What makes a true friend? Aristotle in his Nicomachean Ethics outlines certain conditions for virtuous friendship, but he sets the bar high, and his estimation of women's capacity for friendship is low. This week we're putting Aristotle in dialogue with Mary Astell, an early modern (and proto-feminist) English philosopher who also wrote extensively on friendship.

Friendship

Gaslighting is the word on everyone's lips right now – in fact, Merriam-Webster named it their Word of the Year for 2022. But what is it about gaslighting that has us all talking about it? And why is it philosophically interesting?

Gaslighting

Most of us experience time as something that passes, or flows like a river - or at least we think we do. Could it be that the sense of time passing is just an illusion? This week we're getting to grips with a theory of time that denies the reality of "flow" - and we're asking why time seems to speed up or slow down in certain situations.

Why time doesn't pass

Tourette Syndrome is not well understood, even by clinicians, and it raises a host of fascinating philosophical questions around volition and free will. Is Tourette's-related behaviour intentional? And if it is, should it be understood as action that carries moral responsibility?

Exploring Tourette's

There was once a time when mythology and philosophy got along perfectly well together. But since the Enlightenment, philosophy has come to regard myth as something of an embarrassment – especially in political theory, where the memory of "blood and soil" Nazi ideology is still fresh. Is there a role for myth in secular democratic politics, and in modern philosophy?

Philosophy and myth

Transgender is commonly invoked as an identity, but this week we're asking if it is better understood as something that points to experience.

Transgender identity and experience

Around the beginning of the 20th century, philosophy began to take what's come to be known as "the linguistic turn". All major philosophical questions, it was argued, were really questions about language, and this conviction would dominate philosophical discourse for the next century. But are philosophers now starting to turn away from the linguistic turn? And what might be coming next?

How philosophy fell in love with language

Life is hard - disappointment, regret and suffering come with the territory - and if the projections of climate scientists and epidemiologists are correct, it's not going to get easier any time soon. But then, life has always been hard. What do philosophical traditions have to say about the incurable toughness of human existence?

Philosophy for tough times

Is justice a game? Most of us would say no. But for John Rawls – arguably the 20th century’s most important political philosopher – the answer was a qualified yes. This week we’re wondering if the gamification of justice can create more losers than winners.

Taking politics seriously

If you're a gamer, you might be interested to hear that according to a new study, female characters speak approximately half as much as male characters in video games. But why should philosophers be interested?

Gender, gaming and pop culture

The simplest questions often have the most complex answers. The Philosopher's Zone is your guide through the strange thickets of logic, metaphysics and ethics.

This is one of the original and best history shows out there. The host Melvyn Bragg and various experts discuss a character, topic or idea from history. It’s a simple format but it’s always in-depth and fascinating. Listen and feel your mind expand.

One of the Best

Is there anyway to put all, or more, of the back episodes on iTunes?

Back episodes

Philosopher's Zone

When we die, our digital selves sometimes live on. The line between death and life — already blurred by medical technology — is even blurrier in the digital domain. How should we prepare for our electronic afterlives?

The digital dead

Tired of having a casual, abstract flirtation with philosophy? It might be time to commit. A personal philosophy of life can be hugely helpful — but which one to choose?

Choosing a personal philosophy: Existentialism

Heidegger was an unrepentant Nazi. Nietzsche's later work contains passages that openly advocate slavery and genocide. Today, with far-right extremism on the rise around the world, how concerned should we be when reading – and teaching – the work of these canonical figures?

Dangerous minds

Many of us have extra time on our hands at the moment, and for many of us that time can feel like a burden. But what is this mysterious relationship between what time feels like and what it really is?

Time in a time of excess time

Boredom hasn't received a lot of philosophical attention — which isn't surprising, given that it suggests a radical absence of anything to talk about. But even the most tedious things can prove on inspection to be complex, multi-layered and... well, interesting.

The big snore

Consensus among citizens in the development of cities is always the goal — but it's rarely achieved. This week we explore the philosophical foundations of a more realistic model for citizen participation in urban planning.

Citizens and urban planning

Artificial intelligence is helping us to make all sorts of decisions these days, and this can be hugely useful. But if we outsource our moral intuition to AI, do we risk becoming morally de-skilled?

AI and moral intuition: use it or lose it?

As LGBT people grow old, they can become particularly vulnerable to social isolation and loneliness. Simone de Beauvoir had a keen appreciation of the challenges of ageing – “old age exposes the failure of our entire civilisation” – so can we find resources in her brand of existentialism that address some of the issues raised by LGBT elders?

LGBT elders, isolation and loneliness

Is philosophy experiencing an unprecedented crisis? And are universities becoming a hostile environment for philosophers?

The why of philosophy

Institutions shape every aspect of our lives, yet they can be strangely amorphous things, operating according to norms and conventions that often undermine each other. For women, this can result in institutional discrimination – in workplaces and public organisations, but also in less tangible institutions like the family and the law. This week we’re talking feminist institutionalism, and the need for a women’s honour code.

Honour in the institution

These days it seems that critical thinking could be failing us – and we’re not sure why. Have too many people strayed from the path of reason? Or is reason insufficient – ever overrated – as an ingredient in the formation of good citizens?

Is reason enough?

We casually talk about "Australia" as though it were a single entity. But what exactly is such a collective? And how can it be held responsible for its deeds - or misdeeds? This week we're talking group duties - and for International Women's Day, a conversation about gender and progress in philosophy.

The many and the one

Refugees are often spoken and written about as victims: people on the far side of a border that separates them from all the things we citizens know and love about our homeland. But what if the refugee actually knows things about Australia that we don't?

Border patrol

We're told that COVID-19 is an unprecedented event, one that's upended all our old certainties — so it's perhaps strange that we're thinking about it in very familiar ways. Considering the history, the politics and the ethics of COVID-19 can reveal fascinating and uncomfortable insights about ourselves and our society.

Thinking a pandemic

Can our genes tell us if we're gay? Or intelligent? Science says the answer is complex, and that genetic determinism — the idea that we're genetically hardwired for certain outcomes — shouldn't be taken seriously. But genetic determinism has taken hold of the public imagination.

What can genes tell us?

George Yancy

Speaking out against racism by insisting on the collusion of white people — even well-meaning ones — in a system that's racist to the core can bring serious consequences. George Yancy knows this well.

Race in America pt 1: George Yancy

The road has always been a great social leveller — we all get stuck in the same traffic jams. But with the advent of driverless cars, that could all be about to change, with troubling ethical consequences.

Driverless cars, inequality and the 'trolley problem' in a high-tech world

Science welcomes dissent. Scientific progress depends on challenging and dismantling theories as well as verifying them. But how should we deal with misinformation about science, and the ways it can erode such liberal democratic values as personal autonomy?

Science, misinformation and dissent

Refugees have been with us for millennia, but the modern refugee exists under a distinctively modern set of circumstances. Moral philosophers addressing the refugee issue often fail to take these circumstances into account, and to acknowledge the ways in which the West can be responsible for refugee crises.

Refugees and moral obligation

Ubuntu is an African tradition of thought whose ethical orientation is captured in the well-known aphorism “I am, because we are”. But what gets lost when Ubuntu is framed as a philosophical discourse in the Western intellectual tradition? And where do we see its successes and failures in the reconstruction of post-colonial Africa?

Philosophy in a nutshell pt 5: Ubuntu

The best podcast episodes on global issues affecting everyone. Covering topics such as the #metoo movement, climate change, the impact of technology and some of the biggest global issues facing us right now. For anyone interested in learning more about the world, and some of the issues we're facing, pick an episode below and start listening! Add episodes you're interested into your queue below!

Best Episodes on Global Issues

The best podcasts about ourselves as well as the world through the lense of Science. Specific topics include things about our brain, emotions to biology, physics and more!