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Sam Dresser

Senior Editor, Aeon+Psyche

Sam has been with Aeon since its launch in 2012. He’s most interested in how to do philosophy and in the continental/analytic divide. History and politics are also amusing to him. He considers Evelyn Waugh to be a very funny writer and enjoys pubs more than he should.

See Sam Dresser’s profile on Psyche

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Written by Sam Dresser

Black and white photo of a child walking towards a large tree on a foggy field.

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Thinkers and theories

Peak ellipsis

Does philosophy reside in the unsayable or should it care only for precision? Carnap, Heidegger and the great divergence

Sam Dresser

Vintage photo of a woman with short hair who is Margaret Mead looking at a carved wooden tribal figure against a dark background.

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Anthropology

The meaning of Margaret Mead

Mead argued that non-Western cultures offered alternative (often better) ways to be human. Why was she so vilified for it?

Sam Dresser

Colourful drawing of two men in suits shaking hands. One has a beard and pipe, the other is clean-shaven. Background is dark purple.

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Thinkers and theories

Freud versus Jung: a bitter feud over the meaning of sex

Sam Dresser

Black and white photo of a man in a suit and tie, looking slightly to his right, with a textured wall as the background.

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History of ideas

How Camus and Sartre split up over the question of how to be free

Sam Dresser

Edited by Sam Dresser

Ancient fresco showing two figures in flowing robes dancing against a dark blue background, one holding a tambourine.

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Dance and theatre

Why the old man dances

Religious ritual to appease the gods or free expression of human agency? For the ancient Romans, dance could be both

Karin Schlapbach

Hand-drawn diagram titled “Free-Form Discrete H’Texts” showing a map with two-way links and a flowchart with one-way links.

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Future of technology

A linkless internet

In creating anonymous summaries, AI flattens out all the fascinating architecture of thought that makes the internet hum

Collin Jennings

A person’s hands pouring olive oil into a row of wine glasses with people blurred in the background at a tasting event.

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Food and drink

The flavour of mechanisation

Olive oil was revered and cherished by the ancients. But its distinctive peppery taste is really a modern invention

Massimo Mazzotti

Painting of two anthropomorphic peacocks in 18th-century attire in front of a stately home surrounded by trees.

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Beauty and aesthetics

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

Painting of a man and woman in elegant 18th-century attire sitting on a pink sofa with ornate decoration.

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History of ideas

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

Ancient mosaic depicting two figures with instruments on a blue stone background.

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Food and drink

The fermented crescent

Ancient Mesopotamians had a profound love of beer: a beverage they found celebratory, intoxicating and strangely erotic

Tate Paulette

A man in yellow shorts floating on his back in a swimming pool, with dark lane markings and reflections in the water.

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History of science

Forwards, not back

Medicine aims to return bodies to the state they were in before illness. But there’s a better way of thinking about health

Kate MacCord & Jane Maienschein

Vintage advertising poster for ‘Cocaine Toothache Drops’ featuring two children playing happily, building a house from sticks, in front of a house with a wooden fence.

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Subcultures

An undulating thrill

Once lauded as a wonder of the age, cocaine soon became the object of profound anxieties. What happened?

Douglas Small

Fresco fragment with geometric borders framing curved shapes representing waves crashing upon the shore, partially damaged.

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Nature and landscape

Laughing shores

Sailors, exiles, merchants and philosophers: how the ancient Greeks played with language to express a seaborne imagination

Giordano Lipari

Black and white photo of four people in sunglasses standing on a terrace overlooking the sea with a hilly coastline in the background.

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Metaphysics

Desperate remedies

In order to make headway on knotty metaphysical problems, philosophers should look to the methods used by scientists

Nina Emery

An old photograph of a man pulling a small cart with a child and belongings, followed by a woman and three children; one child is pushing a stroller.

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Thinkers and theories

Rawls the redeemer

For John Rawls, liberalism was more than a political project: it is the best way to fashion a life that is worthy of happiness

Alexandre Lefebvre

Silhouette of baobab trees against a vibrant orange sunset with the sun peeking through the branches of the largest tree.

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Biology

Seeing plants anew

The stunningly complex behaviour of plants has led to a new way of thinking about our world: plant philosophy

Stella Sandford