Guide to Online Self-Promotion
Last spring we discussed some issues regarding self-promotion in philosophy. The focus then was largely on egotistical and boorish online behavior. The current discussion of Academia.edu here has brought renewed interest to the topic, particularly on the question of how to do it well, and a request for a guide to online self-promotion in philosophy.
Online self-p..
Projects Funded by New Directions in the Study of Mind
New Directions in the Study of Mind, a project headed by Tim Crane (Cambridge) and funded primarily with a £1.25 million grant from the Templeton Foundation, has announced the initiatives it will be supporting:
- “Attention, Not Self: The Nature of the Conscious Mind” — Jonardon Ganeri (NYU)
- “Primitive Colours and Non-reductive Minds” — Derek Brown (Brandon)
- “..
Earnings and Occupations of Humanities Undergrads
Data about the earnings, occupations, and unemployment of humanities undergraduates (as of 2013) is featured in a new report by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Robert Townsend, director of the organization’s Washington office, writes:
As usual, the main narrative is about the humanities as a whole—where we can at least demonstrate that overall earn..
SEP, IEP, NDPR, Wi-Phi Weekly Update
Here are last week’s additions and updates to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (SEP), the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (IEP), Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews (NDPR), and Wi-Phi Wireless Philosophy, appearing here via special arrangement with Philosophical Percolations. They were first posted in PhilPercs’ “Saturday Linkorama” along with lots of other ..
Stubblefield Convicted of First-Degree Aggravated Sexual Assault
Anna Stubblefield, a professor of philosophy at Rutgers-Newark, was found guilty of two counts of felony first-degree aggravated sexual assault for raping a mentally disabled man she was introduced to in order to help him learn to communicate (previously). NJ.com reports:
The jury… convicted the 45-year-old philosophy professor of sexually assaulting a 34-year-..
Undergrad at Philosophical Crossroads
An undergraduate student in philosophy writes in with a question that I suspect many philosophers confronted at some point in their studies. Perhaps we can provide some assistance:
I am a philosophy student in my last year of undergrad studies in need of some advice. I am about to apply to graduate studies in philosophy but not sure what I should choose to focus ..
Three Philosophers Honored by Royal Society of Canada
Last year, the Royal Society of Canada launched a new initiative to provide recognition for notables among the “emerging generation of scholarly, scientific and artistic leadership in Canada.” Called the College of New Scholars, Artists and Scientists, it will be welcoming 48 new members this fall, including three philosophers: Kristin Andrews (York University), Ant..
De Cruz from Amsterdam to Oxford Brookes
Helen De Cruz, currently assistant professor in philosophy at the VU University Amsterdam, will become senior lecturer (associate professor) in the Department of History, Philosophy, and Religion at Oxford Brookes University, effective January 2016. Professor De Cruz works in cognitive science and philosophy of religion, and has also written on topics in philosophy ..
Examples of Public Philosophy
Barry Maguire (UNC) is attempting to get a new prize for public philosophy up and running. By “public philosophy” he means “anything with significant philosophical content or method written by someone with significant philosophical trainining primarily for an audience of non-philosophers.”
He is collecting examples of public philosophy but is having trouble findi..
Problems with Academia.edu?
A professor who prefers to remain anonymous writes in:
Academia.com has recently, and without previous announcement, changed its appearance. This is, in itself, not remarkable, but the changes are vast and drastic and have an enormous effect on several of the features of the past; features which users used to have control over. For instance, they completely del..
10 Ways to Beat Writer’s Block (Ought Experiment)
Welcome back to Ought Experiment! This week’s question comes to us from someone dealing with a bad case of writer’s block. Maybe.
Dear Louie,
I’m sure you’re going to say this is one of those problems everyone has, but I really struggle with writer’s block. It can hit when I’m just starting a new paper, or it can hit me when I’m already several drafts into a p..
Bioethics Groups Win $3.6m NIH Grant on Pregnancy and HIV/AIDS
Georgetown University’s Kennedy Institute of Ethics, Johns Hopkins University’s Berman Institute of Bioethics, the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill Center for Bioethics, and the University of Washington School of Medicine’s Department of Bioethics and Humanities have won a $3.6 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for a project on ethi..
Bentham’s Cookbook
Jeremy Bentham’s Prison Cooking is a real book. Need I say more?
The book is based on a collection of Bentham’s papers marked “Panopticon – cookery, errors of present practice” and was put together as part of the Transcribe Bentham initiative at University College London. “The book features beautiful original illustrations by Jake Lamerton, and contains images, r..
Did This Monkey Intentionally Take A Selfie?
Some monkey business is raising questions in philosophy of action, philosophy of language, legal theory, and animal ethics.
British photographer David Slater traveled to the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, came across some macaque monkeys, and set up a camera with a tripod. One of the monkeys, Naruto, reportedly pressed the button on the camera, with the result be..
Philosophers On Drug Prices
The price of Daraprim (pyrimethamine), a drug that treats the parasitic infection toxoplasmosis and is used in some cases to treat cancer and AIDS, was raised from $13.50 to $750.00 per pill when sole rights to its sale in the United States were acquired last month by drug company Turing Pharmaceuticals. The news brought outrage from all corners, prompting the owner..
This One’s Not For The Ladies
You may recall that last week was the launch of the Job Candidate Mentoring Program for Women in Philosophy. As you also may recall, this announcement was followed by clamor for job market mentoring for others besides women. Well, from your lips to bloggers’ ears, folks.
Announcing: The Philosophers’ Cocoon Job-Market Mentoring Project, “a philosophy job-market m..
SEP, IEP, NDPR, Wi-Phi Weekly Update
Here are last week’s additions and updates to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (SEP), the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (IEP), Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews (NDPR), and Wi-Phi Wireless Philosophy, appearing here via special arrangement with Philosophical Percolations. They were first posted in PhilPercs’ “Saturday Linkorama” along with lots of other ..
What It’s Like to Be Josh Knobe
A new interview is up at What Is It Like To Be a Philosopher?, this time with Joshua Knobe (Yale). Interviewer Clifford Sosis (Coastal Carolina) asks Knobe a range of questions about his life and ideas.
Some interesting excerpts:
On the job market:
I lived pretty far from campus and hardly ever came in. As a result, I was woefully ignorant about just about ..
Refutation Watch
Retraction Watch is profiled in today’s Chronicle of Higher Education (currently paywalled). The site keeps track of retractions in scientific research, with an emphasis on retractions owed to scientific misconduct.
Its founders, a pair of veteran science writers, were not just interested in big-ticket fraud cases; they were determined to apply scrutiny to scient..
Ethics of Suicide Digital Archive
In what is being referred to as “an unprecedented example of library-author-publisher collaboration,” a new philosophy book and accompanying digital archive of its material were recently launched. The book is The Ethics of Suicide: Historical Sources, by Margaret Battin (Utah). Professor Battin worked with her publisher, Oxford University Press, and the University o..
Reaching Under-Represented Job Candidates
Job search committees are asking the American Philosophical Association (APA) for help in reaching potential job candidates who are members of under-represented groups in philosophy, according to Teresa Blankmeyer Burke (Gallaudet), the acting chair of the Committee on Inclusiveness in the Profession. Of particular interest are email distribution lists (listservs) t..
AAUP’s 2015 Volume on Academic Freedom
The American Association of University Professors (AAUP) has published the 2015 edition of its Journal of Academic Freedom. The volume covers a variety of events and issues. Several pieces are on Steven Salaita’s “unhiring.” There’s a piece on the personal ethics of academic freedom, one on the emergence of institutional review boards as threats to academic freedom,..
Yogi Berra (1925-2015)
Baseball player Yogi Berra — whose birth name was Lawrence Peter Berra — died yesterday. Normally announcements of this sort on Daily Nous are reserved for academic philosophers, but I thought it would be appropriate to note the death of someone who is well known for sayings that have provoked the public to thoughts of puzzlement and paradox — and in such an amu..
Why You Should Teach Online Courses
“The more you hate the idea of teaching online, the more that online education needs you.”
That’s historian Joseph Rees (Colorado State – Pueblo), writing at Vitae. He is no fan of online courses, worried about their quality and effectiveness but notes that their increased prevalence is probably unstoppable. Here’s the context for the above quote:
I recently m..
Philosophy Majors Are Less Likely To Marry Each Other (updated)
Only 5% of “philosophy or religious studies” majors end up marrying other “philosophy or religious studies” majors, according to an analysis of census data by Dan Kopf at Priceonomics this past summer. This makes it one of the least common majors shared by married couples. Since, in the Census data, philosophy is lumped in with religious studies, we don’t know what ..
Philosophy Job Market Mentoring for Women
A program informally piloted last year is officially launching now as the Job Candidate Mentoring Program for Women in Philosophy. According to the program’s website,
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 ..
Fire at University of Chicago Philosophy Department
This past Sunday, a fire broke out in Stuart Hall at the University of Chicago, home to the school’s Department of Philosophy. No one was injured.
While information is at the time a bit tentative, current reports are that a shredder motor overheated, starting a fire which moved down the Department of Philosophy’s hallway. No foul play is suspected. I am told that..
Philosophers Doing “Ask Me Anythings” on Reddit
The folks at Wi-Phi are interested in doing more to bring together philosophers and the public, and one avenue they’re tentatively pursuing is having philosophers take part in “Ask Me Anything” (AMA) sessions on Reddit (you may recall the AMA that Peter Singer did a few months back).
The first one is tomorrow (Tuesday) at 11am Eastern time and will be with Chris ..