Philosophy

On Human Shields

If Hamas uses civilian shields, is the IDF responsible for their deaths?

  • Seth Lazar

Taking Just War Seriously in Gaza

Many more Palestinians have been killed in Gaza than Israelis. Is this, on its own, justified?

  • F. M. Kamm

The Neoliberal Bailout

Sure, the system worked—we avoided another Great Depression. But it worked much better for some than for others. 

  • Jonathan Kirshner

Mourning, Victorian Style

The way New Yorkers responded to the 9/11 tragedy harkened back to the earlier Victorian-era styles.

  • Claude S. Fischer

Is Get-Out-the-Vote Bad for Democracy?

How efforts to increase voter turnout exacerbate inequality.

  • Anthony Fowler

Norman Finkelstein: Teaching John Stuart Mill in Iran

A video of our conversation.

  • Danny Postel

Sign up for our newsletter

Saving Privacy

Framing surveillance as a tradeoff between privacy and security is a dead end for democracy.

  • Reed Hundt
with responses from
  • Richard M. Stallman
  • Marvin Ammori & Adam Kern
  • Archon Fung
  • Rebecca MacKinnon
  • Jennifer Granick
  • Frank Pasquale
  • Jeremy K. Kessler
  • Bruce Schneier
  • Evgeny Morozov

The Weak Self: Christopher Lasch on Narcissism

In Response to Vivian Gornick

  • George Scialabba

In Defense of Narcissism

When narcissism was pathologized, reformers were labeled as narcissists and discontent swept under the rug.

  • Vivian Gornick

When Money Shrinks Democracy

We are moving into an era where the direct influence of money on politics breaches new ground.

  • Claude S. Fischer

Women and Children First

Dora Russell and the evolution of feminisim.

  • Judith Levine

Daniel Dennett and Steven Pinker: Can We Become a More Peaceful Species?

A recording of their debate at the Unlearning Violence conference.

  • John Berger

The Possibility of Self-Sacrifice

When is public death meaningful? A case study of political suicide.

  • Oded Na’aman

Roads to Utopia

Inside Spain’s Model Village

  • Sarah Hill

Does Reading Literature Make You More Moral?

Literature helps shape what we consider to be moral in the first place.

  • Paula M.L. Moya

Transparency Is Not the Government’s Responsibility

The problem is that it is not anybody else’s responsibility, either.

  • Andrew Mayersohn

Dogs Are Not People

Why are we so desperate to assume animals must be like us?

  • Colin Dayan

Is Life a Ponzi Scheme?

Samuel Scheffler’s Death and the Afterlife uses doomsday thought experiments to figure out what makes life meaningful. 

  • Mark Johnston

What Are Radicals Good For?

An interview with George Scialabba on utopia, the hive mind, reviewers, and intellectuals.

  • Lindsey Gilbert
  • George Scialabba

Crying Wolf: Democracies in Crisis

An interview with David Runciman

  • David Runciman

The Sound of Terror

The phenomenology of a drone strike.

  • Nasser Hussain

Your Body, Their Property

Who owns human tissues?

  • Osagie K. Obasogie

Subject of Study

If there is a moral limit to artistic license, director Alice Winocour has gone beyond it in Augustine.

  • Alan A. Stone

Learning Sympathy

The success of humanitarian appeals  is not a given of human nature. They work because we have come to sympathize with the suffering of others, distant and alien.

  • Claude S. Fischer
trending_flat
Get our newsletter

Vital reading on politics, ideas, and culture to your inbox

A political and literary forum, independent and nonprofit since 1975

Registered 501(c)(3) organization

Help Us Stay Paywall-Free

Donate

Become a Member

Subscribe