This is a lecture video developed for my online World Views and Values class currently in session at Marist College. In this portion of the class, we are reading, examining, and discussing portions of Rene Descartes' work, the Discourse on Method

This video discuses the quest for completely certain and reliable knowledge motivating Rene Descartes, narrated in the first part of the Discourse on Method. He examines the claims to provide knowledge for all of the various disciplines which he studied, then discuses the possibility of acquiring knowledge through life experience, and finally turns to a decision to start a new project.

1. Plato, Republic (lecture 1)
2. Plato, Republic (lecture 2)
3. Plato, Republic (lecture 3)
4. Plato, Republic (lecture 4)
5. Plato, Republic (lecture 5)
6. Plato, Republic (lecture 6)
7. Epictetus, Discourses (lecture 1)
8. Epictetus, Discourses (lecture 2)
9. Epictetus, Discourses (lecture 3)
10. Epictetus, Discourses (lecture 4)
11. Epictetus, Discourses (lecture 5)
12. Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy (lecture 1)
13. Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy (lecture 2)
14. Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy (lecture 3)
15. Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy (lecture 4)
16. Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy (lecture 5)
17. Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy (lecture 6)
18. Descartes, Discourse on Method (lecture 1)
19. Descartes, Discourse on Method (lecture 2)
20. Descartes, Discourse on Method (lecture 3)
21. Descartes, Discourse on Method (lecture 4)
22. Descartes, Discourse on Method (lecture 5)
23. Descartes, Discourse on Method (lecture 6)
24. Hobbes, Leviathan (lecture 1)
25. Hobbes Leviathan (lecture 2)
26. Hobbes Leviathan (lecture 3)
27. Hobbes Leviathan (lecture 4)
28. Hobbes Leviathan (lecture 5)
29. Hobbes Leviathan (lecture 6)
30. Rousseau, Discourse on the Origins of Inequality (lecture 1)
31. Rousseau, Discourse on the Origins of Inequality (lecture 2)
32. Rousseau, Discourse on the Origins of Inequality (lecture 3)
33. Rousseau, Discourse on the Origins of Inequality (lecture 4)
34. Rousseau, Discourse on the Origins of Inequality (lecture 5)
35. Rousseau, Discourse on the Origins of Inequality (lecture 6)
36. Wollstonecraft, Vindication of the Rights of Women (lecture 1)
37. Wollstonecraft, Vindication of the Rights of Women (lecture 2)
38. Wollstonecraft, Vindication of the Rights of Women (lecture 3)
39. Wollstonecraft, Vindication of the Rights of Women (lecture 4)
40. Wollstonecraft, Vindication of the Rights of Women (lecture 5)
41. Wollstonecraft, Vindication of the Rights of Women (lecture 6)
42. Karl Marx (and Engels), The Communist Manifesto (lecture 1)
43. Karl Marx (and Engels), The Communist Manifesto (lecture 2)
44. Karl Marx (and Engels), The Communist Manifesto (lecture 3)
45. Karl Marx (and Engels), The Communist Manifesto (lecture 4)
46. Karl Marx (and Engels), The Communist Manifesto (lecture 5)
47. Karl Marx (and Engels), The Communist Manifesto (lecture 6)
48. Martin Luther King, Jr. Letter from a Birmingham Jail (lecture 1)
49. Martin Luther King, Jr. Letter from a Birmingham Jail (lecture 2)
50. Martin Luther King, Jr. Letter from a Birmingham Jail (lecture 3)
51. Martin Luther King, Jr. Letter from a Birmingham Jail (lecture 4)
52. Martin Luther King, Jr. Letter from a Birmingham Jail (lecture 5)

The course itself is intended to introduce students without a background in philosophy to some of the key texts, authors, perspectives, and concepts of the History of Ideas, with a particular focus upon human nature, culture and society, and the reality underlying and encompassing human beings and their experiences.

Lecture videos were created for Dr. Sadler's online World Views and Values class, currently taught in a 10-week (9 thinker/text) version for Marist College, and coming this summer in a 12-week (12 thinker/text) version for Oplerno.

In the current class, the following 9 philosophers are covered: Plato, Epictetus, Boethius, Descartes, Hobbes, Rousseau, Wollstonecraft, Marx, King. We'll be adding 3 additional thinkers in the expanded class: Aristotle, Freud, and Arendt

Intro music is Russian Easter Festival Overture, Op. 36, by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, performance placed in the public domain by MusOpen