Leiter Reports: A Philosophy Blog

Friday Poems: "Let us remember" and "Guilt"

Let us remember

Let us remember

The living

Overlooked as we amass

The dead

 

And assign them a value

Richer than dollars

Shapelier than gravestones

 

More memorable than

Whatever it is

We drop off to sleep

 

Forgetting

 

6/30-7/4/10

 

 

Guilt

How painful

Not to have suffered

 

Left in comfort

To seethe with resentment

 

Watching the bodies

Of those oh so fortunate

 

Sufferers

Float by

 

7/4/10

 

Copyright 2010 by Maurice Leiter

Posted with permission

Dupre on "What Darwin Got Wrong" Got Wrong

MOVING TO FRONT FROM YESTERDAY--SEE UPDATES, COMMENTS NOW INVITED

He joins the chorus.   If anyone competent in the philosophical and scientific issues has had anything favorable to say about the argument of this book anywhere, please send me a link.

UPDATE:  A couple of readers have already flagged the review by the biologist Richard Lewontin, the arch anti-adaptationist, as being somewhat more favorable than others, but I have not had a chance to read it yet myself.

ANOTHER:  Mohan Matthen, a philosopher of biology at the University of Toronto, writes:

Lewontin's review of Fodor and Piattelli-Palmarini in the New York Review of Books is perhaps the most sympathetic response by a competent biologist or philosopher of biology.

 

I assume that one reason why Lewontin is sympathetic to Fodor is that Fodor cited anti-adaptationism when he initially started in on his opposition to the use of the theory of natural selection in philosophical psychology.  (He and Chomsky got attacked by Pinker for this.)  But adaptationism (which, in one form or another, is very widely accepted among biologists) is a much more committed position than the Theory of Natural Selection: you can reject the former and accept the latter, and this is what Gould and Lewontin actually did.  (Their Spandrels paper certainly did not say that Darwin's use of natural selection was fundamentally mistaken.)  However that may be, Lewontin seems not to take strong exception to the fact that Fodor is not just anti-adaptationist, but opposed to most of the work that TNS does in biology.

 

Lewontin attributes to Fodor the view that natural selection is not an entity that causes evolutionary change.  He is sympathetic to what he takes to be Fodor's stand against the reification of natural selection -- he denies, and he thinks that Fodor also denies, that natural selection is a cause of evolutionary change in the way that gravitation is a cause of planetary motion.  (Ironically, a stand against this sort of reification is one of the pillars of the "statistical interpretation of natural selection", which has been advanced in recent years by Denis Walsh, André Ariew, and myself.  We are against reifying natural selection, but just for the record, we are strong proponents of TNS!)  However, this is not what Fodor is on about.  Fodor's view is that there is no such thing as selection-for -- he thinks that it is incoherent, for example, to say that the heart was selected for its pumping action, but not selected for making rhythmic noises.  Lewontin seems to have missed this point, or to have been blinded to its silliness because of a superficial similarity to the anti-adaptationist programme.

I invite comments from others well-informed about these issues; ALL COMMENTS MUST INCLUDE A FULL NAME IN THE SIGNATURE LINE as well as a valid e-mail address.  Comments may take awhile to appear, so submit your comment only once.

Update on the Howell Case, the Adjunct Religion Instructor at Illinois

Here.

Breaking News: The National Research Council Still Does Not Know When Its Report on Doctoral Programs (circa 2005) Will be Released

This is really quite amazing.  But given Ned Block's devastating critique, it probably doesn't much matter.

Political Interference with "World Philosophy Day" in Tehran?

Story here.

(Thanks to Reza Rad for the pointer.)

U of Minnesota Prof Calls Out Regents and Administration on Budget Priorities

Lots of readers have sent me links to this video of a Classics & Near Eastern Studies professor making a forceful statement before the Board of Regents about the financial priorities of the university, administrative bloat, and other malignant signs of the times at Minnesota and elsewhere.

Godfrey-Smith on Fodor & Piattelli-Palmarini on Natural Selection

Another patient and illuminating discussion, from the LRB.  (Earlier items here, here, here, and here, among other places.)

Franks from Toronto to Yale

Paul Franks (Kant, German Idealism, Jewish philosophy, epistemology) at the University of Toronto has accepted a senior offer from the Department of Philosophy at Yale University, where he will start in fall 2011.   This will give the Yale program very strong coverage of the history of philosophy, especially ancient, early modern, and now Kant and German Idealism.

U of Vienna's Pauer-Studer Also Wins Major ERC Grant

Herlinde Pauer-Studer, a philosopher at the University of Vienna, has also won a major European Research Council grant for a project on "distortions of normativity" during the Third Reich.  A brief description (in English) of the quite interesting project is here, and a more detailed article (in German) is here.  (She and David Velleman [NYU] have a paper on "Distortions of Normativity" forthcoming in Ethical Theory and Moral Practice.)

Strawson on Free Will in the NY Times Blog

Here.  It's an abbreviated version of the argument from his well-known paper "The Impossibility of Moral Responsibility," Philosophical Studies (1994).  There's a reasonably interesting discussion by philosophers here.  The comments at the Times site are, as usual, mostly hopeless, though my experience is that the Dunning-Kruger effect rules when it comes to who chooses to comment anonymously on web sites, so there is reason to hope that intelligent items like Galen's are more constructively received by the silent part of the public.

"The Heidegger Song"

Amusing (in German).  (Via Tim Crane.)

Why Are the Right-Wing Thugs So Effective at Policing the Major Media in the U.S.?

This is an astute analysis; an excerpt:

The American right wing is achieving its long-term goal of becoming the nation's thought police. They are realizing this goal through the timeless practices of extremists...which are intimidation, slander and harassment. In the past several months, conservative outbursts have ruined the careers of journalists, most of whom were of the political center, but who were indiscreet enough to say something that ran counter to the right's version of political correctness....

[Discusses cases of CNN's Octavia Nasr, Helen Thomas, David Weigel formerly of the Washington Post, Eason Jordan formerly of CNN, etc.]

Why is the screaming right so effective? Is it merely the volume? No, it is more complicated than that. Here is my explanation:

First, the Background:

1. In their daily lives the vast majority of Americans are apolitical. They really don't care about left or right politics because it doesn't seem to have much to do with their local lives. They are, however, the consumer audience for which the media outlets compete.

2. While inherently apolitical, this audience does not live in an apolitical media environment. In my opinion, there is no "objective media," much less a "liberal" one. The majority of the media outlets are one of two kinds. They are either: a) overtly conservative because they are owned by right-wing ideologues who are interested in inserting their ultra-conservative worldview into the heads of their audience (the Murdoch/Fox News bunch), or, b) they are "politically neutral" media operations (often owned by bigger businesses like Westinghouse and Disney) whose foremost interest is making a profit (CNN and its ilk)....

3. Since the end of World War II, leftist ideas have been demonized almost out of existence in the US. And, since 9/11, the "commies" have been transformed into Muslims. These simplistic stereotypes set the parameters for correct and patriotic thinking in this country, and they are delivered to you at different levels of intensity by both the conservative and "neutral" media systems. No matter how apolitical one might be in one's daily local life, these notions are in the media air, so to speak. You take them in almost by osmosis. They mess with your mind without you realizing it.

Writing Recommendations for your Philosophy Students Applying to Law School

Mark Decker (Nebraska/Omaha) writes:

I have a question about writing recommendation letters for students who are applying to law school.  When it comes to writing letters for graduate philosophy programs, I know what they're looking for and what to say.  But will a law school care, say, that a particular student did an independent study with me on epistemic expressivism?  Also, are there length restrictions on recommendation letters; is going beyond a single page permissible?

Any advice you have on this topic would be greatly appreciated.  Feel free to post these questions on the blog if you think that would help.

It is certainly true that JD admissions is unlike PhD admissions in a lot of ways.   Two obvious and pertinent differences in this context:   first, the primary evaluation of law school applications is done by a professional dean of admissions (usually someone with a JD), rather than by faculty (though the good news, I guess, is that, depending on the school, faculty are sometimes asked to take a look at the files of some applicants--I often see the files of applicants at Chicago with philosophy backgrounds, and I certainly give the letters significant weight in making recommendations to the admissions dean); second, law school admissions is very heavily driven by the "numbers" (this is, in part, a consequence of the pernicious influence of US News on U.S. law schools), meaning that the GPA and the LSAT score (the latter counting for as much as the former at most places) are decisive in the majority of cases.  (Again, schools vary--those that live-or-die by their US News ranking tend to make admissions decisions almost entirely 'by the numbers' [NYU and Northwestern, among top law schools, are examples], but there is no law school these days that doesn't give the numbers significant weight.)  Anyway, this second point means that there is in most cases very little you can write in your letter of recommendation that will really matter, unless, of course, the letter is negative.

With those caveats, it seems to me the following are some reasonable rules of thumb about writing letters for your philosophy students applying to law school:  (1) you don't need the same detail about the substance of philosophical work the student did as you would provide in a letter for PhD programs, but details about the kind of work (extensive writing, oral presentations, etc.) is useful, and of course some gloss on the substance (e.g., a class in the history of ethics, or a seminar in philosophy of language); (2) comparison of the student with other students you have known who have gone on to law school is useful; (3) law schools value analytical and argumentative skills, something which philosophy is rather good at teaching, so comments on these skills, to the extent the student has developed them, is particularly useful; finally (4) comments on the student's character, commitment, and collegiality are perhaps a bit more relevant and common than they would be letters for grad school.

The preceding observations are based on what I know about how law school admissions work and my experience reading letters that philosophers have written for JD applicants at Texas and Chicago.  But my experience, while probably greater than the average philosopher's, is limited, and I'd be curious to hear from other philosophy professors, as well as the stray law professor who may have wandered over here, on their experiences and impressions.  Signed comments preferred, as usual.

Oxford's Marmodoro Awarded One Million Euros from European Research Council for Five-Year Project on Ancient Metaphysics

Story here.  I don't think I've ever heard of such a generous grant for a project in ancient philosophy.  Kudos to Dr. Marmodoro and the ERC!

How do you get scholars to take Ayn Rand Seriously? Pay them of course!

Seriously, there are important issues raised in this piece about corporate efforts to inject Ayn Rand into the curricula at different universities.  (Thanks to David Auerbach for the pointer.)

I'm curious what readers think about the issue of financial donations with subject-matter strings attached.  Signed comments are much more likely to appear; all comments must include a valid e-mail address.   This is not an invitation to discuss the merits or demerits of Ayn Rand's work.  I am interested in what philosophers think about the institutinoal/academic freedom issues involved when money is given to promote a particular viewpoint or author.

Rampant Socialism in America!

Something must be done!

Two Philosophers Elected to British Academy

They are Terence Irwin (Oxford University) and Shalom Lappin (King's College, London).  Lappin, it will be recalled, had his job threatened at KCL, before the international outcry led the administration, wisely, to reconsider its plans.  But think about it:  administrators, without tenure as an obstacle of course (!), were going to fire a researcher whose work has now led to his election to the British Academy.   It would be hard to concoct a credible story about judgment this bad.

"Three Minute Philosophy"

This episode: Kant's ethics.  Rather amusing.

(Thanks to Daniel Groll for the pointer.)

Mark C. Taylor (Columbia Religion Dept.) is an Ignorant Menace

Professor Taylor--whom we've encountered previously arguing for "transforming" universities by destroying them and cheerleading for Derrida, has now weighed in, with his characteristic lack of insight and knowledge, on the subject of tenure.  Put aside the absurdity of a postmodernist religion professor peddling the "tough talk" of the marketplace; let's overlook too that salaries are not paid out of endowment (as he bizarrely suggests), but a combination of tuition, endowments, and research grants; and let's even grant him his make-believe numbers about what a professor costs over 35 years; the facts remain that:

1.  Tenure does not mean "lifetime employment, no possibility of dismissal," it means only dismissal for cause, with associated procedural safeguards;

2.  Dismissal only for cause is a less common employment arrangement in the United States than it used to be (though is still enjoyed by significant numbers of school teachers, police, firemen, and by many civil service employees, among others), but is far more common in other Western industrialized nations with stronger labor movements and established civil service systems; that it is not the norm in the U.S. is one of the pathologies of American society, to be lamented, not lauded;

3.  Tenure is an important part of the non-economic compensation for academics, and its abolition would raise the costs of hiring faculty astronomically;

4.  At the best research universities, the percentage of senior faculty who remain research-active 30 years after tenure is extremely high, which puts the lie to Taylor's absurd claim that "it is impossible to know whether a person's research is going to be relevant in five years let alone 35 years";

5.  Taylor's claim that "in almost 40 years of teaching, I have not known a single pereson who has been more willing to speak out after tenure than before" is such obvious bullshit, it's hard to believe he had the audacity to say this in public; in 17 years of teaching, I can think of at least a half-dozen cases of faculty who, after tenure, became markedly more outspoken and undertook more controversial research.  And bear in mind that the biggest threats to academic freedom are likely to come not from, e.g., state legislators pissed off by dumb or controversial reilgion professors (though without tenure there will certainly be more cases like that, as we have noted previously), but from powerful economic interests adversely affected by work on health and safety issues by scientists.  (One might also think that the recent experience in the U.K. without out-of-control administrative bureaucrats would give even Taylor some pause.)

There are two real problems with the current tenure system:  first, that universities are often too reluctant to seek dismissal for cause; second, that the academic freedom rights of untenured and non-tenure-stream faculty are insufficiently protected in the current system.  The AAUP could take the lead on the first issue, including by standing on the side of universities that terminate tenured faculty for cause and following proper procedures.  The AAUP might also help with the second, by being more aggressive about calling out universities that trample on the academic freedom of the non-tenured.

Taylor himself should be glad for tenure, since judging from the reaction to his piece I have heard, I imagine a majority of his Columbia colleagues would be glad to be rid of someone who embarrasses and endangers his institution this way.

An Open Letter to Article Referees

Here.

Putting Ayn Rand's Corpus to Good Use

A fine idea here.

New Philosophers' Carnival is...

...here.

Thank God the rich are doing OK in these difficult times...

...but are there any philosophers among the "Ultras"? 

Railton on Bloggingheads TV Discussing Evolution and Morality...

...with the journalist Robert Wright.  You can discuss the issues at the NHC's "On the Human" forum.  A written version of Railton's thoughts appears at the NY Times philosophy blog; the comments there, as usual, are fairly hopeless, confirming again that democracy is doomed (unfortunately, some of the "commenters" seem to have spilled over to the NHC blog, since the initial comments there are much more uneven than is typical). 

I did laugh when Mr. Wright described "The Stone" blog as well-received, but, as noted awhile back, things are now looking up--Railton this week, Nussbaum last, more good stuff to come, and hopefully nothing more about philosophers falling into wells.

This threat to academic freedom comes from the private sector...

...and with the complicity of many of the scientists involved.  So far no indication that British Petroleum is buying up any philosophers!

More details here.

Another Big Templeton Grant for Philosophy

This time to Christian Miller (Wake Forest) and colleagues for "The Character Project."  The Wake Forest press release is here. 

Speech recognition software for academic writing?

A former student, now studying at the University of Maryland, writes with a request:

If anyone has had success using speech recognition software for academic writing, philosophy in particular, Mark Engleson would appreciate any suggestions on selection and use of software packages. 

If you can help, please shoot Mark an e-mail.

Plato, Heidegger, Strauss, and Fascism

Alan Gilbert (Denver) and Hilary Putnam (Harvard) discuss.

More on Howell, the Religion Adjunct at Illinois

IHE raises some interesting issues here.

Whom do you write like?

MOVING TO FRONT FROM JULY 15--SEE UPDATE

Maybe this site will tell you, or maybe it's just nonsense.  Using two different blog postings, I was told that I write like Margaret Atwood (whom I've never read) and then Isaac Asimov.

UPDATE:  I think it's official:  it's utter nonsense.  Peter van Inwagen (Notre Dame) writes:

I pasted a paragraph from a paper of mine into the site "Whom do you write like?" (mentioned in Leiter Reports) and was told that I write like George Orwell. Very flattering, but the paper from which the paragraph was taken was *about* Orwell, and it contained some specific  references to his work. I tried again with a paragraph from the same paper that contained no references to Orwell and was told that I write like H. P. Lovecraft (less flattering). Paragraphs from two other papers elicited "Like David Foster Wallace" and "Like Stephen King"--the most unkindest cut of all. Here's the "Stephen King" paragraph: 

What, then, grounds this conviction? It certainly *seems* to be the case that Russell regards the statement ‘There is no reason to believe that God exists’ as having some sort of strong anti-theological or anti-theistic implications. But, surely, the strongest thesis that would be unacceptable to theists that can possibly follow from this statement, this statement *alone*, is what we might call “neutral agnosticism”: the thesis that a rational person—a rational person who is aware that there is no reason to believe that God exists—will regard neither the existence nor the non-existence of God as more likely than the other.  And yet it seems clear that Russell regards ‘There is no reason to believe that God exists’ as somehow implying, if not atheism, then, as one might call it, “strongly negative agnosticism”: the thesis that the rational person—a rational person who is aware that there is no reason to believe that God exists—will assign a far higher probability to the non-existence of God than to the existence of God. As we have seen, however, strongly negative agnosticism does not follow from the “no evidence” thesis. And yet Russell, who has some reputation as a logician, thinks that it does follow. Why he thinks this is an interesting question.

 (On re-reading this paragraph, I'm not very happy with it--but for philosophical rather than stylistic reasons; I'm going to have to revise it. But that doesn't let "Whom do you write like?" off the hook.)

 

In my view, the designers of "Whom do you write like?" might as well have used a program that responds to each submission with the name of a well-known writer chosen at random. Perhaps that *is* what they've done (or that plus an epicycle that causes the program to keep a record of submitted passages and ensures that a given piece of text will get the same response each time it is submitted)--although the "Orwell" response suggests that their program is a little more sophisticated than that.

 

Yours,

 

Peter

 

PS I found a paragraph from a Stephen King novel on line and submitted it. I was told that I write like Stephen King. But I can hardly be the only person to think of testing the site by submitting a passage by a famous writer, and "Whom do you write like?" no doubt keeps the texts of most best-selling novels on file--and, in any case, the paragraph I submitted contained several proper names that, to a high probability, occur only in King's novels. I tried again with an on-line open letter (about e-publishing) from King to his readers, and got the result, "You write like David Foster Wallace."

Democracy is Doomed, Part 172

Facts, schmacks.

(Thanks to Phil Gasper for the pointer.)

On Fascism, American-Style

Reader Tim Beaumont sends along a link to this old but fine essay by Henry Wallace, that we've had occasion to remark on previously.  Much of the analysis is alarmingly timely, e.g., "The American fascist would prefer not to use violence. His method is to poison the channels of public information. With a fascist the problem is never how best to present the truth to the public but how best to use the news to deceive the public into giving the fascist and his group more money or more power."  And Wallace was not thinking of Karl Rove or Fox "News."   Deja vu all over again, as the political philosopher Yogi Berra would say. 

Some More New Philosophy Books

I haven't posted in a couple of months on books I've received, so here's a list of some newly published items that might interest some readers:

Rawls and Habermas:  Reason, Pluralism and the Claims of Political Philosophy by Todd Hedrick (Stanford University Press, 2010)

The Routledge Companion to Nineteenth Century Philosophy edited by Dean Moyar (2010)

Tough Choices:  Structured Paternalism and the Landscape of Choice by Sigal R. Ben-Porath (Princeton University Press, 2010)

Limits of Legality:  The Ethics of Lawless Judging by Jeffrey Brand-Ballard (Oxford University Press, 2010)

In Memoriam: Brian O'Shaughnessy (1925-2010)

MOVING TO FRONT FROM JULY 11--SEE UPDATE

A conference on his important contributions to philosophy of mind and action was held in London just last month.  I will post links to memorial notices as they appear.

UPDATE:  An informative obituary by Mike Martin (UCL) in The Guardian.

Not a Proud Day for NYU: An Endowed Chair to be Named After Alan Greenspan!

And it's endowed by the social parasite who made money off of Greenspan's mishandling of the economy and creation of the housing bubble to boot!

In Memoriam: James F. Ross (1931-2010)

An expert in medieval philosophy, who also wrote in metaphysics and philosophy of religion, Professor Ross had been a member of the Department of Philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania since 1962, where he was Professor of Philosophy at the time of his death.

The Future for Sensible Gun Regulation in the U.S. in the Wake of the Supreme Court's Re-Writing of the Law

This skillfully crafted opinion by Judge Easterbrook from the 7th Circuit charts a useful path for other courts and municipalities trying to salvage some sanity when it comes to gun regulation in the wake of the Supreme Court's reinvention of the Second Amendment.  The basic legal strategy for local jurisdictions will be a combination of (1) barring gun ownership for large classes of individuals convicted of felonies and certain misdemeanors, and (2) devoting resources to securing additional convictions for those felonies and mismdemeanors.  The danger of the approach (connected to [2]) is obvious, but since regulation of guns is essential in many parts of the U.S., including Chicago, the Supreme Court has left local officials little choice.

The Strange Case of the Adjunct Religion Professor at the University of Illinois

Kenneth Howell, an adjunct at the University of Illinois offering courses on Catholic moral and social thought, has not had his contract renewed after a student complained about this e-mail that Howell sent to his class.    I imagine any philosopher reading the e-mail can see a legitimate reason for terminating Howell's contract, namely, that his characterization of utilitarianism and the quality of reasoning and argument are incompetent.  (Really, the kind of reasoning in Howell's e-mail would be unacceptable in a student paper, it really is a bit shocking to see this being offered as the professor's "explanation" of the issues.  Even allowing that it's an e-mail, it is amazingly bad.)  But according to news reports, that may not have been the reason he was terminated.  Instead, it appears his contract was not rewewed because a student complained who thought his teaching of standard Catholic doctrine about homosexuality was "hate speech."  On this thin factual record, this does look like a violation of Howell's academic freedom, as the AAUP President remarks in the original article.   (Legally, he probably has no remedy, however, given that adjuncts are 'at will' employees.)  I do wonder, though, what the facts are about what really goes on in Howell's classroom.  If the "arguments" offered in class were at the absurdly low level of the material in the e-mail, then I imagine that over the course of a term this could look more like proseltyzing than teaching the doctrines of a sectarian tradition.

UPDATE:  Howell's lawyers give their version of events here.  On those facts, it looks like a colorable First Amendment claim.

ANOTHER:  Comments towards the end of this news item suggest the e-mail incident may have been the tip of an iceberg.  We will see what, if anything, comes to light.  The University certainly seems correct to ask for a review of the matter with an eye to academic freedom issues.

More Higher Education Mischief by the Know-Nothings in Texas

I spent enough years watching the shenanigans in the Texas legislature to know that this new law has one and only one purpose:  to make it easier for right-wing crazies and ignoramuses to target and harass faculty.  What a disgrace. 

(Thanks to Phil Gasper for the pointer.)

How Much Does a Professor of Paleography Really Cost?

As usual, Iain Pears brings to light facts that do not reflect at all well on the King's College, London administration.

Salaries for Philosophy Professors at a Wide Range of Public Universities

This site collects data in the public domain for salaries across different fields, including philosophy, at a wide array of public universities, from the top PhD-granting department, to public schools focused on undergraduate education.  It is often, but not always, possible to search by "philosophy," though in some cases you need to search by name.  Anyone thinking of an academic career in philosophy ought to spend some time looking at this data in order to get a realistic sense of what the financial future might look like.  Philosophers earning over $100,000 per year in 2009 are in the minority.  Very distinguished senior philosophers (e.g., those elected to the American Academy, who can and do get offers from other leading departments) earn salaries in the $175-to-200,000 range.  There is some variation by region of the country, and there are outliers, like Rutgers.  Also bear in mind that the public data may not include summer salaries in some cases.   Private universities will, on average, pay somewhat more than their public peers, but bear in mind that most private institutions of higher education focused on undergraduate education are probably paying less (anecdotal evidence suggests a lot less) than the top public research universities like Michigan and California.

UPDATE:  A colleague elsewhere writes with some pertinent observations:  "[B]enefits can also matter a great deal. Three things stand out: college tuition benefits, retirement matching/contributions (especially if your contribution is small and the institutional contribution is large-ish, say, 4% & 10%, respectively) and the medical plan. These things can have a significant effect on take home pay, and should be taken into account. (For example, if you only have to contribute 4% of your salary instead of a counterpart contribution of 7%, your take-home pay is 3% higher than that of the counterpart.)"  College tuition benefits tend to be more of an issue at private, rather than state, universities. and even among wealthy private universities there is considerable variation in the size and portability of the benefit (Chicago and Wash U/St. Louis, for example, have significantly better college tuition benefits than Cornell and Penn, just to take examples with which I'm familiar.)  There are also some striking differences in retirement plans and the nature of the matching contributions.  My impression is that there is less variation in medical benefits between schools, but it is sometimes difficult to assess from the outside.

Signs of the Times

First:

American colleges are spending a smaller share of their budgets on instruction, and more on recreational facilities for students and on administration, according to a new study of college costs.

The report, based on government data, documents a growing stratification of wealth across America’s system of higher education.

At the top of the pyramid are private colleges and universities, which educate a small portion of the nation’s students, while public universities and community colleges serve greater numbers, have fewer resources and are seeing tuitions rise most rapidly....

The United States is reputed to have the world’s wealthiest postsecondary education system, with average spending of around $19,000 per student compared with $8,400 across other developed countries, says the report, “Trends in College Spending 1998-2008,” by the Delta Cost Project, a nonprofit group in Washington that advocates for controlling costs to keep college affordable.

“Our analysis shows that these comparisons are misleading,” said Jane Wellman, the project’s executive director. “While the United States has some of the wealthiest institutions in the world, it also has a ‘system’ of postsecondary education with far more economic stratification than is true of any other country.”

Community colleges, which enroll about a third of students, spend close to $10,000 per student per year, Ms. Wellman said, while the private research institutions, which enroll far fewer students, spend an average $35,000 a year for each one....

Second:

Whether it is their residence, a second home or a house bought as an investment, the rich have stopped paying the mortgage at a rate that greatly exceeds the rest of the population.

More than one in seven homeowners with loans in excess of a million dollars are seriously delinquent, according to data compiled for The New York Times by the real estate analytics firm CoreLogic.

By contrast, homeowners with less lavish housing are much more likely to keep writing checks to their lender. About one in 12 mortgages below the million-dollar mark is delinquent.

Though it is hard to prove, the CoreLogic data suggest that many of the well-to-do are purposely dumping their financially draining properties, just as they would any sour investment.

"The rich are different: they are more ruthless,” said Sam Khater, CoreLogic’s senior economist.

A Hopeful Sign Regarding the Idiotic "Impact" Measure for Universities in the U.K.

Story here:

The government is to delay the research excellence framework by a year to see whether consensus emerges in the sector over plans to measure the social and economic "impact" of academics' work.

David Willetts, the universities and science minister, said this week that he had yet to be convinced by the efficacy of the impact measure....

The first REF, which will replace the research assessment exercise as the means of distributing £1.5 billion in annual quality-related funding in England, was due to complete in 2013, with up to a quarter of departmental scores based on impact.

Mr Willetts, who is due to announce the delay in a speech on 9 July in London, told Times Higher Education that the new time frame was reasonable given the "lively dispute" on the issue.

He said that he wanted the Higher Education Funding Council for England to "establish whether there is a measure of impact that is methodologically sound and that commands the assent of the academic community". He added: "I don't believe those criteria have been met yet, but a year will give Hefce and the academic community longer to see if a consensus view emerges."

(Thanks to Emma Borg for the pointer.)

Hope for the NY Times Philosophy Blog

I have it on good authority that they are going to start inviting a somewhat stronger group of philosophers to contribute in the coming weeks.  Also good news is that it is not Critchley who is doing all the inviting.  (Earlier coverage here and here and here.)

Toronto Police Now Busy Trying to Rationalize Their Misconduct

Fortunately,they aren't very good at it.

(Thanks to Toby Chow for the pointer.)

More on NYU's Abu Dhabi Initiative

Here.

Speaking of Toronto, the Police There Would Benefit from Some Lessons in Ethics...

...and the law, since they've been going crazy (I think that's the right word for it) during protests at the G20 meetings:  see, e.g., this or this or scroll through all the material here.  Oddly, this has gotten almost no coverage in the major media in the U.S., at least not that I have seen.

Meanwhile, the U of T simply shut its campus 'in honor' of the G20 meetings!

(Thanks to Denise Reaume for several of these pointers.)

UPDATE:  Thanks to Ingo Brigandt for additional links:

Rape threats and sexual assault against female detainees:

http://drdawgsblawg.blogspot.com/2010/06/if-toronto-police.html

 

Amputee has his artificial leg ripped off by police before arrest: 

http://niagaraatlarge.com/2010/07/05/thorold-ontario-amputee-has-his-artificial-leg-ripped-off-by-police-and-is-slammed-in-makeshift-cell-during-g20-summit-%E2%80%93-at-least-one-ontario-mpp-calls-the-whole-episode-%E2%80%9Cshocking/

 

A very detailed detention account: 

http://backofthebook.ca/2010/07/01/how-i-got-arrested-and-abused-at-the-g20-in-toronto-canada/3476/

An excellent commentary by a constitutional lawyer on the secretly passed law that amounted to a temporary martial law in Toronto: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1kZwps4CPwc&feature=player_embedded

 

Up to a point, this has figured in Canada's mainstream media:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/adam-radwanski/mcguinty-washes-his-hands-of-police-mistreatment-allegations/article1623731/

 

Meanwhile, Michel-Antoine Xhignesse calls my attention to another piece on the secret declaration of a kind of martial law in the area of the G20 meetings!

 

What's happened to Canada?

 

ANOTHER UPDATE:  Mohan Matthen (Toronto) writes to take issue with some of the preceding:

 

I was quite surprised by a number of misstatements in the pieces that you linked to in your post on G20 Toronto.  I'll try to be brief.

U of Toronto Will Close Its Centre for Ethics

More information here.  This is surprising, given that value theory is one of the major strengths at U of T.  Anyone know the story?  Signed posts more likely to appear, though as long as there is a valid e-mail address (which won't appear) and good cause for anonymity, I'll consider those too.

The Decline of Tenure in the U.S.

This is an important piece that everyone should read.  We have started to see in the U.K. the effects of the end of de jure tenure, but the neo-liberal paradigm in higher education is working its effects here too, and will continue to do so.

(Thanks to Tom Carson for the pointer.)

"You've just committed genocide on an entire race of strawmen."

That memorable remark was attributed to the late Jay Rosenberg (North Carolina), but it certainly seems apt (as suggested to me by Jamin Asay) with respect to this extraordinarily silly piece by Ron Rosenbaum, purporting to be a defense of agnosticism, but which is mostly just a smear job on atheism and the "logical positivist" Alvin Plantinga (yes, that is a quote).

UPDATE:  Some good comments have appeared, perhaps from readers of this blog (if so, kudos to you folks!).  I like this one especially:

Atheism is NOT the certainty that there are no gods. It is NOT a conviction that science will one day answer all questions. Atheism is the refusal to believe in gods in the absence of evidence for their existence.  
 
Atheists do not believe in gods for exactly the same reason that you do not believe in unicorns. Even such prominent atheists as Richard Dawkins do not insist that they know with certainty that there are no gods (though they do admit to 99.99% certainty, in light of the available evidence), only that they are unwilling to believe in gods because there is no evidence that they exist (again, think of the unicorns), and are exasperated by people who not only choose to believe things for which there is no evidence, but choose to believe things for which there is ample evidence to the contrary.  
 
Until you understand the difference between not believing something and being certain it is false, you should probably refrain from writing about this subject, if only to avoid embarrassing yourself.