In Our Time

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Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the ideas, people and events that have shaped our world.

Melvyn Bragg

Marcus du Sautoy

Barbara Sattler

James Warren

Simon Tillotson

In Our Time: Zeno's Paradoxes

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Zeno's Paradoxes

BBC Radio 4 - In Our Time, Zeno's Paradoxes

Does an arrow in flight move and could Achilles overtake a tortoise? Not according to Zeno

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the paradoxes attributed to Zeno of Elea (c490-430BC) which have stimulated mathematicians and philosophers for millennia.

In a programme first broadcast in 2016, Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Zeno of Elea, a pre-Socratic philosopher from c490-430 BC whose paradoxes were described by Bertrand Russell as "immeasurably subtle and profound." The best known argue against motion, such as that of an arrow in flight which is at a series of different points but moving at none of them, or that of Achilles who, despite being the faster runner, will never catch up with a tortoise with a head start. Aristotle and Aquinas engaged with these, as did Russell, yet it is still debatable whether Zeno's Paradoxes have been resolved.

With 

Marcus du Sautoy
Professor of Mathematics and Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science at the University of Oxford

Barbara Sattler 
Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of St Andrews

and 

James Warren
Reader in Ancient Philosophy at the University of Cambridge

Producer: Simon Tillotson

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