Episode 1 – Who wishes to speak
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The democracy of Ancient Athens was the birthplace of equal and uninhibited speech. Or Isegoria and parrhesia to the Athenians. Jacob Mchangama guides you through how oratory was central to […]
Episode 2 – Liberty or License
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Rome was the most powerful empire in antiquity. But were the Romans free to speak truth to power? Did history’s first successful Women’s March take place in Rome? And who […]
Episode 3 – The Age of Persecution
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Why did the polytheist Ancient Romans persecute the followers of the new Jewish sect of “Christians” in the first three centuries AD”? How high was the price that Christians […]
Episode 4 – Expert Opinion – Paul Cartledge
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In our first expert opinion segment, Jacob Mchangama talks to Emeritus Professor of Greek Culture at Cambridge University Paul Cartledge. With his intimate knowledge of ancient Greece, we dive deeper […]
Episode 5 – The Caliphate
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Why did the medieval Abbasid Caliphs have almost all ancient Greek works of philosophy and science translated into Arabic? How did the long list of medieval Muslim polymaths reconcile abstract […]
Episode 6 – The not-so-Dark Ages, medieval intellectuals, and freethinkers
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In episode 6, we get medieval! Find out why the Middle Ages were as much a period of reason and inquiry as inquisition and superstition. Why was the famous […]
Episode 7 – Expert Opinion – Peter Adamson
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In our second expert opinion episode, Jacob Mchangama talks with Peter Adamson, who is a professor of philosophy at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich and host of the podcast “History […]
Episode 8 – The hounds of God – medieval heretics and inquisitors
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From the High Middle Ages, Europe developed into a “persecuting society,” obsessed with stamping out the “cancer” of heresy. But questions about how this was accomplished — and the consequences […]
Episode 9 – Expert Opinion – Christine Caldwell Ames
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Our last stop in the Middle Ages is an interview with professor Christine Caldwell Ames, who is an expert on medieval heresy and inquisition in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. […]
Episode 10 – The Great Disruption: Part I – The Printing Press and the Viral Reformation
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The disruptive effects of the internet and social media on the spread of information are unprecedented. Or are they? In episode 10 of Clear and Present Danger, we cover […]
Episode 11: The Great Disruption – Part II
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In episode 11 we continue to survey the wreckage after hurricane Luther was unleashed on Europe with the Reformation. When the Reformation mutated and spread across the continent a […]
Episode 12 – Expert Opinion – Teresa Bejan
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We enter the early modern age with an expert opinion featuring Teresa Bejan, associate professor at Oriel College, Oxford University and author of “Mere Civility: Disagreement and the Limits of […]
Episode 13 – Expert Opinion – Jonathan Haidt
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In this episode, we do a bit of time travel and leave the 17th century for a discussion of free speech on American college and university campuses today. Our guest […]
Episode 14 – ‘Universal Peace’: Religious tolerance in the Mughal empire
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Episode 14 leaves the West and heads to 16th and 17th Century India and the Mughal empire. In particular, the rule of Akbar the Great. A century before John Locke’s […]
Episode 15 — Paper-bullets and the forgotten martyrs of radical free speech
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Episode 15 returns to Europe and formative events in 17th Century England, where a mostly forgotten group of radicals demanded a written constitution guaranteeing free speech, liberty of conscience, […]
Episode 16 – Expert Opinion – Michael Shermer
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In this episode, we join up with historian of science Dr. Michael Shermer to investigate the cross-fertilization between science and free speech. Michael Shermer is a prolific writer on science, […]
Episode 17 — Global Inquisition
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In the 16th Century Spain and Portugal globalized the inquisition by spreading the fight for religious orthodoxy and against heresy, blasphemy and apostasy to the Americas, Africa and Asia […]
Episode 18 – Colonial Dissent: Blasphemy, Libel and Tolerance in 17th Century America
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Americans are more supportive of free speech than anyother people. 95 % of Americans think it’s “very important” to be able tocriticize the government without censorship and 77% support the […]
Episode 19 – Expert Opinion – Steven Nadler on Spinoza’s ‘book forged in hell’ and the right to ‘think what you like and say what you think‘
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Baruch Spinoza (also known as Benedict de Spinoza) was born in Amsterdam in 1632. While his given name means “blessing” in both Hebrew and Latin, Spinoza’s “Theological-political treatise” from 1670 […]