Films On Demand is a streaming video platform which provides educational films that can be shown in their entirety without fear of copyright and can be incorporated into your classroom or online curriculum via Blackboard.
Introduction to Philosophy Series / 3Titles
Introduction to Philosophy is a three-part series. Each film approximately 35 minutes
Great Philosophers Series - 15 Titles, 45 minutes each
This series of incisive intellectual conversations from the BBC archives presents a comprehensive introduction to the concepts of Western philosophy through 15 of its greatest thinkers. Each program features series creator, world-renowned author, professor, and philosophy specialist Bryan Magee, who discusses the philosophers’ ideas within the context of their times and intellectual accomplishments with other distinguished experts.
Great Ideas of Philosophy I Series - 7 Titles
This series investigates core questions in philosophy, such as: Why is there something rather than nothing? What is right action? And what do we mean when we talk about the “mind”? Some of the world’s foremost contemporary philosophers—Richard Sorabji, Colin McGinn, Hilary Putnam, Frances Kamm, Alexander Nehamas, and Arthur Danto, to name only six—enlighten and enliven with their knowledge on these and other topics. 7-part series, 43–51 minutes each.
Great Ideas of Philosophy II Series – 6 Titles
Stimulating commentary by renowned philosophers whose lines of inquiry intersect the spheres of science, religion, politics, epistemology, and logic makes this 6-part series an indispensable asset for the study of philosophical principles and approaches that are closely aligned with the activities and concerns of daily life. Interviews with some of the discipline’s top experts, excerpts from influential writings, and numerous on-screen charts, diagrams, and illustrations enhance each program. 6-part series, 42–46 minutes each.
The Power of Knowledge: Heroes of the Enlightenment (52:21)
The 18th-century movement known as the Age of Enlightenment saw the rise of intellectuals who endorsed freedom of thought apart from the dictates of state and religion, thus laying the foundation for advances in science, social philosophy, and culture. This program discusses the contributions of Immanuel Kant, Isaac Newton, Denis Diderot, the Marquês de Pombal, and Erasmus Darwin.
Freud: Genius of the Modern World - Full Video (59:22)
Sigmund Freud was dubbed the “Father of psychoanalysis.” And certainly no other individual exploration of the human condition has had such a lasting and profound effect on the understanding of the psye. His work changed the climate and the context in which we understand our lives, as well as the landscape of the inner workings of the human mind. The program begins in Vienna. Sigmund Freud arrived here in 1860 aged 4 and for the next 80 years this was the context for his radical and often disturbing insights into the human psyche: insights that would wipe away the horizon of all that had come before, and re-envisage the landscape of the mind.
Nietzsche: Genius of the Modern World - Full Video (59:26)
The 19th century philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche was one of the most brilliant and dangerous minds of the 19th century. His uncompromising and often brutal ideas smashed the comfortable presuppositions and assumions of religion, morality, and science. His was a world not just bereft of God, but almost of humanity—breathtaking in both its post-religious starkness and its originality. In this episode, host Bettany Hughes goes in search of the beliefs of a man whose work is possibly the most devastatingly manipulated and misinterpreted in philosophical history. Nietzsche’s dislike of systems and of seeking truths left his ideas ambiguous and sometimes incoherent. It was this that made him vulnerable to interpretation, and as a result his thoughts—which warned against the very notion of a political system like totalitarianism—were manipulated to strengthen its ideals. Violently opposed to anti-Semitism throughout his life, his anti-Semitic sister made sure he became the poster boy for Hitler’s drive for an Aryan ideal. Anti-nationalistic, he came to symbolize a regime he would have loathed.
Essentials of Faith: Humanism - Full Video (23:50)
It is a philosophy that seeks to replace religion with rites of passage based on compassion and rationality. Despite its overarching goals, Humanism divides into several groups—from hedonism to secularism. This program delineates viewpoints from five articulate humanist proponents who, through thoughtful explanations, evoke the multifaceted landscape of Humanist thought.