One of the topics I like to teach in my Introduction to Philosophy classes is that of freedom and determinism. There is a lot of great literature discussing these metaphysical matters, and one of the early important texts is an (unfortunately) incomplete one by Marcus Tullius Cicero, called On Fate.
The ideas in On Fate get referenced by several other authors who I often teach as well, particularly Augustine of Hippo and Boethius, when they are considering the same issues of freedom of the will and causal determinism.
What I particularly like about this text - as a teacher - are several things. First, it's short. True, it's shorter than we'd like since we've lost part of the text! But it's easy enough to cover in a class session. Second, it introduces some key ideas that have been used to make sense of the topics involved. It also introduces them to a common argument favoring fatalism, and some ideas about determinism that still show up in the present. And third, it provides some useful summaries about the positions of four important thinkers and schools on these matters in antiquity.
The six podcast episodes come to a bit under an hour and a half of listening time. Here they are:
- Temperament And Geographical Determinism
- Diodorus' Megarian Position
- Epicurus' Position
- Chrysippus' Stoic Position
- Carneades' Academic Skeptic Position
- The Idle Argument
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