This is the sixth installment of my series Philosophical Chats. In this episode, I have a conversation with Emma Young who is a research master student in philosophy at Groningen University. We focus on the issue of (political) polarisation. While it seems common to portray public discourse as being polarised, we rarely find the assumption itself questioned or investigated as such. Here is a rough outline of topics:

• Introduction 0:00
• Is polarisation empirically discovered or an assumption structuring our perception? 5:58
• Does the assumption of polarisation create a self-fulfilling prophecy? 9:30
• First summary. And does polarisation obscure problems? 12:10
• Division over corona policies as an example 15:50
• How polarisation promotes the illusion of a (neutral) centre 23:00
• How this illusion figures in history (of philosophy) 33:03
• Interests in or beneficiaries of polarisation 45:02
• Is polarisation irrational? 48:26
• Does philosophy fail in overcoming polarisation? 52:28
• How do we build solidarity? 1:07:04