ABC Radio National

Features

• Why milestones matter

  Thursday 18 May 2017

  

  Everywhere you look these days, we're measuring our lives, and imposing a kind of order on the passage of time. To mark The Minefield's 100th episode, Scott Stephens and Lisa A Williams look at the moral meaning of milestones.

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• Trump represents triumph of class over identity

  Thursday 10 November 2016

  

  America has become a nation in which its citizens have stopped listening to one another. In Trump, has one half of the nation finally been exposed to the sheer reality of the other? Shadi Hamid joins Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens to discuss.

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• Sport, celebration, and the ethics of joy

  Thursday 6 October 2016

  

  What is the place of joy within the moral life? Can it be pursued in itself or is it only ever the by-product of some other experience? Waleed Aly, Scott Stephens and the University of Melbourne's Brock Bastian discuss.

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• Clinton v Trump: Whoever wins, will the nation lose?

  Thursday 8 September 2016

  

  Last year, it was almost unimaginable that the Republican and Democratic parties would end up nominating their most polarising, politically compromised candidates to contest this year's presidential election. But they did. Waleed Aly, Scott Stephens and Timothy Lynch consider what this means.

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• When are plebiscites legitimate?

  Thursday 1 September 2016

  

  The 45th Parliament is underway and one of its first orders of business is what to do about marriage equality. But are there matters over which 'the will of the people' has no jurisdiction? Waleed Aly, Scott Stephens and Joel Harrison debate the issues.

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• Fear and loathing on Nauru

  Thursday 11 August 2016

  

  Australia's border protection policy relies on a logic of consequentialism: we justify our treatment of asylum seekers by pointing to the protection of the Australian way of life and the prevention of deaths at sea. Scott Stephens, Waleed Aly and Robert Manne consider the moral limits of this argument.

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• Why 'recognition' isn't enough

  Thursday 11 August 2016

  

  Australia is crawling toward recognising the nation's first people in the constitution, but even if it makes it, will we have achieved anything meaningful? Waleed Aly, Scott Stephens and Megan Davis explain why the concept skips over 40,000 years of history.

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• Are the Olympics worth it?

  Friday 5 August 2016

  

  Hosting the Olympic Games has cost Brazil billions of dollars, while putting them at the centre of intense scrutiny and continuing controversy. Scott Stephens, Waleed Aly and sports journalist Gideon Haigh discuss the Olympics' merits.

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• Is there something fundamentally wrong with detention?

  Thursday 28 July 2016

  

  Why did it take graphic footage of abuse, dehumanising violence and even torture at the Don Dale Youth Detention Centre in Darwin to arouse both public outrage and political will? Scott Stephens and Waleed Aly discuss the case with Martha Nussbaum.

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• Does freedom of speech have limits?

  Thursday 21 July 2016

  

  In the west, free speech is often seen as a sacred right, but how can that be balanced with the need to protect minorities such as Muslims from hate? Scott Stephens, Waleed Aly and political theologian William Cavanaugh discuss.

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