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Professor Shapiro transitions to the third and final section of the course, an in-depth look at democracy and its institutions. According to him, democracy is the most successful at delivering on the mature Enlightenment’s twin promises to recognize individual rights as the ultimate political good and to base politics on some kind of commitment to objective knowledge. And interestingly, democracy as a tradition was not made famous by its champions, but rather by its critics. Professor Shapiro guides the class through the writings of Plato, Tocqueville, Madison, and Dahl. He zeroes in specifically on American democracy and such concepts as tyranny of the majority, factionalism, and checks and balances.
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Video Length: 0
Date Found: May 25, 2011
Date Produced:
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 ACADEMIC EARTH |
May 25, 2011
Professor Snowden describes the final exam, and takes questions from students.
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 ACADEMIC EARTH |
May 25, 2011
In the eighteenth century, smallpox succeeded plague as the most feared disease. The two maladies, however, are very different. While plague is a bacterial disease, smallpox is viral. Plague is spread by rats and fleas, smallpox is transmitted by contact and airborne inhalation. Unlike plague, ...
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 ACADEMIC EARTH |
May 25, 2011
The next and final Enlightenment tradition to be examined in the class is that of John Rawls, who, according to Professor Shapiro, was a hugely important figure not only in contemporary political philosophy, but also in the field of philosophy as a whole. The class is introduced to some of the ...
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 ACADEMIC EARTH |
May 25, 2011
In this lecture, Professor Freeman discusses the Declaration of Independence and sets the document in its historical context. The Declaration was not the main focus of the Second Continental Congress, which was largely concerned with organizing the defensive war effort. The Congress had sent ...
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 ACADEMIC EARTH |
May 25, 2011
SARS, avian influenza and swine flu are the first new diseases of the twenty-first century. They are all diseases of globalization, or diseases of modernity, and while relatively limited in their impact, they have offered dress-rehearsals for future epidemics. As information about SARS spread ...
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