TELEVISION

Early Modern Philosophy: Descartes and the Rationalists

Series: Early Modern Philosophy: Descartes and the Rationalists
(0)
Episodes
12
Rating
TVPG
Year
2024
Language
English

About

Four centuries ago, bold thinkers put reason in the driver's seat. Meet the rationalist philosophers who changed the course of the modern world.

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Episodes

1 to 3 of 12

1. Philosophy at the Dawn of the Modern Age

31m

Explore the intellectual climate in the 16th and 17th centuries, when early modern philosophy took off. What makes this philosophical movement modern? And what connects it to ancient and medieval philosophy? Professor Reid previews the thinkers covered in the course, and examines their connection to the ongoing Scientific Revolution and the concurrent Reformation that was dividing Christians.

2. René Descartes's Quest for Certainty

36m

A pioneer of early modern philosophy, René Descartes set the goal of building a foundation for knowledge that is absolutely certain. Trace the chain of reasoning in his Meditations on First Philosophy that led him to the self-evident truth of his own thinking existence. Look at other conclusions reached by Descartes in this remarkably subtle work.

3. Descartes's Method and Motives

30m

Why was Descartes so obsessed with certainty? Delve into The Discourse on the Method, which includes an intellectual autobiography. A key step was the time he spent alone in a stove-heated room, when he concluded that a single individual using reason can get closer to the truth than the aggregate of learning contained in all books. Follow the revolutionary deductions he reached with this method.

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