Leiter Reports: A Philosophy Blog

In Memoriam: Charles W. Mills (1951-2021)

MOVING TO FRONT FROM SEPTEMBER 21--UPDATED

Professor Mills, a leading figure in political philosophy and philosophy of race, was, since 2016, Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, before that having spent more than a quarter-century in the Chicago area, first at the University of Illinois at Chicago and then Northwestern University.  His best-known work was undoubtedly The Racial Contract (1997), although he wrote influential books and articles on Marxist philosophy, Africana philosophy, and other topics.  I will add links to memorial notices as they appear.

UPDATE:  A brief memorial notice from the APA.

ANOTHER:  A memorial from the CUNY Graduate Center.

AND ANOTHER:  A charming and evocative "personal tribute" from philosopher Liam Kofi Bright (LSE).

STILL MORE:  A NYT columnist on Mills.  And an obituary from the Jamaica Observer.

A PHILOSOPHICAL APPRECIATION:  From philosopher Jason Stanley (Yale).

"Agency and Responsibility Research Group"

MOVING TO FRONT FROM SEPTEMBER 21--UPDATED

Here, courtesy of philosopher Thomas Nadelhoffer (Charleston).

UPDATE:   Upcoming talks this semester are by Derk Pereboom (9/30), Christian List (10/27), and Carolina Sartorio (12/03).

Philosopher Arif Ahmed on challenges for academic freedom at his school, Cambridge University

Here, and with lessons for those who teach elsewhere.

Richard Marshall interviews Paul Thagard (Waterloo)...

...at 3:16 AM.

The philistinism of the philosophers

From an essay by philosopher Justin Smith (Paris VII):

The political philosopher Jake McNulty reminded me recently of a wonderful observation of Adorno’s: that it was not the artists with firm political convictions expressed through their art, such as Bertolt Brecht, who ended up truly revolutionizing their historical moment, but those such as Samuel Beckett, whose work is infinitely ambiguous, non-committal, and open to endless interpretation. The one gave us Tin Pan Alley retrofitted with revolutionary slogans, the other gave us his own sort of revolution. One fears that the closest thing we have to intellectuals today are so disengaged from even the ideal of an avant-garde that they know only how to scan a work for its manifest content, and thus today’s descendants of Brecht are deemed good because they are “on message”, while today’s descendants of Beckett, if there were any, would be deemed irresponsible for failing to state explicitly enough their commitment to antiracism.

"Anti-realism" and the analytic-continental divide

Philosopher Lee Braver (South Florida) comments.  Of course, Derrida really is a charlatan, but he is the exception and not the norm in the post-Kantian traditions in Continental European philosophy.

"The Need for Socially Distanced Citizens"

Philosopher Robert Talisse (Vanderbilt) comments.

New editors for the Journal of Aesthetics & Art Criticism

Jonathan Gilmore and Sandra Shapshay, both at CUNY.

Political orientation, science denial, and COVID vaccinations

Philosopher Adrian Bardon (Wake Forest) comments.

Interview with Prof. Jeremy Fischer who resigned his post at Alabama/Huntsville over their inadequate public health measures

Here; an excerpt:

EA: In your resignation letter, you said you did not want to be complicit in a “moral atrocity.” Can you elaborate on what you consider to be the “moral atrocity” in this situation? Is it limited to UAH? What does it mean on a world scale?

JF: There is a good chance that classes and other in-person events on campus will accelerate COVID transmission in the wider community. This is a huge problem for a state like Alabama, in which only about 76% of senior citizens are fully vaccinated. (Compare that number with 99% in Vermont, 98% in Maine, 96% in Washington State and 95% in Maryland.) Already, as the school year begins, Alabama hospitals are packed with COVID patients and running out of ICU beds (and workers to staff them ).

In such circumstances, large institutions like schools and universities need to take all reasonable steps to minimize coronavirus transmission. (See, for example, the possible mitigation policies, numbered (1)-(8) above, as well as our petition demand to move at least some classes online and implement C.D.C.-recommended social distancing guidelines.) But, despite their modest efforts, the UA System failed to take even most of these steps. In my judgment, this failure is morally atrocious.

Philosopher Nathan Jun has resigned his tenured position at Midwestern State University

We noted Professor Jun's ordeal last year.  He has now sent out an email to me and others as follows:

I am writing to let you know that I have been forced to resign from Midwestern State University. As a result of last year's scandal I ended up developing severe PTSD for which I have since been hospitalized on three separate occasions. Having already thrown me under the bus in October 2020 by publicly condemning me and refusing to defend my safety and reputation against attacks by a white supremacist mob, the university subsequently saw fit to deny the accommodations I had requested under the ADA. Faced with the choice of being terminated or resigning, I ultimately opted for the latter.

Long story short: the far right--in concert with the soulless, amoral administration of Midwestern State University--has succeeded in destroying my academic career and, frankly, my life. 

I do know that he has resigned, but I do not know any further details beyond what Professor Jun reports.  If readers learn more, please email me, and I will update this post.

A call for greater opportunities for non-native speakers in "analytic" philosophy

MOVING TO FRONT FROM YESTERDAY--SOME READERS ASKED ME TO OPEN COMMENTS, WHICH I HAVE NOW DONE (couldn't moderate them yesterday)

Dubbed the "Barcelona Principles" by its creator, philosopher Filippo Contessi, it adopts the currently trendy language of "inclusion," but its basic point is sound:  insofar as analytic philosophy tries to be a Wissenschaft, it should be open to scientific contributions from researchers across different linguistic cultures.  It seems to me doubtful, however, that one can evaluate "publications, presentations, proposals and submissions without giving" weight to their authors' "linguistic style" and "fluency," since the latter are often inextricable from the substance.  (One can, certainly, as the principle proposes, disregard accent.)  Far better, it seems to me, to invite non-Anglophone philosophers on the merits of their work and then help them, as needed, with their English expression.  (With the four volumes [so far] of Oxford Studies in Philosophy of Law, we have solicited a number of important legal philosophers outside the Anglosphere, and, when necessary, helped edit their English.)

"How We Argue Now"

Philosopher John Martin Fischer (UC Riverside) comments.

Memorial for Joseph Margolis this Friday

Philosopher Espen Hammer, Chair of the Department at Temple, writes:  "The Temple philosophy department will be hosting a memorial event for Professor Joseph Margolis. The event will take place 3-5pm (EST) on Friday, September 17. Please click here for the zoom link!"

"Against Effective Altruism"

Philosopher Alice Crary (New School/Oxford) comments. What Professor Crary calls "the institutional critique" is the really decisive one it seems to me; here is her useful summary of it:

This critique attacks effective altruists for operating with a damagingly narrow interpretation of the class of things that are assessable as right or wrong. It targets effective altruists’ tendency to focus on single actions and their proximate consequences and, more specifically, on simple interventions that reduce suffering in the short term. Advocates of the institutional critique are on the whole concerned to decry the neglect, on the part of EA, of coordinated sets of actions directed at changing social structures that reliably cause suffering. EA’s metrics are best suited to detect the short term impact of particular actions, so its tendency to discount the impact of coordinated actions can be seen as reflecting ‘measurability bias’. A leitmotif of the institutional critique of EA is that this bias is politically dangerous because it obscures the structural, political roots of global misery, thereby contributing to its reproduction by weakening existing political mechanisms for positive social change

Paul Pietroski (Rutgers) interviewed about his work in semantics and cognitive science...

...here.

(Thanks to Norbert Hornstein for the pointer.)

Philosopher Peter Singer to donate all of $1 million prize to charities

This, of course, is what he should do, given his ideas and arguments, so kudos to him.  If he were not a proponent of "effective [i.e., measurable in the short-term] altruism," he might choose different beneficiaries for the money, but that's a separate debate.  

2200 students enrolled in logic at the University of Sydney!

I learned of this "rock star" logic teacher at Sydney (Sebastian Sequoiah-Grayson) via my former student Michael Sevel (a legal philosopher at Sydney) on Twitter.

Reflections on the Jan Boxill case at UNC...

...at CHE.  (Earlier coverage.)

Fantasy or reality in narrative?

Philosopher Noel Carroll (CUNY Grad Center) and others discuss at IAITV.

In Memoriam: Alex Orenstein (1936-2018)

Philosopher David Rosenthal (CUNY) recently learned that Professor Orenstein (who had retired from CUNY a decade ago and moved away) had passed away in 2018, something others at CUNY and Oxford, where Professor Orenstein also spent time, had not known.  He shared this memorial notice:

Alex Orenstein, professor of philosophy at the Graduate Center and Queens College of the City University of New York, died of cancer in June 2018 at the age of 82, while in the care of close family in Las Vegas, having lost contact with academic colleagues and friends the preceding year.

Alex Orenstein was born in New York City on March 5, 1936.  He earned an A.B. from Hunter College in 1956, and was a Lecturer in Philosophy there from 1957 to 1960.  He then worked for three years as a computer programmer and systems analyst, returning to philosophy in 1964 to pursue a Ph.D. at NYU, which he completed  in 1972.  In 1968 he began teaching at Queens College and in 1974 joined the philosophy faculty of the Graduate Center of CUNY, teaching at both places until his retirement in 2011.

Is radical political action like brain surgery or a landslide?

Robert Paul Wolff comments; an excerpt:

Let me begin with the distinction, which I am sure I have several times drawn before on this blog, between two very different images of progressive or transformative political action: brain surgery and a landslide. If you think that radical political action is like brain surgery, then you will suppose that it is a precise and delicate matter in which it is desperately important to perform the operation in precisely the correct manner – one wrong move can leave the patient paralyzed or, worse still, dead. For the past 200 years, a good deal of debate on the left seems to have been motivated by this image of political action. I saw this up close at the University of Massachusetts almost 50 years ago when five young Marxist economists were hired simultaneously into tenured positions in the economics department and almost immediately split into three factions.

"I-reasoning" and "We-reasoning" during the COVID crisis

Philosopher Anne Schwenkenbecher (Murdoch U) comments.

What did authoritarian rulers study at university?

Philosopher Paul Raymont took a look; law and engineering were popular, but there were a few who studied philosophy.

In Memoriam: Kenneth Kipnis (1943-2021)

A longtime member of the Department of Philosophy at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, where he was emeritus, Professor Kipnis was well-known for his work in applied ethics, especially (but not only) with regard to medical issues.   There is an obituary here.

David Papineau (CUNY/KCL) talks about "The Metaphysics of Sensory Experience"...

...with Ricardo Lopes at The Dissenter.

Richard Marshall interviews Douglas Stalker (Delaware) (Part 1)...

...at 3:16 AM.

"When should you forgive?"

Philosopher Brandon Warmke (Bowling Green) discusses at Brain in a Vat.

Bertrand Russell's Nobel Prize acceptance speech: on four important human desires

I came across this recently (given how much of it resonates with Nietzsche, one marvels at Russell's infamous hostility towards Nietzsche).  An excerpt:

All human activity is prompted by desire. There is a wholly fallacious theory advanced by some earnest moralists to the effect that it is possible to resist desire in the interests of duty and moral principle. I say this is fallacious, not because no man ever acts from a sense of duty, but because duty has no hold on him unless he desires to be dutiful. If you wish to know what men will do, you must know not only, or principally, their material circumstances, but rather the whole system of their desires with their relative strengths....

[M]an differs from other animals in one very important respect, and that is that he has some desires which are, so to speak, infinite, which can never be fully gratified, and which would keep him restless even in Paradise. The boa constrictor, when he has had an adequate meal, goes to sleep, and does not wake until he needs another meal. Human beings, for the most part, are not like this. When the Arabs, who had been used to living sparingly on a few dates, acquired the riches of the Eastern Roman Empire, and dwelt in palaces of almost unbelievable luxury, they did not, on that account, become inactive. Hunger could no longer be a motive, for Greek slaves supplied them with exquisite viands at the slightest nod. But other desires kept them active: four in particular, which we can label acquisitiveness, rivalry, vanity, and love of power....

The end of Oxford's dominance in jurisprudence: Leslie Green to leave Oxford

Leslie Green, Professor of the Philosophy of Law at Oxford University since 2006, has resigned his Chair effective the end of September.  (He will continue with his part-time appointment at Queen's University in Canada.)  With the untimely death of John Gardner in 2019,the filling of his prior Chair with a moral philosopher, Timothy Endicott's taking up the Vinerian Chair in English Law (which will focus his energies and supervision in administrative law, rather than jurisprudence), and now Green's departure, the senior ranks in jurisprudence will have been decimated.  There still remain many very good younger legal philosophers at Oxford, but since the Professors have primary responsibility for supervision of graduate students, Green's retirement marks the end of an era, that began with H.L.A. Hart's appointment as Professor of Jurisprudence in 1952.  Oxford is expected to fill Green's Chair, although I don't know how soon.  I can count on one hand (with fingers to spare) the number of appointments that would suffice to sustain Oxford's leadership role in this field.   Prospective students will want to watch this carefully.

Philosopher's Annual, ten top papers of 2020

Professor Grim and the other editors sent this out to the Nominating Editors not long ago (I've added school affiliations):

Our thanks to the Nominating Editors for a wonderful set of initial nominations and for extremely useful survey input and comments. 

This year’s final selection:

The Philosopher’s Annual volume 40

from the literature of 2020

Zach Barnett (National University of Singapore), “Why You Should Vote to Change the Outcome,” from Philosophy and Public Affairs

 Susanne Bobzien (Oxford and Simon Shogry (Oxford), “Stoic Logic and Multiple Generality,” from Philosophers’ Imprint

Renée Jorgensen Bolinger (Michigan), “The Moral Grounds of Reasonably Mistaken Self-Defense,” from Philosophy and Phenomenological Research

Christopher Fowles (Oxford), “The Heart of Flesh: Nietzsche on Affects and the Interpretation of the Body,” from the Journal of the History of Philosophy

Jane Friedman (NYU), “The Epistemic and the Zetetic,” from the Philosophical Review

An interview with philosopher Sophie-Grace Chappell (Open U)

Intelligent and illuminating, as one would expect!

Guess who's 251 today?

And we're still not rid of him!

Martha Nussbaum's amicus brief in New York case in support of habeas corpus petition of elephant

Here.

Virtue signalling and public morality

Philosopher Anthony Appiah (NYU) and others discuss at IAITV.

Can science explain "near-death experiences"?

Various scientists and philosopher John Martin Fischer (UC Riverside) comment in this article.

"Seeing Clearly: A Buddhist Guide to Life"

Ricardo Lopes interviews philosopher Nic Bommarito (Simon Fraser) at The Dissenter.

Philosophy of rhinos?

Philosopher Craig Callender (UC San Diego) suggested to me that this category should be added to the PGR; I assured him I'd raise it with Professors Brogaard and Pynes!  The suggestion did remind me of an old essay by my colleague (now Judge) Frank Easterbrook on why there was no course on "The Law of the Horse."

Richard Marshall interview Samuel Fleischacker (Illinois/Chicago), Part 2...

...here.  (Part 1 here.)

Two philosophers win Australian "Future Fellowships"

They are:  Amanda Johnson (Macquarie) and Seth Lazar (ANU), and Magdalena Zych (Queensland).

(Thanks to Nic Southwood for the pointer.)

UPDATE:  Philosopher Toby Meadows (UC Irvine) points out to me that Professor Zych's was not a philosophy project; she is a physicist, although the project sounds very much like one a philosopher of physics might have undertaken.

"Realism, Disagreement, and Explanation"

MOVING TO FRONT FROM YESTERDAY--UPDATED

This essay is my contribution to a forthcoming symposium in Philosophy & Phenomenological Research on Justin Clarke-Doane's important book Morality & Mathematics (Oxford, 2020).  (Some of the themes are related to a just published article in a special issue of Ethical Theory & Moral Practice [edited by Richard Rowland] on "Moral Disagreement.")

UPDATED:  Springer has now provided this link for the Ethical Theory & Moral Practice paper.  Not sure how long it will be good, but this should take you to the full paper that is referenced in my contribution to the symposium on the Clarke-Doane book.

Virtual Dissertation Groups, once again

From philosopher Joshua Smart (Southern Illinois/Edwardsville):

What it is: VDG is a free service for those currently working on their doctoral dissertations in philosophy departments. Since 2014, we’ve connected students from over 30 countries to provide peer feedback on dissertation work with a minimal time commitment.

How it works: Each dissertator is placed in a group of three on the basis of a short survey about their project/area of work. About once a month, one member sends some work to the others—3,000 – 6,000 words—who then return feedback and comments in a week or so. (While this has typically been in the form of written comments, the survey now includes an option to indicate a preference for holding video discussions.)

Consciousness, space and time

Philosopher Craig Callender (UC San Diego) and others discuss at IAITV.

Tenured philosophy professor resigns position over university's mishandling of the COVID crisis

Jeremy Fischer, an Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Alabama at Huntsville, resigned his position today because of the university's failure to take adequate health and safety precautions in light of the terrible COVID situation in the state.  Professor Fischer's resignation letter is here:  Download 8.16.2021 Fischer Resignation StatementFINAL.   Professor Fischer had previously drafted a petition signed by more than 130 faculty and staff:  Download 000 UAH COVID Petition with Signatures to Administration FINAL UPDATED 8.16.21.

What a failure of leadership by the administration at Alabama/Huntsville.

ADDENDUM:  Professor Fischer kindly offered some details about what the university has and has not done in response to COVID (there is no vaccine mandate, of course): 

On the current Stoicism fad in parts of popular culture

Here, with quotes from philosophers Angie Hobbs (Sheffield), Nancy Sherman (Georgetown) and others.

In Memoriam: Sarah (Waterlow) Broadie (1941-2021)

MOVING TO FRONT FROM EVENING OF AUGUST 9--I HAD FORGOTTEN INITIALLY TO OPEN COMMENTS FOR THOSE WHO WISH TO POST REMEMBRANCES AND APPRECIATIONS

The eminent scholar of ancient philosophy has died.  Her colleague at St Andrews, Professor John Haldane, kindly shared this obituary:

It is with sadness that we report the death of our good friend and colleague Sarah Broadie. Sarah had suffered ill health in recent times, most recently being diagnosed with a respiratory condition that largely confined her to her home in St Andrews. She was, however, in good spirits and enjoyed conversation and continuing her work including with the Philosophical Quarterly which she much enjoyed and through which she first came to know Moira with whom she became close friends and who did much to look after her. I was closely involved, partly through the good offices of her stepson the philosopher Alexander Broadie, in her recruitment to St Andrews from Princeton in 2001, prior to that she held positions at Rutgers, Yale, Texas (Austin), and Edinburgh universities.

Great moments in Brown Philosophy Department rock 'n' roll...

...with an epistemology theme.  That's Ryan Doody on bass, Jamie Dreier and Nomy Arpaly on vocals, and David Estlund on guitar:

 

"What is love?"

Philosopher Raja Halwani (School of the Art Institute, Chicago) discusses the topic at Brain in a Vat.

Michelle Montague (Texas) discusses "the given," mental content and experience...

...with Ricardo Lopes at The Dissenter.

"Do the ends justify the means?"

Arch-utilitarian philosopher Alastair Norcross (Colorado) discusses this question at Brain in a Vat.