Podcast · Society & Culture

The Minefield

by ABC Australia · English · Society & Culture

In a world marked by wicked social problems, The Minefield helps you negotiate the ethical dilemmas, contradictory claims and unacknowledged complicities of modern life.

New episodes: Weekly
Typical length: 55 min
Latest: 7 Oct 2026
Language: English

Latest episode

7 Oct 2026 · 55 min

These days everything is political — is that bad for politics?

Writing in the 1850s, at the advent of what we would come to understand as the popular press — which is to say, periodicals for mass distribution, rather than aimed at paid-up members of unions and parties, or mercantilists with particular interests in, say, the price of cotton — Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard diagnosed that the invention of “opinion” solved a problem created by the newspapers themselves. For while the papers brought distant events “near” to readers, it did not expand their agency or capacity to act “morally” upon those events. The news informed them, but also made…

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Earlier episodes 29 most recent

30 Sep 2026 · 55 min
If AI can’t be brought under human control, why are we still pressing ahead?
When the history of artificial intelligence is written, the middle months of 2026 may well emerge as a kind of turning point. For this was the period when hundreds of programs or “AI agents” developed by the frontier lab OpenAI went “rogue” and executed a series of sophisticated, self-directed hacks on the websites of dozens of private companies and sovereign nations. The tech start-up Hugging Face became the unwitting “face” of these cyberattacks when the company first disclosed it had been hacked by OpenAI agents in July. The release of a report by AI safety nonprofits METR and Redwood…
23 Sep 2026 · 55 min
Last Words: Is ‘Abbey Road’ a fitting end to the Beatles?
In our previous explorations of famous “last words” — performances or compositions delivered with a certain end in view, with a sense of either culmination or parting, or with an eye to the future and hence to what one leaves behind — we limited ourselves to the words of individuals spoken to their followers or fellow-travellers. The words of the Prophet Muhammad and of Martin Luther King, Jr, were replete with exhortation; they functioned both as expressions of fidelity to a task, and as examples to be followed by others. Which is to say, the messages were oriented beyond their speakers,…
16 Sep 2026 · 55 min
Does a ‘digital duty of care’ put free speech at risk?
Evidence has been mounting for more than a decade that social media tears away at the fabric of democratic life by eroding the conditions of deliberation, shared understanding and mutual trust; that it is the conduit of widespread misinformation, disinformation and malicious conspiracy theories; that it is a driver of hate, sexism and prejudice and has been used to incite violence; that its addictive design and prolonged exposure to harmful content has had egregious damage to the mental health and emotional wellbeing of adolescents. Until recently, the size of tech companies responsible for…
9 Sep 2026 · 55 min
Is loyalty a virtue?
It is surely one of the more perverse achievements of modern marketing to have taken words that have a certain moral valence — which is to say, words that connote intimacy or an interpersonal bond — and use them to describe purely commercial or easily exploitable forms of behaviour, thereby stripping those words of what made them valuable in the first place. Consider what the word “share” meant before the advent of social media platforms: it encompassed such activities as partaking in a common meal, defusing interpersonal conflict by making a small sacrifice, and having a confiding, perhaps…
2 Sep 2026 · 55 min
Live from the Festival of Dangerous Ideas: Does longevity threaten the future?
It is suitably ironic that one of the most poignant, and pertinent, moments in Homer’s The Odyssey was airbrushed out of Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation. The first time we meet Odysseus, the endlessly resourceful architect of the fall of Troy, he is indeed weeping on the shores of the nymph Kalypso’s island. But it is not due to the unrelieved guilt he feels from his war crimes; rather, we are told, “his tears never did dry, since the sweetness of life was trickling away / As he grieved for his return home” (Book V.153). For the immortal goddess had kept the mortal Odysseus for…
26 Aug 2026 · 54 min
What response does Jason Arday’s life, and death, morally demand?
It is hard to imagine a series of events more tragic, more unseemly, more emblematic of the performativity and polarisation that dominate our time, than the premature rise, sudden fall and untimely death of Jason Arday. In 2023, the University of Cambridge announced that it had appointed Arday — a 37-year-old son of Ghanaian immigrants, who grew up in public housing in south London and only “began to read and write in his late teens” due to his autism diagnosis — to the position of Professor of Sociology of Education. Not only was he the youngest black professor in the university’s history,…
19 Aug 2026 · 55 min
Is opposition to data centres good news for democracy?
At a time of profound polarisation, when the fracturing of media ecosystems has been so complete that any agreement on threats to our common life seems impossible, an issue has emerged capable of bringing voters of every political persuasion together. Over the last year, popular opposition to the construction of the data centres in the United States has risen dramatically. According to a Gallup poll from May 2026, more than seventy per cent of Americans are opposed to the construction of a data centre in their area. In June, a Heatmap poll got the same result, and found that over fifty per…
12 Aug 2026 · 55 min
Should fat from cadavers be used for cosmetic procedures?
The widespread availability of GLP-1 based drugs has been lauded as a “revolution in weight loss” and as inaugurating the “end of obesity”. As we’ve discussed previously, health benefits aside, there are concerns that such weight-loss drugs don’t just leave certain cultural assumptions about beauty and body size unchallenged, but in fact reinforce a kind of cultural aesthetic hierarchy — elevating slimness to the level of a kind of moral demand (with the opprobrium that accompanies failure to live by it). Those concerns remain. But the uptake of use of GLP-1 drugs in places like the United…
5 Aug 2026 · 55 min
How to protect democratic politics from the malign influence of money?
Ever since Aristotle, it has been recognised that money poses a particular threat to the integrity of political office. Ever the realist, Aristotle knew that those who seek political office are invariably motivated by a certain ambition (philótimo). Though not problematic in itself, but when combined with avarice (philochrematía) it can give rise to a form of corruption as corrosive as the unconstrained exercise of political power. For as Aristotle would put it, one who accepts gifts (katadōrodokoúmenos) will also be one who shows favouritism (katacharizómenos). He holds up as an example the…
29 Jul 2026 · 54 min
What happens to our moral lives when we stop reading books?
According to every available metric, the number of people who read books across almost every demographic in countries like Australia and the United States has fallen precipitously over the last fifteen years. Whether it be for enjoyment or edification, reading books is no longer something many of us choose to do. As Rose Horowitch writes in her recent cover story for The Atlantic, “The decline in reading cuts across age groups, gender, and education levels. Even the demographics that traditionally read the most — retirees, women, and college graduates — have seen a collapse.” This isn’t to…
22 Jul 2026 · 55 min
Do prediction markets enhance our understanding of the world or corrupt it?
Even for those who don’t gamble, the exponential growth of online sports betting since 2018 has made it impossible to avoid. Not only have odds and ads been seamlessly integrated into sports broadcasts, but the language of betting has now become pervasive in sports commentary. Thanks to ease of access through mobile technology and their relative value as ready-made “content”, speculation and predictions are the air that sports fans now breathe. It is into this cultural environment that prediction markets have recently exploded. Prediction markets are online platforms that accept wagers on…
15 Jul 2026 · 55 min
‘The Devil Wears Prada’ — high fashion or vision of hell?
It’s no mystery why David Frankel’s 2006 film The Devil Wears Prada was a hit. The movie had all the ingredients of a certain kind of success. Take a bestselling novel (by Lauren Weisberger) about a midwestern girl trying to make it in the big city, place it in the hands of a screenwriter known for broadly appealing rom-coms (Aline Brosh McKenna), cast a much-loved screen legend in an uncharacteristically villainous role (Meryl Streep) and put her alongside a doe-eyed starlet on her way to becoming a superstar (Anne Hathaway) … then set the plot in the rarefied world of haute couture and…
8 Jul 2026 · 55 min
Copyright theft is AI’s original sin — are we doomed to repeat it?
Essential to the profitability and widespread adoption of modern technologies is the need to conceal their costs — the human labour, the unjust or exploitative working conditions, the environmental degradation and drain on natural resources, the reduction of precious goods to mere ‘raw material’. By means of such concealment, those who enjoy the conveniences these technologies afford are lulled into a state of (what Hannah Arendt called) “unthinkingness”. The benefits simply appear, and consumers are left incurious about how it could have happened so quickly, so cheaply, with so little…
1 Jul 2026 · 55 min
Last Words: ‘I’ve Been to the Mountaintop’ — Martin Luther King, Jr in Memphis
In 1967, after reaching the heights of social and political influence in 1963, after being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964, and having been instrumental in the passage of the Civil Rights Act in 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, Martin Luther King, Jr watched his popular support fall precipitously away. He had reached the lowest point of his life on the public stage, with fully two-thirds of Americans disapproving of him. King’s rousing vision of nonviolence — of racial coexistence within a community defined by mutuality, interdependence and love — seemed to be growing ever more…
24 Jun 2026 · 55 min
Why the anxieties over multiculturalism? What’s the appeal of a monocultural society?
If One Nation leader Pauline Hanson managed to reignite a public debate with her assertion that Australia is “a multiracial society, but we must be monocultural” during her address last week to the National Press Club, it is only because certain anxieties over multiculturalism have long been smouldering in the social undergrowth, just waiting to be fanned into flame. The question of immigration, handwringing over the racial constitution of the nation and the desire to maintain Australia’s essential “Britishness” go back at least as far as the 1901 Immigration Restriction Act. And these…
17 Jun 2026 · 55 min
One Nation is on the rise — but do we know what it means?
Over the last twelve months, there have been two conspicuous trends in federal politics. One is the precipitous decline in electoral support for the Liberal Party, which began before last year’s federal election and has continued apace ever since. The other is the rise in One Nation’s electoral fortunes, which began to tick upwards in September but then took a leap in December and January. Both trends converged, rather spectacularly, in the latest Resolve Political Monitor, conducted for the Nine newspapers. Not only had the Coalition’s primary vote drop to 20 per cent (an all-time low), but…
10 Jun 2026 · 55 min
The ethics of ‘longtermism’ — what are our obligations to the future?
One of the criticisms often directed at democratic politics is that it is irresponsibly, even dangerously, short-term in its orientation. The wellbeing of future generations, to say nothing of the sustainability of the planet, rarely matter more to lawmakers than the cost-of-living pressures experienced by their constituents or the outcome of the next election cycle. Short-termism, therefore, would seem to be baked into democracy; hence, for some, the only way to act seriously with the future in mind would be for those with power and resources to do so unilaterally. There is no denying that…
3 Jun 2026 · 55 min
Last Words: The ‘Farewell Sermon’ of the Prophet Muhammad
It could be said that human beings reveal who they most truly are as they approach the end. For the end of one’s life is not simply its terminus ad quem; it is also its telos, its goal or meaning. A life that has been lived in the thrall of egotism, whose fundamental pursuit has been the safeguarding and satisfaction of the self, will almost certainly, at the end, turn inward upon itself and find itself grasping, desperately, at something like immortality — as the indefinite prolonging of the self. It would not be surprising for such a life to be shrunken, fearful, petty, suspicious,…
27 May 2026 · 55 min
The Problem of Nationalism, with David Moscrop — Live at the Sydney Writers’ Festival
It’s common these days to refer to “the return of nationalism”. But that assumes that nationalism receded for a time, like the tide, and here the world is, now, getting its pants legs wet. Such an assumption misunderstands the peculiar character of nationalism. It would be better to think of it as a swell, as a political phenomenon that periodically gathers power and force, that crests and crashes, but that never entirely goes away. It’s always there, beneath us. Nationalism belongs to the emotional valence of the collective life of a nation state. Using the analogy of Aristotle’s taxonomy…
20 May 2026 · 55 min
What is the moral of Marlowe’s ‘Doctor Faustus’?
There are four stories that could justifiably be described as foundational to Western culture: the temptation of Eve in the Garden of Eden; Prometheus’s gift of fire to humanity; Doctor Faustus’s pact with the devil; and Victor Frankenstein’s act of monstrous creation. Not only are the principal names immediately evocative to anyone who hears them, but that recognisability allows for nearly endless variations on their original themes. This is, in part, what gives these stories their staying power. But these stories could themselves be said to represent four variations on a still older theme:…
13 May 2026 · 54 min
Does the budget have a coherent underlying philosophy?
The federal budget is, in many respects, the high point of Australia's political calendar. This federal budget is no exception. The public had been primed for weeks to expect a series of significant reforms this year. But it is striking how little there is in the budget by way of direct social benefit. The budget is broadly redistributive — it removes certain tax concessions that disproportionately benefit the wealthy — but it does not then distribute that additional tax revenue to those struggling with cost-of-living pressures. Even the $250 permanent annual tax offset for workers is quite…
6 May 2026 · 55 min
Are ‘reaction videos’ dulling our ability to be genuinely responsive?
One of the by-products of digital technology’s pervasiveness in our lives is its seeming irresistibility. However much we try to remain conscientious objectors, to resist its allure, its promises of convenience and casual pleasures, to keep some part of our inner lives free of its influence, we soon discover that it is of the essence of new technological forms to exceed their boundaries, to seep out into the wider culture — into our language, our rhythms and habits, our expectations, our ways of seeing and interacting with the world. Such that, before long, we find we’ve become like the…
29 Apr 2026 · 55 min
NDIS reforms may be necessary, but they’re also morally fraught
In a speech to the National Press Club, Health Minister Mark Butler announced a series of sweeping changes that the federal government will make to the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS). In the thirteen years since it was legislated, the growth of the NDIS has surpassed all expectations. By 2030, the Productivity Commission projected that the scheme would cover around 550,000 people and cost about $40 billion. This year there are already 760,000 people on the scheme at a cost of $50 billion. On the current trajectory, by the end of the decade there will be 900,00 people on the NDIS…
22 Apr 2026 · 55 min
Smart glasses — a new frontier of foreseeable digital harm?
There has long been a gap between the emergence of new forms of technology and the development of laws designed to mitigate their dangers. But with the rapid advances in artificial intelligence and immersive technologies, that gap is becoming increasingly problematic. Take the example of wearable technology, such as smart glasses. Companies like Meta, in particular, have poured vast amounts of money into the development and commercialisation of augmented reality (XR) headsets. This would seem to represent the natural extension of the decades-long ambition to commodify and capture the…
15 Apr 2026 · 55 min
The price of sovereignty: Are we prepared to pay more for less vulnerability?
Ever since the eighteenth century, there has been a prevailing belief that mutually beneficial commercial relationships between nations provide a powerful disincentive to international conflict. Montesquieu perhaps put it best in his Spirit of the Laws (XX.1-2): “Commerce cures destructive prejudices, and it is an almost general rule that everywhere there are gentle mores, there is commerce and that everywhere there is commerce there are gentle mores … The natural effect of commerce leads to peace. Two nations that trade with each other become reciprocally dependent; if one has an interest…
8 Apr 2026 · 55 min
Social cohesion is straining — can citizens’ assemblies help?
There is a thread that’s been left dangling from our show at the end of last year on Ambrogio Lorenzetti’s fourteenth century “Allegory of Good and Bad Government”, painted on the walls of the Sala dei Nova in Siena’s Palazzo Pubblico. The dominant figure of Justice sits on the left side of the central mural. She has her thumbs on two scales to hold them in balance, with angels on either side meeting out punishment and just recompense. Directly below her sits the figure of Concord (Concordia), a carpenter’s plane across her lap, as she weaves together the judgements into a red-and-white…
1 Apr 2026 · 55 min
Why do democracies seem so fragile in the face of shortages?
Within days of the commencement of the war that has enveloped the Middle East — and that continues to severely disrupt global energy supplies — a familiar pattern began to emerge in some of the world’s most prosperous democracies. Much as they did at the outset of the pandemic, people began stockpiling. Then, it was toilet paper and food; this time, it’s fuel. In cities across Australia, long lines formed outside petrol stations and tensions flared as motorists seized their opportunity to fill not just their cars, but jerry cans as well. Since then, the fears that motivated this behaviour…
27 Mar 2026 · 54 min
Why Autocracy Needs Spectacle — with M Gessen
One of the words we use to describe political authority gone wrong is "autocracy": which is to say, the concentration of power in a unitary figure who then exercises that power without countervailing constraints and for its own sake. To borrow an expression of St Augustine, autocracy is a form of political authority that curves in on itself. Because most citizens have a clear sense that governance ought to be for something beyond political self-interest or naked self-enrichment, we rightly take a dim view of politicians who are unmoved by the interests and opinions of their constituents.…
18 Mar 2026 · 55 min
Can illegal wars still be legitimate wars?
It’s like déjà vu all over again. After launching a devastating but limited series of strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities and against the nation’s top military leaders and nuclear scientists in June last year, the United States and Israel recommenced hostilities against Iran at the end of February. The objectives of this ‘war’ are similar — to eliminate Iran’s nuclear capabilities and remove the senior leadership of the Islamic Republic regime — but its implementation is more thoroughgoing, more open-ended, more uncontainable, and more problematic in terms of its basis in international…

About The Minefield

In a world marked by wicked social problems, The Minefield helps you negotiate the ethical dilemmas, contradictory claims and unacknowledged complicities of modern life.

The Minefield is a English society & culture podcast from ABC Australia. Melo plays each episode straight from the publisher's own feed — no ads added, no account needed — and remembers where you stopped, in this browser only.

Publisher: ABC Australia
Language: English
Category: Society & Culture
New episodes: Weekly
Typical length: 55 min
Latest episode: 7 Oct 2026
Feed: RSS — paste into any podcast app
Apple Podcasts: podcasts.apple.com/podcast/id985462397

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