Category: political philosophy

No, Everything Really Is Worse: Technology and the Degredation of Public Life and Everyday Experience

To be sure, there is a real and misguided tendency to romanticize the past. But for a long time I’ve been agitated by a nagging feeling that this time is different. Many aspects of social life and everyday experience really are worse. Beyond shaking my fist at the sky, I didn’t have a good way of articulating what was underlying this feeling. This is my attempt to do so.

The story begins with two common observations that, taken together, give rise to a paradox: First, we seem to be inundated with customer feedback surveys. No matter how trivial the interaction with a business or institution, we inevitably receive a request to fill out a customer feedback survey. The second observation is that, in many industries, customer service seems worse than ever.

How does this make sense? If we’re constantly filling out customer feedback surveys, we should be living in the golden age of customer service. What explains this paradox?

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The Rational, The Reasonable, and Covid-19 Vaccine Policy

The words ‘rational’ and ‘reasonable’ are often used interchangeably in everyday language. But for philosophers they have specific meanings. These distinct meanings are important because they help to articulate the desirable features of a policy response to Covid-19 and vaccines. As with anything in philosophy (or any subject, for that matter) there isn’t unanimous agreement […]

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Problems with Pandemic Policy

The very first thing you’re taught about writing in philosophy is to narrow your focus. Before every assignment, every professor will plead, “pick just one idea and develop it!” I tell my students the exact same thing. But today, I am going to do exactly the opposite. Don’t do as I do, do as I […]

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IF YOU LIKE SOCIALISM SO MUCH, WHY DON’T YOU MOVE TO VENEZUELA?

We’re entering election season in the US of A, so it’s time to pollute the internet’s comments sections with fear mongering, bad arguments, strawmen, and knee-jerk reactions. Of course, these rhetorical techniques and fallacious argument forms pervade all domains of discourse. But when it comes to political discourse in ‘Murica, expect to find these cranked […]

Read More IF YOU LIKE SOCIALISM SO MUCH, WHY DON’T YOU MOVE TO VENEZUELA?