In Our Time With Melvyn Bragg
By BBC Radio 4
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Podcast Description
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the history of ideas - including topics drawn from philosophy, science, history, religion and culture.
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1 |
IOT: Trojan War 31 May 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the Trojan War, one of the best known events of Greek mythology. According to the traditional story, the war began when a Trojan prince, Paris, eloped with the Spartan queen Helen. A Greek army besieged Troy for ten... | 5/31/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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2 |
IOT: Marco Polo 24 May 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the celebrated Venetian explorer Marco Polo. In 1271 Polo set off on an epic journey through Asia and he was away for more than twenty years. When he returned, he told extraordinary tales of his adventures. The... | 5/24/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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3 |
IOT: Clausewitz's On War 17 May 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss On War, a treatise on the theory and practice of warfare written by the Prussian soldier and intellectual Carl von Clausewitz. First published in 1832, Clausewitz's magnum opus is commonly regarded as the most... | 5/17/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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4 |
IOT: Game Theory 10 May 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss game theory, the mathematical study of decision-making. Some of the games studied in game theory have become well known outside academia - they include the Prisoner's Dilemma, an intriguing scenario popularised in... | 5/10/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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5 |
IOT: Voltaire's Candide 05 May 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss Voltaire's novel Candide. First published in 1759, the novel follows the adventures of a young man, Candide, and his mentor, the philosopher Pangloss. Often uproariously funny, the novel is a biting satire whose... | 5/3/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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6 |
IOT: The Battle of Bosworth Field 26 Apr 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the Battle of Bosworth Field, the celebrated encounter between Lancastrian and Yorkist forces in August 1485, which resulted in the death of Richard III. Henry Tudor's victory established the Tudor dynasty which was... | 4/26/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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7 |
IOT: Neoplatonism 19 Apr 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss Neoplatonism, the school of thought founded in the 3rd century AD by the philosopher Plotinus. The Neoplatonists brought a new religious sensibility to bear on Plato's thought, outlining a complex cosmology which... | 4/19/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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8 |
IOT: Early Geology 12 Apr 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the emergence of geology - the study of the Earth, its history and composition. Although geology only emerged as a separate area of study in the late 18th century, many earlier thinkers had studied rocks, fossils... | 4/12/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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9 |
IOT: Quakers 5 Apr 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the origins of Quakerism. In the mid-17th century an itinerant preacher, George Fox, became the central figure of the Religious Society of Friends. Persecuted for many years, particularly after the Restoration of... | 4/5/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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10 |
IOT: Measurement of Time 29 Mar 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the measurement of time. Early civilisations used the movements of heavenly bodies to tell the time, then mechanical clocks emerged in Europe in the medieval period. For hundreds of years clocks were inaccurate but... | 3/29/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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11 |
IOT: Moses Mendelssohn 22 Mar 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the work and influence of the 18th-century philosopher Moses Mendelssohn. Moses's learning earned him the sobriquet of the 'German Socrates' and he is considered to be one of the principal architects of the Haskala,... | 3/22/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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12 |
IOT: Vitruvius 15 Mar 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss Vitruvius' De Architectura. Written 2000 years ago, Vitruvius' treatise is a ten-volume work on Roman engineering and architecture, the only surviving text on the subject from the ancient world. The rediscovery of... | 3/15/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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13 |
IOT: Lyrical Ballads 8 Mar 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss Lyrical Ballads, the collection of poems by William Wordsworth and Samuel Coleridge first published in 1798, which attempted to cast off the stultifying conventions of formal 18th-century poetry. Lyrical Ballads... | 3/8/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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14 |
IOT: Benjamin Franklin 01 Mar 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the life and work of Benjamin Franklin. A printer, statesman, diplomat, writer and scientist, Franklin was one of the most remarkable individuals of the 18th century. As the only Founding Father to have signed all... | 3/1/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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15 |
IOT: Conductors 23 Feb 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the physics of electrical conduction. In investigating electrical conduction scientists discovered two new classes of material. Semiconductors have given us the transistor, the solar cell and the silicon chip, and... | 2/23/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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16 |
IOT: The An Lushan Rebellion 16 Feb 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the An Lushan Rebellion, a major uprising against the Chinese Tang Dynasty in 755 AD. Although the dynasty's authority was restored, it never regained the prosperity of previous generations. The An Lushan Rebellion... | 2/16/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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17 |
IOT: Erasmus 9 Feb 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the life and work of the 16th century humanist scholar Desiderius Erasmus, almost universally recognised as the greatest classical scholar of his age. An important religious writer, he was also an outspoken critic... | 2/9/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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18 |
IOT: The Kama Sutra 2 Feb 2012 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the Kama Sutra, one of the most celebrated and misunderstood texts of Indian literature. Although it is best known today for its chapter devoted to sexual pleasure, this Sanskrit work is a wide ranging manual to a... | 2/2/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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19 |
IOT: The Scientific Method 26 Jan 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the evolution of the Scientific Method, the systematic and analytical approach to scientific thought. It became a topic of intense debate in the 17th century, and thinkers including Isaac Newton, Thomas Huxley and... | 1/26/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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20 |
IOT: 1848 Year of Revolution 19 Jan 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss 1848, the year that saw Europe engulfed in revolution. Across the continent, from Paris to Palermo, liberals rose against conservative governments. The first stirrings of rebellion came in January, in Sicily; in... | 1/19/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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21 |
IOT: Safavid Dynasty 12 Jan 12 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the Safavid Dynasty, rulers of the Persian empire between the 16th and 18th centuries. At the peak of their success the Safavids ruled over a vast territory which included all of modern-day Iran. They converted... | 1/12/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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22 |
IOT: Macromolecules 29 Dec 11 | Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the giant molecules that form the basis of all life. Macromolecules, also known as polymers, are long chains of atoms which form the proteins that make up our bodies, as well as many of the materials of modern life.... | 12/29/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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23 |
IOT: Robinson Crusoe 22 Dec 11 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss Daniel Defoe's novel Robinson Crusoe. Published in 1719, it was an immediate success and is considered the classic adventure story - the sailor stranded on a desert island who learns to tame the environment and the... | 12/22/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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24 |
IOT: Concordat of Worms 15 Dec 11 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the Concordat of Worms. This treaty between the papacy and the Holy Roman Empire, signed in 1122, put an end, at least for a time, to years of power struggle and bloodshed. It created a historic distinction between... | 12/15/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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25 |
IOT: Heraclitus 08 Dec 11 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus. Writing in the 5th century BC, Heraclitus believed that everything is constantly changing. He expressed this thought in a famous epigram: "No man ever steps into the same... | 12/8/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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26 |
IOT: Christina Rossetti 01 Dec 11 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the life and work of the Victorian poet Christina Rossetti. Rossetti was born into an artistic family and her siblings included Dante Gabriel, one of the leading lights of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Her poetry... | 12/1/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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27 |
IOT: Judas Maccabeus 24 Nov 11 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the revolutionary Jewish leader Judas Maccabeus. Born in the 2nd century BC, Judas led his followers in a rebellion against the Seleucid Empire, which was attempting to impose Greek culture and religion on the Jews.... | 11/24/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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28 |
IOT: Ptolemy 17 Nov 11 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the ancient Greek astronomer and mathematician Ptolemy, and consider how and why his geocentric theory of the universe held sway for more than a thousand years. It was not until 1543, and Copernicus's heliocentric... | 11/17/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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29 |
IOT: Analytic-Continental Philosophy Split 10 Nov 11 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the Continental-Analytic split in Western philosophy. The Analytic school favours a logical, scientific approach, in contrast to the Continental emphasis on the importance of time and place. But what are the origins... | 11/10/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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30 |
IOT: The Moon 03 Nov 11 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the origins, science and mythology of the Moon. Humans have been fascinated by our only known satellite since prehistory but it was Galileo Galilei who first studied the Moon in detail with a telescope in 1609.... | 11/3/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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31 |
IOT: Seige of Tenochtitlan 27 Oct 11 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the Siege of Tenochtitlan. In 1521 the Spanish conquistador Hernan Cortes led an army of Spanish and native forces against Tenochtitlan, the spectacular island capital of the Aztec civilisation. After a prolonged... | 10/27/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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32 |
IOT: Delacroix - Liberty Leading The People 20 Oct 11 | Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Delacroix's painting July 28: Liberty Leading the People. In 1830 revolution once more overtook France, when a popular uprising toppled the French Bourbon monarch, Charles X. Delacroix's allegorical work, personifying... | 10/20/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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33 |
IOT: The Ming Voyages 13 Oct 11 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the Ming Voyages. In 1405 a Chinese admiral, Zheng He, set sail with an enormous fleet of ships carrying more than 27,000 people. This was the first of seven voyages which took Zheng and his ships all over the known... | 10/13/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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34 |
IOT: David Hume 06 Oct 11 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the work of the philosopher David Hume. A key figure in the Scottish Enlightenment of the eighteenth century, Hume was an empiricist who believed that humans can only have knowledge of things they have themselves... | 10/6/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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35 |
IOT: The Etruscans 29 Sep 11 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the Etruscan civilisation which flourished in Italy for much of the first millennium BC. Developing a sophisticated culture, they were skilled soldiers, architects and artists. Eventually the Etruscan civilisation... | 9/29/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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36 |
IOT: Shinto 22 Sep 11 | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the Japanese belief system of Shinto, a religion without gods, scriptures or a founder. Shinto shrines are some of the most prominent features of the Japanese landscape, where over 100 million people - most of the... | 9/22/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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37 |
IOT: 15 Sep 11: The Hippocratic Oath | Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the Hippocratic Oath. The Greek physician Hippocrates, active in the fifth century BC, has been described as the father of medicine, although little is known about his life and some scholars even argue that he was... | 9/15/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
| Total: 37 Episodes |
Customer Reviews
Words for your Mind
The "In Our Time" series pulls the best contemporary thinkers and scholars into a roundtable discussion to discuss issues of importance: politics, religion, culture, history, philosophy, science, literature, etc. The host finds new scholars each week to discuss a particular topic. Recent topics include a roundtable on astrophysics which attempts to answer--as best we currently know--what the universe is made of. The program was fascinating. Another recent program discusses the origins of angels and how the human concept of angels has evolved over time. If you are looking for a podcast to really make you think, this podcast is for you. You will be hard pressed to find such an interesting discussion in other podcasts.
The Most Civil Discussion on The Net?
You know all that juvenile behavior you get on other 'talk shows': * Hyper-competitive guests obsessed with outdoing each other. * Guests who rigidly ignore each other's contributions (unless they're crudely trashing them) * Everyone talking at once. Louder and louder. Well, there's none of that here! The standard of discussion on this podcast can't be found anywhere else. Quality.
Enlightenment, On Demand
"In Our Time" is, quite simply, the reason I listen to podcasts. Host Melvyn Bragg moderates three guests on a range of topics--art, culture, history, math, science--and the result is nothing short of fascinating. The format, structure and civility of the discussion make it absolutely priceless in getting the point, and the topics are often things I'd never pick up a book about, but the topics always end up being categorically spectacular. Would that there was something so enlightening on American radio these days.
