Jul 2025

Death of Archimedes

Archimedes’s emblematic death makes sense psychologically and embodies a rich historical picture in a single scene. Transcript Archimedes died mouthing back at an enemy soldier: “Don’t disturb my circles.” Or that’s how the story goes. Is this fact or fiction? We have third-hand ... Show More

26m 21s

Dec 2024

Torricelli’s trumpet is not counterintuitive

There is nothing counterintuitive about an infinite shape with finite volume, contrary to the common propaganda version of the calculus trope known as Torricelli’s trumpet. Nor was this result seen as counterintuitive at the time of its discovery in the 17th century, contrary to ... Show More

56m 39s

Nov 2023

Did Copernicus steal ideas from Islamic astronomers?

Copernicus’s planetary models contain elements also found in the works of late medieval Islamic astronomers associated with the Maragha School, including the Tusi couple and Ibn al-Shatir’s models for the Moon and Mercury. On this basis many historians have concluded that Coperni ... Show More

1h 27m

Oct 2022

Ep 158: Knowledge and Ignorance Part 1

Part 1 of a new short series where I am commenting on Karl Popper's lecture "On the sources of knowledge and of ignorance". This paper sets the scene for the link between objective knowledge and fallibilism - refuting, as it does so, the empiricism of the classic British traditio ... Show More

48m 42s

Feb 2010

1.4 From Galileo to Descartes

Part 1.4. Outlines Galileo's revolutionary theories of astronomy and mechanical science and introduces Descartes' (the father of modern philosophy) ideas of philosophical scepticism.

10m 46s

Dec 2022

Ep 165: Knowledge and Ignorance Part 5

Here we delve more deeply into the ways our senses and our reason might go wrong in the creation of knowledge. There are no authoritative inerrant sources of knowledge and yet we can nonetheless come to knowledge...by creating it. Unusually for ToKCast we take a left turn into vi ... Show More

51m 41s

Oct 2023

Ep 199: David Deutsch’s ”The Fabric of Reality” Chapter 10 ”The Nature of Mathematics” Part 2

The certainty of mathematics and its place in the supposed hierarchy of subjects (assumed to be above science which is itself above philosophy in turn). Some more remarks on Bayesianism and somehow ghosts and alien life.

50m 29s

May 2015

Episode #057 ... Kant pt. 2 - The Actual Introduction

On this episode of the podcast we continue our discussion of Kant, this time focusing on his contributions to the debate between rationalism and empiricism . We begin by reviewing the major points of contention between the rationalists and empiricists regarding how we arrive at k ... Show More

23m 6s

Jan 2009

Metaphysics and Epistemology

Metaphysics and Epistemology: what exists, what is its nature and how can we acquire knowledge of it?

1h 30m

Dec 2019

EP55: The Problem Of Empiricism إشكالية التجريبية

في جولتنا الفلسفية عبر دروب فلسفة العلم الحديث مررنا بقرنين من الزمان تقريبا من المفكرين، العلماء، المدارس، و العديد من الأفكار الفلسفية. لكن هناك ثلاث أفكار رئيسية خيمت على رحلتنا. التجريبية، الطبيعية، والواقعية العلمية. وزى ما شفنا الصور الثلاث لها ما لها وعليها ما عليها، من ال ... Show More

1h 18m

Dec 2019

Ep. 231: Descartes's "Discourse" on Wisdom and Certainty (Part One)

On René Descartes's Discourse on Method (1637), an overview of his work that distills his method, outlines his famous Meditations, presents a provisional (Stoic) ethics, and considers whether he wants to be a public intellectual. This is all meant as a prefac ... Show More

39m 55s

Jan 2022

Ep 105: David Deutsch’s “The Fabric of Reality” Chapter 4 “Criteria for Reality” Part 1

In this podcast we cover realism: the common sense claim that there exists an external reality beyond our own minds that we can come to understand through the tools of science and reason more broadly. We compare this to some of the popular rivals that have cropped up over the yea ... Show More

55m 22s

Rationalism versus empiricism