Philosophy
essay
Psychiatry and psychotherapy
Psychodynamic nonsense
For twenty years, I was a practising psychotherapist. Today I believe it has no foundation in science and often causes harm
Niklas Serning
video
Animals and humans
Are zoos and natural history museums born of a desire to understand, or to control?
57 minutes
essay
Metaphysics
The truth about fiction
What distinguishes fiction from nonfiction? The answer to this perennial question relies on how we understand reality itself
Hannah H Kim
essay
Knowledge
The penumbral plunge
Diving into the ring of darkness beyond things easily answerable, asking ‘Why?’ questions is what make humans awesome
Eric Schwitzgebel
video
Virtues and vices
Why Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Adam Smith were divided on the virtues of vanity
5 minutes
essay
Bioethics
Moral resilience
Nurses experience deep suffering when they can’t act according to their moral compass. Our research shows a way forward
Cynda Hylton Rushton
essay
Global history
There are no pure cultures
All of our religions, stories, languages and norms were muddled and mixed through mobility and exchange throughout history
Inanna Hamati-Ataya
video
Beauty and aesthetics
In art, the sublime is a feedback loop, evolving with whatever’s next to threaten us
9 minutes
essay
Philosophy of science
Aha = wow
We surveyed thousands of scientists in four countries and learned just how important beauty is to them
Bridget Ritz & Brandon Vaidyanathan
essay
History
Why history is always political
In his work on republicanism as a living idea, J G A Pocock showed that contesting history is part of a robust civic life
Rosario López
essay
Stories and literature
Laboratories of the impossible
By testing the boundaries of reality, Spanish-language authors have created a sublime counterpart to experimental physics
Joshua Roebke
essay
Philosophy of mind
The stories of Daniel Dennett
Often metaphorical and allusive, the philosopher’s work will long be remembered for how it grappled with everyday thought
Tim Bayne
essay
Dance and theatre
Why the old man dances
Religious ritual to appease the gods or free expression of human agency? For the ancient Romans, dance could be both
Karin Schlapbach
video
Bioethics
What a 1970 experiment reveals about the possibility and perils of ‘head transplants’
6 minutes
video
Beauty and aesthetics
Can you see music in this painting? How synaesthesia fuelled Kandinsky’s art
10 minutes
essay
Political philosophy
The underground university
During the Cold War, Oxford philosophers worked together to aid dissidents behind the Iron Curtain. I was one of them
Cheryl Misak
essay
Metaphysics
Many worlds, many selves
If it’s true that we live in a vast multiverse, then our understanding of identity, morality and even God must be reexamined
Emily Qureshi-Hurst
essay
Thinkers and theories
Who can claim Aristotle?
The endless battle over his legacy testifies to his great authority – and the power of his thought to make the world better
Edith Hall
essay
Philosophy of religion
Compassionate time
On his final journey through Asia, Thomas Merton found some peace in the dialectic between refusing the world and loving it
Drew Calvert
video
Knowledge
Why it takes more than a lifetime to truly understand a single meadow
11 minutes
essay
Bioethics
The cochlear question
As the hearing parent of a deaf baby, I’m confronted with an agonising decision: should I give her an implant to help her hear?
Abi Stephenson
essay
Philosophy of science
The nature of natural laws
Physicists and philosophers today have formulated three opposing models that explain how laws work. Which is the best?
Mario Hubert
video
Political philosophy
The radical activist couple who fought for social change in the courtroom
21 minutes
essay
Technology and the self
We need raw awe
In this tech-vexed age, our life on screens prevents us from experiencing the mysteries and transformative wonder of life
Kirk Schneider