Podcast Episodes

HoP 500a Marguerite Johnson on Sappho

Episode 504

In the first of five episodes to celebrate reaching the episode 500 mark by looking at things he skipped in earlier series, Peter talks to a leading …

1 day, 13 hours ago

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HoP 499 Beyond Belief: Bayle, Toleration, and Atheism

Episode 500

Pierre Bayle argues that religious disagreements should be tolerated and that there are powerful arguments against monotheism, even as some contempor…

2 weeks, 1 day ago

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Bonus Episode: Glenn Adamson on A Century of Tomorrows

Episode 502

Go to www.glennadamson.com to find out more about Glenn's books including A Century of Tomorrows

1 month, 1 week ago

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HoP 498 Probably Probable: Pierre Bayle and his Dictionary

Episode 499

Is Pierre Bayle’s pioneering reference work, the Historical and Critical Dictionary, a monument to skepticism or to fideism?

2 months ago

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HoP 497 Pure and Simple: Quietism

Episode 498

The “Quietists” Jeanne Guyon and François Fénelon argue that self-love can be overcome by cultivating a “pure love” for God. Their reward: to be accu…

2 months, 2 weeks ago

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HoP 496 He Unwilling, She Unwilling: Jean Racine

Episode 497

How the “neo-classical” tragedies of Racine explore the battle between passion and reason.

3 months ago

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HoP 495 Comedy of Errors: Molière

Episode 494

Molière’s famous comedies scandalize Paris and dramatize themes from French moralism, especially the danger of hypocrisy.

3 months, 2 weeks ago

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HoP 494 Tell the Truth While Laughing: The French Moralists

Episode 495

La Rochefoucauld and other “moralists” offer a penetrating and witty critique of human pride, selfishness, and hypocrisy. Is this just cynicism, or d…

3 months, 4 weeks ago

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HoP 493 Better Nature: The French Garden

Episode 496

How the French formal garden embodied both Cartesian philosophy and the political ideology of the French monarchy.

4 months, 1 week ago

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HoP 492 Changing By Degrees: French Scholasticism

Episode 492

How philosophy at the universities evolved in response to Cartesianism and the “new science.”

4 months, 3 weeks ago

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