Leiter Reports: A Philosophy Blog

Richard Marshall interviews Philip Goodchild (Nottingham)...

...at 3:16 AM.

Blast from the past: when the religious right was obessed with "bathroom bills"

Back in 2016.

Speaking of stormtroopers...

...there's an historical precedent for a political party allied with paramilitary street thugs who act as muscle, and it's not a good one.   Are Michigan Repugs the future of the Republican Party?

More mischief afoot at Bogazici University in Istanbul

MOVING TO FRONT FROM YESTERDAY--MORE COMMENTS, INFORMATION, UPDATES, LINKS WELCOME

First there was the appointment of an unqualified political hack to lead the university, now the Turkish President Erdogan has decreed the creation of two new schools, one of law, one of communications--and Erdogan could then appoint a hundred or so new faculty to these schools!  A correspondent in Istanbul writes:

They announced the opening of these two schools overnight with absolutely no consultation with the university faculty. And this is clearly a way for them to stuff the university with party loyalists - and creating these two new faculties is probably a way to sidestep the current Boğaziçi requirement of international publications to be appointed as a faculty member. So there is the worry that this will lead to a large number of hirings where loyalty rather than academic qualifications will be the main qualification. The suspicion is that they will fill the new school of communications with the Turkish equivalent of Fox News talking heads and the law school with the Turkish equivalent of Kraken Lawyers.

Faculty at Bogazici have issued a statement denouncing this  move:   Download Autonomy (EN).

Meanwhile, a leader of the Turkish Mafia has come out in support of Erdogan's puppet at the university!  No doubt the gangster feels a special affinity with Erdogan.

Comments are open for more information, links etc.

On meritocracy and Michael Sandel's Harvard-centric view of the universe

Apt analysis by philosopher and law professor Christopher Kutz (Berkeley).

Philanthropy and the ideal of "civil society"

Political philosopher Chiara Cordelli (Chicago) comments.

Blast from the past: citation networks in philosophy

Back in 2013.

Harvard Law professor writes controversial article about Japanese "comfort women"...

...and another Harvard law professor criticizes him, but hasn't launched a petition, or called for him to be fired, or demanded an apology.   (Students have not behaved as well.)   Philosophy faculty might learn something from this.

(Thanks to Jonathan Adler for the pointer.) 

ADDENDUM:  Unfortunately, others are not reacting so appropriately to an article they disagree with.

The cancel mob of 2014 and subsequent events (a comment on the serial dissembler Jonathan Ichikawa)

Last month, bizarrely, the Twitter Red Guard discovered the 2014 campaign to take down the PGR, thanks to typical dissembling by smarmy Jonathan Ichikawa.  Of course, Ichikawa lied about lots of it and misrepresented his own misconduct and that of his wife, Carrie Jenkins, including their role in inciting--based on falsehoods--a mob to bully me.  I've written about this in the past, for example, here and here, but I'll recap the basics here (see the prior links for details, evidence, further links).  Feel free to link this on Twitter if and when this nonsense starts up again.  Readers who wisely avoid Twitter and remember these events can skip this post.

London universities facing 13.7% cut in government funding...

...including elimination of the very modest salary supplement for cost of living in London.  Comments are open for those with more information.  Will this lead to redundancies?   Might it be stopped?

UPDATE:  See the important clarifications from Professor Hornsby (Birkbeck) in the first comment, below.

South Africa finds the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine doesn't even prevent mild illness very well from the new variant there

This is alarming, especially for UK citizens, where this vaccine has been widely used.   Readers?

Great moments in obscure rock 'n' roll: Les Variations, "What a Mess Again," 1969

French rock trio (whose members were Jews originally from Morocco), this is the lead number from their debut album:

 

COVID vaccines and the new variants

Bad news and good news; an excerpt:

Even if the vaccines are less powerful against the [South Africa] variant, they still appear to protect people from the worst outcomes, like hospitalization or death. But the loss in efficacy against the B.1.351 [South African] variant in clinical trials suggested to some experts that the immunity the shots confer may not last as long against that form of the coronavirus. Or that the vaccines won’t be as powerful of a drag on transmission, the way scientists hope the shots will be for other versions of the virus.

The propaganda film shown at the Trump rally preceding the stormtrooper riot

Philosopher Jason Stanley (Yale) comments on it here.   He's certainly right about the echoes of fascist rhetorical tropes and themes, although he overstates the supposed anti-semitism (e.g., "Hollywood" has been the conservative code word for "liberal elites" for decades now, not for Jews; indeed, most of the best-known "liberal" representatives of Hollywood who attract reactionary ire are not Jews).   Of course, fascist-like rhetoric emanating from Trumpworld is not the same as fascist ideology or practice, as others have noted.  (This may be closer to how fascism really works.)

Trouble for Australian universities without international students?

This is ominous; an excerpt:

“My sense is that international education in Australia is in deep, deep trouble. That means higher education is in deep trouble and scientific research is in equally deep trouble, because this is heavily financed from international student fees.”

Marginson, a former professor of higher education at the University of Melbourne, said, “There is now a major forking of the way” between the British and Australian higher education systems, because Australia has closed its borders during the pandemic, while Britain has not, as well as the greater dependence on international student fees and weaker public science funding in Australia.

“My political nose tells me that [Australia’s] government is not greatly worried about the declining position of university science and still less about the overall position of universities in Australia. It knows that the decline of international education means that the economy will take a hit, but with this government, politics comes before economics,” Marginson said.

Comments are open for additional links or information from those more knowledgeable about the situation.

Is the self an illusion?

Philosophers Lisa Bortolotti (Birmingham), Dan Zahavi (Oxford & Copenhagen), and others discuss.

On Hume's racism, again

I came across this interesting if somewhat curious essay by philosopher Mazviita Chirimuuta (Edinburgh), prompted by the renaming of the Hume Tower at her university.   Professor Chirimuuta tries, rather implausibly I thought, to draw a connection between Hume's naturalism and his racism.  She does so by claiming it is difficulty to pin down what naturalism involves (I'm not so sure it is), and suggesting that it is mainly defined by opposition to the supernatural:

The question we contemporary philosophers need to ask ourselves is whether there is a legitimate notion of the “naturalistic worldview” that does not require, for its own self-definition, a contrast with the “superstitious worldview” of the “primitive” other. We need also to ask seriously whether the unreflected notion of what is a naturalistic, and hence intellectually respectable explanation, is still being used to de-legitimise explanations offered by various indigenous peoples concerning events in the natural world, events which include the symptoms of an ever more crushing ecological crisis. Such accounts are still regularly categorised as “spiritualistic”, and with that certain voices are still summarily dismissed, as expressed by the Māori individuals interviewed in this news report of a mass whale beaching.

Supernatural claims are explanatorily otiose, which is why supernatural entities drop out of a methodologically naturalistic conception of the world (i.e., one modeled on the successful empirical sciences).  "Primitive" peoples have false views about cause and effect, as do their present-day descendants, like evangelical Christians:   are we really not supposed to dismiss these kinds of supernatural-infused views about how the world works?

Does the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine *really* reduce transmissibility of the virus?

The headlines have been claiming that, but the reality is more complicated and less clear.

America is doomed, part 499: the Republican Party is crazier now than it was even before Trump

The new target is Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming, daughter of the former Vice-President and an extremely conservative Republican--but not as crazy as some members of her party:

As she watched Mr. Trump and his supporters peddle conspiracy theories and promote what she called “the big lie,” Ms. Cheney became deeply unsettled by how many of her colleagues seemed so cavalier about Mr. Trump’s actions, friends and associates said. She was also bothered by the way Republicans cheered and mimicked the kind of behavior she expected of a foreign authoritarian leader but never from an American president....

“We control the true spirit and identity of America,” said [Representative Matt] Gaetz (Fascist-Florida), who is leading the effort to oust Ms. Cheney from the House leadership.

After his speech, Teresa Kunkel, a retired state employee, said that she had attended the rally because, as a Christian, she did not believe Ms. Cheney was being an honest representative for Wyoming. “She didn’t represent what we voted for,” Ms. Kunkel said. “She betrayed us — big time.”

The second impeachment of Mr. Trump last month, which Ms. Cheney supported, was an injustice, Ms. Kunkel added. “It’s like: ‘I didn’t like what you did, so you’re out. And we’re in the majority, so we can do that.’ That’s cancel culture,” she said.

Bear in mind that the majority of Republicans in the House of Representatives voted against certifying legitimate election results.   The majority!   Ms. Cheney was one of just ten Republicans in the House to support impeachment of the monster-child for the January 6 stormtrooper riot.

 

Did Frege plagiarize the Stoics?

Philosopher Susanne Bobzien (Oxford) argues that he did in both his philosophy of logic and language.

UPDATE:   Justin Weinberg (South Carolina) has compiled useful excerpts from Professor Bobzien's article.

Blast from the past: Best English-language journals for scholarship on the post-Kantian Continental traditions in philosophy

Back in 2012.  Inquiry has strengthened its position since then, especially for Nietzsche studies.  (Note:  Inquiry publishes the proceedings of the annual meeting of the International Society for Nietzsche Studies, but also publishes articles on Nietzsche submitted through the regular submissions process.)

UPDATE:  A more recent poll from 2017 (thanks to Sean Murphy for the reminder).

Richard Marshall interviews Robert Stecker (Central Michigan)...

...at 3:16 AM.

America is doomed, part 478: Oligarchy edition

I can't find a lot to disagree with in this assessment, alas.  An excerpt (but read it all):

The death spiral of the American Empire will not be halted with civility. It will not be halted with the 42 executive orders signed by President Joe Biden, however welcome many are, especially since they can, with a new chief executive, be immediately revoked.

It will not be halted by removing Donald Trump, and the crackpot conspiracy theorists, Christian fascists and racists who support him, from social media.

It will not be halted by locking up the Proud Boys and the clueless protestors who stormed the Congress on Jan. 6. and took selfies in Vice President Mike Pence’s Senate chair. It will not be halted by restoring the frayed alliances with our European allies or rejoining the World Health Organization or the Paris Climate Agreement.

All the COVID vaccines appear to prevent serious disease and death

And that's pretty important, even if people may still get stick.  An excerpt:

Here’s the key fact: All five vaccines with public results have eliminated Covid-19 deaths. They have also drastically reduced hospitalizations. “They’re all good trial results,” Caitlin Rivers, an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins University, told me. “It’s great news.”

Many people are instead focusing on relatively minor differences among the vaccine results and wrongly assuming that those differences mean that some vaccines won’t prevent serious illnesses. It’s still too early to be sure, because a few of the vaccine makers have released only a small amount of data. But the available data is very encouraging — including about the vaccines’ effect on the virus’s variants.

 

On appreciating the work of "immoral" artists

Philosopher Noel Carroll (CUNY Grad Center) comments.

Which of the "top 25" PhD programs in the U.S. have Black faculty in tenure-stream positions?

Philosopher Jason Stanley (Yale) recently remarked on Twitter that in 20+ years, he had taught at four leading departments--Cornell, Michigan, Rutgers, Yale--and had only one Black colleague on tenure-track during that time (Howard McGary at Rutgers, who is now retired).   I'll return to the question of causation and racism (which seems to have overwhelmed the online discussion [and here]), but the facts are indisputable.   Very few of the leading PhD programs have any Black faculty, and even fewer have African-American faculty.  I list below the "top 24" PhD programs with the names of their Black tenure-stream faculty, when there are any.  Please e-mail me with any corrections.

NYU:                 Anthony Appiah

Rutgers:            Derrick Darby

Princeton:        ---

Michigan:        ---

Pittsburgh:       ---

Yale:                ---

MIT:                 ---

In Memoriam: Waheed Hussain (1972-2021)

A moral and political philosopher, particularly concerned with markets, Professor Hussain was an Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Toronto, where he had taught since 2014.   The Toronto memorial notice is here.

On the difference between political philosophy and political theory

Philosopher Jason Brennan (Georgetown) comments.

"Wokeness" as the new ideology of the American elite

Interesting essay by the writer and social critic Michael Lind.

What the National Football League (U.S.) learned about COVID

Here.  Infection can occur with contact as little as five minutes.  Masks make a difference, being outdoors makes a difference.  Sharing vehicles, eating together:  not a good idea!

January 2021: another record

As I noted last month, 2020 was a banner year for blog readership.   And that continued last month:  January 2021 saw 346,000 visits (and more than 435,000 page views), compared to 300,000 visits (and 371,000 page views) in January 2020.  The blog is currently in its 18th year, so it's gratifying that readership continues to grow.  Thanks, as always, for reading!

(A note on the terminology:  every visit counts as one page view; but if during a visit, one clicks on a "continue reading" for a post because some of it is "below the fold", that counts as another page view; so too if one follows a link to another page on the blog, that counts as another page view.   One can maximize page views by putting the content of almost every post below the fold [so every visit ends up being at least two page views]; obviously I don't do that so, e.g., one can read multiple posts in a single visit, and that will all count as one page view.)

Blast from the past: When Fodor critiqued Fodor's critique of natural selection

Back in 2010.  (Link now fixed!)

A guide to the new coronavirus variants

This is quite informative.

(Thanks to Dean Rowan for the pointer.)

On realism (in the metaphysical sense)

Timothy Williamson (Oxford) comments.