Podcasts · Society & Culture

History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps

Peter Adamson

300 episodes

Peter Adamson, Professor of Philosophy at the LMU in Munich and at King's College London, takes listeners through the history of philosophy, "without any gaps". www.historyofphilosophy.net

Episodes page 4 of 6

  1. HoP 358 - Of Two Minds - Pomponazzi and Nifo on the Intellect

    · 22 min · Episode 358

    Pietro Pomponazzi and Agostino Nifo debate the immortality of the soul and the cogency of Averroes’ theory of intellect.

  2. HoP 357 - David Lines on Aristotle's Ethics in the Renaissance

    · 26 min · Episode 356

    An interview with David Lines on the role of Aristotle in Renaissance ethics.

  3. HoP 356 - I’d Like to Thank the Lyceum - Aristotle in Renaissance Italy

    · 23 min · Episode 357

    Aristotle’s works are edited, printed, and translated, leading to new assessments of his thought among both humanists and scholastics.

  4. HoP 355 - Town and Gown - Italian Universities

    · 23 min · Episode 355

    The blurry line dividing humanism and scholastic university culture in the Italian Renaissance.

  5. HoP 354 - Greed is Good - Economics in the Italian Renaissance

    · 26 min · Episode 117

    Leon Battista Alberti, Benedetto Cotrugli, and Poggio Bracciolini grapple with the moral and conceptual problems raised by the prospect of people getting filthy rich.

  6. HoP 353 - The Good Place - Utopias in the Italian Renaissance

    · 23 min · Episode 116

    Tommaso Campanella’s “The City of the Sun” and other utopian works of the Italian Renaissance describe perfect cities as an ideal for real life politics.

  7. HoP 352 - The Teacher of Our Actions - Renaissance Historiography

    · 23 min · Episode 115

    Bruni, Poggio, Machiavelli, and Guicciardini explore political ideas and historical method in works on Roman and Italian history.

  8. HoP 351 - Quentin Skinner on Machiavelli

    · 35 min · Episode 114

    Leading Machiavelli scholar Quentin Skinner joins Peter to discuss morality, history, and religion in the Prince and the Discourses.

  9. HoP 350 - The Sentence - Machiavelli on Republicanism

    · 24 min · Episode 113

    Peter celebrates reaching 350 episodes by explaining a single sentence in Machiavelli's "Discourses."

  10. HoP 349 - No More Mr Nice Guy - Machiavelli

    · 21 min · Episode 112

    Machiavelli’s seminal work of political advice, "The Prince," tells the ruler how to be strong like a lion and cunning like a fox.

  11. HoP 348 - The Sweet Restraints of Liberty - Republicanism and Civic Humanism

    · 21 min · Episode 111

    Did “civic humanism” really make republicanism a newly dominant political theory in the Italian Renaissance?

  12. HoP 347 - Bonfire of the Vanities - Savonarola

    · 19 min · Episode 110

    The prophetic preacher Girolamo Savonarola attacks pagan philosophy and puts forward his own political ideas, before coming to an untimely end.

  13. HoP 346 - Cecilia Muratori on Animals in the Renaissance

    · 31 min · Episode 109

    An interview with Cecilia Muratori, an expert on the surprisingly modern ideas about non-human animals that emerged in the Renaissance.

  14. HoP 345 - What a Piece of Work is Man - Manetti and Pico on Human Nature

    · 22 min · Episode 108

    Pico della Mirandola and Giannozzo Manetti praise humans as the centerpiece of the created world. But what about the other animals?

  15. HoP 344 - The Count of Concord - Pico della Mirandola

    · 21 min · Episode 106

    Pico della Mirandola argues for the harmony of the ancient authorities, draws on Jewish mysticism, and questions the value of humanist rhetoric.

  16. HoP 343 - As Far as East from West - Jewish Philosophy in Renaissance Italy

    · 23 min · Episode 107

    Jewish philosophers in Renaissance Italy, focusing on Leone Ebreo’s Dialogues of Love, the Averroism of Elijah del Medigo, and Italian Kabbalah.

  17. HoP 342 - Denis Robichaud on Plato in the Renaissance

    · 30 min · Episode 104

    An interview with Denis Robichaud on how, and why, Plato was read in the Italian Renaissance.

  18. HoP 341 - True Romance - Theories of Love

    · 32 min · Episode 105

    Ficino describes a “Platonic” love purified of sexuality, prompting a debate carried on by Pico della Mirandola, Pietro Bembo, and Tullia d’Aragona.

  19. HoP 340 - Footnotes to Plato - Marsilio Ficino

    · 24 min · Episode 102

    Marsilio Ficino’s revival of Platonism, with a focus on his proofs for the soul’s immortality in his magnum opus, the Platonic Theology.

  20. HoP 339 - I’d Like to Thank the Academy - Florentine Platonism

    · 22 min · Episode 103

    The blossoming of Renaissance Platonism under the Medici, who supported the scholarship of Poliziano, Ficino, and Pico della Mirandola.

  21. HoP 338 - All About Eve - the Defense of Women

    · 21 min · Episode 101

    Refutation of misogyny in Moderate Fonte and Lucrezia Marinella.

  22. HoP 337 - More Rare Than the Phoenix - Italian Women Humanists

    · 21 min · Episode 100

    Cassandra Fedele, Isotta Nogarola, and Laura Cereta seek fame and glory through eloquence and learning.

  23. HoP 336 - We Built This City - Christine de Pizan

    · 21 min · Episode 99

    Christine de Pizan's political philosophy, epistemology, and the refutation of misogyny in her "City of Ladies".

  24. HoP 335 - Sabrina Ebbersmeyer on Emotions in Renaissance Philosophy

    · 29 min · Episode 98

    An interview with Sabrina Ebbersmeyer about the relation of emotion to reason and the body, and panpsychism, in the Renaissance.

  25. HoP 334 - Chance Encounters - Reviving Hellenistic philosophy

    · 22 min · Episode 97

    The rediscovery of Epicurus, Lucretius, and Sextus Empiricus spreads challenging ideas about chance, atomism, and skepticism.

  26. HoP 333 - Difficult to Be Good - Humanist Ethics

    · 22 min · Episode 96

    Humanists from Bruni and Valla to Pontano and Castiglione ask whether ancient ethical teachings can still help us learn how to live.

  27. HoP 332 - Jill Kraye on Humanism

    · 38 min · Episode 95

    Jill Kraye returns to the podcast to discuss the nature of humanism, its relation to scholasticism, and its legacy.

  28. HoP 331 - Literary Criticism - Lorenzo Valla

    · 21 min · Episode 94

    Lorenzo Valla launches a furious attack on scholastic philosophy, favoring the resources of classical Latin.

  29. HoP 330 - Republic of Letters - Italian Humanism

    · 20 min · Episode 93

    Coluccio Salutati and Leonardo Bruni combine eloquence with philosophy, taking as their model the refined language and republican ideals found in Cicero.

  30. HoP 329 - Greeks Bearing Gifts - Byzantine Scholars in Italy

    · 19 min · Episode 92

    Bessarion and George Trapenzuntius, rival scholars from the Greek east who helped inspire the Italian Renaissance.

  31. HoP 328 - Old News - Introduction to the Italian Renaissance

    · 20 min · Episode 91

    A first look at the themes and figures of philosophy in the Italian Renaissance.

  32. HoP 327 - Michele Trizio on Byzantine and Latin Medieval Philosophy

    · 24 min · Episode 90

    The series on Byzantium concludes as Michele Trizio discusses the mutual influence of Byzantium and Latin Christendom.

  33. HoP 326 - Istanbul (Not Constantinople) - the Later Orthodox Tradition

    · 26 min · Episode 89

    When the Byzantine empire ended in 1453, philosophy in Greek did not end with it. In this episode we bring the story up to the 20th century.

  34. HoP 325 - Platonic Love - Gemistos Plethon

    · 23 min · Episode 88

    Was Gemistos Plethon, the last great thinker of the Byzantine tradition, a secret pagan or just a Christian with an unusual enthusiasm for Platonism?

  35. HoP 324 - United We Fall - Latin Philosophy in Byzantium

    · 20 min · Episode 87

    Thomas Aquinas finds avid readers among Byzantines at the twilight of empire, and is used by both sides of the Hesychast controversy.

  36. HoP 323 - Through His Works You Shall Know Him - Palamas and Hesychasm

    · 19 min · Episode 86

    Gregory Palamas and the controversy over his teaching that we can go beyond human reason by grasping God through his activities or “energies”.

  37. HoP 322 - Do the Math - Science in the Palaiologan Renaissance

    · 21 min · Episode 85

    Mathematics and the sciences in Byzantium, focusing on scholars of the Palaiologan period like Blemmydes and Metochites.

  38. HoP 321 - Judith Herrin on Byzantium and Islam

    · 33 min · Episode 84

    Historian Judith Herrin joins us to talk about competition and mutual influence between Islam and Byzantium.

  39. HoP 320 - People of the South - Byzantium and Islam

    · 20 min · Episode 83

    Intellectual exchange between Christians and Muslims, and the later flowering of Syriac literature including the philosopher Bar Hebraeus.

  40. HoP 319 - Georgia on My Mind - Petritsi and the Proclus Revival

    · 19 min · Episode 82

    The Neoplatonist Proclus gets mixed reviews from Christians, as Nicholas of Methone refutes him but the Georgian philosopher Ioane Petritsi helps to revive his thought.

  41. HoP 318 - Oliver Primavesi on Greek Manuscripts

    · 36 min · Episode 81

    Peter's Munich colleague Oliver Primavesi tells us how Greek manuscripts are used to establish the text of authors like Aristotle.

  42. HoP 317 - Made by Hand - Byzantine Manuscripts

    · 24 min · Episode 80

    Without handwritten copies produced by Byzantine scribes, we would know almost nothing about ancient philosophy. How and why were they made?

  43. HoP 316 - Just Measures - Law, Money, and War in Byzantium

    · 22 min · Episode 79

    Legal and economic thought in Byzantium: the sources of the law’s authority, the relation of church and civil law, just price, and just war.

  44. HoP 315 - Wiser Than Men - Gender in Byzantium

    · 21 min · Episode 78

    The role of women in Byzantine society and the complex attitudes surrounding eunuchs: did they make up a “third gender”?

  45. HoP 314 - Katerina Ierodiakonou on Byzantine Commentaries

    · 31 min · Episode 77

    A chat about commentaries on Aristotle from Byzantium with guest Katerina Ierodiakonou.

  46. HoP 313 - Queen of the Sciences - Anna Komnene and her Circle

    · 21 min · Episode 76

    Princess Anna Komnene makes good use of her political retirement by gathering a circle of scholars to write commentaries on Aristotle.

  47. HoP 312 - Past Masters - Byzantine Historiography

    · 20 min · Episode 75

    The larger meaning of history in the chronicles written by Michael Psellos, Michael Attaleiates, Anna Komnene, and Niketas Choniates.

  48. HoP 311 - The Elements of Style - Rhetoric in Byzantium

    · 20 min · Episode 74

    Psellos and other experts in rhetoric explore how this art of persuasion relates to philosophy.

  49. HoP 310 - Purple Prose - Byzantine Political Philosophy

    · 24 min · Episode 73

    Byzantine political thought from the time of Justinian down to the Palaiologos dynasty wrestles with the nature and scope of imperial power.

  50. HoP 309 - Hooked on Classics - Italos and the Debate over Pagan Learning

    · 20 min · Episode 72

    The trial of John Italos and other signs of Byzantine disquiet with the pagan philosophical tradition.

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