The Gray Area with Sean Illing

  • A right-wing economist makes his case

    For decades, the American right has stayed on brand: the economy. Low taxes. Free markets. Deregulation. Those have been the buzzwords for more than half a century. But that doctrine is now being challenged by…

  • What “near death” feels like

    Sebastian Junger came as close as you possibly can to dying. While his doctors struggled to revive him, the veteran reporter and avowed rationalist experienced things that shocked and shook him, leaving him with profound…

  • Machiavelli on how democracies die

    Almost nothing stands the test of time. Machiavelli’s writings are a rare exception. Why are we still talking about Machiavelli, nearly 500 years after his death? What is it about his political philosophy that feels…

  • Do you have moral ambition?

    We’re told from a young age to achieve. Get good grades. Get into a good school. Get a good job. Be ambitious about earning a high salary or a high-status position. Some of us love…

  • The science of ideology

    What do you do when you’re faced with evidence that challenges your ideology? Do you engage with that new information? Are you willing to change your mind about your most deeply held beliefs? Are you pre-disposed to…

  • Politics after Covid

    There are lots of stories to tell about the Covid pandemic. Most of them, on some level, are about politics, about decisions that affected people’s lives in different — and very unequal — ways. Covid…

  • Halfway there: a philosopher’s guide to midlife crises

    Philosophy often feels like a disconnected discipline, obsessed with tedious and abstract problems. But MIT professor Kieran Setiya believes philosophical inquiry has a practical purpose outside the classroom — to help guide us through life’s…

  • Whatever this is, it isn’t liberalism

    What exactly is the basis for democracy? Arguably Iiberalism, the belief that the government serves the people, is the stone on which modern democracy was founded. That notion is so ingrained in the US that…

  • A new way to listen

    We have an exciting announcement! Vox Members now get access to ad-free podcasts. If you sign up, you’ll get unlimited access to reporting on vox.com, exclusive newsletters, and all of our podcasts — including The Gray Area —…

  • The beliefs AI is built on

    There’s a lot of uncertainty when it comes to artificial intelligence. Technologists love to talk about all the good these tools can do in the world, all the problems they might solve. Yet, many of…