Wrong ideas: the new podcast curated by the Department of Philosophy of the University of Bologna

What connects bicycles and keyboards with hummingbirds? And Adolf Wölfli’s paintings with the famous chess game between Kasparov and DeepBlue? And what about self-driving cars, treasure hunters and Freud? And what do the Womb and the Anthropocene have in common?

The most immediate answer would be nothing, yet ‘Wrong ideas’ - the podcast of the Department of Philosophy of the University of Bologna available on Spreaker and on all the main streaming platforms – shows there is a file rouge connecting these various elements: it’s a journey made of conceptual characters, elements of a history of ideas, wrong ideas.

But what are wrong ideas? They are ideas long considered to be incontrovertible, and then revealed to be wrong or at least questionable. Wrong ideas are those that are ambiguous, controversial, convincing and productive on the one hand, yet problematic and harmful on the other.

These ideas still haven’t exhausted their function for thought and can open the doors to alternative pathways, to new and borderline investigations, free from the constraints of labels such as ‘right’ and ‘true’. Investigations that embrace error, imbalance and incompleteness not only as an unavoidable backdrop to any research project, but also as a necessary counterpoint to human knowledge.

To know means to produce today ideas that will be wrong tomorrow.

Brought to life by the researchers of the Department of Philosophy of the University of Bologna, the ‘Wrong ideas’ podcast was developed inside the FILCAST project, funded by the University of Bologna’s Third Mission call for applications aimed at producing new concepts and discovering new horizons of thought.

A group composed of thirty people, including young researchers and professors from the Department, have developed the concept based on the notion of wrong ideas. They were instructed by two experts, Matteo Bordone (Il Post, known for his podcast ‘TienimiBordone’) and Andrea Franceschi (Il Sole24Ore, author of the podcast ‘Comprami’ awarded best podcast at the 2024 Italian Podcast Awards), and supported by Immagina Srl, a company specialised in educational audiovisual production.

The FILCAST project was born from an idea of Diego Donna, Luigi Lobaccaro and Luisa Lugli. The ‘Wrong ideas’ concept owes much to Matteo Santarelli. Their collaboration, in conjunction with that of researchers, gave birth to this intricate journey where our host, Gabriele Ferrario, will guide us with his voice and questions.

In addition, the project involved nine professors, two researchers, five research fellows, ten PhD students of the Department of Philosophy and some external guests: Stefano De Giorgis, research contractor of the Institute for Cognitive Sciences and Technologies (ISTC) of the CNR, Prof. Matteo Cerri of the Department of Biomedical and Neuromotor Sciences of the University of Bologna, Prof. Antonella Del Prete of the Department of Philosophy and Education Sciences of the University of Turin, Prof. Francisco Javier Ansuátegui Roig of the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid.

Go to the podcast