The American Philosophical Association’s Committee on Public Philosophy is compiling a list of philosophers who have careers doing public philosophy, either exclusively or concurrently with careers in academic philosophy, and can use your help in identifying them.
There are a variety of ways to do public philosophy, so to be more specific, the committee is looking to gather the names of philosophy PhDs (or those substantially along the way towards completing a PhD in philosophy) who meet any one of the following four criteria:
- do not work in academia but whose work often involves doing philosophy with or for the public, or promoting philosophy to the public.
- have written two or more philosophy essays aimed at non-philosophers which were published in popular non-philosophy periodicals or venues (e.g., websites).
- have written at least one philosophy book (or a book with a substantial amount of philosophy in it) largely for a non-philosophically trained audience.
- are regularly involved in activities that bring philosophy to the public, including broad promotional activities (e.g., festivals), websites and shows that aim to bring philosophy to a non-philosophical audience, and outreach programs for traditionally philosophically-underserved populations (such as prisoners, the elderly, pre-college students, and the lay community more generally).
Please list people you know of who match any of these descriptions–including yourself. Also include in your comment, if you don’t mind, a description of the work or a link to a description of it. Thank you.
(At some point in the future, the list may be expanded to include philosophers who do not have graduate degrees, but for now, please limit your suggestions to those who do, or who soon will.)
Disclosure: I am a member of the APA’s Committee on Public Philosophy.
Kieran Setiya’s in-progress book project “Midlife: A Philosophical Guide”
is aimed at a non-academic audience. See http://www.ksetiya.net/.
Two questions:
(1) is the search/list limited to philosophers based in the USA (or the Anglophone world), and/or philosophers doing public philosophy in English? (I assume there are philosopher based in the USA or the UK doing public philosophy in another language; and there definitely are philosophers based outside the Anglophone world doing public philosophy in English, e.g. Eric Schliesser, and some of my own public phil contributions. Yet there are also philosophers who definitely qualify as ‘public philosophers’ but do not write that public philosophy in English, e.g. my colleague Rutger Claassen (has written two books in Dutch for a broader audience, and many pieces in newspapers etc.)
(2) Am I right in interpreting blog posts with a philosophical flavour also as public philosophy? That is, with “websites” above you also include blogs? If you include such philosophy bloggers, then the list become very long (e.g. some/much of what is being written by philosophers at e..g Feminist Philosophers or Crooked Timber is also reaching out beyond academia).
Hi Ingrid. Good questions. For the purposes of soliciting suggestions here, let’s err on the side of inclusion. So, to answer your questions:
(1) No.
(2) Yes.
It may turn out that the APA’s Committee on Public Philosophy may not make use of all the names that turn up as a result, but it is good to know about what is going on in public philosophy.
Justin,
has your committee approached The Stone about the fact that it has not published work on disability and will not do so?
Not to my knowledge.
Hmmm. That’s a curious response. Does the committee take some actions or refrain from some actions without the knowledge of some of it members? I can’t imagine the (entire) committee overlooking this sort of state of affairs were it done to work that addresses the situation of any other marginalized group in the profession/any other marginalized identity-based field in the discipline, can you? Suppose the editor of The Stone decided that the column was not the appropriate venue for work in feminist philosophy and feminist philosophers were told to go elsewhere. Would the committee overlook this fact and continue to promote the column? Or how about if philosophy of race were excluded from The Stone and philosophers of race were told to go elsewhere. Would you continue to promote the column on your blog and would some members of your committee continue to write for it? Come to think of it: doesn’t this policy on the part of The Stone violate the APA’s anti-discrimination policy?
I assume this is obvious, but just in case it isn’t. Anyone involved in these two book series should qualify based on criteria 2 or 3:
http://www.opencourtbooks.com/categories/pcp.htm
http://www.wiley.com/WileyCDA/Section/id-324354.html
Peg O’Connor works on (among other things) philosophical issues surrounding addiction. Here’s a link to an abridgement of the introduction to her recent book Life on The Rocks:
http://magazine.wesleyan.edu/2016/04/06/between-the-lines-life-on-the-rocks-finding-meaning-in-addiction-and-recovery/
She has also blogs at Psychology Today and has published several articles in The Stone.
well a number of abd dropouts still keeping the flame alive are:
http://www.partiallyexaminedlife.com/about-the-podcast/about-the-participants/
https://rsbakker.wordpress.com/2016/08/25/still-idiosyncratic-yet-verging-on-mainstream/
I’d imagine you’re aware of this, but just in case, the Public Philosophy Network should be able to provide a good number of names (http://publicphilosophynetwork.ning.com/).
The Forum is a non-profit public philosophy organisation based in the LSE. It’s been running events for over 20 years, and now has a podcast stream and blog too: http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/theforum/
Jason Brennan does, for better or for worse. For worse, obviously. I mean, here’s his nonsense from just recently
2016 “Epistocracy Defended,” Aeon, September edition.
2016 “Against Democracy,” The National Interest, September edition.
2016, “Can Epistocracy Fix Democracy?,” LA Times, Sunday August 28.
2016 “Politics Makes Us Dumb and Mean,” Emotion Researcher, September edition.
2016 “We Can Blame Old People for Brexit, but We Shouldn’t Take Away Their Votes,” Quartz, July 1.
2016 “The Brexit Vote Has Exposed the Flaws of Referendum Democracy,” Newsweek,
June 25.
2016 “What Brexit Voters Forgot on Their Way to the Polls,” Quartz, June 25. 2016 “Pox Populi,” Chronicle Review. June 19.
2016 “Make Sure Elites and the People Keep Each Other in Check,” Zócalo Public
Square, June 19.
UNC-Chapel Hill’s Philosophy Outreach Program (http://parrcenter.unc.edu/outreach/) leads around 200 community discussions per year for a variety of philosophically-underserved populations. In recent years we have worked extensively with children, high school students, residents in a juvenile detention center, students in a local GED program, and senior citizens. In addition to myself (I am the Outreach Coordinator), we have a large pool of outreach volunteers, and several graduate students participate in outreach work on a frequent basis. Among those who are currently in their 4th+ year of the program (does “substantially along the way toward completing the PhD” include younger graduate students, too?), Kiran Bhardwaj, Joshua Blanchard, Lindsay Brainard, Chris Dorst, Caleb Harrison, and Lauren Townsend are all highly active in this work. Also, among our recent PhDs (in the last two years), Jen Kling (now at Siena Heights University), John Lawless (now at University of Pittsburgh), and Vida Yao (now at Rice) were all regular outreach volunteers.
As a UNC grad (Morhead Cain 74) I’d love to know more about what you do.
With colleagues from some other disciplines, Don Hubin and I here at Ohio State have been involved over the last few years in getting an Ohio State Center for Ethics and Human Values up and running. The CEHV aims to connect philosophy with other disciplines needed to solve pressing social issues such as immigration reform and environmental sustainability, and to promote (by example, if possible) informed and constructive democratic deliberation on those issues. Our main program so far is called COMPAS (“Conversations on Morality, Politics, and Society”) — a year-long series on a single topic; this year the topic is “inequality” — but more outreach and educational programs are in the works, thanks to increased funding from our university. For an example of the interdisciplinary nature of the events we are organizing on campus, have a look at our upcoming fall COMPAS conference program: http://cehv.osu.edu/events/fall-compas-conference-1 .
I’m currently a grad student and public philosophy is my primary career goal.
1. I have a blog directed at the public which is dedicated to applying basic philosophical ideas to current events and explaining fundamental philosophical ideas. http://missiontotransition.blogspot.com/
2. I’m about 1/3 of the way through building a free interactive online critical thinking course. http://criticalthinkingexamples.wikidot.com/system:list-all-pages/p/1
Julian Baggini, Nigel Warburton, and A.C Grayling have all written books on philosophy for a popular audience. All have been professional academics. Some still are, I think.
I don’t know whether any of the following counts, but perhaps at least some of it should.
There are a couple of youtube channels that do stuff on philosophy:
PhilosophyTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/thephilosophytube
Crash Course Philosophy: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8dPuuaLjXtNgK6MZucdYldNkMybYIHKR
I don’t know whether either of these channels are good, I haven’t really watched any of this material.
Then there are people producing podcasts. There’s Peter Adamson’s superb History of Philosophy without any gaps: http://historyofphilosophy.net/
And Myisha Cherry’s UnMute podcast, which is also excellent. http://www.myishacherry.org/the-unmute-podcast/
Scott Aikin and Robert Talisse. Their recent book, _Why We Argue (and How We Should)_, is aimed at a non-philosophy audience. I also have my Logic students read a chapter or two at the beginning of each semester to motivate the course material. Aikin and Talisse regularly publish on 3QD as well, which I think counts as public…?
I do
Is it fair to consider William Craig as a person who does public philosophy? His bajillion debates pertaining to philosophy of religion are attended mostly by general folk.
I do. Bertha Alvarez Manninen, associate philosophy professor, ASU. Written articles on Huffington Post and Psychology Today. My book on abortion ethics is aimed primarily to a non academic audience: http://www.vanderbilt.edu/university-press/book/9780826519900
Also, Eric Thomas Weber: http://ericthomasweber.org
Here are some of my colleagues (at UC Irvine) who I think meet the criteria:
Aaron James wrote the book Assholes, which was a NY Times bestseller for a while.
Mark Fiocco has organized a large outreach effort to bring Philosophy into local elementary schools.
Cailin O’Connor has published several articles on game theory and feminist philosophy of science in Slate and Huffington Post.
I have a book (The Physics of Wall Street) on history and methodology in financial modeling, and another (Void) on the concept of “nothing” in physics from the seventeenth century on, both aimed at general audiences and published by trade presses; I have also published articles on philosophy and methodology in physics in newspapers and magazines such as Slate, Popular Science, Boston Globe, and Scientific American.
Perhaps it’s obvious, but there is also Craig Callender at UCSD who has written for Scientific American and has a graphic novel about time.
There may be others who meet the criteria who I am overlooking!
Following up on James’s post, philosophers of science have done extensive public philosophy – think of the Dover trial a decade ago, for instance, the sociobiology controversy in the 1980s, etc.
Here is an instance coming from my colleagues in the HPS department at Pitt: Short, easily accessible videos on race, Einstein, and the brain available at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAMdyb5LR0ATvl1NISI-6gQ.
Other videos will be added soon.
I hope the committee will take into account the contributions of philosophy of science.
I’m a AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellow, and (as far as I can tell) the first person with a PhD in philosophy to be a AAAS Policy Fellow since Wendy Parker (who worked as a Congressional staffer in 2004-05, if I remember right). AAAS Policy Fellows are hosted by offices in the US federal government; for the past year I’ve been at the Environmental Protection Agency, and starting next week I’ll spend a year at the National Science Foundation. Most of my work isn’t intended for a general audience, but does engage philosophically with government scientists and regulators. I’ve also done some public talks and podcasts that are intended for a general audience.
Jane Maienschein (ASU), Carl Cranor (UC Riverside), Kristin Shrader-Frechette (Notre Dame), and Hugh Lacey (Swarthmore, emeritus) have all been involved in public policy throughout their careers. Janet Stemwedel (San Jose State) has been blogging and writing public essays for a decade or more, and actually got her blogging to count in her tenure dossier. The Kennedy Institute at Georgetown played a major role in developing institutional bioethics, and its contemporary members (including Rebecca Kukla and Maggie Little) are actively involved in various policy- and general public-facing activities. A number of people at Michigan State have been extremely active public philosophers, including Kyle Whyte, Kristie Dotson, Paul Thompson, Sean Valles, and Kevin Elliott.
Speaking of Jane and Janet, I’d recommend that the APA Committee get in touch with the Joint Caucus for Socially Engaged History and Philosophy of Science [JCSEHPS], which is affiliated with PSA; and the Consortium for Socially Relevant Philosophy of/in Science and Engineering [SRPoiSE]. Many members of both of those groups would count as public philosophers by several of the four criteria.
Carrie Ichikawa Jenkins does both kinds of philosophy, and just won the APA Op Ed contest. Her book on the philosophy of love is out soon – http://www.carriejenkins.net/what-love-is-and-what-it-could-be/ (also for links to other media engagement) – and though I haven’t read it yet I believe it is geared to a broad audience.
David Rodin and other philosophers have established a consultancy for organizational ethics
http://www.principia-advisory.com/
http://www.principia-advisory.com/team.html
I do. My forthcoming book on awesomeness and suckiness is keyed for the general public. It’s coming out with Penguin Books, fall 2017. There’s a little road test of the ideas in Aeon: https://aeon.co/essays/how-being-awesome-became-the-great-imperative-of-our-time
I may already be on the list, since I won an APA Op-Ed award last year (on robot-car ethics). In technology ethics and policy, I do a lot of media writing, as well as work with US and foreign governments and industry. Here’s my biosketch page: http://philosophy.calpoly.edu/faculty/patrick-lin
I do some public philosophy.
Jana Mohr Lone and Michael Burroughs:
https://www.amazon.com/Philosophy-Education-Questioning-Dialogue-Schools/dp/1442234784/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1472690704&sr=8-1&keywords=Mohr+Lone
https://www.amazon.com/Philosophical-Child-Jana-Mohr-Lone/dp/1442217332/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1472690704&sr=8-2&keywords=Mohr+Lone
In addition, there are many professional philosophers involved in the Philosophy Learning and Teaching Organization, a national non-profit organization that supports philosophy in K-12 schools. See: http://www.plato-philosophy.org. I currently serve as PLATO Vice President and Tom Wartenberg is President.
I do. I’ve rounded up most of my public stuff here: https://sites.google.com/site/carolhay/public-philosophy
So does my partner, John Kaag. In addition to a whole bunch of op-eds, his forthcoming book, _American Philosophy: A Love Story_ is pitched at a trade audience: https://www.amazon.com/American-Philosophy-Story-John-Kaag/dp/0374154481/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1472692294&sr=8-1&keywords=john+kaag
I do. I’ve written for and done interviews for a bunch of Internet and radio outlets, including NPR, Wired, The Conversation, Huffington Post, and The Adaptors podcast.
I’ve contributed chapters to Open Court’s Philosophy and Popular Culture volumes on Stephen Colbert, Philip K. Dick, and Louis C. K. I also maintain a blog aimed at a popular audience called Examined Worlds: Philosophy and Science Fiction (http://examinedworlds.blogspot.com).
Me – I’ve contributed to work on philosophy and pop culture, have a blog at Psychology Today, and am a former member of the APA committee on public philosophy.
(A side note: During my time on that committee, I was struck by the wide variations in views regarding what makes philosophical work ‘public’. Given the rather broad four conditions described in the OP, doesn’t almost every philosopher do public philosophy?)
Roger Scruton (for example, his book I Drink Therefore I am; many media appearances).
I do. I’ve contributed to pop culture & Philo as well as the Philo for everyone series. In addition I co-founded the Iowa Lyceum (with Dr. Greg Stoutenburg–Idaho) and the Utah Lyceum (with Prof. Kirk Fitzpatrick–SUU). I also serve on the APA’s CPIP.
Utah Lyceum: https://sites.google.com/site/utahlyceum/home
Iowa Lyceum:
https://sites.google.com/site/lyceumiowa/home
I suggest that the following meet at least one of the criteria, and should therefore be included on the list:
1) Charlene Elsby;
2) Kimberly Baltzer-Jaray;
3) Rob Luzecky.
All have published numerous chapters elaborating on the the value and relevance of certain philosophical concepts through the non-canonical, non-specialist lens of pop culture. The fundamental aim of their
body of work is to introduce philosophical concepts to a lay community.
I do. I have six articles either published or forthcoming in *Think*, which is a philosophy journal for the public:
“Why Afterimages are Metaphysically Mysterious”, forthcoming in Think.
”Why the Vagueness Paradox is Amazing”, forthcoming in Think.
“Justifying a Large Part of Philosophy”, forthcoming in Think.
“The Atheistic Argument from Outrageousness”, forthcoming in Think.
“The Irrationality of Religious Belief”, Think, 15 (2016), 15-33.
“The Rationality of Religious Belief”, Think, 14 (2015), 109-117.
I also have four book manuscripts for a general audience–but I have yet to decide on how to publish them! Here they are:
An Agnostic Defends God
Greatest Mysteries: Meaning, Truth, Knowledge
Greatest Mysteries: Mind, Matter, God
Top Ten Challenges for Science and Philosophy
Maria Sanders , an Associate Professor of Philosophy at Plymouth State University in New Hampshire, is an Applied Ethicist whose career focus has been on public philosophy. She completely revised the bachelors degree at PSU two years ago, adding 18 new courses and an applied ethics niche. Students participate in community events and activities both on and off campus as a regular part of their education. She hosts a radio program entitled “Philosophy 4 Life” and will be leading a Happiness Quest in the town of Plymouth which will include a television show on the local cable station. More about her work can be found at philosophy4life.com .
I’ve being blogging (and now tweeting) about philosophy for ten years now, with tons of humour
http://mappingignorance.org/author/jesus-zamora/
https://www.amazon.com/Science-Market-Positivist-Philosophy-Metaphysics-ebook/dp/B01BHESN60/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1472730876&sr=8-1&keywords=science+market+bonilla#nav-subnav
And in Spanish:
http://abordodelottoneurath.blogspot.com.es/
http://escritossobregustos.blogspot.com.es/
https://twitter.com/jzamorabonilla
No particular order, but here are a few that immediately come to mind:
Massimo Pigliucci
Jesse Prinz
Martha Nussbaum
Susan Blackmore
Dan Dennet
Patrica Churchland
Neil Levy
Robert Talisse and Scott Aikin
Julian Baggini
Nigel Warburton
Jason Stanley
Kenneth Taylor
A.C Grayling
Gregg Caruso (Me)
Eddy Nahmias
Al Mele
Lynn Tirrell
Stephen Law
Kate Manne
Galen Strawson
Luciano Floridi
Ray Monk
Peter Singer
David Papineau
Carrie Jenkins
Lisa Bortolotti
Julian Savulescu
Barry C. Smith
David Chalmers
Alva Noe
Angie Hobbs
Kwame Anthony Appiah
Brit Brogaard
Nicole Vincent
Tamler Sommers
Leigh M. Johnson
And many more that I will kick myself for forgetting….
Socrates
In addition to some of those I’ve already interviewed:
Bharath Vallabha: http://freerangephilosophers.com/2016/06/30/philosopher-bharath-vallabha/
Kelly Heuer: http://freerangephilosophers.com/2016/06/30/philosopher-kelly-heuer/
Tom Wartenberg: http://freerangephilosophers.com/2016/07/24/tom-wartenberg/
Nancy McHugh: http://freerangephilosophers.com/2016/08/21/nancy-mchugh/
I have forthcoming interviews with:
Amy Leask: http://amyleask.com/amyleask/
Liz Swan: https://www.psychologytoday.com/experts/liz-swan-phd
Michael Spicher: https://twitter.com/MRSpicher
After a university career of 15 years, I’ve been doing public philosophy exclusively for 21 years. See more at http://www.TomVMorris.com. It’s great fun and very gratifying. PhD Yale.
I do public philosophy:
1. One chapter in Batman, Superman, and Philosophy (Open Court, 2016)
2. One chapter in X-Files and Philosophy (Open Court, forthcoming)
3. One chapter in Wonder Woman and Philosophy (Wiley, forthcoming)
4. One book manuscript, With Great Power: How Superhero Comics Channel and Challenge Philosophy (under review)
(Details here: home.wlu.edu/~goldbergn)
I’ve been wondering this about public philosophy. On the “supply” side, it’s called Public Philosophy. Has anyone though tried to figure out what the “demand” side might call it? I.e., for people who are seeking public philosophy, how do they seek it? I doubt they go out looking for something called “Public Philosophy”! So how do they seek what we hope they will find, or do we just put stuff out there and hope it is found, even though people aren’t really looking for it?
https://www.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&q=public%20philosophy
And an expanded Google Trends search:
https://www.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&q=public%20philosophy,philosophy,introductory%20philosophy,beginning%20philosophy,relevant%20philosophy
Hi, Nathan — good question. They most certainly do not call it “public philosophy” outside the discipline. In ethics at least, ethics is sometimes subsumed under “law and policy” or “societal impact”; but it’s hardly ever called “philosophy” unless it’s an academic meeting. “Philosophy” is not a selling point but a negative indicator for many, i.e., “ethicist” is more credible than “philosopher”…
Oh, and “responsibility” and “values” are also codespeak for applied ethics, outside of philosophy.
Ian Olasov (CUNY Graduate Center) runs Brooklyn Public Philosophers: http://bkpp.tumblr.com/
Ajay Chaudhary (Columbia) runs the Brooklyn Institute for Social Research: https://thebrooklyninstitute.com/bisr_faculty/ajay-singh-chaudhary/
I do public philosophy. My focus is on the ethics of public policy.
I have written for numerous outlets including: Inside Higher Ed, The Hill, The Diplomat, Counterpunch, and Aeon (forthcoming).
Currently, I’m a Postgraduate Research Fellow in philosophy at Princeton.
It isn’t clear whether the books that bring philosophy to non-professionals by relating philosophical issues to popular culture fall under headings 1-4. If they don’t, we need new headings. The Committee on Public Philosophy, a splendid group that deserves our support, has an unfortunate history of overlooking such work, despite the popularity and success of these series from multiple publishers (Blackwell, Open Court, Rowman and Littlefield, and more). There are too many authors I would like to mention, so let me give a shout-out of praise to some of the editors who have been so successful in bringing philosophy to a mass audience. With apologies to the many I’m overlooking, a round of applaud for:
William Irwin (who kicked the who genre off).
Robert Arp
Kevin Decker
George A. Dunn
Jason T. Eberl
Richard Greene
Jacob M. Held
Courtland Lewis
Nicolas Michaud
Rachel Robison
Typo. I meant that William Irwin kicked off the “whole genre” not the “who genre”. The “Who” genre, of course, was kicked off by Pete Townshend.
You can include me — I have done some public-facing work on emerging ethics, but nowhere near as much as my colleague Pat Lin, mentioned above. My interests include autonomous vehicles and autonomous weapons, cyber war, military ethics, and the ethics of algorithms and AI. You should also include my other colleague, Keith Abney, who does much of the same, plus space ethics and bioethics.
HI, I’m that chair of the APA Committee on Public Philosophy. I have just read over all these wonderful posts and am inspired to see so many names, so many kinds of projects, and such good will toward publicly engaged philosophy. We all know that this is not an exhaustive list. We aren’t really trying to be gatekeepers, just trying to get a sense of what’s happening in philosophy beyond the circles we each know. The categories above were spurred by an administrative question we were asked, but the APA Committee on Public Philosophy doesn’t take the position that those 4 categories are the be-all and end-all of who does public philosophy or what counts as doing it. We are aware that there are many people contributing to the growth of philosophy without having gotten a Ph.D. This was just a start. Also, please be aware that the committee gains and loses 1/3 of its members every year, so it is a group with changing views over time. This is healthy and keeps us vital. And although there is an easy connection between ethics and politics to policy issues, we will not forget the philosophers of science, epistemology, and more. Thanks for this helpful start to our developing a better picture of the work being done.