Anaximander: the Ancient World’s Most Radical Scientific Thinker

Carlo Rovelli is one of the world’s best-known scientists. A theoretical physicist, his books have sold over two million copies around the world. He recently came to Intelligence Squared to talk about his favourite scientist, the little-known Greek philosopher Anaximander, whose ideas, articulated over two millennia ago, lay the foundations for cosmology, physics, geography, meteorology, and biology. It's the subject of Rovelli's book, Anaximander: And the Nature of Science, now being published in English for the first time. In conversation with the award-winning historian Tom Holland, Rovelli shows how Anaximander opened up a path that we are still on today: one that requires us to accept the provisional nature of our knowledge and allows us to challenge, rebel against and create new images of our world.  We’d love to hear your feedback and what you think we should talk about next, who we should have on and what our future debates should be about. Send us an email or voice note with your thoughts to [email protected].  At Intelligence Squared we’ve got our own online streaming platform, Intelligence Squared+ and we’d love you to give it a go. It’s packed with more than 20 years’ worth of video debates and conversations on the world’s most important topics as well as exclusive podcast content. Tune in to live events, ask your questions or watch on-demand, totally ad-free with hours of discussion to dive into. Visit intelligencesquaredplus.com to start watching today. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices