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What would it take to build a more just society? In contemporary debates about justice, identity is frequently front and centre, but the 20th-century American philosopher John Rawls thought that looking past identity was the key to more equality. In his book A Theory of Justice (1971), Rawls argued that if we could build a society from behind a ‘veil of ignorance’ that kept us from knowing anything about our identity, we would make choices resulting in a fairer society than we now have – one in which all would benefit from greater freedom and ‘fair equality of opportunity’.
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Art
A prisoner in Guantánamo finds some escape in building intricate model ships
6 minutes
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Meaning and the good life
A Japanese religious community makes an unlikely home in the mountains of Colorado
9 minutes
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Making
Forging a cello from pieces of wood demands its own form of virtuosity
27 minutes
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Education
Scenes from a school year paint a refreshingly nuanced portrait of rural America
25 minutes
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Bioethics
Is it ethical to have a second child so that your first might live?
10 minutes
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Art
Watch as Japan’s surplus trees are transformed into forest-tinted crayons
4 minutes
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Meaning and the good life
‘Everydayness is the enemy’ – excerpts from the existentialist novel ‘The Moviegoer’
2 minutes
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Food and drink
Local tensions simmer amid a potato salad contest at the Czech-Polish border
14 minutes
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Knowledge
An Indigenous myth and a geological survey elicit two ways of knowing one place
4 minutes