Applied Epistemology

Eugen Weber, professor of history at UCLA, is no more. I never saw him in person, but his 52 half-hour lectures on The Western Tradition were the core lectures you wish you could give off the top of your head and kept me avidly tuned to Philadelphia's PBS station every midnight while I was in grad school. The entire run is on streaming video at this site (free, but registration is required). The fourth lecture, "From Bronze to Iron", is a particular favorite, neatly encapsulating how a single technology can revolutionize human societies.