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In Memoriam: Karen Neander (1954-2020)
MOVING TO FRONT, ORIGINALLY POSTED MAY 11–UPDATED A professor of philosophy at Duke University since 2006, Professor Neander was well-known for her contributions to philosophy of mind, biology, and cognitive science. Before Duke, she taught at Johns Hopkins University and the University of California at Davis in the United States, and before that, in her…
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Wisconsin Supreme Court struck down Governor’s stay-at-home order on May 14…
…when the 7-day-average of new cases per day was about 300 for the state; 12 days later, it's now well over 400 new cases per day. Correlation or causation? I'll bet money on the latter. UPDATE: Today, May 28, Wisconsin recorded its second highest case total ever (the highest was less than a week ago).
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On cruel moralizers
Philosopher Paul Russell (British Columbia & Lund) comments.
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Blast from the past: Steve Fuller makes things up
It's important not to forget who the charlatans are.
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Coronavirus in Chicago (and Illinois): a timeline
MOVING TO FRONT, ORIGINALLY POSTED MARCH 14–VARIOUS UPDATES, MOSTLY FOR CHICAGO/ILLINOIS, FEWER NOW FOR NEW YORK CITY Just a snapshot of what's going on in one metropolis, that hasn't (yet!) been hit as bad as NYC or Seattle or parts of Northern California; I'll update this periodically. Illinois is doing a fair bit of testing,…
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Advertising update
June spots are now all sold out. In July I am taking a break from blogging, although I may put something up now and then, but I'm not selling ads that month. In August, I'll resume a lighter schedule of blogging and will sell ads at reduced rates. There is one spot open at each…
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States reopening but lying about their case counts and deaths?
Doubts about Georgia and Florida in this article. State officials fudging on data this important should be fired or, better yet, jailed.
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Works of philosophy summarized in one-syllable words
This game has been making the rounds on social media, and now many of the examples are collected here. Many are quite good; the one on Nietzsche, however, is incompetent (makes me wonder whether the author actually read the book).
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Naturalized epistemology, we need more of it
After Alvin Goldman, Hilary Kornblith (U Mass/Amherst) is my favorite among contemporaries in the analytic tradition, and this judicious review by philosopher Jennifer Nagel (Toronto) brings out his virtues rather nicely.
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Developing herd immunity: an interactive tool
The title of this piece is misleading–depending on variables like how long immunity lasts and how many others each infected person infects, herd immunity may be possible–but what's useful here is the tool that allows you to adjust he variables to see how that affects herd immunity, and how many would die in the process.…
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Penn’s tentative plans for next academic year
Realistic and instructive, probably a useful model for urban campuses; some excerpts: In light of the challenges before us, we want to share four major scenarios currently under consideration. Some of these could be productively combined. The four scenarios are: A hybrid experience with some in-person instruction. In a mostly online learning environment, classroom instruction…
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Great moments in obscure rock ‘n’ roll: Frankie Miller Band, “Ain’t Got No Money,” 1975
This tune comes from Scottish rock singer Frankie Miller's third album, and bears such an uncanny resemblance to a later Bob Seger song one wonders whether there was a copyright infringement action:
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Anthony Fauci on colleges reopening
Cautious, but sensible; here is his take on how to reopen in the fall: I don’t think it’s going to be one size fits all. I think it’s going to depend on the location of where the particular university or place of higher education is, what the demography of the students is, where they’re coming…
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Detailed plans from the University of North Carolina about fall opening
Here; some excerpts from the Chancellor's message: [W]e will ask you to practice physical distancing, wash your hands often, use hand sanitizer, maintain clean spaces and wear appropriate face coverings/masks (provided by the University for those who need them), among other best practices…. The College of Arts & Sciences, along with our schools and units,…
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Blast from the past: shameless hypocrisy of philosophers edition
Back in 2018: philosopher Adriel Trott (Wabash), who participated in the online harsassment of Rebecca Tuvel, complains about online harassment in philosophy!
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After the “war” against COVID-19, we’ll also need “war crimes” trials for…
…Governor Cuomo of New York and Mayor DiBlasio of New York City. See, for example, this and this, but especially this damning ProPublica report contrasting their performance with the performance of San Francisco's Mayor and California's Governor. Having screwed up the initial response, Governor Cuomo has certainly shown himself to be an adept public communicator,…
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Spinoza: moving to center stage in the modern canon?
So argue two Spinoza scholars, Clare Carlisle (KCL) and Yitzhak Melamed (Johns Hopkins) in this interesting TLS essay; an excerpt: The fate of the Ethics in the Anglo-American world is another story. In the 1970s and 80s most analytic philosophers regarded Spinoza as an uncritical and extravagant metaphysician, whose strange ideas might – at best…
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Katha Pollitt, the longtime feminist critic at The Nation, on why she does not believe Tara Reade
I don't read many columnists at The Nation, but I have read Pollitt off-and-on for many years (and it was a thrill to get to have dinner with her last year, when she and Steven Lukes were in town). Here's her sensible take on the Reade business (earlier coverage). I suppose I shouldn't be surprised…
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Pharmaceutical giant spending $1 billion on vaccine development, aiming for the fall
And Pfizer isn't alone in such efforts. This is another reason to be hopeful that science and modern medicine may save us from the incompetence of the political leadership in the U.S. and other backwards countries.
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Open letter from Fordham graduate students seeking better university support during the pandemic
Like their peers at Villanova, the Fordham students are also in need. (Thanks to Ricky DeSantis for the pointer.)
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Cambridge University announces *lectures* will be on-line next year…
…but that still leaves open the possibility of in-person teaching in small groups and tutorials.
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Some (slightly) promising early data on the Oxford vaccine
Here, an excerpt: Preclinical data from a leading COVID-19 vaccine candidate from Oxford University suggest that it may be more like the flu vaccine than the smallpox jab, reducing the severity of symptoms but not preventing infection. Such a vaccine could help individuals infected with SARS-CoV-2 avoid pneumonia and the downward spiral that all too…
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38% of church attendees in Arkansas got COVID-19
Another indication of the problem of groups in enclosed spaces for extended periods of time: The two [index] cases occurred in a husband and wife; the husband is the pastor at a local church (church A). The couple (the index cases) attended church-related events during March 6–8, and developed nonspecific respiratory symptoms and fever on…
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Notre Dame to start two weeks earlier than planned in order to finish by Thanksgiving
Basically every school in the U.S. should be doing this. As I noted back in early April, it's beyond insane during a pandemic to think of sending thousands of students home for a few days and then bringing them back in December for some more school! Starting Winter or Spring terms are going to be…
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New report on the state of the humanities from the AAAS
IHE article here, and you can find the portion of the report specifically about philosophy departments here. Robert Townsend, Director of the Washington Office of the American Academy, sent along this helpful summary of the findings for philosophy: Philosophy departments employed approximately 6,735 full- and part-time faculty members in fall 2017, with an average of…
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Blast from the past: if universities had only arisen after WWII, would philosophy have been taught?
A discussion of some counterfactul speculation by Dummett (back in 2010).
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More on the pathetic case of Tara Reade
This latest bit of reporting should surely put this spectacle to rest. Even before this expose, it was clear that Ms. Reade was a bit "off," quite apart from the other problems with her credibility. (While some segments of "woke" social media seem to think believing Ms. Reade is obligatory, some segments of reactionary social…
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Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews
I learned this morning from Stacie Gutting, the editor of NDPR, that this summer will mark 20 years since NDPR's founding. Kudos to Stacie and her late husband Gary for making NDPR the success it has become! On July 1, a new editor will take over from Stacie, and ownership of the journal will transfer…
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Illinois shut down, Iowa did not…
…and those on the Illinois side of the Illinois/Iowa border fared better as a result. We are lucky to have had an adult and rational Governor who acted early. (Thanks to Dr. David Ozonoff for the pointer.)
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Great moments in obscure rock ‘n’ roll: Asylum Choir, “Tryin’ to Stay ‘Live,” 1971
Pianist Leon Russell and guitarist Marc Benno were studio musicians in California when they formed the band Asylum Choir in 1967. This song comes from their second album, recorded in 1969, but not released until 1971, when Russell had already become famous as a solo performer:
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Marquette adopts new calendar, with fall term ending before Thanksgiving
A good plan (hopefully it will work!). (Thanks to Gregory Mayer for the pointer.)
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President of Harvard explains why the endowment can’t help right now
OK, not really the President of Harvard. But this is pretty funny. (Thanks to Phil Gasper for the pointer.)
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How to study COVID-19 and racial disparities
This is sensible; from the concluding parts of the essay: In addition, when SES [Socio-economic status] is controlled for and does not explain all Covid-19 racial disparities, we should clearly state why that might be the case. One possible explanation is the role of stress and what public health researcher Arline Geronimus has termed “weathering,”…
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An important moral question
This "morality test" is making the rounds; Jerry Dworkin kindly sent me a copy. Its author is unknown. This test only has one question, but it's a very important one. By giving an honest answer, you will discover where you stand morally. The test features an unlikely, completely fictional situation in which you will have…
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Armed terrorists cause Michigan legislators to flee in fear
But it's legal in the benighted state of Michigan. Not all of the United States is a backwater dominated by armed thugs, but more and more of it is. "Anywhere out of this world," said Baudelaire.
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Two senior appointments for Aberdeen: Beaney from KCL, Kallestrup from Copenhagen
Michael Beaney (history of analytic philosophy), Professor of Philosophy at King's College, London and at the Humboldt University, Berlin, will leave his half-time post at KCL to be Regius Professor of Logic at the University of Aberdeen (he will continue the rest of his time at Humboldt). Jesper Kallestrup (epistemology, philosophy of mind), Professor of…
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News and views about philosophy, the academic profession, academic freedom, intellectual culture, and other topics. The world’s most popular philosophy blog, since 2003.
Everything you say is true, but what is the alternative? I don’t think people are advocating a return to in-class…
The discussion here assumes an institutional context where returning to supervised in-person assessment is at least theoretically feasible, a reasonable…
Cyber security professional here -reliably determining when a computational artifact (file, etc.) was created is *hard*. This is sorta why…
Agreed with the other commentator. It is extremely unlikely that Pangram’s success is due to its cheating by reading metadata.
I see this question as a bit naïve. There is metadata on every document created by a modern word processor…
There’s a simple way to test. Open a pre-2022 essay and copy-and-paste it into a new file.
To be worth using, a detector needs not only (A) not get very many false positives, but also (B) get…