November 2005
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A Splinter in Philosophy or just some departments in flux?
In one of the comments threads, Brian Leiter gives voice to a view he has been promulgating for a while about the philosophical community in the United States. As he writes: “there is "agreement over methodology and approach" within particular sub-communities of English-speaking philosophers (e.g., the Princeton-MIT-Rutgers-Arizona-ANU nexus, or the Berkeley-Chicago-Pittsburgh-Harvard nexus, etc.).” …
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First Annual Conferenceon Empirical Legal Studies
I don’t generally do conference announcements, but this one is both "close to home" and likely to be of interest to many: First Annual Conference on Empirical Legal Studies University of Texas Law School 27-28 October 2006 Announcement & Call for Papers (Submission Deadline: June 30, 2006) The inaugural Empirical Legal Studies Conference will be…
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Tenure economics
I was thinking about posting this anyway, but it’s quite relevant to some of the things Jason says in the post below. You see the occasional conservative argument that tenure is a corrupt institution designed to give cushy lifetime employment to soft left-wingers who don’t want to deal with the rigors of competition. But most…
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Tenure and Academic Evaluation
[Full disclosure: I’ve benefited immensely from the current system of evaluating academics] Evaluating philosophers is fun (indeed, stay tuned this week for my list of ‘top ten most overrated New York Area philosophers’). But I’m increasingly suspicious of the way philosophers are evaluated in the field, and I’m sure my concerns here hold for many…
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USC offer to Byrne
Alex Byne has been offered a position at the rapidly improving Department of Philosophy at the University of Southern California. So now he has to decide between Boston, Princeton, and Los Angeles. Though I’d love to have him nearby, Alex has been a crucial figure in graduate education at MIT in the last decade, and…
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Advice on “Fly-Back” Interviews at Law Schools
A colleague elsewhere writes with some useful (and timely) advice for those seeking law teaching jobs: One subject on which there is relatively little advice out there (compared to the meat market and most relevant qualifications) is the flyback interview. I’ve seen a good number of candidates come through my school now, and it seems…
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Catch-all Solutions to Philosophical Problems
I’m now entering my second decade as a professor, and feel like I have amassed enough experience to point out certain trends. I’m not sure if the trends I want to talk about are the “normal science” of philosophy, or if they’ve been particularly noticeable in recent years, as philosophy has gotten more professionalized. What…
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Waynflete Professorship
My colleague John Hawthorne has been offered the Waynflete Professorship of Metaphysical Philosophy at Oxford. This culminates a series of high-profile offers in recent years that John has declined to stay at Rutgers, including Princeton and Yale. John is from England, so we all realize this will be sorely tempting for him, as will of…
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Finding Academic Jobs as a Couple
A student at a law school that produces a lot of law teachers writes: I have been doing searches on your blog to address the question of how should an aspiring academic couple proceed through the academic market. I recognize that these answers very much depend on the school, but if you could provide a…
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Analytic and Continental
As everyone knows, there is supposed to be a large difference between analytic philosophy and continental philosophy. The problem is of course that nobody has any clear idea of what analytic philosophy and continental philosophy are. We’re all very good at spotting clear instances of analytic philosophy (e.g. anything by David Lewis) and continental philosophy…
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The point of my blogging…
Last time we blogged, I was asked by a few people somewhat bemused by what I wrote what message I was trying to communicate by my blogging. I don’t have a message to communicate by my blogging. I’m certainly not blogging because I think I have any brilliant insights (if I think I have a…
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Reminder: the Brothers Stanley…
…philosopher Jason and economist Marcus will be guest-blogging Nov. 28 through Dec. 4! I’ll be back on Dec. 5. Enjoy!
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Perry on Philosophy and Philosophers
Charming, short essay by John Perry (Philosophy, Stanford); a taste: [A] thought about this wonderful and interesting group of people, my philosophical colleagues. I have a very distinct memory of arriving at the Eastern Meetings of the American Philosophical Association some years back, when they were held at a hotel in Baltimore. The meetings began…
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Friday poem: “I Am Knocking”
I Am Knocking I am knocking on doorssoliciting knowledgehow elegant Englishgreets me in silence I am dancing with wordsamazed at my powerwonder of languageI speak only nonsense I am probing the depthsmy limits to fathommagical voice saysno bottom to bottom I am wearing a suitnot to be noticedblessing of charityanyway naked I am staying insideprisoner…
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Oliver Kamm, Marko Attila Hoare, and the Importance of Being Able to Read
All schoolchildren take note: one reason it is really important to learn how to read well is because if you don’t, you might grow up and make a real ass of yourself in public, and do so repeatedly, all because of inadequate reading skills. Of course, learning how to read well is no protection against…
I respond to this report here https://jasonstanleyantifascist.substack.com/p/on-the-philosophical-muddle-that