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Philosophy and Technology: Science’s moral afflictions

On March 28th in a dingy Manhattan courtroom, unrepentant crypto-mogul Sam Bankman-Fried was sentenced to 25 years in prison. This landmark sentence came after an appeal by his lawyers...

2024: The year of elections

In his classic 19th-century work Democracy in America, the politician-cum-philosopher Alexis de Tocqueville looked...

“Diesmal schweigen wir nicht!” (“We won’t be silent this time”)

Germany’s right-wing factions push forward In another spectacular repeat of European history, a group of...
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Tristram Hunt: the Politics of Repatriation

If you came here for a vicious takedown or a strident defence of Tristram...

Hindi and Urdu: A language divided, or a shared history destroyed?

CW: Violence I was in Tesco last week, looking at the tomatoes. A man to my right commented on the ripeness of the peppers. I...

In the belly of Jordan Peterson: Ambivalence in question with the ersatz journalist

"There is no Culture War without its student soldiers. In some ways, the Jordan-Peterson-spectacle is funny; and we can laugh. But we cannot dismiss these people. Perhaps instead we might look a hunched Professor in the face and ask ourselves: what’s it all about?"

The British higher education system: rigid or rigorous?

‘I first realised I wanted to study History and only History when I was 7 and visited the Tower of London on a school...

Choked Up: Race and the climate justice movement

‘As a child it was always the small things I would notice, an ice cream van humming in the playground, parked cars outside the...

The Costa Rican performing arts academy proving why a creative education matters

"Since the Academy was founded, it has flourished, taking in students from the age of just 6 and delivering a range of classes in disciplines like acting, singing, dance and public speaking...When the pandemic began, Laura tells me how all their classes moved online, providing great solace to all the students of the Academy and allowing their creative education to continue."

On Misunderstanding Taylor Swift

"When she does reach pop music, she exerts an extreme amount of control and mastery over commonly used sonic structures. ‘Blank Space’ parodies both the narratives surrounding her and general pop structures. This is done by the marking out of the chorus and the excessive use of four chords that are commonly used throughout music. The basic structure of a song is tripartite: setup, build-up, and climax, often corresponding to the sections verse-chorus, verse-chorus, bridge-chorus.‘Shake It Off’, as basic as it may seem, is one of the most complex songs on the album ‘1989’. This is because each sub-setup, build-up, and climax have their own setup, build-up, and climax. We praise Homer for his ability to expand on his basic structural frameworks: to appreciate the artistry of the compositions, we should look at Taylor’s songs in the same way."

Staying in to ensure a safe night out

"Ultimately, clubs don’t seem to envision a world in which spiking does not happen, and despite their good intentions, this automatically places the onus on the individual to go out of their way to avoid being spiked, and go through the stress of reporting it when it does happen."

Cis-piscion and the difficulties of ‘identifying’ ancient transgender figures

"The Classical world remains one that was intensely interested in gender."

‘Fear of Kidnapping and Beating’: The ‘Triple Crisis’ of Female Refugee Care

"Silence is a hard stain to get out. Even when they reached their host countries, refugee women and asylum-seekers could not voice their trauma."

The Damaging Effects of Mild, Persistent Sexism and Why it’s so Hard to Talk About

"When the sexist behaviours are mild but occur over a long period of time, the effect can also be damaging and yet an intense angry reaction is easily dismissed."

#StopAsianHate was long overdue

"Whether it be when going for a walk in the park or when doing the weekly supermarket shop, I felt a slight pang of fear whenever someone looked at me or approached me, scared of whatever prejudice my mere presence had ignited within them."

Is Oxford responsible for an anti-vaxxer?

"Twitter has shown themselves to be better arbiters of truth than Oxford University."

The price of Citizenship: The inherent britishness of bureaucracy

I cannot speak for immigrants everywhere, but an enduring sense of anxiety looming in the back of my mind has been fears of a recalcitrant government revoking residency rights. What would follow would entail deportation to a country I feel rather distant from and would struggle to adjust to.

The Prosecutor’s Fallacy: How flawed statistical evidence has been used to jail innocent people

CW: Discussion of murder and infanticide, mentions of rape and alcoholism.  On the 24th October 2003, Kathleen Folbigg was sentenced to 40 years in prison...

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