I think it’s obvious that contemporary professional philosophy has a gender-gap and a minority-gap, no matter how one calculates the percentages of women or members of minority groups (ethnic and racial, economic class, sexual-orientation, disability, etc.) in the field: that is, whether it’s in relation to all current tenure-track faculty of any age-cohort (including emeritus/a … [continue reading]
Monthly Archives: August 2013
The Schizophrenia of Authentic Philosophy, Part 1
There are authentic and inauthentic philosophers in the professional philosophical world. An authentic philosopher is one who, at the very least, does philosophy without regard for what the profession as a whole decides is right or correct simply by fiat. In other words, an authentic philosopher is one who does not let the prevailing biases … [continue reading]
“Under Submission”: 4 Radical Fixes for the Philosophy Publication Racket
I once had a colleague, now quite a well-respected person in his sub-field, and the holder of a prestigious professorship at one of The Fortune 500 Philosophy Club universities, of whom it was said that he loved refereeing because that way he could keep his enemies out of print. Indeed, after a few drinks, he … [continue reading]
FOOC the MOOCs.
The U.S. Supreme Court has declared that corporations are people, so I guess it’s not surprising that universities are corporations…. and College and University Presidents are much like CEOs. The main goal of higher education, then, must be to make a profit. At my home institution, online courses were developed as a means to boost summer … [continue reading]
If We’re So Smart, Then Why Are We Such Assholes?
This is a true story about my life, followed by a short argument. Last Saturday, Y sent to the APP circle the following bit of text, which in turn was excerpted from this article, which by now everyone in professional philosophy has either read or heard about: Scholars in all disciplines have disagreements. But philosophy … [continue reading]