Leiter Reports: A Philosophy Blog

Philosophy faculty at Portland State University protest proposed termination of non-tenure-stream faculty

Their letter to University leadership (earlier coverage):

Dear President Cudd, Provost Chabon, Dean Rosenstiel, Associate Dean Carlson, and Associate Dean Oslund,

We, the faculty of the Department of Philosophy, are writing to request the immediate reversal of the decision to terminate the positions of our colleagues Dr. Brian Elliott, Dr. Monica Mueller, and Dr. Albert Spencer III. This opaquely-reasoned decision jeopardizes the Department of Philosophy’s long-term viability, its ability to offer a diverse curriculum, as well as high-profile community-facing programs such as the Oregon High School and Middle School Ethics Bowls.

The elimination of faculty has been framed as “due to changes in their departments’ programmatic and curricular needs.” However, decisions have apparently been based on an analysis that targets departments with too many classes of fewer than 12 students. This makes the Dean’s Office’s decision unclear since, according to its own analysis, shared with the CLAS Curriculum Committee, Philosophy does not have a particularly large number of classes with fewer than 11 students. Compared to all CLAS departments, it is below both the mean and median in low-enrolling classes. Nonetheless, the College’s strategy has been to eliminate philosophy adjuncts, followed by eliminating non-tenure track faculty, with the idea that tenure-track faculty can step in to meet curricular needs.

The Dean’s Office is operating under the rationale that faculty are fungible. Dr. Elliott, Dr. Mueller, and Dr. Spencer each teach 9 courses yearly. Together, they taught 910 students last academic year for a total of 3,640 SCH, an average of 33 students per class. All three are known as inspirational teachers and mentors to our majors. Moreover, they each teach classes that other colleagues in the department cannot.

Their classes include central courses for the Race & Ethnic Studies requirement, such as Philosophy of Race, Indigenous Philosophy, Queer Philosophy, and Latinx Philosophy. They also include Philosophy of Education, the Philosophy for Children Capstone, and the Philosophy Summer Camp for high school students. Other classes include the Metamorphosis First Year Inquiry and Feminist Philosophy, taught at the Coffee Creek Correctional Facility for women. These faculty also are primarily responsible for teaching high enrolling general education classes, such as Environmental Ethics, Philosophy of Sex and Love, Philosophy of Work and Leisure, and Philosophy of Sport.

Over and above their high teaching load, our colleagues have produced a remarkable amount of scholarship. Over the last seven years while at PSU, they have (taken together) published three books in major presses, with a further two books forthcoming in 2025, on topics such as urban revitalization, climate change, and our gaming culture. These publications support PSU’s effort to be a top research institution, and allow PSU to garner an international reputation as a place for high-quality and timely research. 

Matthew Kramer on "Legal Rights and Moral Rights"...

...is free from CUP until early February!

In Memoriam: Robert Paul Wolff (1933-2025)

MOVING TO FRONT FROM JANUARY 7--UPDATED

I was sorry to learn that Professor Wolff died last night.  He was, of course, well-known to readers of this blog for his many trenchant insights into contemporary events, to which I often linked, as well as his fascinating autobiography, to which we linked often a decade ago.  Professor Wolff began his career as a Kant scholar, but became best-known as a political philosopher, with his classic defense of anarchism in 1970, and books on Marx and Rawls, among other figures and topics.  He taught at the University of Chicago, Columbia University and, for most of his career, the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, first in the Philosophy Department and then in the Afro-American Studies Department.  Comments are open for remembrances from those who knew Professor Wolff, or for those who wish to comment on the significance of his work.  I am, as it happens, teaching Marx later this afternoon (a subject on which I learned much from Professor Wolff), but will add some comments of my own in the coming days.

UPDATE:  An informative obituary here.

A 1962 lecture by Ernest Nagel on the "current issues" in philosophy of science

Here.   Curious to hear what contemporary philosophers of science think of his characterization of philosophy of science.

(Thanks to Richard Marshall for the pointer.)

In Memoriam: Lawrence Sklar (1938-2024)

Professor Sklar, who was emeritus at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, where he spent most of his career, died last year.  He was a leading contributor to the philosophy of science and physics, but he was remarkably erudite about almost everything in philosophy (including even phenomenology).  He joined the Michigan faculty in 1968, after brief stints teaching at Swarthmore and Princeton, where he took his PhD.  The Michigan memorial notice is here, and it captures him well!  Comments are open for remembrances from those who knew Professor Sklar, or for those who wish to comment on the significance of his work.  I'll add my own recollections in the coming days.

Friends "without pressure"

Philosopher Mark Phelan comments.

"Cunk on Life"

Philomena Cunk is a well-known (in Britain) comedian, and her latest, very funny "documentary" includes some brief interviews with philosophers, including Peter Kail and Ruth Chang.  (Peter Kail's cat, it turns out, is an existentialist.)

ADDENDUM:  I should add that you can see this "documentary" on Netflix currently.

Colorado Summer Seminar in Philosophy for 2025

Philosopher David Boonin (Colorado) tells me the topic for 2025 will be "Laws, Markets, and Conventions: Specific issues to be discussed may involve debates about the nature or normative status of various legal institutions, controversies about specific legal prohibitions, questions about science and the laws of nature, concerns about inappropriate market commodification, puzzles about consumer boycotts and ethical divestment, questions about the merits of capitalism and private property, and debates on the role of convention or social construction in these and other domains. Readings will cover a wide range of philosophical subfields and include both contemporary and historical sources.”

There are more details here:   https://www.colorado.edu/philosophy/events/summer-seminar

I've heard good things about these summer seminars over the years, so I encourage undergraduate readers, especially those thinking they might be interested in graduate school, to take a look.

To control your self, control your environment

Philosopher Matthew Haug discusses.

A lecture by Susanne Langer on "Man and Animal"...

...from 1959.

(Thanks to Richard Marshall for the pointer.)

JHP 2024 Article Prize

Professor Deborah Boyle, editor of the Journal of the History of Philosophy, writes:

The Journal of the History of Philosophy has awarded its 2024 article prize to Douglas R. Campbell’s “Irrigating Blood: Plato on the Circulatory System, the Cosmos, and Elemental Motion” (JHP 62.4 [October 2024]: 519–41. Cheryl Misak’s paper, “Ryle’s Debt to Pragmatism and Margaret MacDonald” (JHP 62.4 [October 2024]: 639–56) received an Honorable Mention. Both articles can be found here: https://muse.jhu.edu/issue/53288

In Memoriam: Joseph S. Ullian (1930-2024)

MOVING TO FRONT FROM DECEMBER 29, FOR THOSE WHO MAY HAVE MISSED IT.

Professor Ullian, who spent most of his academic career at Washington University, St. Louis (where he was emeritus), worked in logic, philosophy of mathematics, and philosophy of language, and was probably best-known for his co-authored book with Quine, The Web of Belief (2nd ed., 1978).  Comments are open for remembrances from those who knew Professor Ullian or for those who wish to comment on the significance of his work.

(Thanks to Ernie Lepore for the information.)

Dominic Scott on "Contemplation and Civic Happiness in Plato and Aristotle"...

...is free for two more weeks from Cambridge Elements!

"The Sublime and the Beautiful Revisited"

Audio of a 1959 lecture by Iris Murdoch at Yale.

(Thanks to Richard Marshall for the pointer.)

In Memoriam: Graciela de Pierris (1950-2024)

Professor de Pierris, a specialist in the history of early modern philosophy, probably best-known for her work on Hume, died in August.  She had taught at Stanford for more than twenty years, and before that at Indiana University at Bloomington and the University of Illinois at Chicago.  The Stanford memorial notice is here.  Comments are open for remembrances from those who knew Professor de Pierris or for those who wish to comment on the significance of her work.

Law professors reading Marx

A nice note from a law professor elsewhere:

I wanted to pass on a note thanking you for your marvelous book with Jaime Edwards on Marx. The explanation of ideas is lucid and exactly what this non-expert needed as a clear and comprehensive introduction. Like many, I have read at one time the Manifesto and bits of Capital before. But I've never had a fully satisfying explainer, and this is it. The examples also are extremely helpful in understanding things (and some were genuinely funny, like the proto-Cheetahs!). I'm planning to assign portions to my students for appropriate classes.

 

APA announces Fall 2024 Prizes...

...including the new AI-related prizes, as well as the Gittler Award, Dewey Lecturers, and others.

Bayne on Dennett

An illuminating essay on Dennett's ideas by philosopher Tim Bayne.

Comments are open for reader reactions from those knowledgeable.

The risks of neurotechnology

Philosopher Karina Vold and colleagues comment.

The quiet bloodbath developing at Portland State University

Despite having a "feminist philosopher," Ann Cudd, at the helm, philosophers and other humanities scholars at Portland State University are not faring well.  An academic there writes:

Three long-term NTTF [non-tenure-track faculty] philosophers at Portland State University were notified on Friday that their contracts would not be renewed at the end of the current academic year. These are 20% of the 15 NTTF cuts in  the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, in addition to the previous dismissal of 70 adjuncts throughout the University, including several very-long term adjuncts in the Philosophy Department.

   These faculty teach many popular and current courses, such as Chinese, Indigenous, and other world philosophy, philosophy of sport and of gaming; philosophy of sex, eco-ethics, AI ethics, and other fields. The fired faculty include the Department's only phenomenologist, only pragmatist, and only Marxist. And yet Philosophy has been forced to cut staff each of the last several years.

   This leaves Philosophy, History, and other departments barely able to serve majors and in a poor position to attract students.

   Plus program eliminations are upcoming, including some of PSU's best-known programs. A concerted effort is under way to dismantle the award-winning general education program, in which humanities and social science departments heavily participate.

   The rationale for these cuts remains unclear to most faculty here, despite the "Strategic Plan" on which they are supposed to be based. The courses these philosophy faculty taught are central to current student interests. It is hard to see how the University can thrive if its curricula are so badly attenuated. There has been a lot of pressure to turn the University's programs toward "career readiness."

   Not a single administrator has lost a dollar in pay.

Neurodiversity among philosophers

Philosopher Thomas Nadelhoffer writes:

My collaborators and I are conducting research on neurodiversity in professional philosophers (and those training to be philosophers) and in the general population. Neurodiversity encompasses the varied neurological makeup of all individuals, but it is frequently associated with autism and other neurological or developmental traits like ADHD.

Our plan is to first recruit current and future professional philosophers through philosophy blogs. That’s where you come in! The survey contains a battery of psychometric scales that measure different cognitive styles and abilities. Then, there are two short thought experiments, each followed by a few questions. Once we have collected data from philosophers, we will collect a matched data set from the general population.

Our long-term goal is to investigate whether neurodiverse traits (in philosophers and in the general population) predict different philosophical intuitions and views. The survey should take less than fifteen minutes to complete. Once we have collected and analyzed the data, we will share the findings with the philosophical community. The study has been approved by IRB at College of Charleston. If you have any questions or concerns, please let me know: Thomas Nadelhoffer, Dept. of Philosophy, College of Charleston, [email protected]

Here is the link: https://cofc.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_0lElv4rDKcKhXaS

What's happened to Pitt's Philosophy of Science archive?

Philosopher Jeffrey Ketland points out to me that the URL, http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/,  has turned into something else (the Aphasiology Archive!).  Did the domain name registration expire?  Anyone know?

Moving from at-home writing assignments to in-class writing assignments to prevent AI cheating

MOVING TO FRONT FROM FRIDAY, DECEMBER 16--FINAL RESULTS, PRETTY REMARKABLE!

A philosophy friend on Facebook remarked that they were thinking of entirely replacing writing assignments that students would complete outside class with in-class writing assignments (essay exams, quizzes etc.).  Many others chimed in that they had already done exactly that.   Here's a poll for those of you who are teaching undergraduates:

If you teach undergraduates, have you switched from out-of-class writing assignments to in-class writing assignments because of concern about AI cheating?

Yes

 

No

 

Not yet, but thinking about it

 

 

pollcode.com free polls

Comments are open for those who want to explain their answers, give more nuanced answers etc.

UPDATE:  After four hours, here's what the votes look like:

f you teach undergraduates, have you switched from out-of-class writing assignments to in-class writing assignments because of concern about AI cheating?   Selection   Votes  Yes  45% 141  No  19% 58  Not yet, but thinking about it  36% 114  313 total

Comments, below, are also very interesting.  I have to say it's pretty dramatic that nearly half of respondents have already adjusted their evaluation modalities in response to Chat GPT etc.

In Memoriam: Susan Feagin (1948-2024)

Professor Feagin, emerita at the Univesity of Missouri, Kansas City, was a well-known philosopher of art, who was a Past President of the American Society of Aesthetics, and a former editor of the Journal of Aesthetics & Art Criticism.  Comments are open for remembrances from those who knew Professor Feagin or for those who would like to comment on the significance of her work.

(Thanks to Noel Carroll for the information.)

"Five Books" list of the Five Best Philosophy Books of 2024

Here, and it very generously includes my co-authored book with Jaime Edwards on Marx; I'll quote just a bit of Nigel Warburton's write-up:

[I]t is certainly an extremely useful book that should become a standard book for students and anybody interested in understanding Marx. Other books purport to do that, but not usually with this level of communicative skill. It’s written by philosophers who can write and who are thinking critically about what they are writing about. It’s not an inert summary, but something that brings Marxist ideas alive, and shows their strengths and limitations.

The other books sound interesting too!

 

Was there a Big Bang? Does time have a beginning?

Philosopher of physics Thomas Barrett called this interesting popular piece to my attention, noting in particular that, "It is always nice to see appreciation of the contributions that philosophy of science makes to science... the discussion of the Malament and Manchak results is particularly clear and insightful."  Comments from knowledgeable readers are welcome.

 

Philosopher and logician Hannes Leitgeb receives the Leibniz Award in Germany...

...one of the most prestigious academic honors in the country.

The therapeutic power of placebos?

Philosopher Dien Ho comments.  Curious what those knowledgeable about this topic make of this.

In Memoriam: Martha Brandt Bolton (1943-2024).

MOVING TO FRONT FROM SATURDAY, FOR THOSE WHO MAY HAVE MISSED IT

Professor Bolton, a longtime member of the Department of Philosophy at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, where she was emerita, was well-known for her work on Locke and Leibniz, among other figures in early modern philosophy.  (Her husband, the philosopher Robert Bolton, died earlier this year.)  Dean Zimmerman, Chair of the Department, kindly shared the memorial notice posted below the fold.  Comments are also open for remembrances form those who knew Professor Bolton or for those who would like to comment on the significance of her work.

"Why must philosophy writing be so bad?"

Philosopher Steven Hales comments, with some amusing examples.

Two million Euro grant from ERC to philosopher Ruth Boeker...

...at University College Dublin for a project on "New Histories of British Moral Philosophy in the Eighteenth Century (c.1690–1800)."

An interview with T.M. Scanlon about his moral philosophy

Here.  This I found particularly striking and interesting:

AR: You were part of a discussion group of maybe 10 to 12 people back in your Princeton days, with luminaries such as Tom Nagel, Ronald Dworkin, Nozick, and many others. In an interview with The Utopian, you called this the most important thing in your philosophical development. What made it so important? 

TS: Well, it was like having this gang of great teachers, for one thing. In my career, I was mainly doing logic, philosophy, mathematics, things like that, although I was interested in moral and political philosophy, and I got more drawn into it because I was doing a lot of teaching in that area. So this was partly a way of developing more expertise in the field because I was just in the process of getting into it. Second, it was something that provided me with confidence in two ways: One, there really was a subject matter there that you could learn more about because in the 1950s, moral philosophy had a kind of skeptical air to it. It was sort of conventionalist or emotivist, non-cognitivist, and so on, and so we were drawn together by the fact that most of us in the group tended to think that there were real facts about right and wrong, and that just by thinking really hard and clearly about them, you could make progress, and that wasn’t what was going on in most of philosophy at the time. It wasn’t where the action was in philosophy; it was mostly in philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, philosophy of science, things like that.

So the group gave me confidence that there were other people who think that we’re not just banging things up, that there’s something there. And second, that gave me confidence in myself, because these people were willing to talk to me, and so I could be a member of this group, which was amazingly flattering. I was kind of a junior partner in the group, so I felt, wow, this is amazing. So it really was important in my philosophical development in those ways, giving me confidence in the subject, and, to some degree, confidence in myself.

Dupre on Dawkins...

...at the Los Angeles Review of Books.  A good read.

Philosopher Laurie Paul profiled...

...at The New Yorker.  It's a nice write-up!

 

The rise and fall of "The Future of Humanity Institute" at Oxford

Interesting account of the mostly bad scifi passing as philosophy.   "Effective [i.e., short-term, measurable] altruism" also makes an appearance.

An interview with Simon Blackburn about moral philosophy and quasi-realism in particular

Here.

A review of the Edmonds biography of Parfit...

...in The Philosopher's Magazine.  The review starts by sounding a Nietzschean note:  "Philosophers tend to tolerate a high degree of personal strangeness in one another. More specifically, they tend not to worry – at least explicitly or on the record – about whether the weird philosophical beliefs and the weird non-philosophical actions of a colleague might have a common source."  For Nietzsche, of course, the philospohical systems of at least the great philosophers admit of psychological explanation.  Regarding the Edmonds biography, the reviewers note that,

The book is largely an entertaining, and highly revealing, exercise in psychological portraiture by means of anecdote. Parfit, Edmonds tells us, would peddle in the nude on his exercise bike, reading philosophy; he would brush his teeth for hours, reading philosophy; every day he would eat the same breakfast of muesli and yoghurt and the same dinner of carrots, cheese, lettuce, and celery, to maximise his time for philosophy; he would make coffee using water straight out of the tap, to maximise his time for philosophy; he would take a mixture of vodka and pills every night to help him sleep, since he couldn’t stop thinking about philosophy.

In Memoriam: Arnold Koslow (1933-2024)

A longtime member of the philosophy faculties at Brooklyn College and the City University of New York Graduate Center, where he was emeritus, Professor Koslow wrote widely in philosophy of science, philosophy of mathematics, and logic. He died last month.  Comments are open for remembrances from those who knew Professor Koslow or for those who wish to comment on the significance of his work.

(Thanks to Mark Zelcer for the pointer.)

 

Boston University suspends PhD admissions across humanities (including Philosophy) and social sciences...

...it appears because graduate students won higher wages.  I supsect concern about what the Trump Administration has planned for higher education may also be in the background of their concerns.

If you are staying on Twitter/X, why?

Philosopher Jc Beall raised a question which I also wonder about:  "It would be very interesting to know whether any philosophers are staying on Twitter and -- this is what I'm curious about -- *why*."  So readers who use social media, if you're staying with X, what are your reasons?  This is asked out of genuine curiosity; I can imagine reasons, but would like to hear what philosophers are thinking.

 

Political theorist Paul Sagar on adjusting to severe paralysis after a climbing accident

A gripping read about a horrible situation.

Heidegger against the philosophical tradition

A pleasingly clear short essay at IAITV, that has some affinities with the Dreydegger familiar in the Anglophone world, but is also importantly different and probably closer to the spirit of Heidegger.

 

James Woodward receives 2024 Hempel Award...

...from the Philosophy of Science Association to recognize lifetime achievements in the field.  Woodward is an Emeritus Professor in the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Pittsburgh.

(Thanks to Edouard Machery for the information.)

"The Ethical Philosophy of Bernard Williams" by Alan Thomas

Free to download from CUP for the next few weeks!

Jaime Edwards and I talk about our Marx book...

...at The Dissenter, with Ricardo Lopes.

In Memoriam: George E. Smith (1938-2024)

A longtime member of the Department of Philosophy at Tufts University, where he was emeritus, Professor Smith was well-known for his contributions to philosophy of science.  Professor Smith came to philosophy later than most; there is more information about his career and work here.  Comments are open for remembrances from those who knew Professor Smith or for those who would like to comment on the significance of his work.

(Thanks to Eric Schliesser for the information.)

The new Republican initiative for higher education in states they control: "Western Civilization" centers (sometimes called "civics" centers or variations on that)

They have been created at the University of Florida at Gainesville, the University of Texas at Austin, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.  Often they reference the "principles of a free society," meaning a capitalist society, not a society free of wage slavery.  The motivation for creating them is plainly political, but in the abstract it's hard to quarrel with more money for faculty lines to teach ancient Greek and Roman philosophy and the history of modern philosophy.  Republican legislators are sufficiently ignorant that they do not realize how politically radical many of the so-called "Great Books" are, so the more teaching of them, the better one might think!

The difficulty, of course, is that many of the hires at these programs make them look like they are also using a political litmus test, which is unlawful for the same reason that "diversity statements" are unlawful in faculty hiring at public universities:  public universities cannot discriminate based on the political viewpoint of applicants.   So if you advertise for scholars to teach ancient Greek and Roman philosophy, a red flag should go up if everyone hired turns out be a political conservative or libertarian.  Sooner or later, some rejected candidate will have to sue, and the actual hiring process will be subjected to the sunlight of discovery.

Wenar on "effective [sic] altruism" and his critics

Philosopher Leif Wenar wades into the fray again, responding in part to critics of his earlier piece.  I'm sympathetic to much that Professor Wenar says, although it touches only indirectly on the main difficulty, namely, that "effective [sic] altruism" really only concerns "altruistic actions with fairly immediate and measurable short-term effects," which is not the same as making people better off, regardless of one's motive.  (Wenar's criticism of the unintended effects of aid on non-recipients is relevant to this issue, but it's just the tip of an iceberg of consequences that are never considered by members of the church.)

More stories of "first-generation" philosophers

Alfred Mele and Nadia Ruiz, among others.  This from Dr. Ruiz's essay was particularly striking:

It was at this point that the hidden curriculum of higher education—the unwritten, unofficial, and often unintended lessons, values, and perspectives that students learn in school—first began to reveal itself to me. These lessons include norms, values, and beliefs that are conveyed in the classroom and in one's social environment without explicitly being taught. As a first-generation college student, I was often unaware of these unspoken rules and expectations. For example, I didn't know about the importance of building relationships with professors, attending office hours, or the various support programs available. The fact that this curriculum remained hidden from me longer than it did for my non-first-generation peers created a significant barrier, making it difficult to navigate the academic landscape and access the resources necessary for success. Most first-gen students discover or find out about these resources on the fly, if at all: this keeps us behind.

Both my parents were college graduates, but I have to admit it took me awhile to figure some of these out too.  But it is definitely even more foreign territory for those who have never been part of bourgeois society, of which academia is an importance instance.

 

In Memoriam: Bernard Manin (1951-2024)

An influential political theorist, Professor Manin was probably best-known among philosophers for his contributions to democratic theory.  The political theorist Melissa Schwartzberg, Chair of the Department of Politics at NYU, kindly shared this memorial notice (below the fold):