Thinking In a Pandemic | Boston Review
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Philosophy

Law & Justice, Philosophy & Religion

Bostock v. BLM

Two conflicting visions of equality have recently emerged on the American political left. Only one aims at institutional change.

Aziz Z. Huq

Class & Inequality

The Keynesian Revolution

A new biography reveals the full scope of John Maynard Keynes’s critique of unfettered capitalism, emphasizing the economist’s larger philosophical vision of the good life.

Jonathan Kirshner

Philosophy & Religion

Moral Reasoning in a Pandemic

Three things we need to get right.

F. M. Kamm

Philosophy & Religion

The Unfinished Project of Enlightenment

In a sweeping new history of Western philosophy, Jürgen Habermas narrates the progress of humanity through the unfolding of public reason. Missing from that story are the systems of violence and dispossession whose legacies are all too visible today.

Brandon Bloch

Law & Justice, Philosophy & Religion

Rights in a Pandemic

The COVID-19 crisis creates a conflict not between individual rights and the community, but rather between individual rights themselves—including, above all, the right to health.

Attila Mraz

Philosophy & Religion, Science & Nature

From Pandemic Facts to Pandemic Policies

In the debate over COVID-19 responses, it is not only the scientific facts—including the grim death toll—that are at issue, but also the less often discussed relationship between science and decision-making, where values inevitably play a role.

Jonathan Fuller

Gender & Sexuality

Our Identities, Ourselves?

Adhering to a particular sexual or gender identity may mean abandoning the things that make us most unique. So why has identity become the default for talking about who we are and what we desire?

Mark D. Jordan

Philosophy & Religion

The Tragedy of Costs and Benefits

In the fight against COVID-19, weighing costs and benefits is indispensable for moral clarity. At the same time, we must not forget its limits.

Roberto Tallarita

Science & Nature

Good Science Is Good Science

For the sake of both science and action in the COVID-19 pandemic, we need collaboration among specialists, not sects.

Marc Lipsitch

Science & Nature

Models v. Evidence

COVID-19 has revealed a contest between two competing philosophies of scientific knowledge. To manage the crisis, we must draw on both.

Jonathan Fuller

Politics, Science & Nature

Hydroxychloroquine and the Political Polarization of Science

How a drug became an object lesson in political tribalism.

Cailin O'Connor, James Owen Weatherall

Forum

The Philosophy of Anger

There are two problems with anger: it is morally corrupting, and it is completely correct. 

Agnes Callard

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THINKING IN A PANDEMIC

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