Michael Sandel leads Zoom event on ethics
Suppose Harvard were allowed to reopen tomorrow. Would it be ethical to allow a limited number of students to return, provided they tested virus-free and were willing to repeat the test daily? That and other hypotheticals were proposed by Michael Sandel in a campuswide Zoom event, “Harvard Live: Pandemic Ethics,” on Thursday evening. Sandel, Bass Professor of Government Theory at Harvard Law School, has lately been examining implications of COVID-19. Earlier this week he published a New York Times opinion piece, “Are We All in This Together?,” which argued that the pandemic has laid bare economic inequities and that we should take this opportunity to rectify them when the nation reopens. On Thursday Sandel took full advantage of the interactive format to involve the preregistered students and faculty in discussion and debate. His method was to propose a hypothetical and poll the audience on whether they felt it was ethical, then invite...