Genius of the Modern World - Season 1
Season 1
Episodes
Marx
In this first episode Bettany investigates the revolutionary ideas of Karl Marx.
Born to an affluent Prussian family, Marx became an angry, idealistic radical, constantly on the run for his political agitating and incendiary writing.
In Paris he first formulated his explosive analysis of capitalism and its corrosive effects on human nature. In Brussels he co-authored the Communist Manifesto with Frederick Engels. In London his obsessive theorizing dragged his family into poverty, and tragedy.
Marx's masterpiece Das Capital was largely overlooked in his lifetime, and only 11 people attended his funeral. Yet his ideas would generate one of the most influential, and divisive ideologies in history.
Drawing on expert opinion, and new evidence, Bettany reveals the flesh-and-blood man and his groundbreaking ideas.
Nietzsche
Historian Bettany Hughes explores the minds of three of the greatest thinkers of the 19th century. This time she travels across Europe in the footsteps of the German philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche.
His uncompromising and often brutal ideas smashed the comfortable assumptions of religion, morality and science, yet, appropriated by the Nazis, his work is among the most devastatingly manipulated and misinterpreted in history.
His philosophical quest led him to isolation and ultimately madness, but his ideas helped shape the intellectual landscape of the modern world.
Freud
Historian Bettany Hughes retraces the lives of three great thinkers whose ideas shaped the modern world.
This time she travels to Vienna on the trail of Sigmund Freud - the father of psychoanalysis.
Freud's influence surrounds us today. We take it for granted that we should be able to talk openly about our deepest feelings, from sexual difference to our inner demons. Plus phrases such as the Oedipus Complex, repression and wish fulfillment have become part of our everyday language.
Yet Freud's career was riven with controversy. His early research into cocaine almost ruined his reputation, and his theories about childhood sexuality have been fiercely debated.
Freud was a pioneer in the study of the human mind. Working as a young doctor in the 1880s, he became fascinated by the medical conundrums of nervous conditions like hysteria.
Believing these illnesses had deep-seated psychological causes, his psychoanalytic talking cure addressed deep-seated emotional issues that had seldom been discussed openly before.
Freud believed that psychoanalysis and dream-analysis could reveal hidden aspects of the mind. It's from Freud that we get the idea of the unconscious mind, where repressed emotions, irrational primal desires, and complex feelings about our parents bubble beneath the surface of consciousness.
Recently Updated Shows
Jimmy Kimmel Live
Jimmy Kimmel Live features a diverse lineup of guests that include celebrities, athletes, musical acts, comedians and human-interest subjects, along with comedy bits and a house band.
The Floor
The Floor is a physical quiz show that sees 81 contestants face off in quiz duels on a giant LED floor divided into a 9×9 grid of squares, each representing its own field of knowledge.
The first challenger, selected at random, must choose one of his or her neighboring opponents to go head-to-head in an epic quiz duel in the opponent's category. The winner takes over the loser's square, gaining valuable ground as they expand their territory, while the loser exits the game. The winner must then choose – do they continue on and attempt to secure another square? Or do they let The Floor choose a new challenger? The last contestant standing who gains full control over The Floor takes home a life-changing $250,000 cash prize.
The Chi
The Chi is a timely coming-of-age story centering on a group of residents who become linked by coincidence but bonded by the need for connection and redemption. Kevin is the pre-teen who must step past shattered illusions and embrace the normal rites of childhood, while Brandon the dreamer makes his own nearly impossible leap of faith to succeed in life and love with girlfriend Jerrika. Emmett is the carefree teen is thrust into complex responsibility with guidance from his mother Jada, and Ronnie is the drifter whose struggle to love and be loved calls into question his every pursuit.
The Secret of Skinwalker Ranch
Gaining full and unprecedented access to one of the most infamous and secretive hotspots of paranormal and UFO-related activities on earth, The Secret of Skinwalker Ranch will feature a team of scientists and experts who will conduct a thorough search of this infamous 512-acre property located in Utah's Uinta Basin. They will attempt to find out the truth behind more than 200 years of mysteries - involving everything from UFO sightings and paranormal activities to animal mutilations and Native American legends of a shape-shifting creature known simply as The Skinwalker.
