History

Humans have probably always killed one another. Warfare is something narrower. It implies groups, planning, logistics, memory, leadership, and enough social organisation that violence stops being a personal act and becomes a collective institution. The interesting question is not when humans first killed. It is when killing acquired administration. Ask that question and a small crowd of theories turns up, each with its own literature, its own favourite dig site, and its own conviction that the others have missed the point. The Hobbesians say war is ancient. The Rousseauians say civilisation invented it. The circumscription theorists say geography did. The economists point at surplus, the anthropologists at prestige, the international relations scholars at the security dilemma. Each theory has evidence. Each has counterexamples. The usual response is to pick a champion and treat the rest as noise. ...

Picture a journalist, a scientist, or even your neighbour declaring with solemn authority: “I am being objective.” Dignified, is it not? Objective, impartial, fact-driven, like a well-polished broom sweeping all bias into the corner. Only, as with most magical brooms, it has a particular corner it prefers: the one that keeps the powerful comfortable and the inconvenient quiet. Objectivity can sometimes be used to avoid confronting ethical dilemmas. And claiming objectivity is rarely neutral. Like neutrality, it carries consequences. Often, it shields those already in power while quietly silencing the vulnerable. ...

Imagine standing on the pavement, observing an injustice unfold. Perhaps a villain is performing egregiously bad deeds, or a bureaucrat is quietly rearranging paperwork in a way that ruins lives. You shrug. You mutter, “Not my circus, not my monkeys,” and continue scrolling through social media. This is the practical magic of neutrality: invisible, polite, and utterly useful if your goal is to help the oppressor. Desmond Tutu, who knew more than a little about elephants on mice, explained it in no uncertain terms: “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.” And just to make sure nobody missed the metaphor, he added: “If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.” ...

In 1991, The Tech at MIT published an interview with Joseph Weizenbaum, the computer scientist best known for creating ELIZA and later becoming one of the field’s sharpest internal critics. Speaking with Diana ben‑Aaron, he dissected the role of computers in education, their entanglement with the military, and the ethical evasions of scientists. Three decades later, his words are less a time capsule and more a mirror, the issues he named have not only persisted but mutated into modern forms, from AI hype cycles to tech‑military partnerships dressed up in start‑up chic. This post is a “then/now” rendering of that interview: his points in their original spirit, and how they look in the world of 2025. ...