Leiter Reports: A Philosophy Blog

How Vietnam avoided a COVID catastrophe

Pretty remarkable, given the size of the country and the proximity (and ties) to China.  Nothing like competent political leadership during a catastrophe.

Great moments in obscure rock 'n' roll: Tear Gas, "Woman for Sale," 1971

Scottish hard rock band, this comes from their second album:

 

Can President Trump federalize the National Guard and/or send in the U.S. military to restore order?

Yes to both.   The Insurrection Act was utilized during the Civil Rights era to insure state compliance with court decisions in the American South, and it was utilized again during the urban riots of 1967 and 1968 in cities like Detroit and Chicago.

Biden's proposal to lower Medicare eligibility to age 60

This is informative.

(Thanks to Dr. David Ozonoff for the pointer.)

Yet another charlatan in the Trump administration

But at least he thought pretending to have a PhD in philosophy was better than having a PhD in management!

(Thanks to John Casey for the pointer.)

Philosopher Kathleen Stock (Sussex) calls out some bad actors in academic philosophy

Here (and scroll down).

Section 230 and Twitter

Section 230 of the ironically-named 1996 "Communications Decency Act" provides that:  "No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider" (47 U.S.C. § 230).   What this means is that, whereas the New York Times is liable in tort if it publishes a letter that defames you or intentionally causes you emotional distress, if the exact same statement appears on Twitter, Twitter is not liable, only the author of the letter is.  (The author of the letter is liable in both contexts, of course.)  

The provision was meant to encourage the development of the Internet, which it has, and it is also primarily responsible for the Internet being the cesspool of misinformation, abuse, and tortious wrongdoing that it is.   Although Twitter polices speech on its platform in arbitrary ways, it--like most social media platforms--claims it would be impossible to actually police the platform for unlawful speech.   Note the further irony that Twitter, as things stand, is legally responsible for copyright violations by its users, and has established procedures for remedying such violations (these rules also impose burdens and costs on those claiming copyright violations).  Why Twitter and other social media platforms should get a pass on tortious wrongdoing by their users but not on violations of copyright by their users is a bit puzzling, shall we say.

More on the need for ventilation in indoor spaces--social distancing is not enough

A Dutch study, summarized here.

‘After a single cough, it takes about five minutes for the number of small droplets in the air to be halved,’ the researchers said. These tiny droplets are therefore much more dangerous when it comes to possible transmission of coronavirus. When the same experiments were repeated in a well-ventilated room, the results improved dramatically. With only mechanical ventilation turned on, half of the droplets disappeared within 2.5 minutes, but in a room that also had a door and window open, the number of droplets was halved after 30 seconds – ten times faster than in the unventilated room.

Read more at DutchNews.nl:

‘After a single cough, it takes about five minutes for the number of small droplets in the air to be halved,’ the researchers said. These tiny droplets are therefore much more dangerous when it comes to possible transmission of coronavirus. When the same experiments were repeated in a well-ventilated room, the results improved dramatically. With only mechanical ventilation turned on, half of the droplets disappeared within 2.5 minutes, but in a room that also had a door and window open, the number of droplets was halved after 30 seconds – ten times faster than in the unventilated room.

Read more at DutchNews.nl:

Sweden has highest rate of COVID-related deaths per capita in the world...

...according to this source, although one suspects Brazil, which is close, may not be testing or keeping track as thoroughly as Sweden.

Princeton Sociology Department will not accept PhD applicants in 2020-21

MOVING TO FRONT FROM YESTERDAY--SEE THIRD COMMENT WHICH  EXPLAINS WHAT PRINCETON IS DOING

Now this is a striking decision, not only because this is a top sociology PhD program, but because Princeton is far and away the richest university in the United States.  Have other PhD programs in philosophy or other fields announced that they are suspending admissions for a year?

In Memoriam: Ronald Giere (1938-2020)

A leading contributor to the philosophy of science, Professor Giere taught for roughly twenty years at Indiana University, Bloomington, before moving to the University of Minnesota in 1987, where he spend the remainder of his teaching career.  I will add links to memorial notices as they appear.

Texas is opening up, so the Dallas Morning News asked some experts what activities would be safe

The answer is very little that is indoors, a bit more that is outdoors.

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 native Australia.  I will add links to memorial notices as they appear.

UPDATE:  The Australasian Society of Philosophy memorial notice.

UPDATE:  The Duke memorial notice.

ANOTHER:   La Trobe's memorial notice.

Blast from the past: ignorance of philosophy, identity politics, and the cosmopolitan ideal

Back in 2014.

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).

Richard Marshall interviews Richard Gipps (Oxford)...

...at 3:16 AM.

Class action law firm filing suits around the U.S. against universities seeking tuition refunds

While many schools refunded prorated room and board, I'm not aware of any who have refunded tuition, but that's exactly what a growing number of lawsuits are seeking.  This will add to the serious financial woes of U.S. universities, especially if the plaintiffs are successful and online teaching continues into the coming academic year.

On cruel moralizers

Philosopher Paul Russell (British Columbia & Lund) comments.

Blast from the past: Steve Fuller makes things up

It's important not to forget who the charlatans are.

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, but not nearly enough.  Technically these are the numbers for Illinois, but almost all the cases are in the Chicago metropolitan area (9.5 million people are in the Chicago metro area, Illinois has 12.5 million altogether, Cook County, where Chicago is, has 5.2 million people; the data is broken out starting March 18):

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 level right now.   Regular blogging resumes in September as do the regular rates, and there's still plenty of spots to choose from.   E-mail me for more information.

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.

Impact of the pandemic on universities in the UK

This is a pretty sobering assessment; some excerpts:

Manchester University published what it considered its worst-case scenario about what might happen next year: 80 per cent of students from outside the EU and 20 per cent of UK and EU students could  defer or drop out. On that basis, they estimate, the university stands to lose £270m in a single year.

If you work through that scenario, it means the UK universities would be down by £6.7bn from tuition fees alone. Last year, excluding one-off pension costs, most institutions ran a narrow financial surplus. They made about 3.5 per cent more than they spent. Under the nightmare scenario, the lost fees would drive the average university to a 16 percentage point deficit.

Assume, too, that universities might lose two terms of housing, catering and conference income. Social distancing is cancelling events, preventing full occupancy of buildings – and has already cost them one term of rent. That would add another £1.5bn to the losses, and the average deficit could drift out to 20 per cent. Even if that were a one-off hit, and institutions could be sure that the good times were coming back, it would mean a lot of debt for the sector to carry. For some institutions, it would mean the end....

The hardest hit institutions in our scenario in absolute terms include a lot of very famous institutions: UCL would lose £115m in fees. Manchester, King’s, Edinburgh, Leeds and Warwick more than £60m....

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).

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.

New CDC estimates on COVID

35% of cases are asymptomatic (but still infectious), while the fatality rate for those with symptoms is .4% (so four times worse than the standard estimate for flu mortality); from a CNN article:

The fifth scenario is the CDC's "current best estimate about viral transmission and disease severity in the United States." In that scenario, the agency described its estimate that 0.4% of people who feel sick with Covid-19 will die.

For people age 65 and older, the CDC puts that number at 1.3%. For people 49 and under, the agency estimated that 0.05% of symptomatic people will die.

The article goes on to note one expert's skepticism about the fatality numbers as being too optimistic.

Why did the APA Board terminate the "Committee on Philosophy and Law"

See here, and for some further detail, the end of the 2018-19 report.  The latter seems to suggest it has something to do with the fact that so many legal philosophers are not in philosophy departments, but other units (like law schools, but not only there).   Does anyone know what the story is?

(Thanks to Michael Sevel for the pointer.)

 

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.

(Thanks to Jerry Dworkin for the pointer.)

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 would be offered for small seminars, research group meetings, experiential clinics, studios, and other courses enrolling no more than 25 students. These classes could be offered in lecture halls and other large venues that accommodate physical distancing and facial coverings and could even include newly installed Plexiglas barriers for separating lecturers from the audience. All larger classes of more than 25 students would be delivered online, even for those living on campus.

An in-person experience ending at Thanksgiving break. In this scenario—compatible with the hybrid experience described above—the fall semester would begin and end on schedule, but all on-campus activities would conclude as Penn breaks for Thanksgiving. After Thanksgiving, the remainder of the fall semester would be conducted online. In some cases, in order to ensure the required hours of instruction, some classes might schedule additional meetings in the early evening and/or on Saturdays.

More robust summer course offerings in 2021. To maintain flexibility for our students, we could offer expanded class options, in addition to our current strong summer programming, during the summer of 2021, providing greater opportunities for earned academic credits and cohort-based experiential learning. This scenario is also compatible with the first two scenarios above and would enable us to accommodate an even wider range of educational needs and preferences.

An entirely online experience for the fall semester. In the event that the pandemic precludes us from bringing students back to campus in the fall, we would then conduct all fall semester instruction, mentoring, and advising at a safe distance via technology. In this scenario, we would make every effort to bring students back to campus as soon as possible and to preserve class traditions, including for our entering Class of 2024. This scenario is distinct from the first two scenarios above but compatible with the third....

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:

 

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 from. All of these things have to be taken into account.

A number of presidents of universities have been in discussions with us at the task force, with the vice president and with others, talking about creative ways where they could continue the education and yet safeguard the safety and the health of the students. There are a variety of models.

One of the models has been to essentially test all the students before they come in, just so that you know what the baseline of infection is. Test them both to see if they’re actually infected with tests for the virus, as well as — depending upon the technology at the time — antibodies to see if they had been previously exposed.

But one of the things that I have heard — and I’m not necessarily saying I’m advocating it because I think it’ll be appropriate variably depending on where you are — is to get at least a baseline and intermittently survey the students. By baseline, meaning you know when you start on Day 1 what you’re dealing with and intermittently do random surveillance every couple of weeks or what have you. You have to have the capability when students get infected, which they will, to then get them to a situation where they would be able to be comfortably isolated if in fact they’re just waiting out a relatively mild infection. Or, if they get ill, to have the health care available for them.

As this IHE article confirms, it is likely that there will be more than enough testing available by fall, although the cost may be prohibitive for some schools.

APA announces Spring 2020 prizes

Here.

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, are reconfiguring in-person course instruction to include physical distancing provisions. These considerations mean that small classes will meet in larger spaces, and large lecture classes may be split into smaller sections, delivered remotely or consist of a combination of both. Our goal is to offer as much flexibility for students and faculty as possible.

Under guidance from our infectious disease and public health experts, we have revised the academic calendar to begin classes a week earlier and conclude before Thanksgiving. We made the difficult decision to eliminate fall break not only to finish sooner but also to minimize possible virus spread associated with travel....

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!

Sweden's approach to the pandemic hasn't worked very well

An interesting thread, with links, from Yale's Professor Christakis.

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, but that doesn't change the fact that people died because they didn't get going soon enough.

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 – be allowed into serious discourse only once domesticated. This often meant abstracting his arguments from his complex engagement, constructive as well as critical, with Jewish and Christian scriptural and philosophical traditions.

This uneasy reception of the Ethics into contemporary anglophone philosophy changed dramatically with the re-emergence of analytic metaphysics in the 1990s. A new generation of rigorously trained philosophers and historians of philosophy – all of them indebted to Edwin Curley’s astute, scholarly translation of the Ethics – found Spinoza’s strict naturalism, uncompromising systematicity and deep aversion towards anthropocentric illusions immensely attractive. Don Garrett and Michael Della Rocca did groundbreaking work that repositioned Spinoza as a meticulous rationalist. In 2017 Della Rocca assembled twenty-five scholars to produce The Oxford Handbook of Spinoza, much of it devoted to metaphysical issues arising from the Ethics, and since then OUP has published significant books on Spinoza’s metaphysics by the North American philosophers Sam Newlands and Martin Lin, as well as an outstanding new collection of papers by Garrett. The recent explosion of Spinoza studies – and of contemporary metaphysics and epistemology inspired by Spinoza – has resulted in a deep reorientation in analytic as well as continental philosophy. In many ways, Spinoza is now replacing Kant and Descartes as both the compass and the watershed of modern thought.

It is probably true that the "Spinoza boom" has something to do with the return of "analytic metaphysics," but since fashions change, sometimes quickly, that may mean the boom is short-lived.

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 to learn from Pollitt's essay that Kate "enough about my book, what do you think of my book?" Manne has been demanding that everyone take Reade seriously; Pollitt's response is apt:

Many studies show that most women who say they have been sexually assaulted are telling the truth. However, when you’re dealing with actual individuals, it isn’t good enough to go with generalities. (As Susan Faludi clearly established, #BelieveAllWomen is a right-wing canard.) Otherwise, you get arguments like those of the feminist philosopher Kate Manne, who writes in The Nation that Biden is “the type” of man who would sexually assault Reade, because he has “a demonstrated history of handsiness.” That’s like saying a man accused of armed robbery is “the type” because he was in the habit of shoplifting. Touching women, invading their space, commenting on their bodies, looking them up and down are all regrettably common, especially among men of Biden’s generation; impulsively assaulting a staffer in a public hallway, not so much. Both behaviors may spring from “the same sense of privileged male entitlement,” but they are different in kind.

 

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.

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.)

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.

Some skepticism about the initial reports on Moderna's vaccine

A propos this, see this; an excerpt:

The company’s statement led with the fact that all 45 subjects (in this analysis) who received doses of 25 micrograms (two doses each), 100 micrograms (two doses each), or a 250 micrograms (one dose) developed binding antibodies.

Later, the statement indicated that eight volunteers — four each from the 25-microgram and 100-microgram arms — developed neutralizing antibodies. Of the two types, these are the ones you’d really want to see.

We don’t know results from the other 37 trial participants. This doesn’t mean that they didn’t develop neutralizing antibodies. Testing for neutralizing antibodies is more time-consuming than other antibody tests and must be done in a biosecurity level 3 laboratory. Moderna disclosed the findings from eight subjects because that’s all it had at that point. Still, it’s a reason for caution.

Richard Marshall interviews David Weissman (City College of New York)...

...at 3:16 AM.

Wearing masks at all times when indoors with others has to become the new normal...

...and it makes a difference.  This is going to be especially true at colleges and universities that attempt to reopen this fall.

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 frequently leads to a ventilator. It would save lives, especially among the most vulnerable, such as the elderly and people with diabetes and other health conditions that put them at high risk of succumbing to COVID-19.

A partially effective vaccine would not, however, break the spread of infection....

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 March 10 (wife) and 11 (husband). Before his symptoms had developed, the husband attended a Bible study group on March 11. Including the index cases, 35 confirmed COVID-19 cases occurred among 92 (38%) persons who attended events held at church A during March 6–11; three patients died. The age-specific attack rates among persons aged ≤18 years, 19–64 years, and ≥65 years were 6.3%, 59.4%, and 50.0%, respectively....

During March 6–8, church A hosted a 3-day children’s event which consisted of two separate 1.5-hour indoor sessions (one on March 6 and one on March 7) and two, 1-hour indoor sessions during normal church services on March 8. This event was led by two guests from another state. During each session, children participated in competitions to collect offerings by hand from adults, resulting in brief close contact among nearly all children and attending adults. On March 7, food prepared by church members was served buffet-style. A separate Bible study event was held March 11; the pastor reported most attendees sat apart from one another in a large room at this event. Most children and some adults participated in singing during the children’s event; no singing occurred during the March 11 Bible study. Among all 94 persons who might have attended any of the events, 19 (20%) attended both the children’s event and Bible study....

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 hard enough; I strongly suspect it will be impossible to start those terms normally, but perhaps things will evolve in such away that at least some of the following term can be live.

(Thanks to Stephen Woodside for the pointer.)

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 nine faculty members per department. Sixty-eight percent of these faculty were either tenured or on the tenure track, and 22% were employed part-time.
• Seventeen percent of philosophy departments hired a new permanent faculty member for the start of the 2017–18 academic year (the smallest share found among the disciplines included in the survey), and 27% of the departments had a faculty member come up for tenure in the previous two years (also a comparatively small share).
• Total enrollment in graduate-level philosophy courses was 24,970 in fall 2017 (with an average enrollment of 33.2 students per department). The average number of students pursuing an advanced degree in philosophy was 54 per department that granted such degrees.
• On average, philosophy departments awarded nine bachelor’s degrees per department in the 2016–17 academic year (a statistically significant decrease from 2012). Students also completed an average of 8.9 minors per department.
• Forty-three percent of philosophy departments rated the career services programs at their college or university “good” or “very good” for their students, while 11% rated the services “poor” or “very poor.”

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).

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 media seem to think Reade's accusations are like Dr. Ford's allegations against Brett Kavanaugh.  But whereas it has been clear from the start that Ms. Reade is "off", there were no such concerns about Dr. Ford, whose testimony was more credible, although not decisive about what happened.)