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BBC Radio 3 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced Third Programme.

BBC Radio 3

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The Essay Podcast

The Essay

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Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond.

Leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond, themed across a week - insight, opinion and intellectual surprise.

The Essay: The Case for Doubt

The Essay: The Case for Doubt: Episode 4: Jennifer Michael Hecht on Doubt

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The Case for Doubt

Episode 4

Episode 4: Jennifer Michael Hecht on Doubt

Jennifer Michael Hecht on Doubt

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American poet and historian Jennifer Michael Hecht argues doubt is 'a beautiful thing'.

Poet and historian Jennifer Michael Hecht argues that if we are interested in freedom and truth, our fixed opinions and beliefs will start giving way to doubt.

American poet and historian Jennifer Michael Hecht on doubt. "If we are interested in truth, and in our own freedom, we ought to celebrate that which convinces us to doubt". 
 
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Jennifer Michael Hecht on doubt.

"If we are interested in truth, and in our own freedom, we ought to celebrate that which convinces us to doubt". 

The American poet and historian Jennifer Michael Hecht reflects on doubt as 'a beautiful thing' in a world where knowing is celebrated more than doubting. Hecht, who has written a history of Doubt, argues that if we are truly interested in freedom and truth, our fixed opinions and beliefs will start giving way to doubt. 

This is the fourth of five Essays on The Case for Doubt - political, religious, and scientific doubt ... concluding with self-doubt.

First broadcast in April 2012.

Live music and the arts: broadcasts more live music than any other radio network. Classical music is its core. Genres include world and new music, jazz, speech and drama.

Series in which people discuss the idea that doubt is more useful than fixed beliefs

Series in which people discuss the idea that political, religious, and scientific doubt, even self-doubt, though sometimes troubling, is much more useful and valuable than fixed opinions and beliefs

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Episode 4: Jennifer Michael Hecht on Doubt

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