Curated playlist
Philosophers of logic
- Thomas AquinasThomas Aquinas's family held him prisoner for nearly a year. At nineteen he chose to join the Dominican preachers.
- Immanuel KantA Prussian king's censors forbade Immanuel Kant to speak publicly about religion. The philosopher answered in 1798.
- AristotleOnly around a third of Aristotle's original writings survive, and none was meant to be published.
- AvicennaIn a fortress prison, Avicenna imagined a man falling through air. It became known as the Floating Man.
- René DescartesRené Descartes had three dreams in a heated room in 1619. He believed they revealed a new philosophy to him.
- Adam SmithAdam Smith once walked straight into a tanning pit while talking about free trade.
- Rudolf CarnapRudolf Carnap argued that most deep philosophical questions were meaningless.
- Francis BaconFrancis Bacon may have died after stuffing a hen with snow. He wanted to test if cold could preserve meat like salt.
- Edmund HusserlA Franciscan priest smuggled approximately 40,000 pages of Edmund Husserl's notes out of Nazi Germany.
- AverroesIn 1169, a caliph asked the philosopher Averroes if the heavens had a beginning.
- Henri PoincaréHenri Poincaré won a royal prize for a problem he did not solve. His entry still revealed the first chaotic system.