Religion & Philosophy

When it comes to public policy on when, if ever, it is acceptable to take a human life, Americans have shown strongly mixed feelings. This timely two-part series seeks to understand this ambivalence and to point the way toward an ethic of life that all Americans can live with. Guests…

Magician, inventor and poet Jerry Andrus (1918-2007) has an insatiable appetite for uncovering the mysteries of life on the boundary between reason and illusion. Seen here wandering through his Albany, Oregon, “Castle of Chaos,” he demonstrates his incredible inventions (such as the Tri-Zonal Space Warper), and waxes philosophic on the…

Daisetsu Teitaro Suzuki (1870~1966) was one of the 20th century’s most important writers and thinkers. During his long and extraordinarily fruitful life Suzuki became the first voice of Japanese Buddhism, especially Zen, to the Western World. He traveled and lectured around the world and has had a major impact on…

Presented by Pauline Mcleod, a master Aboriginal storyteller, actor and poet, from the youngest child watching Play School on ABC, to the most sophisticated and successful people, not only in Australia but all over the world. Aboriginal Dreamtime 1 includes the stories of 'Tiddalick the Frog', 'Flying Fox', 'Wahrn the…

What do modern art, a symphony, and a documentary film have in common? They all require aesthetic considerations. This program presents the ideas of key figures in the shaping and understanding of aesthetics-from Plato, Francis Hutcheson, and Kant to Leon Battista Alberti, Stendhal, and Tolstoy-and addresses pivotal writings, including Aristotle's…

A century after its inception, analytic philosophy continues to clarify issues through argumentation, analysis, and logical rigor-and to parse out the phenomenon of language. This program scrutinizes the founding of analytic philosophy, the rise of logical positivism, the rejection of metaphysics, and the advent of linguistic philosophy through Russell's Principia…