewer, of Rutgers University. Ranging from the Physics of Aristotle to the competing physics paradigms of Einstein...

As a tool for characterizing rational thought, logic cuts across many philosophical disciplines and lies at the core of mathematics and computer science. Drawing on Aristotle's Organon, Russell's Principia Mathematica, and other central works, this program tracks the evolution of logic, beginning with the basic syllogism. A sampling of subsequent topics includes propositional and predicate logic, Bayesian confirmation theory, Boolean logic, Frege's...

Systematic thought about the true nature of things is the very foundation of philosophical reasoning: idealism and materialism.realism, nominalism, and conceptualism.the noumenal and the phenomenal.logical positivism, emergentism, and modal realism. In this program, Rutgers philosophers Brian McLaughlin, Barry Loewer, John Hawthorne, Ted Sider, and Dean Zimmerman discuss the nature of this most ancient branch of philosophy, exploring concepts of causation,...

This program explores three major areas of philosophical inquiry into religion: religious epistemology, or the exploration of the rational grounds for religious beliefs and, in particular, the existence of God; the metaphysics of religion, which inquires into the nature of God; and theodicy, which examines the philosophical implications of the presence of evil in the world. Commentary by Alvin Plantinga, of the University of Notre Dame; Fordham University's...

Those who wish to pursue a life of pure reason are often attracted to the movement known as secular humanism. This program explores the movement by presenting several humanist inquiries, including: How and why do religions develop? Can morality exist without religion? Is there a humanist narrative that can take the place of myth? How can public policy become truly rational? The film features explanations from prominent humanist figures-Dr. Paul Kurtz,...

In this program with world-renowned author and professor Bryan Magee, the late philosopher and radical political theorist Herbert Marcuse explains how the so-called Frankfurt School reevaluated Marxism when world economic crisis failed to destroy capitalism as predicted by Marx. He also analyzes the philosophical roots of the student rebellions of the sixties.

At the end of the 19th century, socialism was an idyllic dream among intellectuals. Sixty years later it had become a reality for much of the world. This program describes the expansion of socialist and Communist rule into Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and western Europe-showing the weaknesses that developed in the practice of socialism even as it reached the apex of its popularity. Documenting the ascendancy of Clement Atlee in Britain and the challenges...