Philosophy

The underground university

During the Cold War, Oxford philosophers worked together to aid dissidents behind the Iron Curtain. I was one of them

Cheryl Misak

Many worlds, many selves

If it’s true that we live in a vast multiverse, then our understanding of identity, morality and even God must be reexamined

Emily Qureshi-Hurst

Who can claim Aristotle?

The endless battle over his legacy testifies to his great authority – and the power of his thought to make the world better

Edith Hall

Compassionate time

On his final journey through Asia, Thomas Merton found some peace in the dialectic between refusing the world and loving it

Drew Calvert

Why it takes more than a lifetime to truly understand a single meadow

11 minutes

The cochlear question

As the hearing parent of a deaf baby, I’m confronted with an agonising decision: should I give her an implant to help her hear?

Abi Stephenson

The nature of natural laws

Physicists and philosophers today have formulated three opposing models that explain how laws work. Which is the best?

Mario Hubert

The radical activist couple who fought for social change in the courtroom

21 minutes

Is beauty natural?

Charles Darwin was as fascinated by extravagant ornament in nature as Jane Austen was in culture. Did their explanations agree?

Abigail Tulenko

Elusive but everywhere

A new theory argues that unseen ‘fields’ guide all goal-directed things in the Universe, from falling rocks to voyaging turtles

Daniel W McShea & Gunnar O Babcock

The forces of chance

Social scientists cling to simple models of reality – with disastrous results. Instead they must embrace chaos theory

Brian Klaas

Settling accounts

Before he was famous, Jean-Jacques Rousseau was Louise Dupin’s scribe. It’s her ideas on inequality that fill his writings

Rebecca Wilkin

Rage against the machine

For all the promise and dangers of AI, computers plainly can’t think. To think is to resist – something no machine does

Alva Noë

Life makes mistakes

Hens try to hatch golf balls, whales get beached. Getting things wrong seems to play a fundamental role in life on Earth

David S Oderberg

Wander through the English countryside with two teens trying to make sense of the world

10 minutes

Against humility

Intellectual humility has recently been hailed as the key to thinking well. The story of Barbara McClintock proves otherwise

Rachel Fraser

My leap across the chasm

After years of debate and contemplation, I’ve come to think a heretical form of Christianity might be true. Here’s why

Philip Goff