Get curated editors’ picks, peeks behind the scenes, film recommendations and more.
Today, the philosophical treatise known as the Ethics (1677) by Baruch Spinoza is widely considered a masterwork of philosophy. But at the time of its publication, Spinoza’s radical vision of God as synonymous with nature was enough for the Portuguese-Jewish congregation of Amsterdam to excommunicate him for ‘abominable heresies’. In this short video from the London Review of Books, the British philosopher and historian Jonathan Rée dissects the radical rationalism of the Ethics, elucidating Spinoza’s once-unconventional views on God, freedom and the necessity of approaching the world with an ‘intellectual love’ above all else.
Video by the London Review of Books
Producer: Anthony Wilks
video
Thinkers and theories
Jeremy Bentham was consumed by creating a perfect prison. Here’s the result
4 minutes
video
Logic and probability
Chew over the prisoner’s dilemma and see if you can find the rational path out
6 minutes
video
Architecture
The radically impractical 18th-century architect whose ideas on beauty endure
19 minutes
video
Metaphysics
Bertrand Russell wanted to kill off causation. Can contemporary philosophy rescue it?
8 minutes
video
Ethics
How many monkeys is it worth sacrificing to save a human life?
6 minutes
video
Human rights and justice
Thirty years after one teenager shot another, is it time to forgive?
28 minutes
video
Chemistry
A square inch in a Petri dish becomes a grand stage for chemical transformations
4 minutes
video
Virtues and vices
From violent criminal to loving parent – a son’s story of his father’s transformation
23 minutes
video
Thinkers and theories
Bernard Williams on Descartes’s audacious endeavour to prove knowledge is possible
43 minutes