To φ Or Not To φ (Daily Nous Philosophy Comics)
To φ Or Not To φ
by Tanya Kostochka
Applied Philosophy Courses Outside Value Theory
Philosophy departments face increasing pressure to demonstrate their value to their universities. One type of response is to attempt to increase enrollment in philosophy courses. There are various ways to do this. One way is to offer courses that apply philosophy to matters of personal or social concern. The result is a familiar variety of courses in applied ethics,..
Starting and Maintaining a College Philosophy Club
A professor of philosophy at a U.S. college writes in with a request for information about undergraduate philosophy clubs:
My university currently does not have a philosophy club. For various reasons my department thinks such a club would be a good idea, and I, perhaps foolishly, volunteered to help get it started. (more…)
The Pathologies of Philosophers
Pathologies of Philosophers
an incomplete list
Enthymemalysis – the inability to proceed with a conversation because one’s interlocutor has neglected to explicitly state a step in their thinking that any normal listener would have automatically filled in. (more…)
Follow Daily Nous on Facebook & Twitter
Just a little while ago Daily Nous gained it’s 10,000th follower on Facebook. (more…)
Update on the Persecution of Academics in Turkey
The Turkish government, under the leadership of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has continued its crackdown on those it deems enemies of the state in the wake of an attempted coup this past July. According to The Independent, over 70,000 people have been arrested during this time. (more…)
Naturalism, Evolutionary Biology and Theism
In yet another excellent interview at 3AM: Magazine, Richard Marshall talks with Elliott Sober (Wisconsin). There is a lot of interesting material in this interview, including Sober’s takes on the criticisms of evolutionary theory by Jerry Fodor (Rutgers) and Thomas Nagel (NYU).
On Nagel, he says:
Nagel thinks that “remarkable facts” can’t have low probabiliti..
Online Philosophy Resources Weekly Update
Good morning, philosofriends. Below is the weekly report on what’s new at the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (SEP), Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (IEP), Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews (NDPR), and Wi-Phi. (more…)
Three Philosophers Received Feces in the Mail (Update: Four Philosophers)
Sally Haslanger (MIT), Carrie Ichikawa Jenkins (UBC), and David Velleman (NYU) each received envelopes in the mail this past summer containing feces, according to an article at Buzzfeed by Katie J.M. Baker. As the article notes, “All three philosophy professors were embroiled in a 2014 academic brawl over what they perceived as an abuse of power within their field,”..
The Injustice Boycott and Academia
Influential activist and writer Shaun King—currently “senior justice writer” at the New York Daily News—has announced plans for a potentially massive boycott of “cities, states, businesses, and institutions which are either willfully indifferent to police brutality and racial injustice or are deliberately destructive partners with it.”
The boycott is set to b..
Philosophy of Jazz
Philosophy of Jazz is a new site—“currently in its initial stages”—on topics at the intersection of jazz and philosophy. The site, created by David C. Ring (Orange Coast College) is set up as an editable wiki, and you can find in the top menu a link to request to become an editor. (more…)
Philosophers, Neighbours, and Tartars (Guest Post by Justin E. H. Smith)
Mind Chunks (Daily Nous Philosophy Comics)
Mind Chunks
by Pete Mandik (more…)
APA To Launch Graduate Student Council
The American Philosophical Association (APA) has announced that it will be launching a new group responsible for “reporting to the board of officers on issues of interest, concern, and relevance to philosophy graduate students.” The APA Graduate Student Council, as it has been named, will be composed of twelve graduate students, with eight appointed by a selection c..
Charles Taylor Wins Million Dollar Berggruen Prize
Charles Taylor, professor emeritus of philosophy at McGill University, is the winner of the inaugural Berggruen Prize. (more…)
Publishing Scam Mimics Legitimate Philosophy Journal
When Chris Kramer, associate professor of philosophy at Rock Valley College in Illinois, learned that a paper of his had been accepted to the International Journal of Philosophy and Theology, he was excited. And then suspicious. (more…)
Glasgow Hires Six New Philosophers
The Department of Philosophy at the University of Glasgow made six new permanent appointments this summer. That’s an unusually large number of hires at one time for one department. (more…)
Mary Hesse (1924-2016)
Mary Hesse, professor emeritus of philosophy at University of Cambridge, died this past Sunday. Professor Hesse worked in philosophy of science. She had been at Cambridge since 1960 in its Department of History and Philosophy of Science, becoming a fellow of Cambridge’s Wolfson College in 1965. (more…)
Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Writing a Tenure Letter But Were Afraid to Ask (guest post by David Boonin)
The following is a guest post* by David Boonin. He is currently professor of philosophy at the University of Colorado, Boulder, where he has also been department chair and associate dean. He noticed that there did not appear to be much in the way of guidance when it came to writing external review letters for people under consideration for tenure, and sought to reme..
Anglo-American Philosophy: “A Site of White Supremacy”
“A perverse feature of American life is that calling a white person racist is allegedly a very wounding insult.”
That’s Lionel McPherson (Tufts), in a post currently up at Philosopher. I start with that quote because reflection on it might forestall some knee-jerk reactions to some of the other things McPherson says. It is worth noting the relative seriousness wi..
Joseph Boyle (1942-2016)
Joseph Boyle, professor emeritus of philosophy at the University of Toronto, died on September 24th. Professor Boyle worked mainly in ethics, including ethical theory and applied ethics (especially bioethics), as well as natural law theory. He received his doctorate in philosophy from Georgetown University, and prior to the University of Toronto, held appointments a..
Online Philosophy Resources Weekly Update
It’s Monday morning—somehow already the first Monday of October—and time for the weekly report on what’s new at the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (SEP), Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (IEP), Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews (NDPR), and Wi-Phi. (more…)
Shafer-Landau to Return to Wisconsin
Russ Shafer-Landau, currently professor of philosophy at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and director of its Parr Center for Ethics, will be returning in Fall 2017 to the Department of Philosophy at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, where he had been professor for 13 years. (more…)
APA Committee Issues Statement on Swinburne’s SCP Keynote (Updated)
The Committee on the Status of LGBTQ Philosophers in the Profession, one of the committees of the American Philosophical Association, has issued a statement in light of the controversy regarding Richard Swinburne’s keynote address at the 2016 Midwest Society of Christian Philosophers (SCP) meeting.
The statement first emphasizes that Swinburne’s talk was a keynot..
“European Philosophy” Is No Good
At least not as a helpful label:
So I have a provocative proposal of my own: intellectually speaking, the more valid distinction is not between ‘European’ and ‘non-European’ philosophy, but between philosophical cultures that respond to Greek thought (however indirectly), and those that do not. (more…)
A Surprisingly Overlooked Gap in Philosophy (guest post by Bob Fischer)
Bob Fischer is an assistant professor of philosophy at Texas State University. In a brief conversation over the summer, he shared with me an observation about a problem teaching philosophy to college students and I thought, “no, that can’t be correct.” But he was right, and he was doing something about it. In the following guest post, he explains the problem and how..
Update on the Threat to Philosophy at IPFW (guest post by Charlene Elsby)
In August we learned that the Philosophy Department at Indiana University – Purdue University, Fort Wayne (IPFW) was confronting the possibility of a “restructuring” that could result in its elimination, owing to the university’s financial problems and what appeared to be a stacking of the deck against units in the school’s College of Arts and Sciences in the proced..
Why Are These Philosophers Voting For Trump?
A list of scholars and writers, including several philosophers, have placed their names on a website beneath the statement, “Given our choices in the presidential election, we believe that Donald Trump is the candidate most likely to restore the promise of America, and we urge you to support him as we do.” (more…)