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Symposium

Every issue has a section devoted to a particular question. These symposia challenge preconceived ideas about our most urgent cultural and personal decisions and ask readers to reflect on the purpose of the institutions, political traditions and art forms that shape our world.

  • What is travel for?
  • What is the left for?
  • What is sport for?
  • What is science for?
  • What is protest for?
  • What is privacy for?
  • What is politics for?
  • What is poetry for?
  • What is marriage for?
  • What is film for?
  • What is conservatism for?
  • What is comedy for?
  • What is church for?
  • What is America for?
  • What are animals for?
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Symposium

What is travel for?

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What is the left for?

from  Issue No. 5

The demise of socialism as an emancipatory vision poses a problem for the Left. It is not that it lacks good ideas for social changes and public policies that would improve life for most people, but that these proposals have not been coherently organized in a way that makes for a compelling ideal...

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What is sport for?

from  Issue No. 4

To reflect on sport is to reflect on more than the direct lessons of athletic experience; it is also to confront some of the widest questions of ethical life...

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What is science for?

from  Issue No. 8

When this question is squarely and thoughtfully faced, scientists will agree that science exists for man, and not for itself alone...

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What is protest for?

from  Issue No. 11

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What is privacy for?

from  Issue No. 9

Privacy seems to have become such a naturalized sacred right in the liberal imaginary that it no longer seems necessary to make a new positive case on its behalf ... Yet we need to know just what it is we love.

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What is politics for?

from  Issue No. 1

It seems beyond dispute that the goal of politics is to ensure security and prosperity; the only question is what means will achieve the ends. But could it be that when we understand the goal of politics as security and prosperity, we underestimate it?

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What is poetry for?

from  Issue No. 12

Why can’t we determine what poetry is for simply by asking what it does?

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What is marriage for?

from  Issue No. 7

The problem with marriage, we all know, is the endlessness of it. Plenty of things we do will have long-term repercussions, but in what other situation do you promise to do something for the rest of your life?

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What is film for?

from  Issue No. 2

Hegel claimed that art can no longer compete with philosophy. But can film take us to places not available in theory?

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What is conservatism for?

from  Issue No. 3

Conservatives have traditionally spoken of themselves as the voices of truth, goodness and beauty drowned by the tide of modern revolution. They have been by nature pessimistic, not merely or even chiefly about the probable fortunes of any utopian schemes for perfection of a dual-natured man...

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What is comedy for?

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What is church for?

from  Issue No. 15

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What is America for?

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What are animals for?

from  Issue No. 6

Moral battles over how humans should treat other animals are usually waged between those who defend our right to use natural resources and those who defend animals’ right to live free of exploitation; the two sides, unsurprisingly, argue on different terms. They remain entrenched because lives and traditions are at stake, and because each is rooted in a fundamental truth.

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The Point is a magazine founded on
the suspicion that modern life is worth examining.

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