Why are soldiers allowed to kill in war? For philosophers who believe in what Seth Lazar calls the “new orthodoxy,” the answer is that soldiers can kill for the same reason anyone can kill: self-defense. War is just individual self-defense writ large. But self-defense, Lazar says, is a deeply problematic basis for something as important as the rules of war.
Episode 16. Samantha Brennan on Microinequalities
[UPDATED] In the West, women and men share equal status under the law. But in countless practical ways, women experience inequality on a daily basis. Why is it that a woman can lead a country, yet women are slower to be served in coffee shops? Today on Public Ethics Radio, we dive into the structure of women’s inequality with Prof. Samantha Brennan.
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Public Ethics Radio is back!
We’re back! I’m very happy to announce that we have a whole new season of Public Ethics Radio ahead of us. We’ll be publishing new episodes at the beginning of the month—starting today! Stay tuned for a fascinating conversation with Samantha Brennan of the University of Western Ontario on gender inequality.
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Special Episode: Queens College Part II
This is the second half of our special episode featuring contributions by the students of Queens College. The students spent the semester in an upper-level philosophy class developing and recording short podcasts. In this two-part episode, we present those student-produced podcasts. The students each sought to answer the question: what do the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan tell us about our traditions of just war theory?
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Special Episode: Queens College Part I
Welcome to a very special episode of Public Ethics Radio. This podcast is the result of a semester-long experiment conducted by a class of students at Queens College of the City University of New York. The students took an upper-level philosophy seminar co-taught by Matt Peterson and Queens College’s Sari Kisilevsky. Students spent the semester developing and recording short podcasts. In this two-part episode, we present those student-produced podcasts.
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Episode 15. Joy Gordon on Iraq Sanctions
The United States has faced an uphill battle this summer in its attempts to impose international sanctions on Iran and North Korea. In this episode of Public Ethics Radio, we consider why it might not be such a bad thing that sanctions are difficult to impose. Our guest is Joy Gordon, whose new book on the Iraq sanctions regime describes a superpower run amok. The international sanctions on Iraq were the strictest ever imposed. The tremendous damage that ensued set the stage for the devastated country we see today.
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Episode 14. Matthew Rimmer on Intellectual Property and Clean Technologies
Climate change exposes the trade-off inherent in intellectual property protection. Research and development is expensive; companies won’t invest in it if they don’t expect to profit. Traditionally, profits from new technologies are provided by the exclusive rights granted by the patent system. But by granting patent rights, we ensure that new innovations will have a limited reach. So how do we both create new technologies and spread them as widely as possible? We need climate-friendly technology to be used everywhere, including in developing countries with limited resources. In this episode of Public Ethics Radio, we explore the debate about intellectual-property policy for clean technologies.
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