The Minefield: Recent Episodes
ABC Radio
In a world marked by wicked social problems, The Minefield helps you negotiate the ethical dilemmas, contradictory claims and unacknowledged complicities of modern life.
During the pandemic, there was a sudden renewal of interest in Harold Ramis’s 1993 film “Groundhog Day” — especially its bleaker aspects. But this missed its sophistication and humanity, to say nothing of its acute depiction of moral growth.
Spanish painter Francisco de Goya’s depiction of Saturn eating his son is a haunting portrait of lust and the fear of one’s own finitude. Christos Tsiolkas joins Waleed and Scott to look into that darkness, and discover what looks back.
Now that the PM has announced the date of the referendum, it’s worth remembering that the zero-sum nature of referenda can unleash the kind of bruising rhetoric that does lasting damage to a political community, no matter the outcome.
Opposition leader Peter Dutton has recently reintroduced the prospect of nuclear power as part of Australia’s commitment to decarbonisation. But what is behind the push for nuclear, and does it make sense in a nation like this?
When Oxford University proposed to confer an honorary degree on the man who ordered an atomic bomb to be dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, philosopher Elizabeth Anscombe condemned the decision as “shar[ing] in the guilt of a bad action by praise and flattery”.
When US President Gerald Ford pardoned Nixon of his crimes, did he thereby place the presidency above the law — or did he understand a hard reality about democratic politics that should inform the multiple prosecutions of Donald Trump?
It is fair to say that boredom is a distinctly modern terror. But, as Stan Grant discusses with Waleed and Scott, what if existential boredom points us to our deeper need?
Are the doomsday scenarios associated with Artificial “Super” Intelligence distracting us from the ways that the pervasive use of AI is already corrupting our use of language and the transmission of knowledge?
Earlier this month, US President Joe Biden made the surprising decision to supply Ukraine with cluster munitions. Does the threat posed by Russia outweigh the moral considerations that place such weapons beyond the pale for many other nations?
Western culture’s association of ageing with decline and obsolescence fuels (and is fuelled by) a desire to dissociate ourselves from our age — but such forms of subtle and overt ageism express contempt for something that is essentially human.
The newly formed National Anti-Corruption Commission faces both unrealistic expectations and a potentially fraught political climate. Professor A.J. Brown joins Waleed and Scott to discuss how it can restore popular faith in democratic politics.
Platforms like Spotify have transformed the way people listen to music through their use of recommendation algorithms and customised playlists designed to cater to either a particular activity or a particular mood.
The tendency over the past four decades has been for governments to try to shield their populations from energy shocks and their associated “cost of living” crises — but is such a response truly sustainable?
The proposed Voice to Parliament is particularly susceptible to two arguments: that it violates the principle of equal citizenship; and that it will enshrine a divisive form of “identity politics” in Australian public life. Whether these arguments hold depends on our understanding of the meaning of democratic equality.
The final season of HBO’s prestige television series Succession confirms that the various characters’ willingness to betray, deceive, manipulate and enact an unrelenting cruelty upon one another has all but assured that, in the end, everyone loses.
It’s been a long time since a policy adopted by the federal government has presented such a knot of party-political, parliamentary, social and ethical problems — Professor Miranda Stewart joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to try to untangle it.
At the end of Monday’s Q+A, Wiradjuri man and journalist Stan Grant stated: “We in the media must ask if we are truly honouring a world worth living in.” Why aren’t more taking him seriously?
As the fourth and final series of the HBO television show “Succession” approaches its finale, Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens revisit the first three seasons. Why does this show matter? What does it tell us, despite its opulence and obscenity, about what is of greatest value in human life?
We live in an era dominated by vast digital platforms, what David Auerbach calls “meganets” – the sheer volume of data they trade in and numbers they produce seem to render them unassailable, irresistable.
Hyperconnectivity has coincided with an epidemic of loneliness — but is loneliness simply part of the human condition? Samantha Rose Hill joins The Minefield to discuss whether we can counter its harmful effects while nurturing genuine solitude.
Can soldiers be trained to kill their fellow human beings without that training doing irreparable damage to the moral lives of the soldiers themselves?
In the final episode of our Ramadan series, we explore the roots of our occasional heedlessness when confronted by the plight and pleas of another person: What could make us callous to their suffering, and how should we respond?
In the fourth instalment of our Ramadan series, we discuss whether “knowledge” which is wielded in a way that demeans others, or which is accumulated as a form of vanity, can really be considered beneficial?
For this third show in our Ramadan series, we’re asking what it is about the human condition that seems to drive it to perpetual discontentment? What is the virtue of repose, and when does “contentment” become indolence or conformity, a chronic lack of curiosity?
Ego-centrism is a form of inattentiveness, a failure to be responsive to the moral reality of another person. In this second instalment in our Ramadan series, we explore how such inattentiveness can corrupt our words and actions.
What does it mean to be intellectually humble? How might such humility be cultivated? What are its benefits — both to ourselves and to those around us?
Now that John Cleese and his daughter Camilla have announced the series will be “rebooted”, it’s worth examining what it was that made Fawlty Towers work — and whether its interaction with the political climate of the 1970s had anything to do with it.
What made the Online Compliance Initiative — better known as the Robodebt scheme — so egregious is the way it was designed to treat those purported to be “welfare cheats” with utter contempt.
Even though we rarely frame it in these terms, it is hardly inappropriate to refer to the relationship between a parent and a child as a moral relationship. Professor Luara Ferracioli joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to explore the nature, and limits, of that relationship.
There are good political and philosophical reasons for seeing free and equal access to early childhood education as an expression of our shared commitment to justice.
Dr Lauren Gurrieri joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to discuss the sophisticated ways sports gambling operators are targeting new clientele — through targeted ads and by parasitising existing social media technologies.
Professor Naomi Baron joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to discuss whether ChatGPT and its soon-to-be-released competitors, with their lure of efficiency and ease, are threatening the human ability to write.
Professor Maryanne Wolf joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to discuss whether we are entering an age of widespread moral illiteracy — an incapacity to engage in the processes that make up the habit of deep reading.
Australians, it seems, are disinclined to alter the Constitution, and any proposal that would seek to gain their approval must carefully navigate a conservative disposition and an underlying sense of national pride.
While political comedy has long been a distinguishing feature of truly democratic cultures, one of the more notable shifts over the past two decades has been the merger of comedy into political commentary. What has this done to the conditions of our common life?
In Jane Austen’s novel Emma, we find an abiding concern with the demands, not just of propriety, but of morality, an attentiveness to the dangers of self-deception, and vivid reminders of the importance of friendship to progress in the moral life.
Over the next few weeks, we are bound to be in the same space with some most disagreeable company. Is this a prospect we should dread?
Does Stanley Kramer's 1967 film, "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner", have to make too many sacrifices in order to be morally palatable to its white audience?
The Minefield helps negotiate the ethical dilemmas, contradictions and complicities of modern life.
Ever since the advent of “ready-to-wear” mass-produced clothing, the brands and prevailing fashions they establish hold out a kind of “idealised” body to which wearers must conform.
In our time, civility has gotten a bad name — usually by being reduced to something like politeness or courtesy. But is that all there is to civility?
In our time, civility has gotten a bad name — usually by being reduced to something like politeness or courtesy. But is that all there is to civility?
There is no denying that Queen’s set at Live Aid on 13 July 1985 was one of the most electrifying live performances ever captured. But did Queen simply pull out their “greatest hits”, or were they attuned to the ethical demands of the occasion?
Guest: Shane Homan is the Head of the School of Media, Film and Journalism at Monash University.
There is no denying that Queen’s set at Live Aid on 13 July 1985 was one of the most electrifying live performances ever captured. But did Queen simply pull out their “greatest hits”, or were they attuned to the ethical demands of the occasion?
Guest: Shane Homan is the Head of the School of Media, Film and Journalism at Monash University.
Movements like Extinction Rebellion and Effective Altruism both regard the fact of climate change and the impending threat of climate catastrophe as moral realities that cannot be ignored. Which is the more fitting response?
Movements like Extinction Rebellion and Effective Altruism both regard the fact of climate change and the impending threat of climate catastrophe as moral realities that cannot be ignored. Which is the more fitting response?
How far should clubs be expected to go when it comes to accommodating the ethical or religious objections of their players to wear sponsor logos?
How far should clubs be expected to go when it comes to accommodating the ethical or religious objections of their players to wear sponsor logos?
Politics is sometimes called the “art of the possible”, which entails sacrificing what is ideal for the sake what is tolerable and achievable. But when are such compromises virtuous, and when are they a form of consent to injustice?
Politics is sometimes called the “art of the possible”, which entails sacrificing what is ideal for the sake what is tolerable and achievable. But when are such compromises virtuous, and when are they a form of consent to injustice?
What are we to make of Elon Musk’s claims about “free speech” and about a private company functioning as a “de facto public town square”?
What are we to make of Elon Musk’s claims about “free speech” and about a private company functioning as a “de facto public town square”?
Because of the pervasiveness of contempt, we no longer see those with whom we radically disagree as members of a common moral community, and therefore as participants in a shared political project.
Because of the pervasiveness of contempt, we no longer see those with whom we radically disagree as members of a common moral community, and therefore as participants in a shared political project.
Ukraine has enjoyed remarkable military success against Russian invaders — thanks, in no small part, to the financial support and weaponry provided by Western nations. In response, President Vladimir Putin has raised the possibility of nuclear retaliation. Does such a prospect change the moral calculus of the West’s support of and solidarity with Ukraine?
Ukraine has enjoyed remarkable military success against Russian invaders — thanks, in no small part, to the financial support and weaponry provided by Western nations. In response, President Vladimir Putin has raised the possibility of nuclear retaliation. Does such a prospect change the moral calculus of the West’s support of and solidarity with Ukraine?
Are the more deleterious tendencies of economy and culture moulding sport after its own image?
Are the more deleterious tendencies of economy and culture moulding sport after its own image?
In a time when everything is politicised, it is worth noting that so many people have such evident affection for a figure who stood above the political fray. Does democratic politics require apolitical institutions in order to be healthy?
In a time when everything is politicised, it is worth noting that so many people have such evident affection for a figure who stood above the political fray. Does democratic politics require apolitical institutions in order to be healthy?
Over the last century, we’ve seen the profound longing for a way of life that has seemingly been “lost” — or, more insidiously, “stolen” — be weaponised by cunning politicians and turned against members of a political community. But should nostalgia simply be dismissed?
Over the last century, we’ve seen the profound longing for a way of life that has seemingly been “lost” — or, more insidiously, “stolen” — be weaponised by cunning politicians and turned against members of a political community. But should nostalgia simply be dismissed?
For many people, burning-out is taken as proof of our dedication to our jobs. Have we finally reached the point where we can re-envision the relationship between work and life?
For many people, burning-out is taken as proof of our dedication to our jobs. Have we finally reached the point where we can re-envision the relationship between work and life?
For the last two weeks, Australian political coverage has been consumed by a series of decisions undertaken by the former Prime Minister. What made them so serious? How far should we go to ensure they can't happen again?
For the last two weeks, Australian political coverage has been consumed by a series of decisions undertaken by the former Prime Minister. What made them so serious? How far should we go to ensure they can't happen again?
Democracies assume that there will be a high level of disagreement among its members. But what happens when those disagreements become incommensurable, when the parties become unintelligible to one another?
Democracies assume that there will be a high level of disagreement among its members. But what happens when those disagreements become incommensurable, when the parties become unintelligible to one another?
Perhaps no “moral emotion” in our time is more reviled than shame. It is regarded, certainly in the West, as uniquely destructive to a healthy sense of self, as psychologically damaging and socially abusive, and to be avoided at all costs. Professor Owen Flanagan joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to discuss whether shame has been given a bad rap, and why we might need more of it.
Perhaps no “moral emotion” in our time is more reviled than shame. It is regarded, certainly in the West, as uniquely destructive to a healthy sense of self, as psychologically damaging and socially abusive, and to be avoided at all costs. Professor Owen Flanagan joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to discuss whether shame has been given a bad rap, and why we might need more of it.
In his speech to the Garma Festival, PM Anthony Albanese put it to the nation that constitutionally enshrining a First Nations Voice would not undermine Australia’s national identity, but more fully express it. Professor Tim Soutphommasane joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to discuss the nature and moral limits of patriotism, and whether it can co-exist with an appropriate sense of national remorse, even shame.
In his speech to the Garma Festival, PM Anthony Albanese put it to the nation that constitutionally enshrining a First Nations Voice would not undermine Australia’s national identity, but more fully express it. Professor Tim Soutphommasane joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to discuss the nature and moral limits of patriotism, and whether it can co-exist with an appropriate sense of national remorse, even shame.
Amazon recently unveiled its plans for an update to Alexa that will enable the device to sound like someone you love — even someone who has died. Professor Yolande Strengers joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to unpack why this is such a bad idea, and how to understand the ethical limits of our relationship with technology.
Amazon recently unveiled its plans for an update to Alexa that will enable the device to sound like someone you love — even someone who has died. Professor Yolande Strengers joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to unpack why this is such a bad idea, and how to understand the ethical limits of our relationship with technology.
Following the ignominious resignation of Boris Johnson, the Tories are looking for a new leader — and the UK a new Prime Minister. The cast of contenders is the most diverse we’ve seen, but that hasn’t yielded a notably different political vision. Why? ANU political scientist Marija Taflaga joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to discuss the significance of and constraints on diversity in political representation.
Following the ignominious resignation of Boris Johnson, the Tories are looking for a new leader — and the UK a new Prime Minister. The cast of contenders is the most diverse we’ve seen, but that hasn’t yielded a notably different political vision. Why? ANU political scientist Marija Taflaga joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to discuss the significance of and constraints on diversity in political representation.
Democratic politics is more than a matter of power. It is predicated on the possibility of discovering common ground through practices of mutual recognition, exchange, attentiveness, and understanding.
Democratic politics is more than a matter of power. It is predicated on the possibility of discovering common ground through practices of mutual recognition, exchange, attentiveness, and understanding.
In Jane Austen’s novel Emma, we find an abiding concern with the demands, not just of propriety, but of morality, an attentiveness to the dangers of self-deception, and vivid reminders of the importance of friendship to progress in the moral life.
Far too much debate today is more like a play of competing monologues, or self-promotion designed to perform for one’s tribe. Should we give up on the fantasy of persuasion through argumentation and cascading theses altogether?
Julian Assange’s defenders claim that the free speech protections afforded to news organisations should apply to Assange as well — and that his impending extradition to the US therefore poses a threat to democracy. Professor Katharine Gelber joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to discuss whether the free speech argument holds.
While political comedy has long been a distinguishing feature of truly democratic cultures, one of the more notable shifts over the past two decades has been the merger of comedy into political commentary. What has this done to the conditions of our common life?
Five years after the historic gathering at the red centre, Anthony Albanese used his election night victory speech to “commit to the Uluru Statement from the Heart in full”. Professor Megan Davis joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens on The Minefield to discuss some of the obstacles that stand in the way of a constitutional referendum, and how a First Nations Voice might transform the moral fabric of our politics.
Social media platforms have been the objects of unrelenting public and political scrutiny over the past decade. Rather less attention has been paid to their more benign cousins — so called “crowd-funding platforms” like GoFundMe. Until now. For what happens when one person’s worthy cause is another’s moral abomination?
Does the 2022 federal election tell us anything about the future of Australian democracy? We know that the Coalition was resoundingly defeated. But does Australia’s new patchwork parliament hold out a surprising model for how some of the inherent limits of representative politics can be overcome?
There is an inescapable conflict that any policy meant to address housing affordability must contend with: in order to make home-ownership more achievable for some, the value of houses must decrease — thereby offending the way we have been urged to see houses as an instrument of financial accumulation. Professor Victoria Ong ViforJ joins The Minefield to discuss whether there is a solution.
We live in a time when “hot” emotions prevail. It could be that an alternative sentiment, in some ethically complex circumstances, is ambivalence — which is to say, a willingness to withhold judgment, to linger in the interval between two options.
By turning the Solomon Islands into a federal election “issue”, Australia has emphasised the national security implications of their agreement with China. PM Manasseh Sogavare has, in response, asserted their right to “manage our sovereign affairs”. ANU’s Terence Wood joins The Minefield to discuss the tension between security and sovereignty, and what it all means for Solomon Island’s democratic culture.
Few of life’s activities are as morally complicated as eating. If food has become, in our time, a source of nourishment for what Iris Murdoch calls the “fat relentless ego”, what might it mean to transform food into a means of achieving companionability with others?
There are habits of seeing which can corrupt our moral lives, or clutter our vision, or defile our imaginations. Just as there is a “contemptuous gaze”, as Iris Murdoch puts it, there are also “eyes tempered by grace”. So what might it mean to undergo a “fast for the eyes” in order to see the world more clearly?
Of all the ways we interact with the world and with the moral reality of other persons, none is as fundamental as speech. In a time when we are saturated with words, what might it mean to purify our language?
What if the impediments to moral growth are not purely or even primarily external to us? During the month of Ramadan, we explore the inner tension between our tendency toward egotism, craving, and self-deception, and the task of cultivating the virtues of humility, self-restraint, and moral clarity.
There is no doubt that emotions like anger can be a proper response to the persistence of injustice or inequality or prejudice or cruelty in the world. But it can also be exhausting and insatiable in its desire for retribution, or to impose one’s will upon the world. Should we, then, seek to renounce anger?
The question of whether the franchise should be extended to children has become an increasingly pressing topic in political theory. But why would we want them to vote? Is it in the interests of political equality? It is to achieve a specific outcome — say, more future-oriented, climate friendly policies? Or is it to cultivate the necessary democratic virtues?
It is hardly surprising that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has been met by fierce, swift, and unified opposition on the part of the West and their allies — who have offered strategic support to the Ukrainian military, and isolated Russia through an unprecedented regime of economic, diplomatic, and cultural sanctions. What might this mean for international responses to other such atrocities elsewhere?
Lying has become so commonplace in politics that it has almost become expected — if not quite accepted. Many politicians who are notoriously promiscuous with the truth even remain relatively popular. Whereas few things infuriate voters like hypocrisy. Should hypocrisy bother us as much as it does? Should we be quite as blasé about political lying as we seem to be?
Works of art, both high and low, can inform and inflect a moral vision of the world. It makes sense to approach works of art with an attentiveness to the light they shed on our lives and our life together. But does this still apply to the award-winning HBO series “Succession”, with its evident delight in cruelty, cunning, and almost virtuosic vulgarity?
Two years ago Scott Morrison raised the drawbridge, effectively sealing “Fortress Australia” off from the rest of the world. What effect has the act of separating Australian citizens and residents from the world and from each other had on our sense of national life, identity, and solidarity? “We” may be “all in this together” — but who, exactly, can be said to count among this “we”?
The debate over the Religious Discrimination Bill has exposed a tension at the heart of the liberal vision of a pluralistic society, in which citizens commit to living together despite their profound disagreement over matters of highest importance. What happens when disagreement becomes a cause of harm?
The practice of compulsory voting, along with the two other pillars of Australia’s electoral system — preferential voting and non-partisan election administration — have kept Australian democracy remarkably stable over the past hundred years. But just how much can we rely on these formal elements of Australian democracy to safeguard Australia’s democratic culture?
The misuse of moral language in public debate is nothing new. But in our social-media saturated age, this misuse has taken on a distinct and rather perfidious form. Morally weighted language is regularly used to grant excessive or abusive claims, and personal or categorical insults, an air of moral seriousness. This kind of language marks the end of conversation. Are we better off without it?
Over the past two months, the conduct of two prominent figures have evoked fierce expressions of public emotion. What explains the intensity of feeling? Have these emotions distorted the public’s judgment, or have they granted that judgment a certain moral clarity?
It’s become a sad commonplace in our time to hear the lines along which democratic societies are now divided. What is often absent, however, is mention of class. Why? Do Korean films like Bong Joon-ho’s Parasite, or Hwang Dong-hyuk’s smash hit Squid Game, have anything to teach us? Atlantic staff writer George Packer joins us.
How might we avoid bad faith quotations, served up in vain interests, and locate ourselves, our hearers, our readers, in a community of mutual interest and intellectual wonder — not so much using quotations, as exposing ourselves to their provocation?
They seem innocuous, but since their invention more than two decades ago, emojis have come to permeate our forms of online communication. Indeed, they are the perfect expression of what communication has become in a social-media saturated age.
Over the last year, there have been a number of high-profile cases where journalists have either landed themselves in legal trouble, or have sparked fierce backlash, due to their conduct on social media. This raises complex problems, not just for the public’s perception of journalists, their impartiality and credibility, but also of the news organisations to which they belong.
Opinion writing plays a disproportionate role in our media eco-system: it drives online traffic, fuels emotion, feeds the forces of polarisation, and promotes an incapacity to understand one another. But is there a different way to think about opinion?
One of the most notable cultural changes to have taken place over the past two decades is the emergence of “prestige television” — which is to say, television as the visual equivalent of literature, and with similar ambitions. What has this shift done to our moral sensibilities, or to our understanding of the shape and demands and limits and possibilities of the moral life?
Now that vaccines are enjoying widespread coverage among wealthy nations, and with the recent emergence of the Omicron variant and rapidly rising rates of infection in the United States and throughout Europe, many states have begun implementing domestic booster campaigns. But this presents thorny ethical problems involving vaccine distribution and global equity.
In a time when so many opinions are clamouring for views in our debauched attention economy, “sht-stirring” has become an irresistible strategy to get oneself noticed. But it does so at a cost, not least to the reputational cost of those who practice it — including moral philosophers. So what is the difference between “sht-stirring” and something like virtuous provocation?
Over the last two weeks, we’ve seen a new wave public protests grow in both size and palpable anger in Victoria. With politicians already trying to make the most of these demonstrations in the lead-up to next year’s federal election, what are their implications for representative politics in Australia?
How much leeway should we give politicians to change, if not their minds, then at least their positions? Under what circumstances are political “U-turns” not liable to condemnation or censure? When should they be met with suspicion, and when should they be received as a reflection of the hard realities of representative politics itself?
It’s become a sad commonplace in our time to hear the lines along which democratic societies are now divided. What is often absent, however, is mention of class. Why? Do Korean films like Bong Joon-ho’s Parasite, or Hwang Dong-hyuk’s smash hit Squid Game, have anything to teach us? Atlantic staff writer George Packer joins us.
Every so often, fans are forced to reckon with the high price that sports can exact on the lives of athletes. In such moments, we are compelled to ask: Is our enjoyment worth the cost?
How might we avoid bad faith quotations, served up in vain interests, and locate ourselves, our hearers, our readers, in a community of mutual interest and intellectual wonder — not so much using quotations, as exposing ourselves to their provocation?
There is a growing evidence that people have accepted the reality of climate change and the need for action. But there is significant divergence in attitudes toward the salience of the problem — which is to say, how big a problem it is, how much it should matter to us, and where to rank climate change in a list of national priorities.
Far too much debate today is more like a play of competing monologues, or forms of self-promotion designed to perform for one’s tribe. Should we give up on the fantasy of persuasion through argumentation and cascading theses, as some philosophers have, or do we need to rethink the conditions of persuasion altogether?
As the philosopher Bernard Williams anticipated, utilitarianism has largely disappeared from public view, not because it is no longer adhered to, but because it has become the “operating system” that governs most of our public decision-making. What the COVID-19 pandemic has done is make that hidden calculus explicit.
In modern politics and moral philosophy, what is most meaningfully human is regularly ignored in the interests of solving “real problems”. While this is often understandable, it also points to a certain debility, a malaise at the heart of the way forms of both representative politics and moral philosophy are often practiced: an inattention to the “everyday”.
If levels of strident “vaccine hesitancy” in Australia are extremely low, and the push to help the population reach the necessary vaccination threshold is more logistical than it is ideological, should we continue publicly to use language and to employ punitive measures which effectively humiliate or ostracise the unvaccinated?
Even in a scientifically enlightened, media-savvy age, conspiracy theories have proven strangely resilient. They just don’t seem to want to go away, and many people seemingly can’t get their fill. We’ve touched on the odd persistence of conspiracy theories on this show in the past, but now RN has devoted an entire series to what makes conspiracies attractive, how people find themselves swallowed up by them, and, perhaps most importantly, how people have found their way out.
The events of 9/11 are inseparable from the horrors of what was subsequently revealed about the use of torture against detainees in locations like Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo Bay. What does the persistence of torture say about political communities that continue to countenance its use?
In the face of the latest COVID-19 outbreaks, there is little that has differentiated the governing strategies of Liberal and Labor state governments — certainly not at the level of practice. Are we witnessing a more long-term scrambling of Australia’s already unclear political divisions?
Over the last year, there have been a number of high-profile cases where journalists have either landed themselves in legal trouble, or have sparked fierce backlash, due to their conduct on social media. This raises complex problems, not just for the public’s perception of journalists, their impartiality and credibility, but also of the news organisations to which they belong.
Does the swift collapse of the US-backed Afghan government suggest that places like Afghanistan are ungovernable by anything other than brute force and unimpeded corruption — or does it suggest that the ultimate folly of the post-9/11 wars was the conceit of “nation building” itself?
Snitching, ratting, dobbing, grassing — these are all words for behaviour that we are taught, at a very young age, to find reprehensible. Is our reticence to “dob” an expression of a worrying disposition toward non-intervention, or is it an expression, even if a perverse one, of a deeper moral principle?
The COVID-19 pandemic has ushered in a wave of “emergency politics”, in which the normal processes of democratic deliberation and public accountability have been suspended. In a public health crisis, is democratic dissent a problem to be solved, or a resource for a more sustainable, mutually beneficial outcome?
The COVID-19 pandemic has ushered in a wave of “emergency politics”, in which the normal processes of democratic deliberation and public accountability have been suspended. In a public health crisis, is democratic dissent a problem to be solved, or a resource for a more sustainable, mutually beneficial outcome?
Could the full acknowledgement of the extent of our complicity in the injustices of the past, constitute a galvanising principle, the basis upon which a new political community is formed? Is shame really inimical to national pride, or is it rather one of its expressions?
A new “space race” is underway – except this time, it’s not between the United States and Russia, or even China and India. Instead, billionaires Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, and Richard Branson are spearheading the lucrative “space tourism” industry. Should this be seen as a source of hope, or simply one more expression of capitalism’s dogma of infinite growth.
A new “space race” is underway – except this time, it’s not between the United States and Russia, or even China and India. Instead, billionaires Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, and Richard Branson are spearheading the lucrative “space tourism” industry. Should this be seen as a source of hope, or simply one more expression of capitalism’s dogma of infinite growth.
The military coup, which overturned the results of last November’s national election, has plunged Myanmar into a cycle of escalating violence. This poses quite specific questions about the legitimacy and limits of revolutionary violence, and the kind of political community that might be left in its wake.
The military coup, which overturned the results of last November’s national election, has plunged Myanmar into a cycle of escalating violence. This poses quite specific questions about the legitimacy and limits of revolutionary violence, and the kind of political community that might be left in its wake.
What is the prolonged experience of the pandemic showing us about the nature of Australian politics, the limits of executive power, the role of experts in the administration of public life, and the fault-lines that continue to undermine our sense of common purpose?
What is the prolonged experience of the pandemic showing us about the nature of Australian politics, the limits of executive power, the role of experts in the administration of public life, and the fault-lines that continue to undermine our sense of common purpose?
In moral philosophy and mass culture alike, “nihilism” has a bad name. And little wonder. It is most often associated with meaninglessness, pessimism, and amoralism. At its heart, nihilism is a view of the world in which progress is not assured, a world without overarching meaning. Does that present a problem to the moral life?
Is the conviction and sentencing of Derek Chauvin something to be celebrated as an indication of moral progress? Can the shared horror over George Floyd’s murder, and the solidarity that followed it, galvanise a fresh commitment to justice and a preparedness to sacrifice existing privileges?
Philosophy’s concern with laughter is as old as philosophy itself. The association of laughter with derision and contempt runs through the concerns of philosophers from Plato and Aristotle to Hobbes and Nietzsche. But is there laughter beyond ridicule and derision? Can laughter be transformative or liberating?
Should we be bound by the constraints of our former self, and the promises we have made in the past? Is moral progress a matter of consistency with one’s previous self, away from one’s previous self, or toward ever-enriching relationships with others?
Should we be bound by the constraints of our former self, and the promises we have made in the past? Is moral progress a matter of consistency with one’s previous self, away from one’s previous self, or toward ever-enriching relationships with others?
Should certain privileges be afforded to those who have received a COVID-19 vaccine (from international travel to attending sports venues and restaurants)? Could such privileges act as incentives (and if so, under what conditions), or are they more likely to produce deep feelings of inequity and resentment?
The Royal Commission into Aged Care and the ravages of COVID-19 within aged care facilities have thrown a spotlight on the adequacy, the ethics and the dignity of our ongoing care of the elderly. To what extent have entrenched patterns of ageist prejudice created the conditions within which certain forms of abuse and neglect could take place? And what can we do to challenge and change these prejudices?
Attachment to sporting clubs is one of our deepest and most emotionally charged forms of prejudice. But what about those moments when a fan decides she can no longer support her team? Has she betrayed her team? Alternatively, in what ways can clubs betray their fans?
The incommensurability of the claims in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict produces a kind of moral absolutism, whereby one side is entirely to blame and another is entirely justified. But are there moral resources that can be brought to bear which grant the legitimacy of the maximal claims of both sides, and then set about exploring the conditions of mutual recognition?
Fatigue is a fascinating moral phenomenon. It can be a consequence of attentiveness, a willingness to face the realities of the world. But it can also be a form of avoidance, of “moral laziness”, the symptom of an active desire not to confront matters that seem to call for our attention. What are the dangers of fatigue, and how are we to respond to it when it overtakes us?
How do we practice solitude in a time rich with distractions and which exhibits peculiar aversion to (and fear of) loneliness? And when we are alone with ourselves, how do we avoid the dangers of self-deception such that solitude becomes genuinely transformative — for us, and for others?
While fasting is an observance associated with Ramadan, versions the practice are broadly familiar to us — from the forms of “self-restraint” that are bound up with physical fitness, to advice commending the health benefits of a regular 14-hour fast. But are these forms of “self-care” just further preoccupations with “the self”, rendering us forgetful of the needs of the moral life?
One of the defining features of our time is the overproduction of what could be called "useless knowledge" — ranging from gossip and empty speculation, to undeniably important "news" which makes no claim on our moral lives other than that we have an opinion about it. In a world full of competing distractions, could it be that one of the greatest moral challenges is how to limit what we know?
With the proliferation of digital distractions and addictive technologies, many of us live in a state of perpetual half-attention. We tend to move from one “sugar-hit” to the next — stimuli which elicit strong if transitory emotions, but discourage us from being present, entirely, to one person, one text, one idea. What is the lack of attentiveness doing to our moral lives?
Will the experience of working-from-home make employees reluctant to resume the daily struggle with traffic or public transportation, or to put up with irritating co-workers and unproductive work environments? Or will we discover that we've missed something precious in being deprived of interactions with others?
It's understandable that so much anger should be directed at the federal government, and that the federal government's numerous missteps and failures to respond appropriately to what this moment demands have added insult to injury. But if the problem is culture-wide, can federal politics be the solution?
It’s understandable that so much anger should be directed at the federal government, and that the federal government’s numerous missteps and failures to respond appropriately to what this moment demands have added insult to injury. But if the problem is culture-wide, can federal politics be the solution?
One of the perhaps underappreciated aspects of COVID-19 is the way the pandemic has dealt a blow to these daily interactions which reinforce our commitment to a common life. What is 'civility'? What is the regulative role it plays in our common life?
One of the perhaps underappreciated aspects of COVID-19 is the way the pandemic has dealt a blow to these daily interactions which reinforce our commitment to a common life. What is ‘civility’? What is the regulative role it plays in our common life?
Does our limited conception of moral responsibility stem from a profound failure to recognise our interconnectedness, the extent to which our lives are implicated in the suffering and wellbeing of others – human and nonhuman?
Does our limited conception of moral responsibility stem from a profound failure to recognise our interconnectedness, the extent to which our lives are implicated in the suffering and wellbeing of others – human and nonhuman?
In the absence of a police investigation into an historical allegation of sexual assault against the Attorney-General, many Australians have pinned their hopes on an independent, arms-length, confidential inquiry. Professor Rosalind Dixon joins us to discuss the legal and moral grounds for such an inquiry.
They seem innocuous, but since their invention more than two decades ago, emojis have come to permeate our forms of online communication. Indeed, they are the perfect expression of what communication has become in a social-media saturated age.
The measures Facebook has taken over the past week have precipitated a long-overdue reckoning. Now that the “social network” has lifted the veil on its ambitions and civic disdain, how can news media companies continue, in good conscience, with their Faustian pact?
The measures Facebook has taken over the past week have precipitated a long-overdue reckoning. Now that the “social network” has lifted the veil on its ambitions and civic disdain, how can news media companies continue, in good conscience, with their Faustian pact?
Professor Rita Felski joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to explore whether a better understanding of the nature of aesthetic experience – of what art does to us, and why – can give us a better sense of the nature of moral disagreement, and of how it is that we might come to discover a shared world.
Do Republicans have an obligation to convict and impeach Trump, for the sake of the health of the body politic? Can democracy itself survive when each “side” casts its electoral success as necessary to the survival of the nation, and the “other side” as an existential threat?
Opinion writing plays a disproportionate role in our media eco-system: it drives online traffic, fuels emotion, feeds the forces of polarisation, and promotes an incapacity to understand one another. But is there a different way to think about opinion?
Opinion writing plays a disproportionate role in our media eco-system: it drives online traffic, fuels emotion, feeds the forces of polarisation, and promotes an incapacity to understand one another. But is there a different way to think about opinion?
Perhaps the most consequential event over the last two months was decision of social media companies to ban Donald Trump — permanently or indefinitely — from their platforms "due to the risk of further incitement of violence". Why are some vaguely uneasy about this move? Are there valid ethical objections?
How does liberal democracy manage incommensurable disagreement? Do the moral and political demands for justice and inclusion trump the principles of free expression and open debate? What is the moral status of "opinion"?
It is the nature of technology to insinuate itself into our daily lives, and to convince us that it is both benevolent by design and utterly indispensable. Little wonder that we have invited digital domestic assistants into our homes and lives at an alarming rate — but at what cost?
Over summer last year, Australia witnessed the devastation of forests and the immolation of wildlife on an unimaginable scale. The emotional or even the tragic content of the bushfires has been — understandably — reserved for the loss of human life and home and livelihood, and for the loss of some non-human animals. But why do we grieve fauna and not flora? What if these fires present to us an invitation we refuse to heed: an invitation to rediscover moral companionship, moral community with trees?
The vice of impatience reflects a particular relationship to time: the notion that time is a finite commodity that ‘must be made the most of’, not an opportunity for encounter or an invitation to attentiveness and mutual discovery. Better put, impatience is ultimately about control.
Can pride be ‘redeemed’, and form the basis of human dignity, or is pride as such a form of moral corruption, a debased form of moral vision?
This is a year that has thrown up a sometimes dizzying series of crises and moral conundrums. On this, our last show of 2020, we try to take stock of the major events and try to discern the underlying themes that come to light. What have we learned — about us, about our world, about our common life?
Is "woke politics" really a form of moral judgment, or is it merely a brand of moralism that seeks to side-step the hard work needed for genuine moral and political transformation?
Have we come to accept a degree of corruption as part of the price we pay for democracy? Is administrative competence more important to us than political incorruptibility?
The Brereton Report compels us to reflect on what it might mean to say that soldiers express a nation’s “values and laws” – which is to say, that soldiers and civilians belong to the same moral community.
While Trump’s conduct, cruelty, and incompetence disqualified him in the eyes of a majority of Americans, very nearly half of the nation voted for and remain fiercely devoted to the president. America is divided, but so is the Democratic party. What does this mean for the future?
Should we think about the story of Australia’s halting “recognition” of its First Peoples as an expression of the ongoing conflict between political philosophies and conceptions of what properly constitutes the common life of a people?
Should we think about the story of Australia’s halting “recognition” of its First Peoples as an expression of the ongoing conflict between political philosophies and conceptions of what properly constitutes the common life of a people?
During the week in which American voters cast their verdict on Trump’s term in office, it makes sense to ask: To what extent is Trump to blame for America’s political malaise? In what ways might Joe Biden’s nomination be a sign of democratic hopefulness?
It is the nature of technology to insinuate itself into our daily lives, and to convince us that it is both benevolent by design and utterly indispensable. Little wonder that we have invited digital domestic assistants into our homes and lives at an alarming rate – but at what cost?
The coronavirus pandemic has exposed, rather than alleviated, the nature and extent of inequality in many modern societies. As the recent federal budget demonstrated, Australia is a case in point. What is ‘inequality’, and why is it problematic?
We have become increasingly interpersonally punitive and unforgiving, believing this to be a sign of our moral seriousness or our commitment to justice. But perhaps Shakespeare’s late plays — especially Cymbeline and Winter’s Tale — hold out a different moral vision.
What should our reaction be to the news of that Trump tested positive to COVID-19? It is wrong to feel glad, or to hope that he experiences severe symptoms, or that he dies?
What should our reaction be to the news of that Trump tested positive to COVID-19? It is wrong to feel glad, or to hope that he experiences severe symptoms, or that he dies?
“Politics” is, it seems, inescapable. Christos Tsiolkas joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to discuss whether we should preserve ways — in literature, in art, in comedy, in sport — to escape the limits of political conflict.
The conflict and partisan positioning that followed the recent death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg reflects the role played by the US Supreme Court in adjudicating matters of intense social and political disagreement. What matters should be left to the messy process of political deliberation, contestation, and compromise? Professor Adrienne Stone joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to discuss when, and how, the courts should negotiate politics and public opinion.
Disagreements these days are often met with claims that an argument is “offensive, harmful, unhelpful, or divisive.” What consideration should be given to the likely consequences of an argument? How is this open to abuse?
The COVID-19 pandemic has proven particularly conducive for those intent on discerning an insidious plot behind both the emergence of the virus and the political response. To what extent are these conspiracies part of a wider culture of pervasive distrust and mutual suspicion?
Joe Biden has presented himself as a person who knows pain and loss, a tragic figure of uncommon empathy and compassion. Does this tell us anything about how political leadership may be changing under the conditions of the COVID-19 pandemic?
Before walking it back, Scott Morrison said he expected a COVID-19 vaccine "to be as mandatory as you can possibly make [it]". The Prime Minister thereby brought to the fore a series of complicated, but fundamental, ethical questions.
What if the hoped for COVID-19 vaccine is delayed by months – or years? Do we have the emotional and interpersonal resources to bear up under the strain? Alda Balthrop-Lewis joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to discuss the habits and practices which might help us cultivate the kind of inner life, and life with others, that could see us through the pandemic.
Many of us are prone to express our sense of having hardship inflicted upon us by the COVID-19 pandemic — only to be reminded that someone else, somewhere else, has it much worse than we do. Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens discuss when we are permitted to complain, without being guilty of ingratitude.
The fee changes to university degrees announced by the federal government are designed to produce “job ready graduates” by funnelling students into “job-relevant” courses — but at the expense of the Humanities and Social Sciences. Professor Moira Gatens joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to discuss what society loses when philosophy is devalued.
The COVID-19 pandemic presents us with an all-too concrete situation in which seemingly minor, individual actions can have dire consequences for thousands of others. Is the pandemic an extreme situation that makes unusual demands of us, or does it simply make visible the kinds of moral demands which are upon us even in more 'normal' times?
COVID-19 has reversed the dynamics and inner-logic of globalisation. As we begin imagining a world after COVID-19, will things go back to “normal”? Should things go back to “normal”
How does liberal democracy manage incommensurable disagreement? Do the moral and political demands for justice and inclusion trump the principles of free expression and open debate? What is the moral status of "opinion"?
Teams across codes and countries are facing the prospects of competing in empty or largely empty stadiums. Whatever that might mean for the players themselves, the lack of crowd noise is proving too off-putting for fans watching from home. Kasey Symons from Swinburne University joins us to discuss why.
Following the deaths of Breonna Taylor, George Floyd and Rayshard Brooks, there are serious calls to defund or even "abolish" the police in the United States. It’s a serious proposal, and it deserves to be taken seriously. But what does it mean, and how can it be done? Yale Law School Professor Tracey Meares joins us to discuss what police abolition looks like.
What does it mean for a nation - whether it be the United States, Germany, or Australia - fully to acknowledge the truth of its past, to drag its moral debts into the light of day? Should a sense of guilt play any role in that acknowledgement?
What are we to make of the fact that, in a time when democratic politics is being radically challenged by a series of seismic shocks, and when ideas or options once thought impossible are now squarely back ‘on the table’, our political leaders and their opponents have rarely seemed more conventional? David Runciman, Professor of Politics at Cambridge University and host of the Talking Politics podcast, joins us to dissect this political moment.
The vice of impatience reflects a particular relationship to time: the notion that time is a finite commodity that ‘must be made the most of’, not an opportunity for encounter or an invitation to attentiveness and mutual discovery. Better put, impatience is ultimately about control.
The death of 46-year-old George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police was both shocking and sickeningly familiar. What are the protesters communicating about the moral content of the police-killing of black men and women?
Are there reasons to act in a particular way, to willingly make some sacrifice, do something which may be good, and which we may even be committed to, when our actions (or lack of action) are likely to be of no consequence? Is size detrimental to democratic community? Professor Roger Crisp joins us to discuss whether the free rider problem highlights the limitation of moral philosophy.
Much like the month of Ramadan, the COVID-19 pandemic presents an intense reminder of a reality we most often ignore: the fact of the limits we inhabit, and our dependence on others.
Calls are mounting for an end to the “shutdown” that has been imposed by governments throughout the world in response to the COVID-19 pandemic – including from some highly regarded philosophers. Are there more humane, more democratic ways of responding to the threat of the virus?
Is the pandemic having a chastening effect on our politics, bringing voters back to the real-world consequences of political decisions, or is the pandemic in fact playing right into the hands of populist politicians, creating ideal conditions in which to fan the flames or fear, resentment and mutual suspicion?
Why, in the light of the #MeToo movement, have we not questioned the aesthetic, much less moral, justification for the disproportionate amount of nudity and simulated sex required of female actors? Do we really need to prolong this puerile reliance on sex to attract viewers?
Can pride be ‘redeemed’, and form the basis of human dignity, or is pride as such a form of moral corruption, a debased form of moral vision?
As societies, we are having to grapple with the question of whether some will be made to bear a disproportionate amount of the cost of our collective response to COVID-19.
In little more than a month, the coronavirus has exploded the sense of certainty, confidence, optimism and control on which so much of modern life, the economy and politics are predicated. Were these always just illusions?
Any meaningful recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic will require imagination, risk, solidarity and vulnerability; it will mean refusing to ‘free-ride’ and a willingness to sacrifice. How can we cultivate this capacity for social solidarity in our time of social fragmentation and mutual distancing?
What new forms of life together — of modesty, prudence, simplicity, mutuality, sociality and cooperation — might we discover under the conditions of scarcity and social isolation imposed by the coronavirus, that perhaps we didn’t envision in more 'normal' times?
Is there a way of responding to the coronavirus that is both effective and ethical? That contributes to the tasks of social cohesion and mutual concern?
Does capitalism cultivate an ethos, an understanding of the nature of social relations and mutual obligation that is inimical to what might be called the demands of "democratic morality"?
The corporate rebranding of International Women’s Day (IWD) couldn’t be further from the day’s revolutionary roots, or any meaningful discussion of women’s liberation. It negates any discussion of the nature of power under patriarchy, and how relations of power between women and men might be genuinely transformed.
Why it is that we want to know the 'truth' about celebrities? What happens when the very promise of transparency, of authenticity — of intimacy, even — becomes part of the carefully cultivated appearance of celebrity itself?
This week on The Minefield, we explore what Montaigne referred to as "that accursed vice" — the most corrupt and all-corrupting of them all: lying.
Does representative democracy depend on practices of public scrutiny, or exercises of 'popular sovereignty' between elections?
Every four years, a disproportionate amount of attention is focused on the unlikely midwestern state of Iowa. In a very real way, the Iowa caucuses encapsulate the profound political and ethical challenges that confront the Democratic Party in its bid to defeat Donald Trump in November — challenges that continue to bedevil democratic politics in other countries: How to mobilise voters around a common cause, without tipping over into either absolutism or unprincipled, 'whatever-it-takes' pragmatism?
Over the summer months, Australia has witnessed the devastation of forests and the immolation of wildlife on an unimaginable scale. The emotional or even the tragic content of the bushfires has been — understandably — reserved for the loss of human life and home and livelihood, and for the loss of some non-human animals. But why do we grieve fauna and not flora? What if these fires present to us an invitation we refuse to heed: an invitation to rediscover moral companionship, moral community with trees?
Back in 2008, newly elected prime minister Kevin Rudd convened a summit of Australia’s "best and brightest" to discuss what kind of nation they wanted Australia to be in 2020. Now that we’re here, 2020 doesn’t look very much like the future at all. What happened? Is there a lesson here about the importance of adopting a sceptical posture, a profound reticence to claim to know, much less predict, our political future? Or are we just reading the wrong signs?
If the recent glut of "democracy in crisis" books is anything to go by, there is a sense that something has gone wrong in our common life. Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt has diagnosed the increasing 'tribalism' in and of our civic and political life particularly acutely, and he joins Waleed and Scott to discuss whether and how we might break free from its Manichean absolutism.
Our lives are saturated with 'news'; but far from creating informed citizens, this is producing forgetful, inattentive citizens. Megan Le Masurier joins us to discuss whether "slow journalism" could help us remember what matters.
Cambridge historian and host of the Talking Politics podcast, David Runciman, has put forward a radical proposal to extend the vote to children as young as six. Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens discuss whether this is just what is needed to recover a healthy democratic culture.
Is our culinary enjoyment enough to justify a complicity in cruelty which our fellow citizens find reprehensible?
What does a society lose when it neglects the moral discipline of reading literary fiction?
What stands out to you about 2019? This week, for the last show of 2019, Waleed and Scott discuss the year that was, what it all meant, and what it means for the future of our common life.
The media has always been in the business of isolating and mass circulating 'newsworthy' pieces or slivers of reality. But we are living in an age of 'clipification', where reality itself is broken up into highlights tailor-made to be shared and viewed again and again. What does democracy look like in an age of 'clipification'?
These days, mass culture, movies, commercial television, music, novels are awash with language that once would have been deemed beyond the pale. Does it still make sense to speak of 'obscene language'? What makes words 'obscene'? Can obscene language be used in such a way that removes the taint from what they refer to?
Is economic growth a virtuous circle or a Faustian treadmill that benefits some and immiserates others (human and not)?
What is it about "calling-out" someone online or "cancelling" someone guilty of an egregious wrong, that is problematic? Does moral seriousness, in a time of incommensurable disagreement, necessarily need to take the form of moral purity?
The fall of the Berlin Wall thirty years ago is celebrated across the Western world as a world-historical moment: the triumph of freedom over tyranny, of democracy over communism. But is this justified? And why the fascination in the West? Professor of International Relations Sarah Percy joins Waleed and Scott to discuss what the 'fall' of the Berlin Wall revealed, and concealed.
Feminism is undeniably one of the most significant political movements of the last century. So what does feminism demand of men? Meagan Tyler joins Scott and Waleed to discuss whether men can be "feminists"?
If conspiracism is the consequence of particular conceptions of truth, knowledge, agency, power in democratic politics, is it a problem that can be solved? Professor Sophia Rosenfeld joins us to discuss whether conspiracism become an inescapable, all-pervasive feature of modern life.
What obligations does the United States have to the Kurds, and indeed, to the region as a whole? Professor Nader Hashemi from the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Denver joins us to discuss the past, present and future of the Syrian conflict.
Modern democratic politics have taken what could be called an 'optimistic turn': a kind of hyperbolic cheeriness in the face of a purported threat; an assurance that the future will be bright, and that only the man at the helm can deliver it. So there’s no need to be anxious. Political philosopher Romand Coles joins Waleed and Scott to discuss why this optimism is the antithesis of genuine democratic hope.
Is the damage that Trump is inflicting on US political culture and the office of the executive so egregious that legislative sanction is more important than electoral advantage? We explore the normative and pragmatic considerations of impeaching this president, with Professor Joshua Cohen.
Are there reasons to act in a particular way, to willingly make some sacrifice, do something which may be good, and which we may even be committed to, when our actions (or lack of action) are likely to be of no consequence? Is size detrimental to democratic community? Professor Roger Crisp joins us to discuss whether the free rider problem highlights the limitation of moral philosophy.
Is the Australian media’s coverage of China having the effect of both alienating Chinese Australians and promoting a kind of countervailing pro-China nationalism? Professor Wanning Sun joins us to discuss why it is that China has acquired the status in the national imagination of not just a geopolitical threat, but a source of almost existential anxiety.
If liberal democracies are now ailing, maybe even failing, what might a recovery of a politics of virtue look like? We explore the politicisation of morality with guest, Adrian Pabst.
In some ways the peculiarities of the Brexit debacle are just the latest manifestation of a much older political tension between democracy and representation. Tim Lynch joins us to discuss whether democracy is about more than 'representation'.
There is undoubtedly a great need for climate science research to be communicated to the public in a manner that is clear, compelling and that cannot readily be captured, let alone dismissed, by partisan politics. Andrew Pitman joins us to discuss whether climate research can be communicated without pandering to the epistemological and political deficiencies of our time.
Advertising has always been about creating desires, not just appealing to an existing demand. And the tension between capitalism and democratic culture is as old as capitalism itself. Soshana Zuboff argues there’s a new form of capitalism with tentacles extending deep into our private lives to influence and modify our behaviour for profit.
Is 'goodness’ still a term that we should be using? Is there a difference between the 'good' and the 'virtuous' character? What is the relationship between action and intention, between the inner and outer life?
The introduction of the Libra would undoubtedly increase Facebook’s power and would certainly disrupt our existing financial systems. But if it diminishes Facebook’s untrammelled sway over news distribution, political communication and the ‘information economy’, is this a price we should be willing to pay?
Cambridge historian and host of the Talking Politics podcast, David Runciman, has put forward a radical proposal to extend the vote to children as young as six. Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens discuss whether this is just what is needed to recover a healthy democratic culture.
If the recent glut of "democracy in crisis" books is anything to go by, there is a sense that something has gone wrong in our common life. Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt has diagnosed the increasing 'tribalism' in and of our civic and political life particularly acutely, and he joins Waleed and Scott to discuss whether and how we might break free from its Manichean absolutism.
Was the extradition bill the 'last straw' around which a torrent of popular discontent in Hong Kong has gathered? Political scientist Ngok Ma discusses whether these protests are aimed at a complete redrawing of the city's relationship to greater China.
In a century that produced a dizzying array of philosophers and philosophical approaches, few philosophers were as distinctive, and stood out quite so conspicuously, as Iris Murdoch (1919-1999).
The invitation of the Uluru Statement from the Heart is to set off on a journey of mutual attentiveness, of truth-telling and peace-making, without a clear sense of the shared destination. Marcia Langton joins us to discuss whether Australia’s political settlement accommodate such a strenuous moral task.
Is the controversy surrounding Israel Folau just one more example of the tension between incommensurable rights claims: freedom of expression; freedom of religion; freedom from discrimination on the basis of religion or sexuality? Or has Folau simply exposed the limits of political project of liberal tolerance? Constitutional legal theorist and philosopher Patrick Emerton joins Waleed and Scott to unpick this ethical knot.
Given democracy’s tendency to prioritise the short-term and appeal to voter self-interest, and given its inherent anthropocentrism, does our ecological crisis warrant bypassing democratic procedures. Political philosopher David Schlosberg argues we need more, not less, democracy.
Our lives are saturated with 'news'; but far from creating informed citizens, this is producing forgetful, inattentive citizens. Megan Le Masurier joins us to discuss whether "slow journalism" could help us remember what matters?
The media plays a vital role in a representative democracy by acting as a check on political power and powerful interests. But is it enough for the free press to provide scrutiny and surveillance? Peter Greste joins us to discuss the ethics of press freedom.
What if social media and democratic politics serve radically different goals? Tech investor Raina Kumra joins us to discuss whether social media is undermining the conditions of healthy democratic society.
As we wrap up this year’s Ramadan series, we turn to the importance of having a place to be and a people to be among. How does 'love of country' square with our collective failure to address the way we are ravaging our 'common home'?
Is there a danger in seeing hardship as something that simply needs to be overcome, and which can be overcome given the right technologies or policies, rather than something that is intrinsic to life?
What is 'good' conversation? What are its preconditions? What is its goal? And why is it so important to the moral life?
During Ramadan, we’re giving concerted attention to what makes for a healthy moral life. In a time characterised by clamour and empty chatter, it’s never been more important — or more difficult — to reclaim the importance of silence.
Has the weight of expectation on the findings of the Mueller Report foreclosed serious reflection on whether Trump should be impeached?
Can social media platforms be anything other than purveyors of violence in countries with deep and long-standing histories of ethnic-religious tensions?
Is our culinary enjoyment enough to justify a complicity in cruelty which our fellow citizens find reprehensible?
Do modern nation-states have persistent obligations to their citizens, even when those citizens engage in behaviour that seems to deny their membership to that political community?
What does a society lose when it neglects the moral discipline of reading literary fiction?
Why is it that most other forms of racist contempt can find a place in the diseased branches of antisemitism?
Why has it taken the sound of bullets fired and the sight of blood spilled to get some to see Muslims as fully human, as capable of placing demands on our attention or claims for our respect?
Does ethics have anything to say to the prospect that some of the sexual fantasies enacted on sex robots will, undoubtedly, include 'rape'?
Should we place a premium on the political virtue of compromise instead of the zero-sum game of the two-party contest?
Does the invocation of a political 'emergency' have corrosive effects on the moral health of a political community?
What is the nature and what are the limits of political decision-making? Just how important — how final — is ministerial responsibility?
What is the nature, and what are the limits, of our responsibility for others? When can we say we've discharged our obligation?
How best to respond to the prevalence, use and associated dangers of illicit drugs presents particular challenges to political decision-making and ethical judgment alike.
Have prisons outlived their political and moral usefulness? Can we find a moral equivalent to incarceration?
In a democracy, the denial of shared facts also denies the possibility of a shared world in which we can deliberate together.
It is one quality that undergirds all others; it constitutes their ground, their condition of possibility. But is humility the virtue of all virtues?
In the ancient world, steadfastness is bound up with personal integrity and interpersonal loyalty. Today, can it provide the basis for dynamic political friendship?
Should forbearance still be considered a virtue? Or is forbearance ultimately an undesirable response to a hideously unjust world?
Can we still learn from, use, enjoy or legitimately benefit from the work of people who have committed egregious moral wrongs or who themselves hold morally repugnant beliefs?
Is there reason to remain hopeful in democracy as a form of peaceful, pluralistic, ethically defensible way of life?
Why have hypothetical scenarios come to dominate moral reflection over the last century? Is it time for moral philosophy to abandon its preoccupation with hypothetical cases?
Does the resurgence of notions of “identity” represent a problem to be solved, or does it present an invitation to rediscover a deeper understanding of solidarity?
Do fans have particular moral responsibilities when it comes to their consumption of, and participation in, professional sport?
When the conditions of political friendship seem no longer to exist, what democratic resources remain that might begin healing this civic wound?
Can the ends, the goal, the telos of humanities research be articulated in a way that both demonstrates public benefit and welcomes scrutiny?
Does the fact that international alarm has flared up so quickly mean that the lividity of concern will fade just as quickly? What would a stance toward the Middle East that is at once informed, realistic and ethically defensible look like?
Does anti-discrimination legislation present a limit, a countervailing claim, to the right to religious freedom? Can they both be reconciled within a common moral framework?
What happens when two fundamental rights claims — religious freedom and freedom from discrimination — clash with one another?
The moral questions that emerge from the competing testimonies of Kavanaugh and Blasey Ford are both profound and far-reaching.
What is the nature of moral responsibility when confronted with a problem as complex as climate change?
If there are indeed White House officials actively impeding the wishes of a democratically-elected president, on what grounds can they do so? Is there any other way of classifying such behaviour than as a 'coup d'etat'?
What are the democratic practices and forms of organisation that need to be recovered in order to provide meaningful resistance to neoliberalism’s decades-long assault on our common life?
Is the way that Australia practices parliamentary democracy broken? Or is there something more perfidious about the fracturing of the political parties themselves that leaves little motivation for anything other than naked ambition?
What are the limits of 'public deliberation'? When is one permitted to pronounce a fellow citizen/member of a political community, 'beyond the pale' or beyond the reach of political communion?
In a democracy, the denial of shared facts also denies the possibility of a shared world in which we can deliberate together.
Was the publication of the allegations against the federal Labor MP Emma Husar in 'the public interest'? Or has its haste to scoop its rivals caused BuzzFeed to abandon the temperance and care with which personal lives should be handled — even those of politicians?
Can we still learn from, use, enjoy or legitimately benefit from the work of people who have committed egregious moral wrongs or who themselves hold morally repugnant beliefs?
The choice between nationalism and multiculturalism is becoming increasingly stark in our time. But what if that choice is a false one?
Increasingly, prosperous states like Australia are seeking to limit their migrant intake. When do states have a right to exclude migrants in need? Is there a case for 'open borders'?
Why has constitutional recognition for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples proven to be an impossible 'problem' to solve? And why does it elicit fear among so many Australians?
Is taxation overvalued as a way of addressing inequality? Or does taxation have a crucial role in maintaining residual forms of social solidarity and mutual concern in a predominantly neoliberal age?
Public and political discourse have grown increasingly intemperate over the past decade. Can satire, in times like these, be an ethical form of speech? Or is it just a progressive variation of 'hate speech'?
It is one quality that undergirds all others; it constitutes their ground, their condition of possibility. But is humility the virtue of all virtues?
In the ancient world, steadfastness is bound up with personal integrity and interpersonal loyalty. Today, can it provide the basis for dynamic political friendship?
Is frankness the preference of truth over 'opinion' or does it go beyond that? Is it the willingness to place oneself in a position of vulnerability?
Should forbearance still be considered a virtue? Or is forbearance ultimately an undesirable response to a hideously unjust world?
Is torture morally unconscionable because it is an unreliable means of extracting information? Or is it morally wrong regardless of the quality of information it elicits?
Have we lost something essential to the moral life – something beyond monetary value – in our pursuit of convenience?
What does the Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry say about the nature of money?
Can critical reflection on a nation’s history be cultivated without a sense of national identity and coherence thereby being undermined?
The ‘gig economy’ promises unparalleled autonomy and flexibility for its workers. But the workers themselves become both capital and labour. Are there conditions under which the ‘gig economy’ might be considered moral? What are the ethical implications for consumers?
It has long been part of our received political wisdom that Australia is a nation of centrists, but these are not centrist times. What are the political implications in this age of extremes?
Can Martin Luther King Jr.’s true moral challenge only be heard once he is freed from the theatricalised struggle for civil rights in the South?
Modern democratic politics runs up against its limit in the form of the problem of intergenerational justice: How to secure electoral support for just policies, whose benefit will accrue to future voters, but whose cost is borne by voters now?
The steady stream of revelations since the 2016 Presidential election reveal that Facebook is simply not interested in democratic participation, but the degree to which it can convert citizens into that most valuable to modern commodities: data.
When serious political issues are subordinated to the commercial logic that governs the production of movies, television, etc., isn't there an irresistible temptation just to give consumers what they want, and thereby to reduce politics to 'good guys' and 'bad guys'?
Can #MeToo bring about a cultural reformation? Can it maintain its passion while also maintaining a commitment to due process?
If there is anything more sickening than the gratuitous displays of gun violence that tear at America’s civic fabric, it is the ritualised excuses and political alibis that follow in their wake. But in the wake of the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School things seem somewhat different.
What is perhaps most alarming in the Barnaby Joyce affair is the lack of basic agreement on some fundamental questions: Should the ‘private lives’ of public figures be the objects of scrutiny? Should workplaces be places where one might reasonably pursue sexual conduct?
The historic Apology to the Stolen Generations was a potentially transformative step towards the righting of egregious wrongs. But were there dynamics at play that conspired to undermine its moral force?
In our current media-saturated age, content has become incidental to the real story, which is the entertainment-value of the political spectacle itself. Have politics and mass culture become too inextricably entwined to imagine one without the other?
What is the purpose of education? What goods are schools supposed to serve? On what grounds could a parent, justifiably, opt out of the public schooling system?
As the intensity of the Australia Day protests has grown, so too has the push-back from those who want to keep 26 January as a day of particular patriotic sentiment. But can such counter-arguments be morally justified?
In a time of gross unaffordability, is the presumption of home ownership a thing of the past?
In a time of speed, the integrity and intelligibility of our moral lives may well hinge on our capacity to remember that slower is most often best.
Unless we cultivate the capacity to trust, are we condemning ourselves to morally emaciated existences defined by fear, envy and mutual disdain?
Inequality is the defining social and economic reality of our time. But who should bear responsibility when poverty itself becomes moralised?
What are holidays for? What ethical considerations ought to constrain trips to remote and overseas communities? Is tourism just the latest manifestation of the colonial impulse?
Given the seismic events that shook Western politics in 2016 – most notably, Brexit and the election of Donald Trump – what is most remarkable about 2017 has been its tedium. Politics has become decidedly petty, unambitious and self-referential.
What has come to be known as the ‘Weinstein effect’ may well prove the defining moment of 2017. But the fact that it took allegations of this severity to achieve such a cultural groundswell says something about our broader culture of complicity.
It is becoming increasingly difficult for public hospitals to balance the health and wellbeing of the patient with the stark reality of limited public funds.
Has the same-sex marriage debate made the disagreement between both sides more intractable than it was before?
The Federal Government’s response to asylum seekers on Manus Island and to the claims of the First Nations are underwritten by contradictory political logics, but is there a deeper malaise that drives both?
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has made the rather startling move of conferring citizenship onto a robot named Sophia. Is our faith in artificial intelligence misplaced?
Does the moral claim for recognition on the part of trans women challenge what it now means to be a ‘woman’? Does it redefine our understanding of the relationship between gender and biology?
Is ‘Whiteness’ best understood as a political-historical category, or is there a dimension to the experience of being ‘White’ that can only be registered in moral terms?
Can Hollywood films really provide occasions for genuine moral reflection and philosophical insight?
Las Vegas joins a long and growing list of American cities to have been ravaged by mass gun violence. There is, it seems, a national mythos that puts gun possession beyond the reach of critical scrutiny for many Americans.
Why should something so seemingly trivial, whose consequences are fleeting if not nugatory, command the passions the way sporting contests do?
In a time of gross unaffordability, is the presumption of home ownership a thing of the past?
The violence in Myanmar is an urgent reminder of problem of political idol-worship, a warning of the inherent dangers of democratic reform, and a spur to reflect on what is needed to effect thoroughgoing political change.
Is the only time we can discuss the truly ‘big issues’ when no one is paying attention?
Is legalism the right response to abuses of executive power, or are mercy and discretion vital for the proper functioning of justice?
Why are political idealism and unprincipled opportunism equally dangers to the wellbeing of the body politic?
There’s no minimising how complex the problem of homelessness is. But perhaps the place to begin is by addressing our own sense of disdain and distaste.
Inequality is the defining social and economic reality of our time. But who should bear responsibility when poverty itself becomes moralised?
How do we overcome the gap between our attitude and behaviour towards organ and blood donation?
The world of superheroes has long been intertwined with the political and social realities of our world.
Australian cricket has struck out into unchartered territory. Has the current pay dispute eroded the trust that is central to a mutually dependent relationship?