Victor Nuovo


  • Victor Nuovo: The trial and death of Socrates

    Victor Nuovo: The trial and death of Socrates

    In 399 BCE a judicial assembly of the city of Athens found Socrates guilty of impiety and corrupting the youth, and it sentenced him to death.

  • Victor Nuovo: The art of persuasion

    Victor Nuovo: The art of persuasion

    Gorgias of Leontini (483–375BCE) was another celebrated sophist, perhaps more celebrated than Protagoras.

  • Victor Nuovo: The Socratic Revolution

    Victor Nuovo: The Socratic Revolution

    Why is Socrates so important? Socrates wrote nothing, so we can’t search a body of writing for answers. And the fact that he was written up by a…

  • Victor Nuovo: Protagoras, the first humanist

    Victor Nuovo: Protagoras, the first humanist

    These teachers, known as “sophists,” travelled from city to city giving instruction for pay. Some of them became rich and famous. One of the most successful of these…

  • Victor Nuovo: The Greek Atomists

    Victor Nuovo: The Greek Atomists

    The atomic theory was first conceived by two Greek philosophers, Leucippus and Democritus, who flourished during the first half of the 5th century BCE.

  • Victor Nuovo: Parmenides: A two-fold reality

    Victor Nuovo: Parmenides: A two-fold reality

    Parmenides endeavored to achieve his goal by demonstrating through purely rational argument that the very idea of Nature is absurd.

  • Victor Nuovo: Heraclitus and the unity of opposites

    Victor Nuovo: Heraclitus and the unity of opposites

    Heraclitus was the first to make paradox a philosophical theme. 

  • Victor Nuovo: Xenophanes, the free thinker

    Victor Nuovo: Xenophanes, the free thinker

    Xenophanes was a wandering poet. The times of his birth and death are unknown, but he is said to have “flourished,” that is, been active, around the middle…

  • Victor Nuovo: Pythagoras and his school

    Victor Nuovo: Pythagoras and his school

    Imagine how hard it would be, if not impossible, to think coherently if we lacked the number 1, which is the very idea of Unity.

  • Victor Nuovo: ‘The mother of all knowledge’

    Victor Nuovo: ‘The mother of all knowledge’

    Philosophy has been called “the mother of all knowledge.” However, since this was said by a philosopher (viz. Aristotle), there may be reason to doubt its truth.