Wow, gentle reader: Atypically, I did not buy this set of lectures at a Friends of the Library Book Sale, but rather at a book store in Overland, Kansas, in 2022 (that trip was that long ago already?). At any rate, after the half of An Introduction to Greek Philosophy (of which I only had Part I), I delved into this set of three binders, eighteen lectures, about nine hours running time. And since I had a lot of car time this week, I polished off the last third of it pretty quickly.
It is not a science course. It is a history of the philosophy of science course. So the tack of the course is not only on scientific discoveries, but on the social impace (and Progress) each one brings. You get some early lectures on Greek philosophers and natural scientists and the tension between Being and Becoming focii, and we’ll see how they play out over the centuries and even into the quantum era which might unify the two concepts. Or not.
At any rate, the lectures include:
- Knowledge, Know-How, and Social Changes
- Writing Makes Science Possible
- Inventing Reason and Knowledge
- The Birth of Natural Science
- Mathematics and the Order of Nature
- The Birth of Techno-Science
- Universities Relaunch the Idea of Knowledge
- The Medieval Revolution in Know-How
- Progress Enters Into History
- The Printed Book–Gutenberg to Galileo
- Renaissance Painting and Techno-Science
- Copernicus Moves the Earth
- The Birth of Modern Science
- Algebra, Calculus, and Probability
- Conservation and Symmetry
- Instruments as Extensions of the Mind
- Time, Change, and Novelty
- The Atomic Theory of Matter
- The Cell Theory of Life
- The Germ Theory of Disease
- Energy Challenges Matter
- Fields–The Immaterial Becomes Real
- Relationships Become Physical
- Evolution as Process Science
- Statistical Laws Challenge Determinism
- Techno-Science Comes Of Age
- Institutions Empower Innovation
- The Quantum Revolution
- Relativity Redefines Space and Time
- Reconceiving the Universe, Again
- The Idea Behind The Computer
- Three Faces of Information
- Systems, Chaos, and Self-Organization
- Life as Molecules in Action
- Great Ideas, Past and Future
Ope, I missed one, but I can’t be arsed to go get them off of the shelf to review.
The lecture names are generic enough that I’m already forgetting the names of the philosophers and scientists it discusses. Well, most of them, anyway.
The author is a little left–not too bad, although he hangs onto the u in evolution, revolution, and solution a little like I (mis)remembered Old Major doing in Animal Farm (the cartoon). And he’s very eager for science to dispense with its relationship with the church and all that nonsense. Still, not filled with invective or name-calling, so still listenable like professors were in the late 20th century.
I think I would have enjoyed a course on actual science instead of the philosophy of it, but I got a little something out of this one anyway.
One of my goals (probably a stretch goal given how I waste time) is to clean my office closet so I can unbox and review the binders of audio course that I have available and pick one quickly. But that’s a stretch goal. Also, I’ve completed so many over the years that the bookshelf dedicated to the listened to audio courses is almost full. So I might have to take them out of the library binders or something. Or…. Pass them on? Hush your mouth! My estate sale is soon enough.
