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Philosophy

Essays and videos on philosophy, the history of ideas, ethics and life’s big questions
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Logic and probability

What is incoherence?

We can all be inconsistent. Philosophy illuminates a bigger puzzle: how do we hold contradictory beliefs at the same time?

Alex Worsnip

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Thinkers and theories

We’ll meet again

The intrepid logician Kurt Gödel believed in the afterlife. In four heartfelt letters to his mother he explained why

Alexander T Englert

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Metaphysics

Why mathematical truths exist with or without minds to consider them

8 minutes

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Logic and probability

The patterns of reality

Some have thought that logic will one day be completed and all its problems solved. Now we know it is an endless task

Timothy Williamson

The title page and frontispiece engraving of an 18th-century book written in German. The title of the book is written in red in a Gothic font
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Thinkers and theories

The great, forgotten Wolff

Written for laymen, read by women and kings, Christian Wolff’s mathematical method made him a key Enlightenment philosopher

Michael Walschots

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Thinkers and theories

Analytic women

Twin forces marginalised the women of early analytic philosophy. Correct those mistakes, and the next generation benefits

Jeanne Peijnenburg & Sander Verhaegh

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Political philosophy

Is the idea that democracy always benefits society misguided, or just mathematics?

7 minutes

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Philosophy of religion

How a devout Catholic philosopher approaches the problem of evil

8 minutes

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Meaning and the good life

Why Aristotle believed that philosophy was humanity’s highest purpose

9 minutes

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Metaphysics

Are coincidences real?

I am an unequivocal rationalist and yet I still want to see something strange and wonderful in life’s weird coincidences

Paul Broks

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Logic and probability

Chew over the prisoner’s dilemma and see if you can find the rational path out

6 minutes

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Metaphysics

Bertrand Russell wanted to kill off causation. Can contemporary philosophy rescue it?

8 minutes

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Ethics

How many monkeys is it worth sacrificing to save a human life?

6 minutes

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Ethics

Moral mathematics

Subjecting the problems of ethics to the cool quantifications of logic and probability can help us to be better people

Elad Uzan

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video

Metaphysics

Is the question ‘Why is there something instead of nothing?’ even worth asking?

9 minutes

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Logic and probability

Is it more likely you’re a person with a past, or an ephemeral brain in a void?

6 minutes

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Mathematics

How a verbal paradox shattered the notion of total certainty in mathematics

5 minutes

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Philosophy of science

What is a law of nature?

Laws of nature are impossible to break, and nearly as difficult to define. Just what kind of necessity do they possess?

Marc Lange

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video

Logic and probability

The unresolved probability paradox that goes to the heart of scientific objectivity

8 minutes

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Logic and probability

This paradoxical life

When logic fails to make sense of a world noisy with inconsistency, paraconsistent logics hold out (im)possible solutions

Zach Weber

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Mathematics

Check in to the Hilbert Hotel, and learn why some infinities are bigger than others

6 minutes

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Earth science and climate

How much can science really tell us about the future of climate change?

24 minutes

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Mathematics

This puzzle is nearly impossible – but working out why is its own brain-teaser

19 minutes

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Logic and probability

Is a red apple proof that all ravens are black? A paradox of scientific logic

6 minutes