Podcast Episodes
Back to SearchHoP 489 All Power to Him: Malebranche and Occasionalism
Episode 489
What led Malebranche to his notorious view that all bodily motions and thoughts are caused by God, with created things serving only as “occasions” fo…
10 hours ago
HoP 488 No Particular Reason: Nicolas Malebranche
Episode 488
We begin to explore Malebranche’s controversial development of Cartesian philosophy by looking at his theodicy.
2 weeks ago
HoP 487 Showing Good Judgment: The Port Royal Logic
Episode 490
Antoine Arnauld and Pierre Nicole update the study of logic to take account of the ideas of Descartes.
1 month ago
HoP 486 Friends of the Truth: Arnauld and Jansenism
Episode 487
Antoine Arnauld combines Cartesian philosophy with Jansenism, one of the most controversial religious movements of the 17th century.
1 month, 2 weeks ago
HoP 485 Liz Jackson on Pascal's Wager
Episode 486
An interview on contemporary approaches to Pascal's Wager: where decision theory meets philosophy of religion.
1 month, 3 weeks ago
HoP 484 You Bet Your Life: Pascal’s Wager
Episode 485
Should we gamble on belief in God to have a chance at infinite reward?
2 months, 1 week ago
HoP 483 Between Infinity and the Void: Blaise Pascal
Episode 484
Blaise Pascal was a pioneering scientist and deeply spiritual religious thinker; what united these two sides of his thought?
2 months, 3 weeks ago
HoP 482 Indivisible, Under God: the Revival of Atomism
Episode 483
Why did Sébastian Basso and Pierre Gassendi think ancient atomism was the key to developing a new, modern science?
3 months, 1 week ago
HoP 481 True Fool’s Gold: Pierre Gassendi
Episode 482
Gassendi’s path from skepticism to “baptized Epicureanism.”
3 months, 3 weeks ago
HoP 480 Honorable Ignorance: French Skepticism
Episode 481
So-called “libertines” like Mothe le Vayer revive ancient skepticism, provoking a backlash from Mersenne and Arnauld. Were they right to see the skep…
4 months ago