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Never in human history have there been so many ways for privacies to be violated – or, often, just given away freely and without much thought. Using the thinly veiled metaphor of an animated alien planet teeming with terrible hovercar drivers, this animation from TED-Ed explores the value of privacy, and especially what we can lose or gain when we relinquish it. Spanning the work of philosophers ranging from Plato, who saw little value in the concept as we understand it today, to modern thinkers like the Israeli philosopher Ruth Gavison (1945-2020), who believed that certain privacies were necessary for modern democracies to function, the short asks viewers to consider both privacy’s worth and its very meaning in the modern world.
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Philosophy of mind
‘Am I not at least something?’ A surreal dive into Descartes’s Meditations
3 minutes
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History of science
Meet the Quaker pacifist who shattered British science’s highest glass ceilings
14 minutes
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Language and linguistics
Do button-pushing dogs have something new to say about language?
9 minutes
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Computing and artificial intelligence
Why large language models are mysterious – even to their creators
8 minutes
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Information and communication
‘Astonished and somewhat terrified’ – Victorians’ reactions to the phonograph
36 minutes
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Animals and humans
Are zoos and natural history museums born of a desire to understand, or to control?
57 minutes
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Virtues and vices
Why Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Adam Smith were divided on the virtues of vanity
5 minutes
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Political philosophy
The radical activist couple who fought for social change in the courtroom
21 minutes
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Human rights and justice
Can providing humanitarian aid be illegal? A troubling case from the US-Mexico border
17 minutes