Years back, I started producing a new kind of video, in a series I called Philosophy Core Concepts. After seeing the hour-long videos I recorded in my Critical Thinking, Introduction to Philosophy, and Ethics classes take off, I started thinking about other sorts of videos I might produce that would be useful for my students and for other viewers worldwide.
There were already quite a few short (anywhere from 2-10 minutes), often quite high-production videos on topics and thinkers in philosophy. But in my view, they were pretty hit and miss. Some of them could be quite good. Many of them were actually poorly informed, misleading, or biased. And then, there were a lot in between. That's not surprising. Two things are needed to successfully teach about philosophy in videos. You've got to really know what you're talking about. And you've got to give people enough actual content - which then requires a longer amount of time.
I decided to stick with my low-tech, minimally produced approach - if the content is actually engaging, even without animations, sound effects, and the like, people will want to watch it - and started creating these new Core Concept videos. They range between 10-30 minutes in length. In format, it's just me in front of the chalkboard, presenting one key idea, distinction, argument, account or other bit of philosophy, from some important thinker.
You can see the entire playlist by clicking here. Scroll down and you'll find a number of videos on a variety of philosophers from Ancient, Medieval, Early Modern, 19th Century, and 20th Century philosophy. So far, I've created videos on Plato, Aristotle, Epicurus, Cicero, Seneca, Epictetus, Augustine, Anselm, Thomas Aquinas, Rene Descartes, Blaise Pascal, Jeremy Bentham, Immanuel Kant, G.W.F. Hegel, Soren Kierkegaard, John Stuart Mill, Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger, Jean-Paul Sartre, Albert Camus, W.D. Ross, Ayn Rand, Alasdair MacIntyre, Viriginia Held, James Rachels, and Rosemarie Tong.
Over the years, I have invested in better lighting, a voice recorder, and a superior camera, but I've kept the approach consistent. Short videos with me lecturing engagingly in front of a chalkboard with notes on it. I plan to keep on shooting these - they're a valuable resource for the classes I teach, and other people find them useful as well - expanding the series well past the 1,000 video mark. There are quite literally hundreds of texts and dozens of additional thinkers I'd like to cover.
A bit later today, I'll be hosting a YouTube Live session to celebrate this milestone with my viewers, fans, and subscribers. If you'd like to join in on that - and get to vote about the area you'd most like to see me focused on for videos in the near future - you can click here to find out more (and set up a reminder for yourself).
On a final note, if you'd like to support my ongoing work in producing these valuable educational resources, there's two ways you can do that. To become a monthly supporter, click here to go to my Patreon page. If you'd like to make a one-time donation, you can do that here through Paypal.
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