Avicenna
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Persian Islamic philosopher, Avicenna. In the city of Hamadan in Iran, right in the centre, there is a vast mausoleum dedicated to an Iranian national hero. Built in 1952, exactly 915 years after his death, it’s a great conical tower with twelve supporting columns. It’s dedicated not to a warrior or a king but to a philosopher and physician. His name is Ali Al Husayn Ibn-Sina, but he is also known as Avicenna and he is arguably the most important philosopher in the history of Islam. In a colourful career Avicenna proved the existence of god, amalgamated all known medical knowledge into one big book and established a mind body dualism 600 years before Descartes and still found time to overindulge in wine and sex.
→ Listen on BBC Sounds website
Guests
- Peter Adamson
7 episodes
Reader in Philosophy at King's College London - Amira Bennison
10 episodes
Senior Lecturer in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at the University of Cambridge -
Nader El-Bizri No other episodes
Affiliated Lecturer in the History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge
Related episodes
-
Al-Ghazali
19 Mar, 2015 210 Philosophy and theory of religion -
Averroes
5 Oct, 2006 100 Philosophy -
Al-Kindi
28 Jun, 2012 190 Modern Western Philosophy -
al-Biruni
10 Jun, 2010 900 History -
The Translation Movement
2 Oct, 2008 500 Science -
Maths in the Early Islamic World
16 Feb, 2017 510 Mathematics -
The Safavid Dynasty
12 Jan, 2012 950 History of Asia -
Nizami Ganjavi
5 Dec, 2024 890 Other literatures -
Rumi’s Poetry
11 Feb, 2016 890 Other literatures -
Aristotle’s Biology
7 Feb, 2019 570 Biology
Programme ID: b00855lt
Episode page: bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00855lt
Auto-category: 181 (Islamic philosophy and theology)
Hello (First sentence from this episode)
Hello, in the city of Hamadan in Iran, right in the centre, there's a vast mausoleum dedicated to an Iranian national hero.