AAPT Members

As I've mentioned before, proponents of the Intelligent Design movement have set their sites on materialism in the Philosophy of Mind. In today's issue of Science, Martha Farah and Nancey Murphy appeal for calm:

Neuroscience and the soul

They argue, like I frequently do in class, that it is not at all clear that Christianity is committed to substance dualism, but rather something more like Aristotelian monism or attribute dualism. If my experiences are of any help to Farah and Murphy, they have a tough sell to make. Most students with commitments to Protestant Christianity respond to this argument badly (I'll post excerpts from a paper in 'The Vent' someday).

In short, like most other issues where I'm seen as an liberal elitist endoctrinating my students to socialism (Scott from Middle River claims), they dismiss my point on the grounds that I'm biased, don't know the Bible, should not stick my nose into theological matters, etc. - even AFTER I point out that the Apostle's creed, which they recite every week, testifies to a belief in the 'resurrection of the body.' Catholics don't seem bothered, incidentally.

Thanks to Mindhacks for bringing the story to my attention - and Garns for bookmarking it before I did!  read more »

As I've mentioned before, proponents of the Intelligent Design movement have set their sites on materialism in the Philosophy of Mind. In today's issue of Science, Martha Farah and Nancey Murphy have a letter appealing for calm:

Neuroscience and the soul

Their argument, which is one I frequently use in class, is that it is not at all clear that Christianity is committed to substance dualism, but rather something more like Aristotelian monism or attribute dualism. If my experiences are of any help to Farah and Murphy, they have a tough sell to make. Most students with commitments to Protestant Christianity respond to this argument badly (I'll post excerpts from a paper in 'The Vent' someday).

In short, like most other issues where I'm seen as an liberal elitist endoctrinating my students to socialism (Scott from Middle River claims), they dismiss the point on the grounds that I'm biased, don't know the Bible, should not stick my nose into theological matters, etc. - even AFTER I point out that the Apostle's creed, which they recite every week, testifies to a belief in the 'resurrection of the body.' Catholics don't seem bothered, incidentally.

Thanks to Mindhacks for bringing the story to my attention - and Garns for bookmarking it before I did!  read more »

I create little flash movies for use in my lectures all the time. One of my colleagues, Anne Nester, has been after me to do a better job distributing these for use by the wider community. So I'm going to resolve to post these here as I create them:

Parfit / Wiggins Case 1 Static Link

Parfit / Wiggins Case 2 Static link

Parfit / WIggins Case 3 (Fushion) Static Link

I have a rather personal connection (maybe 'grudge' is better) with one of the colleges named in the now-famous APA petition, which you can see here, so I've been a little reluctant to speak out too publicly on this issue. I abhor their hiring policies, and have long wondered why they are allowed to advertise in the JFP.

Philosophers' Association Urged to Take Tougher Stand Against Colleges With Anti-Gay Policies - Chronicle.com

Colleges like those named in the petition are not genuinely interested in the vast majority of the potential job candidates - I know for a fact that one of them required (at least in the late 80's) membership in their particular demonination and that you send your kids to their parochial schools as a condition of tenure.  So why are they even bothering advertising to the general population? It's a sham, and a waste of a candidate's time and money. It is high time that such advertisements be clearly marked for what they are - exercises in futility unless you are already religiously affiliated with these insitutions.

   read more »

George Lakoff has an interesting pre-game analysis of Obama's speech tonight. If you've missed it for the past few years, Lakoff has been analyzing political rhetoric, with some rather interesting insights that never fail to inspire excellent discussion:
The Seven Intellecutal Underpinnings of the Obama Code: George Lakoff for BuzzFlash.com -- A Must Read | BuzzFlash.org

From InsideBayArea.com:
Campus to celebrate 50 years of John Searle - Inside Bay Area

UPDATE - here's one from The Daily Californian:

Philosophy Professor Honored After 50 Years at UC Berkeley - The Daily Californian

And the Daily Californian's Blog:

 The Daily Clog » UC Berkeley Honors Loyal Hotshot Philosopher

A colleague of mine in Physics sent me this link. It doesn't contain any significant insight into the problem of divergent understanding of the role of effort in grading between students and professors, but it does contain this fabulous quote:

Student Expectations Seen as Causing Grade Disputes - NYTimes.com

“I think putting in a lot of effort should merit a high grade,” Mr. Greenwood said. “What else is there really than the effort that you put in?”

“If you put in all the effort you have and get a C, what is the point?” he added. “If someone goes to every class and reads every chapter in the book and does everything the teacher asks of them and more, then they should be getting an A like their effort deserves. If your maximum effort can only be average in a teacher’s mind, then something is wrong.”

I'll just leave it at that.

The DailyRecord a paper from the Wooster, OH region, has an interesting profile of a Phil Major from Vanderbilt who moved into healthcare:
The-Daily-Record.com - Local grad co-writes book using love of philosophy, medicine
Useful for those 'what can you do with a philosophy major' questions no?

At The Fort Morgan Times, of all places: Barker on books - Doggone fun philosophy : columnists : FortMorganTimes.com, Fort Morgan, CO. There is another in the series: What Philosophy Can Tell You about Your Cat. Both could be very useful for an introductory class, or an First year seminar, or even a 1/2 credit Jan Term.

The author of both books, Steven D. Hales is a Phil Prof at Bloomsburg - he interviewed me once, I believe - and by all accounts, is an excellent teacher. He should be a member of the AAPT, come to think of it...

According to Sarah Kolinovsky at the NYU Newspaper:

The hiring process is underway for professor positions at NYU Abu Dhabi, but there is one catch: Candidates for these highly sought-after jobs don’t just have to impress faculty and administrators — some of them will have to impress students, too.

This practice, apparently, is so foreign to the community at NYU that it warrants a newspaper article.  Seriously. You can read about the 'justification' for this radical practice of actually requiring candidates to be able to speak to undergraduates - and even more shockingly - soliciting feedback from undergraduates on their performance!  Unbelievable. How dare they think that legally responsible adults who have spent years listening to various professors of philosophy, and have an invested interest in the outcome of the hire might actually have some insight into the qualities of a good professor. What's next? Professors that actually care about teaching? The horror! We all know that interest in pedagogy is a sign of a weak mind! What ever will happen to our discipline when those entrusted to cultivate the next generation of philosphers actually start giving a damn! The whole thing will get flushed down the crapper I say!

OK, so I got a little carried away. You can read the whole story here:  read more »

The Times Book review on the Book of Dead Philosophers is finally officially online. It appeared about a week ago, but then disappeared.  They are running about three months behind the Vancouver Sun (blogged here)

Books of The Times - ‘The Book of Dead Philosophers’ by Simon Critchley - What’s It All About, Diogenes? - Review - NYTimes.com

The first chapter is available at the NY Times (reliably available since 1/29):

First Chapter - 'The Book of Dead Philosophers,' by Simon Critchley - NYTimes.com

Here's a follow-up from 'monsterandcritics.com':

‘Book of Dead Philosophers’

And more, as they come in:

LexGo.com | 'Dead Philosophers' has fun comparing deep thinkers' deaths with their ideas of it  read more »

What ever other problems we can find with Thomas Kuhn's Structure of Scientific Revolutions, hist discussion of the importance of technique and instrument in the advancement of science is invaluable.  Every introduction of a new technique appears to be followed by a period in which nobody does anything other than simply play with the technique - difficult questions are abandoned in favor of 'cheap and easy' experiments that tend to follow the 'let's turn the machine on and see what will happen' model of experimentation.

I've long been worried about neuroimaging for exactly this reason. For many years there, it seemed like the only work in cognitive science that could get funding required and fMRI machine. Moreover, the only stuff reported in the mainstream press was about the neural correlates of gender differences, terrorist plots, of affections for the president. I have a file of these in my office somewhere. I'll post them someday.

All of this may be coming to an end. A paper in Nature calls into question the assumption underlying all neuroimaging studies that bloodflow correlates with neuronal activity. I first heard of the story from:
Deric Bownds' MindBlog: Brain imaging can reflect expected, rather than actual, nerve activity  read more »

I haven't seen it, but apparently, it is true:
Denis Dutton explains it all, mostly | lohud.com | The Journal News
I thought after Harry G Frankfurt's appearance on The Daily Show, it was all over for us Philosophers on Latenight TV. Harry is obviously a first-rate Philosopher, but he answers almost every question with 'It's complicated...'  That is true - but it doesn't exactly resonate with the late-night audience, if you know what I mean.

Who is also a 'soon to be profession taiko player':
Student Artist Spotlight: Eva Kestner '09 | The Cornell Daily Sun

John Wilkins over at Evolving Thoughts reproduced an early paper by W.R. Greg that Darwin cites in the Descent of Man. Excellent resource for anyone teaching the text (which I will be later this term).
Evolving Thoughts: Natural selection fails with Man - W. R. Greg

Amidst the flurry of stories inspired by the 200th anniversary of Darwin's birth, comes this one, which you may have missed. The pope is convening a conference to study the relationship between catholic dogma and evolutionary theory:
ANSA.it - News in English - Vatican to re- evaluate Darwin
I am not hopeful, given this pope's recent decision to reinstate Richard Williamson. Catholics in American have been a welcome point of rational neutrality in the crazy ID debates, and I fear that that rationality will be lost if this goes the way I expect it will. I wonder if Villanova will have to remove that statue of Gregor Mendel outside the science building that states "between true science and true religion there is no real conflict."

From the student newspaper at the University of Maine:

Op-ed: Philosophy must be at forefront of education - Opinion

A response article appeared 2/12, also from student:

Op-ed: Philosophy - a labor of love - Opinion

Superb article in the Times Higher Ed by Soran Reader (Durham University), a specialist in ethics, who is suffering from an inoperable brain tumor:
Times Higher Education - It is monstrously wrong that patients cannot ask for euthanasia

The Baptist Standard :: The Newsmagazine of Texas Baptists - Scientific organizations, court: ‘intelligent design’ isn’t science

Hal Poe, the Charles Colson professor of faith and culture at Baptist-affiliated Union University, interviewed in response to the 2005 Dover decision, said he thinks neither intelligent design, in its current form, nor the aspect of evolution it challenges qualify as science.

“My view is that intelligent design at the present moment is philosophy of science rather than science,”

Since when is 'Philosophy of Science' a shorthand for 'not-yet-science'? Why do people insist on thinking of Philosophy as some kind of childrens' playground of undeveloped ideas?

Listen people: Philosophy is a discipline like any other. Theories that don't meet the academic standards of other disciplines are not shuffled off into Philosophy to gather cobwebs.* We are not the care-takers of unwarranted beliefs!

I'm off to lower my blood pressure with a little hot tea and yoga.

* Just so you know: I blame Kuhn for this perception.

PZ Myers over at Pharyngula blogged yesterday about the story out of the U Ottawa on Denis Rancourt's practice of announcing at the beginning the semester that they will all get an 'A+':
Pharyngula: Shhhh. Don't tell the students.
The original story is here, at the globeandmail.com: Professor makes his mark, but it costs him his job.
I've always detested grades, having attended an undergraduate college without them, so my sympathies are with Prof. Rancourt. Grades tend to impede real student learning, and while it is uncommon to announce such a policy, the grade-inflation world we live in makes this practive more or less common, esp. in upper-level science classes like his.  After all, most of grad school is on the same unspoken policy, so why is he being fired?
I think something has to be done here - anyone know of a way to get in touch with the administration at U Ottawa?