42. LIFE DURING LOCKE-DOWN - Do We Remain Free While Trapped Inside?
Read More“I feel strangely trapped in my own home, and yet my life this last month looks little different to the life I lived before lockdown.”
41. TO CLAP OR TO CRY FOR CARERS? - On The Importance of Being Able To Hold Two Ideas In Our Heads At Once
Read More“By clapping, was I supporting the myth, the propaganda, and the lies which have put so many unnecessarily in harm’s way during this crisis? From the unprotected nurse to their dying patient, infected because they couldn’t stay home for fear of losing their job - each a victim not of Covid-19, but of our political system?”
40. CAN WE USE THE CORONAVIRUS TO SAVE THE PLANET? - A Student Ponders The Positives of This Pandemic
Read More“Currently we know little about the virus, but we have not denied the science. We accept that it is a major issue that needs to be tackled. In comparison we know a lot about the effect of climate change. However, we do not treat climate change with the same sense of urgency than the virus. “
- EASTER BREAK 2020 -
Normally I use the holidays to remind you all that this blog is only operational during term-time, and that we will be back MONDAY APRIL 20TH with more exciting Philosophy Unleashed. However, in these unprecedented times of school closures and Covid-19…
…I’m still going to say that. Because maintaining our own mental health and wellbeing at this time is as important as ever - and I need a holiday after two weeks of intense learning on the job how to be an online teacher!
That said - thank you to those of you who submitted articles in the first fortnight of home learning - I look forward to publishing some in the weeks to come after Easter, beginning April 20th. In the meantime, if you’re looking for something to do while practicing social distancing or locked in quarantine, please write us an article! Send it in via the WRITE FOR PHILOSOPHY UNLEASHED section. See you April 20th!
39. ANARCHISM AND COVID-19 - Does the need for government intervention undermine the anarchist argument?
Read More“Supporting the lockdown does not, therefore, undermine the anarchist argument, but, to the contrary, makes it even clearer how dangerous, infantilising, and corrupting such state-systems can be. “
38. QUESTIONS FOR THE END OF THE WORLD - Some Concerns and Queries As COVID-19 Continues To Spread
Read More“the world has changed. And here are the questions arising to me as it does…”
37. ELEMENTARY LOGIC - Why UK Schools Must Close Now
Read More“In the name of public health, but also sense and logic, we must close all UK schools now.”
36. COVID-19 AND PHILOSOPHY: Thinking Clearly In Times of Uncertainty
Read More“Doing the right thing only becomes hard when we have constructed a world which puts embedded obstacles in the way of doing so.”
35. OUGHT WE FEAR A 'CANCEL CULTURE'? - Disentangling Fear From Fact
Read More“The conservative narrative is the dominant cultural assumption of our daily news reporting and the framework within which even liberal media organisations must operate for their stories to make sense to audiences inducted into the norms of that predominant discourse. That this discourse - manufactured and disseminated by a whole industry of conservative think tanks, publishers, and strategists who have worked explicitly and intentionally to make it the dominant discourse since at least the 1970s - is also the view of the ruling political parties within the two specific countries - the UK and America - where worry has arisen about the silencing of conservatives, should be reason alone to be suspicious of the claim that such views are being censored.”
34. DID I SLEEP OR NOT? - An Insomniac's Epistemological Struggle
Read More“When we are, and when we are not, conscious seems to be a fairly fundamental piece of self-knowledge every human being should have access to. The more I worry about my insomnia, however, the more I realise how little about our own unconsciousness we actually know.”
33. NO TO CHILDREN, YES TO THE PLANET - Should We Subscribe To Ecological Anti-Natalist Views?
Read More“Ecological anti-natalism is the position that procreation leads to more destruction of our planet and therefore more suffering so it is morally bad, therefore we should abstain from it. I shall argue why we should take this view into account.”
- FEBRUARY HALF TERM -
It’s half-term at the school where I work and so we’re taking the next week off to enjoy some time away from the (philosopher’s) grindstone (the lesser known first draft of JK Rowling’s first Harry Potter book). This blog is only operational during term-time, but we will be back next week with more exciting Philosophy Unleashed. If you’re on a break yourself - please write us an article! Send it in via the WRITE FOR PHILOSOPHY UNLEASHED section. See you February 23rd!
32. THE UNIVERSE AND NIHILISM - What We Can Learn from Space
Read More“You may be wondering why I just induced so many existential crises in you to cause three heart failures, a panic attack and an aneurysm, and you’ll be thankful to know that it wasn’t for my own amusement. It’s because this article isn’t really about space, it’s about the question. The question that we all ask but are too afraid to truly think about because we already know the answer. The question that, while it may lay dormant, bubbles to the surface whenever we gaze up at the stars peppered in the abyss:
Why? Why bother?”
31. GET WELL SOON - What Our Ethic of Personal Illness May Tell Us About Our Wider Hopes to be Ethical People
Read More“Possibly our lack of ethical concern about the spreading of diseases, speaks to our larger ethical deficit when it comes to sacrificing our own immediate pleasures for the greater good of others: the clothing that we want despite the potential bad treatment of workers who made them; the holiday that we want despite the environmental impact of our journey; the social media we enjoy despite the potential epistemic breakdown it is causing for many of our civilisation-sustaining institutions… “
30. REBEL VEGETARIAN - Why It May Be Morally Right For Ethical Vegetarians and Vegans to Eat Burger King and KFC's Plant-Based Products Despite Their Non-Veggie Cooking Methods
Read More“the recent story of Burger King’s “Rebel Whopper” has brought to the forefront of my mind the strange diversity of motivation which make people choose to cut out meat and/or dairy from their diets, and the resulting consequences, and potential for error, within ethical thinking.”
29. THE VALUE AND LIMITS OF DEMANDING SILENCE - On Remembering Power’s Roots and Reasons in the Classroom
Read More“often neither students or teachers remember the justificatory roots for the powers, privileges and obligations which interplay within the classroom, and that this lack of awareness may well be the source of much student/teacher conflict at school.”
28. WHO ARE THESE CHARACTERS? - Questioning Using Teachers to Teach Our Children “Character”.
Read More“are those of us in society who chose to be teachers within the current education system actually demonstrating good enough character to be suitable character “role models” for the next generation?”
27. A PHILOSOPHY OF NEW YEARS - Why We Should Embrace The January Illusion
Read More“sometimes we might fail in our resolutions by January 2nd, or at least by February 1st, but it is not the resolution which is important but the time to reflect and think about our lives.”
- Christmas Break 2019 -
Just a reminder to anyone looking for a new post this week - the blog is only operational during term time so we’re taking the next two weeks off to enjoy the Christmas break and bring peace on earth and goodwill to all during this particularly bleak, post-election season. If you’re on a break yourself - please write us an article! Send it in via the WRITE FOR PHILOSOPHY UNLEASHED section. See you January 6th!
26. OUGHT WE BE PAYING MORE FOR MUSIC? - How A Charity Single Opened My Eyes to Exploitation
Read More“while I currently can listen to all the music in the world that I want to, wherever I am, on any device, through streaming services such as Spotify, the moral philosopher in me begins to ask should I? By not properly compensating the artists I listen to with renumeration for the work they’ve done and the joy it brings me, am I not absolutely complicit in their exploitation? “