Confucius: Heavenly Wisdom
Confucius is not only one of the great minds of China, but has wielded an influence on the politics and culture of the entire world.
The Great Conversation: Language
“The medium is the message,” Marshall McLuhan wrote, and when the Great Conversation touches on language, it’s hard to argue with him.
The Great Conversation: Induction
Though often given second place beside deductive logic, induction is a powerful and surprisingly subtle instrument in the pursuit of knowledge.
Voltaire: Worshiper of Reason
As one of the principal architects of the French Enlightenment, Voltaire wields an influence on all subsequent world history.
The Great Conversation: Element
Nature that fram’d us of four elements, / Warring within our breast for regiment, / Doth teach us all to have aspiring minds: / Our souls, whose faculties can comprehend / The wondrous architecture of the world …
The Great Conversation: Citizen
The relation between citizenship and legal rights, sex, ethnicity, religion, economic class, and a host of other things has a complicated history.
The Great Conversation: Temperance
“The archer that shoots over, misses as much as he that falls short, and ’tis equally troublesome to my sight to look up at a great light, and to look down into a dark abyss.” Michel de Montaigne
The Great Conversation: Space
A vacuum is defined precisely by not being anything, unless sheer empty space is a thing. But if it is, what is it? How do you define it?
The Bhagavad Gītā: Jewel of India
Though it has been available in European languages for only a couple of centuries, the Bhagavad Gita has had a tremendous influence on the world’s culture.
The Great Conversation: Nature
The natural can be opposed to the artificial, the immoral, the moral, the civilized, the supernatural, the unnatural—and all of these have further ramified senses, including some that combine with each other.
