Do Not “Do Not Cite or Circulate”
Lee Anne Fennell, a professor at the University of Chicago Law School, has written a short and amusing paper entitled “Do Not Cite or Circulate.” It’s directed at legal academics, but applies just as well to philosophers. From the opening paragraph:
Law professors, who are generally quite enamored of their own words and not especially reluctant to toss around the..
Philosophy and Depression
In the wake of Peter Railton’s Dewey Lecture, I have been asked to create a space on Daily Nous for philosophers to share their experiences of depression and other forms of mental illness. Discussion of the personal and professional challenges confronting those afflicted by these conditions, ways in which the behavior of others affected your experiences in this rega..
College Credit Philosophy Courses for High School Students
The Alexis de Tocqueville Project in Law, Liberty, and Morality at the University of New Orleans has been offering free for-credit college philosophy courses to local high school students. It sounds great. Chris Surprenant, assistant professor of philosophy at UNO and director of the Tocqueville Project, shared some information about the course:
The overarching f..
Peter Railton’s Dewey Lecture (updated)
A number of people have remarked (here and elsewhere) on the Dewey Lecture delivered by Peter Railton (Michigan) at the American Philosophical Association’s Central Division Meeting this past week. Professor Railton has been kind enough to provide me with a copy of the lecture, which he emphasizes is a draft. I have posted it here (UPDATE 2/27/15: this is a link to..
Recruitment Weekend & Department Climate
Many graduate programs set aside a time for all prospective students to visit and learn about their departments and universities. Lauren Leydon-Hardy, a philosophy graduate student at Northwestern University, writes in with some information about one aspect of their “recruitment weekend”:
When I visited Northwestern as a prospective student in 2011, I used an opp..
Keith Donnellan (1931-2015)
Keith Donnellan, professor emeritus in the philosophy department at UCLA, has died. Donnellan was known for his work in philosophy of language, particularly on definite descriptors. I will post links to obituaries as they appear.
Can We Save Philosophy? (Guest Post by Robert Kirkman) (updated)
The following is a guest post* by Robert Kirkman, associate professor in the School of Public Policy at Georgia Tech and director of its Center for Ethics and Technology, in which he takes up the problem of academic philosophy’s seeming irrelevance to others both inside and outside of academia.
Can We Save Philosophy?
by Robert Kirkman
I write this from the ..
What’s Going On at the Central?
The Central Division meeting of the American Philosophical Association is underway. Let’s hear about it.
Hanti Lin’s “Doing a PhD and Getting a Job in Philosophy”
Check out “Hanti’s Notes on Doing a PhD and Getting a Job in Philosophy” by Hanti Lin, assistant professor of philosophy at UC Davis. It has a lot of good advice. Of particular value is the “When to do what?” section. Also, I appreciate the “Health maintenance” section, the issues under which do not get discussed as frequently as they should. Throughout the guide, L..
Is this video a test of your rationality or your humanity or what?
Boston Dynamics builds robots. Here’s a video of “Spot,” their robotic dog. Watch until at least the 10-second mark.
Is it wrong to kick the dog? What can we learn from our reactions to this video?
An article here reports on the reactions of others.
Philosophical Non-Academic Jobs
A graduate student writes in asking for suggestions of “careers that might be especially ‘philosophy friendly’. By that I mean careers that either have employers who typically value the skills developed and areas of research explored in the study of philosophy or allow someone who studied philosophy to do something semi-related they might enjoy.”
He adds, “I’m th..
“Motivational” Posters from Philosophers
Flavorwire posts a set of (de)motivational posters featuring quotes “from your favorite depressing philosophers.” Philosophers, I think we can do better. My attempts:
These were pretty easy to make by modifying this blank version of the stereotypical corporate motivational poster, but afterwards (of course) I noticed what looks like an even easier met..
Arizona’s Freedom Center Wins $2.9m Grant
The John Templeton Foundation has awarded a $2.9 million grant to the University of Arizona’s Center for the Philosophy of Freedom, which is directed by David Schmidtz.
According to press release from the university:
The gift to the center, part of the UA’s College of Social and Behavioral Sciences, will be used to help the center to collaborate with the colle..
Adjunct Walkout Day: What are you doing?
Adjuncts sometimes say they make up higher education’s invisible class. So an idea pitched on social media a few months ago struck a chord: What would happen if adjuncts across the country turned that invisibility on its head by all walking out on the same day? National Adjunct Walkout Day, proposed for Feb. 25, immediately gained support, and adjuncts continue to u..
Invite-Only and Cliquey Conferences
In the discussion of the “Networking and Merit” post last week there were a number of comments (including a few that did not get approved) about conferences that are invitation-only or appear to be cliquey, accepting mainly friends of the organizers or those closely connected to them.
Our standards for good journals involve anonymous review, as our recent “journ..
Plagiarism Policies
In November of last year, Daily Nous hosted a guest post that exposed the extraordinary plagiarism of Iranian philosopher Mahmoud Khatami (follow-ups here and here). One of the articles alleged to be a work of plagiarism was a 2007 article of his in Topoi: An International Review of Philosophy, entitled “On the illuminationist approach to imaginal power: outline of ..
Quantifying the Influence of Prestige
A new study by an interdisciplinary team of researchers focuses on “who hires whose graduates as faculty” in order to “present and analyze comprehensive placement data on nearly 19,000 regular faculty in three disparate disciplines. Across disciplines, we find that faculty hiring follows a common and steeply hierarchical structure that reflects profound social inequ..
List of Shibboleth Names
The blog “454 W 23rd St New York, NY 10011-2157” provides a “list of shibboleth names”—mispronounced names of cultural VIPs “by which the privileged judge their inferiors.”
It reminded me of a conversation I had a long time ago with a rather distinguished professor of philosophy, in her office, that went something like this:
Me: So I was wondering if you could..
Networking and Merit in Philosophical Success
Critiquing the Philosophy Tag game, commenter “Aspasia,” a tenure-track professor, worries about it “perpetuating the status quo of getting somewhere by networking rather than on the basis of merit in philosophy.” Leave aside Philosophy Tag. Let’s look at the broader issue about the role of networking in philosophy. It crops up in a lot of places such as publishing ..
Irving Singer (1926-2015) (updated)
Irving Singer, professor emeritus of philosophy at MIT, has died. He had been at MIT since 1958. The following is from an obituary posted by MIT:
Singer was an eminent philosopher whose academic career spanned 65 years — with more than half a century as a professor at MIT. Singer was the author of 21 books in the field of humanistic philosophy, focusing on topic..
Update from Abbate on McAdams (updated)
Cheryl Abbate, the former Marquette University philosophy graduate student who had become the target of a smear campaign by associate professor of political science John McAdams, has responded to some of the claims being made in various articles since it was announced that Marquette is seeking to fire McAdams. She writes:
It should be noted that there are a numb..
Stock a High School Library with Philosophy Books
Which philosophy books would you recommend for a high school library? That is the question currently being asked by Hallie Liberto (Connecticut), on behalf of her mom:
My mom is currently choosing books for the philosophy section of the high school library at the Overseas School of Colombo. She wants some recommendations—books that would be particularly good fo..
The Intellectual Costs of Misconduct (guest post)
The following is a guest post* from a woman graduate student in philosophy who wishes to remain anonymous.
Lately, I’ve been reflecting on the complicated ways issues of equity connect with intellectual and professional respect. On philosophy blogs there has been extensive discussion regarding the climate for women in philosophy, issues of sexual misconduct, ..
Philosophy Tag
In our previous edition of Philosophy Tag, my attempts to get Sarah Conly (Bowdoin) to tag someone’s article failed. She instead tagged someone’s book. Ok, fine. Michael Bishop (Florida State) had tagged her book, and I allowed it, so how could I deny her the opportunity to do the same? She tagged When The State Speaks, What Should It Say? by Corey Brettschneider (B..
Turing Manuscript to be Auctioned (updated)
Bonhams, an auction house, is selling an Alan Turing manuscript in New York on April 13th. From the Bonham’s site:
A key handwritten scientific document by Alan Turing, in which he works on the foundations of mathematical notation and computer science, is to be sold in the Fine Books & Manuscripts sale at Bonhams New York on 13 April. The manuscript is expected t..
APA Looking for Blog Editor (updated)
The American Philosophical Association (APA) will be starting a blog and is conducting a search for its editor:
Ha ha ha, APA. Thanks for the invitation.
According to an email from APA Executive Director Amy Ferrer:
The blog will give the APA a major presence in the blogosphere, while helping to serve the mission of the association and providing a forum..
Online Conferences: Pros, Cons, Tips
“I am about to be involved in organizing an online conference and I am interested in how the group mind of philosophy thinks about it,” writes a regular Daily Nous reader in an email. Reasons to make your conference an online conference? Reasons not to? Reports on how they’ve gone from both organizer and participant points of view? Technical suggestions? Organizing ..
Peter Menzies (1953-2015) (updated)
Peter Menzies, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, Macquarie University, has died. Before his appointment at Macquarie, he held positions at the University of Sydney and Australia National University. He had also been a visiting scholar at several institutions, including MIT, Stanford, and Cambridge.
Huw Price and Philip Pettit write (over the PHILOS-L list):
Pe..