philosophy
TagThe Reflectiveness That Makes Us More Opaque To Ourselves
Towards the end of an in-depth and highlyy informative interview with Marya Schechtman (UIC) about the philosophy of personal identity, interviewer Richard Marshall asks her about “difficulties for women in the academy” and whether there’s “something weird going on in philosophy departments that is avoided elsewhere.” Schechtman’s answer includes the following intri..
Philosophy Placement Data: An Update on APDA
Academic Placement Data and Analysis (APDA), a project funded by the American Philosophical Association (APA) and headed by Carolyn Dicey Jennings (UC Merced), aims “to make information on academic job placement useful to prospective graduate students in philosophy.” The project has just been updated to include new data, which Professor Jennings describes in a post ..
The Ideas Faculty are Too Scared To Defend: A Follow-Up
Last week I wrote about the Great Academic Absorption and asked about the ideas it left unabsorbed, or squeezed out. At the time, I wrote: “Since this is a blog largely for academic philosophers, let’s limit answers to our area of expertise: philosophy (as broadly construed as you’d like). Which philosophical or philosophy-related ideas are students not being expose..
In Development: Philosophy Archive & Journal with Crowd-Sourced Peer Review
Imagine a website philosophers can join to post their papers for reading, reviewing (on a wiki), and upvoting/downvoting by other members, and which will periodically publish a journal comprised of a selection of these papers (ones that make it through a review process they qualify for by getting enough upvotes). That’s what Populus will be once it is up and running..
Online Philosophy Resources Weekly Update
Behold: the past week’s updates to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (SEP), Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (IEP), Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews (NDPR), and Wi-Phi. Plus a bonus link. (more…)
Interdisciplinarity and Progress in Philosophy
My current work on racial inequality and social justice—and to a lesser extent my earlier work—takes me into areas of knowledge outside of what we teach and learn in philosophy classrooms. In the last six years or so I have co-authored multiple works and grant proposals with an economist, sociologist, social psychologist, lawyer, and a historian. I have written wi..
Aesthetics for Birds Returns with New Editor
The Aesthetics for Birds blog—“aesthetics and philosophy of art for everyone”—is back in business with a new design and a new editor, Alex King (Buffalo). Nice: (more…)
Grad Students: What Do You Wish You Knew?
It’s the start of the academic year,and for some people, the start of their graduate education in philosophy. Graduate students are getting oriented in their programs, and graduate programs are orientating their students. Are they doing a good job of it? (more…)
Philosophy of War Audio Miniseries Available
A new philosophy show is in the works, and its creator has made three of its episodes—which together make up a miniseries on the philosophy of war—available to anyone teaching a course to which they would be relevant. (more…)
Which Ideas Are Students Protected From? Which Are Faculty Fearful to Defend?
Here are some empirical claims about higher education in the United States. In comparison to 100 years ago:
- There are fewer or weaker institutional, social, and material obstacles to non-white-male people entering academia.
- Academics today regularly and with institutional approval study a greater number of topics, including topics previously thought taboo or unwo..
Philosophy in Prison Program at U.Missouri Kansas-City Wins Prize from APA and PDC
The Philosophy in Prison Program of the Philosophy Department at the University of Missouri – Kansas City (UMKC) has won 2016 Prize for Excellence and Innovation in Philosophy Programs. The prize is awarded jointly by the American Philosophical Association (APA) and the Philosophy Documentation Center (PDC). The prize award is campus-wide electronic access to a bund..
Online Philosophy Resources Weekly Update
It’s Monday: time for the round-up of the past week’s additions and changes to  the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (SEP), Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (IEP), Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews (NDPR), and Wi-Phi. (more…)
Philosophers: Stop Being Self-Indulgent and Start Being Like Daniel Dennett, says Daniel Dennett
Daniel Dennett (Tufts) does seem to say that, but the real topic of this post is the good question he raises about how to figure out whether the kind of philosophy you’re doing is worth doing. We’ll get to that. But first, check out the following, from what might be the most clickbait-titled-but-just-for-academic-philosophers-article-ever-to-appear-on-a-mainstream-w..
Why Philosophy? (Guest Post By Ken Taylor)
The following is a reposting of a piece that originally appeared at Philosopher, a site run by Meena Krishnamurthy (University of Michigan). The author is Ken Taylor, the Henry Waldgrave Stuart Professor of Philosophy at Stanford University, cohost and co-creator of the nationally syndicated public radio program Philosophy Talk, and current president of the Pacific ..
Graded Assignments in Philosophy MOOCs
Philosophy professors generally like to assign papers to students. The format of a paper  allows the student to exercise certain skills of careful exposition and argumentation in ways that quizzes and timed exams don’t. Massive open online courses (MOOCs) often do not include graded work—and certainly not graded papers. The massiveness and openness (inexpensivenes..
The Where, What, and When of Philosophy Jobs
Mark Alfano (Delft), one of today’s more data-driven moral philosophers, has taken information from PhilJobs regarding the location and types of advertised jobs and placed it on a map at Tableau Public. Here’s where the jobs are: (more…)
When Personal Statement Instructions Differ
A student who is applying for admission to PhD programs in philosophy has noticed that at some universities, what the university’s graduate school asks applicants to include in their personal statements differs from what the same university’s philosophy department asks applicants to include. (more…)
Snobbery, Outreach, and the Academic
Nancy McHugh, professor of philosophy at Wittenberg University, teaches philosophy in prisons as part of the Inside-Out Prison Exchange Program. These classes are held in prison and have 15 regularly enrolled undergraduates (“outside” students) in them and 15 students who are inmates (“inside” students). McHugh recently co-authored a paper with a group that included..
Ideas for the First Day of Philosophy Class
Many universities start their fall semesters around now, so it’s a good a time—though not as good a time as last week—to ask: “what do you like to do on your first day of philosophy class?” (more…)
Online Philosophy Resources Weekly Update
Another week, another weekly update. Below find last week’s changes and additions to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (SEP), Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (IEP), Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews (NDPR), and Wi-Phi. (more…)
A Scientist On Philosophy, The “Thankless Job” That Succeeds Through Superfluousness
egardless of whom you want to assign the task of reaching across the line , presently little crosses it. Few practicing physicists today care what philosophers do or think.
And as someone who has tried to write about topics on the intersection of both fields, I can report that this disciplinary segregation is meanwhile institutionalized: The physics journals won’..
The Value of Conferences
The case against philosophy conferences is depressingly formidable. I say “depressingly” because I love philosophy conferences. Here are some of the considerations against them: (more…)
New Blog from the Society for the Philosophy of Sex and Love
The Society for the Philosophy of Sex and Love (SPSL) and has started a new blog, Erotes. The blog will feature interviews with SPSL scholars and also occasional updates on “what’s new in philosophy of sex and love.” It is named “Erotes” after the collective of winged gods associated with love and sex in Greek mythology. (more…)
The League of Notorious Philosophical Arguments
Over at Electric Agora, Daniel A. Kaufman (Missouri State) takes up what may be analytic philosophy’s most notorious argument: G.E. Moore’s proof of an external world. As Kaufman says,
If you were to pinch the nearest analytically trained philosopher and ask him for the worst, most obviously fallacious argument in his tradition, he might very well tell you that i..
Essay Prize in Latin American Thought Awarded
The American Philosophical Association (APA has awarded its 2016 Essay Prize in Latin American Thought to Dr. L. Sebastian Purcell (SUNY Cortland) for his “Neltilitzli and the Good Life: On Aztec Ethics.” (more…)
The Success Story of a High School Philosophy Club (guest post by Kirk Wolf)
Last year, I posted about the efforts of the Philosophy Club at Saginaw Arts and Sciences Academy to raise money for used textbooks. The club’s advisor, Kirk Wolf (Delta College), has now written an update about the club which he thought Daily Nous readers would appreciate.
Those interested in starting or maintaining philosophy clubs (not just at high schools) wi..
Job Market Mentoring for Women
Now in it’s third year, the Job Candidate Mentoring Program for Women in Philosophy” matches job candidates with junior faculty mentors who have recently been on the market.  The program provides mentoring and peer support to women candidates during their job search through videoconferencing and online forums.” (more…)
Online Philosophy Resources Weekly Update
Happy Monday, everyone. Here’s the round-up of last week’s additions to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (SEP), Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (IEP), Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews (NDPR), and Wi-Phi. (more…)