November 2017

Monthly Archives:

Philosophers Win ERC Consolidator Grants (updated)

The European Research Council (ERC) has announced the 2017 winners of its large Consolidator Grants. Among the recipients are three philosophers: (more…)

APA & other Academic Organizations Issue Statement on Tax Bill

The American Philosophical Association (APA) today joined with 34 other academic organizations to issue a public statement opposing the provision in the tax reform bill recently passed by the U.S. House of Representatives that would result in graduate school tuition waivers counting as taxable income. They currently do not. (more…)

Laptops in Classrooms Revisited

Nearly two years ago, prompted by a Columbia professor’s decision to ban laptops in his classes, we discussed classroom computer and phone policies. The subject has been gaining more traction recently, owing to recent studies and an op-ed last week in The New York Times by University of Michigan education, public policy, and economics professor Susan Dynarski. (more..

Philosophy for the Police

In 2015, Freddie Gray suffered fatal injuries in the back of a police van. Since then, the Baltimore police department has instituted various reforms, including an educational program for police that includes philosophy and literature. (more…)

Philosophers and the Humanities

By exerting their imaginations and their talent for coming up with pesky counterexamples, probe away at the conceptual boundaries of God, free will, morality, etc, and try to determine, by the power of thought experiments alone, just what is and isn’t possible, and what conclusions are the most reasonable. (more…)

Online Philosophy Resources Weekly Update

Here’s the weekly report of what’s new at some useful online philosophy resources. (more…)

Mini-Heap

Here’s the latest edition of Mini-Heap—10 recent items from the frequently updated Heap of Links. Feel free to discuss. (more…)

New Interdisciplinary Institute for Science & Technology Studies

The Ann Johnson Institute for Science, Technology & Society (AJI) has been launched at the University of South Carolina. (more…)

Philosophy of Science Undergrad Summer Program

The Center for Philosophy of Science at the University of Pittsburgh will be hosting a summer program in philosophy of science for undergraduate students from underrepresented groups this coming summer. (more…)

Ad Hoc (Daily Nous Philosophy Comics)

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No Winner of Sanders Public Philosophy Award

The Marc Sanders Foundation offers a number of generous awards in several areas of philosophy and in 2016 launched its Public Philosophy Award. For the 2017 run of this contest, the foundation received 65 entries. However, it made no awards. (more…)

Encouraging Your Promising Students To Take Another Philosophy Course

This is a good idea:

Every semester, about this time, I identify students in my intro classes who are doing reasonably well, seem interested in philosophy (based on class participation, conversations in office hours, or written work), and are not graduating in the near future. I email all of them individually (although of course the letters are somewhat repetitiv..

Mini-Heap

Here’s the latest edition of Mini-Heap—10 recent items from the frequently updated Heap of Links. Feel free to discuss. (more…)

ANU Philosophers Awarded Over AU$1.5 Million (updated w/ info re: awardees elsewhere)

Faculty at the School of Philosophy at Australian National University (ANU) have recently received multiple grants totaling over AU$1.5 million (roughly US$1.15 million). (more…)

NYU and Pitt To Waive PhD Application Fees For Some Students

The philosophy departments at New York University and the University of Pittsburgh, as well as the Department of History and Philosophy of Science (HPS) at Pittsburgh, will be waiving the fee for applications to their PhD programs for some students. (more…)

Mini-Heap

Here, a little late, is the latest edition of Mini-Heap—10 recent items from the frequently updated Heap of Links. Feel free to discuss. (more…)

Why Science Education Needs Philosophy

Many of the young people who attend my classes think that philosophy is a fuzzy discipline that’s concerned only with matters of opinion, whereas science is in the business of discovering facts, delivering proofs, and disseminating objective truths. Furthermore, many of them believe that scientists can answer philosophical questions, but philosophers have no busines..

Mind Chunks (Daily Nous Philosophy Comics)

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University of Florida Reopens PhD Program

Admissions to the Ph.D. program in philosophy at the University of Florida (UF) were suspended in the wake of the 2007-2008 economic downturn. That suspension has now been lifted: the UF Department of Philosophy will once again be accepting applications for admission to its Ph.D. program. The M.A. program, which had been in operation during this period, will continu..

Hypatia Board Announces Task Force

The Board of Directors of Hypatia, the non-profit corporation that owns the Hypatia, the journal, have announced the creation of a task force to review its governance structure and editorial policies and to create a search committee for its next editorial team. (more…)

Emergent Horrors (?) of Information Technology

These videos, wherever they are made, however they come to be made, and whatever their conscious intention (i.e. to accumulate ad revenue) are feeding upon a system which was consciously intended to show videos to children for profit. The unconsciously-generated, emergent outcomes of that are all over the place… (more…)

A Way Western Philosophy Is Racist

Mainstream philosophy in the so-called West is narrow-minded, unimaginative, and even xenophobic. I know I am leveling a serious charge. But how else can we explain the fact that the rich philosophical traditions of China, India, Africa, and the Indigenous peoples of the Americas are completely ignored by almost all philosophy departments in both Europe and the Engl..

Chignell from Penn to Princeton

Andrew Chignell, currently professor of philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania (and before that, at Cornell University), will be joining the faculty at the University Center for Human Values (UCHV) at Princeton University as a Laurance S. Rockefeller Professor. (more…)

Tax Proposal Would Make Getting a PhD in the US Very Expensive (Multiple Updates)

The tax plan introduced by Republicans in the U.S. Congress last week would have drastic effects on graduate education in the United States, according to reports at The Chronicle of Higher Education and Inside Higher Ed.

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APA Awards Inaugural Excellence in Teaching Prize

The American Philosophical Association (APA) has announced that the winner of its inaugural Prize for Excellence in Teaching has been awarded to Stephen Bloch-Schulman, associate professor of philosophy at Elon College. (more…)