The Philosophers' Cocoon

A Professorship and three post-doc fellowships in Philosophy of Religion

I received from Yujin Nagasawa (via Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad):

I am starting a new Templeton-funded project called the Global Philosophy of Religion (https://www.global-philosophy.org/). The aim of the project is to promote research involving philosophers of religion from all religious traditions and geographical regions. As part of the project, we are advertising three postdoctoral fellowships - in Hindu philosophy of religion, Islamic philosophy of religion and Jewish philosophy of religion - as well as a senior lectureship in philosophy of religion (tradition unspecified).

The list of the positions are published here: https://www.global-philosophy.org/vacancies

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Yujin Nagasawa

H. G. Wood Professor of the Philosophy of Religion

School of Philosophy, Theology and Religion

University of Birmingham

Edgbaston, Birmingham

B15 2TT

United Kingdom

Web: http://www.yujinnagasawa.co.uk

How to move mid-career?

In our newest "how can we help you?" thread, S writes:

So here's something I've been wondering: How do people work their way up from a job at one place to another midcareer or later? I'm thinking about associate or above hires. It seems to me this might be more possible than say publishing your way into a job that wouldn't normally give someone from your program a look right out of grad school. I think this since I've known several people who did just this; that is going from a job in teaching school to an R2 and sometimes even onto an R1 even with very non-Leiterrific pedigrees. Is it really possible? Or have I just made too much of a few people who've done it? If it is possible how do people do it? Just publish a lot and hope someone notices them or is there something more proactive one can do? I'm not unhappy in my current job, which is teaching focused, and don't plan on going anywhere in the next few years but I'm also not sure I want to spend the next 30 years in this job so I was just wondering what the long term possibilities. (And of course in this day and age maybe no one should even count on having the same job for 30 years, but I suppose that's a grim thought.)

Anyone have any insight, say from personal experience? Here's one thing I've heard through the grapevine: it's helpful if , in addition to accomplishing stuff (publishing, etc.), you know people who like you and your work. This should probably be commonsense, given the statistics that something like 85% of all jobs are obtained through networking. Still, I think it may bear repeating, as there seems to be some tendency (suggested perhaps by S's question whether one should "just publish a lot...?") to believe that academic job-markets are bare meritocracies. Sure, I think there is a real meritocratic element--but it also seems to me that, as in most parts of human life, it doesn't hurt to know people. But what do I know? It might be good to hear from people who have 'worked their way up' mid-career what shape their path took!

Why should you want to be in heaven?: The theology of Vaikuṇṭha

We all know so many clever jokes about how hell should be preferred "because of the good company" and about how boring should heaven be. Let me take the chance to focus on the Śrīvaiṣṇava heaven, i.e., Vaikuṇṭha, and see whether they apply also to it.

Why exactly is Vaikuṇṭha such a great place? For the mystical poets who first mention it (the Āḻvārs) the main reason seems to be that one is in the same world with one's beloved One. The 14th c. philosopher Veṅkaṭanātha adds some more theology to it, speaking of the fact that one does not only share sālokya 'being in the same world [with God]', but also paramasāmya 'supreme identity [with God]'. This last state seems to violate exactly the residual dualism necessary in order to allow for love and service to God, and therefore, Veṅkaṭanātha explains that this paramasāmya is not tādātmya (as for the philosophers of Non-Dual Vedānta), but rather sādharmya 'having the same characteristics'. Still, the person having attained sādharmya is not equal to God in every respect. For instance, they cannot create the world. So, the sādharmya regards other aspects, most notably bhogasāmya 'equality of enjoyment'. In other words, one enjoys all the blessing experiences of God in Vaikuṇṭha, although one does not have the same level of independent agency (but still a lot of freedom, according to Veṅkaṭanātha, Tattvamuktākalāpa 2.63).

The idea of equal enjoyment with God raises the problem of embodiment, since it seems difficult to imagine enjoyment without a body. Veṅkaṭanātha in the Tattvamuktākalāpa says that in fact the soul can at their own will get a body, which is not determined by karman and is therefore not a vehicle of bondage.

Within the sādharmya there is also the attainment of omniscience, which in fact was the natural condition of the soul but was temporarily blocked by karman. (So, in Vaikuṇṭha you will finally be able to understand perfectly Tamil and Sanskrit and solve any philosophical puzzle you wondered about!)

Why should it not get boring at a certain point? Veṅkaṭanātha does not directly address this question, but his Rahasyatrayasāra seems to point to the idea that one would be busy with a continuous flow of beautiful experiences, all connected with the fact that one is with nice people (the other liberated ones) and especially with the object of one's love, Viṣṇu.

Does it sound convincing? Or would one still eventually get bored? Eternity is long… Yes, but one might also speculate that during cosmic dissolutions everything is reabsorbed in Viṣṇu, so that eternity is long but always interrupted. I will get back to this in future posts.

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I was prompted to write this post by a Twitter remark of Helen De Cruz.

Cross-posted, with more Sanskrit and Tamil passages and more historical background, at the Indian Philosophy Blog.

Teaching Bullshit and Assholes - Part 2 (Guest Post by C. Thi Nguyen)

“Awesome and Asshole”

For the rest of “Bullshit and Assholes” week, I was going to cover the notions of “asshole”, “jerk”, “awesome”, and “suck”. The “asshole” part involved comparing Aaron James’ account of an asshole, Eric Schwitzgebel’s account of a jerk, and Ta-Nehisi Coates’ account of an asshole – using YouTube videos and Aeon pieces and blog posts to try to make it manageable. Still, the discussion of "asshole" did not go well, due to the (retrospectively now obvious) total overload of material. Also comparing three subtly different definitions of the same account is not a great idea for intro. Maybe one of you can come up with a better lesson plan for this.

But the “awesome" and “suck” class was fantastic, and students were far more into it than I expected. I taught Nick Riggle's Aeon piece on defining "awesome", "down"," and "suck". This piece later spawned a book, On Being Awesome: A Unified Theory of How Not to Suck. Reading the book definitely enriched my teaching, but everything you need to know is in the Aeon piece. Here, if you want it, is my lesson plan for that:

What are the academic virtues?

Which virtues do we value? There are big cultural variations. For example, the virtue of honor does not have a place in American society at large (as Tamler Sommers discusses in his recent book on the topic), but it still seems prized in some subcultures, such as in sports (taking one for the team, etc). 

In The Lakota way, Marshall uses anecdotes and stories from his family and community to examine which virtues are valued among Lakota. Some of these do not have a clear equivalent in mainstream American culture. For example, humility is prized in the Lakota, but not in the US. Humility will not get you tenure, political office, or fame. By contrast, among Lakota, humility is a virtue that further amplifies and enhances other virtues. Crazy Horse showed leadership and courage, and those were amplified by his humility. 

Virtues can clash, both within and across cultures, leading to tensions in our ethical values, as Owen Flanagan details in Geography of Morals. This is clearly the case for academic culture. Academia has specific virtues and values which are sometimes in tension with the virtues we grew up with. For example, I grew up in a working-class environment in Belgium, where virtues like thrift, modesty (including a gendered version of this), and good manners were valued.

What are the academic virtues? With academic virtues I mean the dispositions that academics generally strive toward and that they find laudable in others, for example, that they mention in obituaries or when speaking of the recently deceased (Mark Alfano has systematic work on this, which I haven't done here, my sense is just an informal appraisal of how people speak of dead academic colleagues). Here's my attempt at fleshing them out. 

Ambition: Aristotle says in Nichomachean ethics that having the proper amount of ambition is good and laudable. You should not claw your way to the top at the expense of everyone else, but you should definitely not be too modest. My sense is that ambition can go very far in academia before it is regarded as improper. 

Excellence: This is probably the most tiresome and daunting of the academic virtues; in brief, you need to be better than other people. You need to perpetually be excellent, outdoing others both in in quality and (to some lesser extent, but still, also) quantity of work. There seems to be no upper limit to how excellent is excellent enough. 

Fortitude/perseverance: this is the hardest one to learn. Academics value fortitude in the face of adversity. If you are for years on the job market, working under difficult circumstances, you basically are expected to suck it up. People may be sympathetic and say how difficult the market is, still, they accept adversity as a reality that you will need to live with. Relatedly, any academic needs to accept multiple rejections (papers, grants, etc.) without grumbling, and just keep on trying and trying, until hopefully they succeed. 

Truthfulness: This is the virtue that guards against such practices as plagiarism, falsifying data, p-hacking, etc. You are expected not to mislead or knowingly falsify data or present work in a misleading fashion. In philosophy, which is less empirically driven, this is perhaps less a concern than in other fields. 

Magnanimity: In an Aristotelian sense, this is the virtue where you know you're worthy of honors and behave accordingly. I think that Aristotle's definition of this term comes pretty close to what I see is expected among academics of a certain seniority (especially "academic stars").

Benevolence: This comes close to the Mengzian idea of rén or humaneness/benevolence, where academics are supposed to show compassion, for instance, to graduate students or to people in precarious positions. While this virtue might not be immediately obvious, I've heard many people speak warmly of academics who showed compassion and were benevolent to them in a difficult period in their lives. 

Edited to add: Originality of thought: Marcus mentioned creativity as an important academic virtue, and while it is indeed a good thing to have, I wonder if we can be more specific to talk about originality of thought, as we don't hold it against academics to re-iterate the same idea for decades, for example. Originality of thought is ideas/concepts you come up with that are specific to you and that define you, in some cases, that are like a trade mark of you, e.g., rigid designators, Gettier cases, Frankfurt cases... While most academics do not have such a trade mark they're still expected (even already as job candidates) to have their specific, original idea that is unique to them. 

I am probably leaving several important virtues out, and maybe people here will disagree with some I listed. Some of these virtues have costs: fortitude/perseverance can lead to sunk costs where people are stuck in suboptimal adjuncting situations but they keep on going in the hope that they will get a job next time round. Magnanimity has problematic aspects of academic hero-worship, clubbishness among elite departments, etc. 

Still, to thrive in academia, you need to either internalize the academic virtues (i.e., the virtues prevalent in academia), or at the very least understand them. Understanding and emulation without internalizing gives rise to "code-switching" where you are in academic mode or in home mode. As Jennifer Morton argues in her recent Moving up without losing your way, this comes at some ethical cost. How to balance the academic virtues with virtues you value for yourself? 

Practicing Academic Kindness in the Classroom (Guest Post by Philipp Schulz)

This is a guest post by Philipp Schulz, a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute for Intercultural and International Studies (InIIS) at the University of Bremen. It first appeared on Duck of Minerva on 17th February 2020. We're grateful to both for allowing us to republish it here.

Academic competitiveness and pettiness is alive and real. From expediting demands of the competitive academic job market, disrespectful peer review comments, to micro-aggressions and open hostilities at conferences – in particular to early career, women and/or people of colour scholars – there seem to be countless examples for an acute absence of kindness and empathy in the academy. Probably most of us, although to varying degrees, have been confronted with the unkind aspects of academic environments. In many ways, of course, these problems are embedded in wider structural problems of racism and sexism within the academy at large.

Fortunately, there seems to be increasing (albeit slow) recognition of the toxic practices of academic work cultures. As an early career researcher, I am particularly excited about some of the kindness that many of my peers are extending and the horizontal generosity that is beginning to spread across conferences, workshops and social media. Yet, I do believe that the (sub-)field of feminist international relations is particularly unique in that way, perhaps not unrelated to some of the disciplinary sanctioning and marginalizing that the field still experiences in the discipline more widely.

Teaching Bullshit and Assholes - Part 1 (Guest Post by C. Thi Nguyen and Imree Parma)

Teaching “On Bullshit”

by C. Thi Nguyen

I recently taught a "Bullshit and Assholes Week" in my introductory ethics class, and just had a lifetime peak teaching experience. It was for my first attempt at teaching Harry Frankfurt's "On Bullshit". Raw, pure, unrefined teaching ecstasy.

I was actually prepping for the class the day before and totally freaking out that I'd picked something too hard for gen-ed, intro ethics – that it was too dry and too tediously analytic. But it turned out to be a TOTAL DELIGHT. It is, in fact, a perfect way to introduce students to conceptual analysis. Because the article is, I now realize, this perfect escalation of gradually improving attempts at getting the right analysis of "bullshit," in a wonderfully teachable sequence.

First pass: is bullshit the same as lying? The answer: no, because there's plenty of bullshit (administrative red tape) that's not lying. Second pass: is bullshit pretentious lying? No, because some bullshit is pretentious, but not lying (excessively precious artisanal-signaling food). And some bullshit involves lying, but no pretension.

The moment the article really hit, for my students, is when Frankfurt proposes the account that bullshit is bullshit because it is sloppy. And the students all saw it at the same moment: that excessively precious artisanal-signaling food may be bullshit, but it is certainly not sloppy. In fact, it is bullshit because *too much care has been put into it," perhaps in the wrong sort of way. And so "bullshit" needs to be an abstract enough concept so that it encompasses some bullshit which is bullshit because it is sloppy, and other bullshit which is bullshit because it is too carefully crafted.

When the students saw it, they were, like, jaws agape in illumination and pleasure. I think they went from laughing at the fact that the professor was talking about bullshit, to laughing at how deep the analysis could go.

How can we help you? (Feb-March 2020)

Now that it's been nearly two months since our last "how can we help you?" thread, I thought it might be a good time for another thread.

For those of you unfamiliar with this series, this is a chance for you to post openly or anonymously in the comments section below on anything you could use help with related to the profession. After you post your query in the comments section, I will then post new threads for readers to discuss your query.

Please feel free to ask questions on anything (within the Cocoon's mission) that you could use help with, including but not limited to:

• The job-market (applying for jobs, etc.)
• Graduate school
• Publishing
• Teaching
• Issues in the profession
• Work-life balance
• Personal struggles
• Etc.

Fire away - we're here to help! 

Twitter thread on negotiating offers

Elisa Freschi drew my attention to this Twitter thread on negotiating academic offers. Here's the thread re-posted:

1/My first piece of advice is simple: negotiate the terms of a TT offer you receive. Negotiation is expected, it’s the norm, even if no one ever taught you how to do it.

2/Approach the negotiation with a positive attitude (not entitled). Let them know you are excited to be their colleague.

3/Overall, don't frame your ask as "I need/deserve more" but more like "there are just a few things I need to do THE BEST JOB I CAN FOR YOU."

4/The Chair is likely your go to person. They are “on your side” and can help you frame your ask in ways that make sense for that institution. Remember THEY WANT YOU!

5/SALARY. Your based salary is the place to start because it will make the most difference in your earning power long term (your raises will be a % of if).

6/In graduate school someone showed me a graph that said on average men get 4% more salary they are first offered, for women that number is 1% (b/c women don’t ASK). Everyone should ask for at least 5%. AT LEAST. I asked for (and got) 10% more on my first job offer.

7/Do your homework. Public institutions make salaries public. When I was negotiating with for my first job at UNCG I knew the salary of every member of the department. The Chronicle has averages for most other institutions by rank.

8/The Chair likely can’t offer you what an Associate Professor is making if you are hired as an Assistant, but she can offer you almost as much (and then has a recent to ask for an equity raise for that Associate next year).

9/Asking for money is awkward, I get it. A simple, “I am excited about the possibility of joining your department and a salary of X would make my decision easier” or “I was hoping for a salary of X” should work.

10/RESEARCH SUPPORT. Depending on what you need, this is the time to ask! And just b/c you are in a humanist doesn’t mean you don’t need guaranteed research funds. In my case I needed to do a lot of international travel of research so got a hefty start up fund for that.

11/Research funds can also pay for computer upgrades, professional dues, developmental editors, fancy office supplies, all kinds of things that will make you more research productive. And they are NOT TAXED.

12/TEACHING SUPPORT: If you have to teach new classes at the new job, ask for course develop funds (perhaps as summer salary) to get those new courses prepped. Think about if you need funds to purchase materials for library collection (that you can assign).

13/COURSE RELEASES: These can make a huge difference to you. First TT job? Ask for 2-3 course releases to take as a pre-tenure leave. If the institution already has a pre-tenure leave, ask for 1-2 to help you get new courses prepped and keep your research on track the first year.

14/Keep in mind that depending on the institution some things are easier to give you than others. Sometimes research funds are a no go, but course releases are fine. And vice versa. This is what the Chair can help with.

15/And just b/c they say no to something you ask for doesn’t mean they don’t value you. Institutions tie chairs'/deans’ hands on some matters. Don’t take it personally. The negotiation is a business transaction.

I wonder how accurate readers in the know think this advice is for philosophy. Six years ago, a job-candidate in philosophy had their offer rescinded mid-negotiation. I don't know how often this happens, as there may well be people who keep these things quiet (I don't know). In any case, for what it's worth (and I could be wrong), the Twitter thread above seems to me probably far too optimistic (and potentially dangerous) for the philosophy market (with the exceptions, perhaps, being the R1 and elite SLAC markets). My spouse recently negotiated competing offers in a STEM field, and in her case the above thread seems to me exactly right. But her discipline's job market is very good. Philosophy's market, as we all know, is horrible: it's a "buyer's market", meaning that there are far more qualified candidates than positions. My sense is that in general, this means that hiring institutions may be a heck of a lot less willing to negotiate. Sure, there are probably really good R1's that have the money and desire to negotiate substantially to get the candidate they really want. But R2's? SLACs?

In my case, all of my offers (after my first VAP) were from SLACs, and in each case the only thing the institutions were willing to negotiate on were salary. Further, I think it's really important to be sensitive to the norms at the institution that has an offer to you. For example, to the best of my knowledge (from fairly good first-hand experience), many SLACs just don't negotiate course releases, additional teaching funds, travel funds, or research funding. Salary may be the most you can get, and asking for a lot more could go very poorly. And, while I'd like to say that the worst that can happen is that "they say no", the above case shows that assuming this can (perhaps rarely) result in disaster. My suggestion, then, is this: try to find out what the norms are at the institution that has given you the offer! For example, suppose you have a good rapport with someone in that department: the chair, search chair, or another faculty member. Consider asking them what they think can and cannot be negotiated before you actually try to negotiate. My sense is that these people typically only want to help you. They're not deans or provosts looking to keep costs down. They want to hire you, and they probably want you to be happy! So, consider asking. See what they say. That's my advice.

What do you all think about the above Twitter thread, my alternative, and negotiating in general?

Reading recommendation letters

In our most recent "how can we help you?" thread, Amanda writes:

[W]hat are the ethics as far as *reading* [recommendation] letters are concerned[?]. Marcus, you said, you don't focus much on letters. Would a really bad letter turn you off a candidate you otherwise liked? I wills say that at R1's, and i've been involved in searches at 3 different institutions, letters are taken extremely seriously. Professors do distinguish between strong/stronger, sounding "restrained" etc. And with grad school applications they are maybe even more important. So what should a search committee member do when a candidate has, say, 1 really strong letter, 1 decent letter, and 1 bad letter?

Good questions. I'm really curious to hear how people answer. Here are my answers, beginning with a quick clarification. Amanda is right that I don't focus much on recommendation letters. This is because the science on this is unequivocal. First, recommendation letters as standardly evaluated poorly predict future performance. In fact, they have some of the lowest predictive validity of future performance of any commonly used measure. Second, they show demonstrable gender bias in academia specifically. Consequently, I'm with Mike Huemer: I don't think the hiring process in academia should include recommendation letters at all anymore. I think they do more harm than good, making hiring more a matter of personal reputation than actual achievement.

Using other offers to renegotiate one's position

In our most recent "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

I am curious about experiences/advice on using new offers to renegotiate existing positions. So, you already have a full time permanent position at a University but get an offer from a different University that you want to use as a bargaining chip (at least potentially).

I am generally curious about the process here, but I am particularly interested in something that is likely a bit idiosyncratic: If you currently have a Non-Tenure Track (but permanent) position (something like an "Assistant Teaching Professor") and get offered a TT position at a different University. Is there any path to getting the NTT job switched over to a TT position (perhaps not immediately, but with some sort of guarantee or promise)?

I obviously understand one response is "just take the TT position" but let's assume there are some good reasons to stick at the current University, although preferably with a TT position.

Although I could be wrong, my sense is that this is pretty simple. All you need to do is schedule a meeting with your dean, letting them know, "I have an attractive offer from another university. But I really love this university, and would like to stay here." The ball is then in their court, and as far as I can tell, what happens next depends on a variety of factors:

1. the financial situation of your university,
2. the institution's hiring policies,
3. the freedom (or lack thereof) of the administration there to convert your current position into a tenure-track position,
4. how much they value you.

Inert and alive substances: Alternative classifications in Veṅkaṭanātha

In case you want to taste some South Asian ontological ideas which will remind you of Greece, but at the same time be different, please continue reading.

In a work called Nyāyasiddhāñjana and in the Nyāyapariśuddhi, the 14th c. philosopher Veṅkaṭanātha discusses some fundamental ontological topics in order to distinguish his positions from the ones of the Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika school.

The Nyāya school proposes a fundamental division of realities into dravya ‘substances’, guṇa ‘qualities’, and karman ‘actions’,¹ with the former as the substrate of the latter two. This leads to two difficulties for Veṅkaṭanātha’s agenda. On the one hand, the radical distinction between substance and attribute means that Nyāya authors imagine liberation to be the end of the connection of the ātman ‘self’ to all attributes, from sufferance to consciousness. By contrast, Veṅkaṭanātha, would never accept consciousness to be separated from the individual soul and even less from God. The other difficulty regards the theology of Veṅkaṭanātha's school, called Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta, which accepted among its sacred texts also the Pañcarātra texts. Since the beginnings of Pañcarātra, one of its chief doctrines has been that of the manifestations (called vibhūti) of God, which are dependent on Him but co-eternal with Him and in this sense are unexplainable according to the division of substances into eternal and transient.

Veṅkaṭanātha opposes to the Nyāya one more than one classification, so that it is clear that Veṅkaṭanātha's main point is addressing the above-mentioned problems with the Nyāya ontology, rather than establishing in full detail a distinct ontology. For an instance of alternative classifications see, e.g., the opening verse in the Nyāyasiddhāñjana, chapter on inert substances:

``Substance is of two types, [according to this classification:] inert or alive, or [according to this other classification:] innerly [luminous] or what is its opposite. [Furthermore,] it is of six types, according to the division in [natura naturans having] three qualities, time, individual souls, God, the ground for [God's] enjoyment (i.e., His manifestations, vibhūti) and [His] cognition. Some distinguish reality as of three types, in order to distinguish the Lord, the individual soul, and the self (as the material cause of the universe) because they do not want to include cognition, time and the ground for [God's] enjoyment, since these have the nature of qualities''.

(Cross-posted, with some modifications, on my personal blog and on the Indian Philosophy blog)

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1. There are in fact further categories, namely sāmānya ‘universal’, viśeṣa ‘individual’, and samavāya ‘inherence’. See for the fact that these latter categories have been added at a later stage of the evolution of the school. The Navya Nyāya school adds also abhāva to the categories. (see Eli Franco and Karin Preisendanz, "Nyāya-Vaiśeịṣika", Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy)↩︎

Tenure appeals

Thus far in this series on tenure, we've discussed clarity of tenure standards at time of offer, different universities' actual tenure standards, the tenure process itself, life after tenure, and tenure denials. In this, the final entry I have planned for the series, I would like to discuss tenure appeals. Here are some questions it might be illuminating to hear answers to:

1. What is your university's tenure appeal process?
2. If you were denied tenure and appealed, what was your experience of the process like?
3. If you won (or lost) your appeal, what were the grounds for the decision?
4. Did you/do you think the appeals process was fair?
5. If you have been through the process, is there anything else you think people should know?

My university's tenure appeal process is detailed here in our faculty handbook (section I). Because I have no experience with the process beyond what is written there, I don't consider myself in a good position to answer any of the other above questions. However, I do hope some readers with experience in these matters choose to weigh in, as I imagine there is a good number of readers out there who would benefit from learning more about appeals, including how often appeals are successful, whether appeals processes are fair, and so on. Anyone with any experience or insight (including, potentially, people who have served on appeals committees) able and willing to share? 

What it is like to be a philosopher in Turkey

This is the eighteenth installment of The Cocoon Goes Global, a series that gives a sense of what the philosophy profession looks like outside of the Anglophone West. Today's entry is by Dr. Saniye Vatansever, Assistant Professor at Bilkent University. 

Disclaimer: I am a Turkish woman who taught in several English-medium public and private universities in Turkey. Hence I will write from a particular point of view (I might be positively biased towards the country) and only about English-medium universities in Turkey. I assume the reader of this piece is a foreigner who might seek employment in one of the English-medium universities in Turkey. Even though the title reads as “What it is like to be a philosopher in Turkey”, the main objective of this piece is to inform potential foreigner job candidates, who have no (or very little) knowledge about the country and/or the academic atmosphere they might join in. That is why I will focus on what I take to be some of the best and worst aspects of being a philosopher in an English-medium university in Turkey.

Advantages of being a philosopher in Turkey

Beautiful country, good food, nice people: Turkey is a very vibrant and beautiful country with rich history and diverse culture, delicious cuisine, and hospitable people. Every region has its unique culture, historical and natural sightseeing sides and traditional delicious meals and deserts (yes, baklava is Turkish!). Due to its geographical location, one can also easily travel to other European and Asian countries for touristic and academic purposes. And if you are a cat or a dog person, this is the country for you as there are street cats and dogs everywhere. It is not uncommon to see cat and dog food left at the corners of the streets for them. I would recommend you to see the documentary called Kedi (cat in Turkish), if you haven’t already.

Neurofunctional Prudence & Morality (new book)

I am excited to report that my new book, Neurofunctional Prudence and Morality: A Philosophical Theory, is now available from Routledge ($70 hardback, $12.50+ ebook). Anyone interested can preview the book’s introduction and part of Chapter 1 here at Google Books. Interested readers can also download a pre-published draft of Chapter 2 (‘Outline of a Theory of Prudence’) here, and read Chapter 3 open access (‘Derivation of Morality from Prudence’) here.

Overview: This book outlines a unified theory of prudence and morality that merges a wide variety of findings in behavioral neuroscience with philosophically sophisticated normative theorizing. Chapter 1 lays out the emerging behavioral neuroscience of prudence and morality. Chapter 2 then outlines a new theory of prudence as fairness to oneself across time. Chapter 3 then derives a revised version of my 2016 moral theory--Rightness as Fairness--from this theory of prudence, showing how the theory of prudence defends Rightness as Fairness against various critiques and unifies prudence, morality, and justice. Chapter 4 then argues that this theory explains a variety of normative philosophical and empirical neuroscientific phenomena better than alternatives. Chapter 5 responds to potential objections and explores future research avenues.

Chapter Abstracts

Introduction: Philosophers have long theorized about the relationship between morality and prudential self-interest. Many argue that moral actions are always or usually prudent, and that morality may even be reducible to prudence. However, others argue that moral actions are not necessarily prudent, or that prudence and morality involve fundamentally different types of normative reasons. This chapter outlines how these disagreements reveal the limitations of traditional philosophical methods. It then provides an overview of the new approach this book defends. It explains how this book combines traditional philosophical methods with behavioral neuroscience and scientific principles of theory selection to defend a new unified theory of prudence and morality. It also outlines how the book’s theory is simultaneously normative and descriptive, providing an account of how prudent and moral agents ought to act, along with testable predictions regarding how prudential and moral cognition actually function. Finally, it explains how this book’s theory refines and defends my earlier theory of morality, Rightness as Fairness, from a variety of objections in the literature.

Chapter 1 - Outline of the Behavioral Neuroscience of Prudence and Morality: This chapter outlines the emerging behavioral neuroscience of prudence and morality, explaining how the findings raise normative and descriptive explanatory questions. It begins by detailing how prudential and moral cognition involve mental time-travel (the capacity to imaginatively simulate different possible pasts and futures), other-perspective-taking (the capacity to imaginatively simulate other people’s perspectives), and risk-aversion. It then discusses 17 distinct regions of the human brain’s default mode network (DMN)—a region involved in daydreaming, mind-wandering, thinking about oneself and others, remembering the past, and imagining the future—that have been implicated in moral judgment and sensitivity across a wide variety of tasks. It also outlines how stimulation and inhibition of particular DMN regions and capacities, including the temporoparietal junction, have been found to have bidirectional effects on prudential and moral cognition and performance. Finally, it suggests the findings outlined raise normative questions about why particular brain regions and capacities should be involved in prudential and moral cognition, and descriptive questions about how they are involved in both forms of cognition, and how the findings summarized appear to cohere poorly with some dominant views in moral philosophy.

Chapter 2 - Outline of a Theory of Prudence: This chapter outlines a new normative theory of prudence and descriptive psychological theory of prudential cognition. It begins from the common premise in the literature that prudence is normatively a matter of acting in ways that have the greatest-expected aggregate lifetime utility. It then contends that because life as a whole is profoundly uncertain, prudence requires acting on principles that are rational from a standpoint of radical diachronic uncertainty—from what Donald Bruckner calls a ‘Prudential Original Position’, a model similar to John Rawls’s famous original position, but where an individual agent is situated behind a veil of ignorance applied to their own life. Following Bruckner, I assume that minimax regret—the principle of acting in ways that minimize the maximum amount of regret an action might result in—is the most rational principle in the Prudential Original Position, and that this principle converges with maximizing expected aggregate lifetime utility the more an agent cares about the past and future. The chapter then constructs a detailed theory of how Bruckner’s account coheres with and appears supported by a specific form of ‘moral risk-aversion’ that prudent people typically engage in and progressively internalize across childhood, adolescence, and adulthood.

Chapter 3 - Derivation of Morality from Prudence: This chapter derives and refines a novel normative moral theory and descriptive theory of moral psychology—Rightness as Fairness—from the theory of prudence defended in Chapter 2. It briefly summarizes Chapter 2’s finding that prudent agents typically internalize ‘moral risk-aversion’. It then outlines how this prudential psychology leads prudent agents to want to know how to act in ways they will not regret in morally salient cases, as well as to regard moral actions as the only types of actions that satisfy this prudential interest. It then uses these findings to defend a new derivation of my (2016) theory of morality, Rightness as Fairness, showing how the derivation successfully defends Rightness as Fairness against a variety of objections. The chapter also details how this book’s theory helps to substantiate the claim that Rightness as Fairness unifies a variety of competing moral frameworks: deontology, consequentialism, contractualism, and virtue ethics. Finally, the chapter shows how Chapter 2’s theory of prudence entails some revisions to Rightness as Fairness, including the adoption of a series of Rawlsian original positions to settle moral and social-political issues under ideal and nonideal circumstances—thus entailing a unified normative and descriptive psychological framework for prudence, morality, and justice.

Chapter 4 - A Unified Neurofunctional Theory of Prudence and Morality?: This chapter utilizes seven principles of theory selection to compare the theory of prudence and morality advanced in this book to alternatives. It first argues that there are two possible ways that a theory of prudence and morality may explain relevant target phenomena: (1) as a normative teleofunctional explanation of why particular phenomena found in behavioral neuroscience should be the case and (2) as a descriptive functional explanation of how prudential and moral psychology actually function. It then argues that in order to evaluate how successful a theory is in both respects, theories of prudence and morality should be judged according to seven principles of theory selection adapted from the sciences, including principles of internal and external coherence, explanatory power, unity, parsimony, fruitfulness, and ‘firm observational foundations’. Finally, it outlines how this book’s unified theory of prudence and morality—Prudence and Morality as Fairness to Oneself and Others—appears to satisfy all seven principles of theory selection more successfully than other existing normative moral theories and descriptive theories of moral psychology.

Chapter 5 - Replies to Potential Concerns, and Avenues for Future Research: This chapter responds to potential concerns about this book's theory of prudence and morality. It first addresses the concern that the theory is overly speculative, arguing that the theory is normatively and descriptively promising and thus worthy of further philosophical and empirical examination. Next, it responds to the concern that the theory commits the naturalistic fallacy and violates the ‘is-ought gap’, arguing that the theory commits neither error. It then addresses the concern that there may be counterexamples to this book’s theory of prudence: individuals who appear to live in prudentially successful ways while not appearing to have internalized the form of ‘moral-risk aversion’ that Chapters 2 and 3 argued serve as the foundation for normative moral philosophy and descriptive moral psychology. The chapter argues that it is ultimately an empirical question whether such counterexamples are genuine and, by extension, whether there really are individuals to whom morality does not normatively apply—implications the chapter argues for taking seriously. Finally, it addresses the concern that my theory is at most a theory of how morality is prudent, not a theory of morality per se.

Figures below are from Chapter 3 (open-access), pp. 86 and 88:

What is it like to be a philosopher in Costa Rica?

This is the seventeenth installment of The Cocoon Goes Global, a series that gives a sense of what the philosophy profession looks like outside of the Anglophone West. Today's entry is by Dr. Laurencia Sáenz Benavides, Invited Professor at the School of Philosophy or the University of Costa Rica Twitter: @laurenciasaenz  

In Costa Rica, philosophy is taught in the last year of high school. It is the State-funded universities, however, which constitute the backbone of the country’s philosophical profession (organization of conferences, academic publications, and formation of philosophy teachers). 

In the spirit of the Cordoba University Reform in 1918, public universities in Costa Rica are autonomous. They are also State-funded by Constitutional mandate, but in the last few decades there have been consistent disagreements between the successive Governments and university authorities, the latter decrying a chronic funding failure. Successive governments have failed to provide the required 1.5% of the GNP, which is destined for Higher Education. Within Universities there are, as elsewhere, strong criticisms of dramatic salary gaps between Vice-chancellors, Administrative and Academic Staff.   

The School of Philosophy of the University of Costa Rica (UCR) has in many ways functioned as the gravitational centre of the profession within the country. This may be partly due to the fact that the University of Costa Rica, founded in 1940, was the first academic space where the study of philosophy became formally institutionalized. According to the philosopher Alexander Jiménez Matarrita, the main architect of what he calls the Costa Rican “philosophical institutionality” was Constantino Láscaris, a Spanish philosopher who migrated to the Central American country in the mid 1950’s. Láscaris actively pushed for the creation of the Costarican Association of Philosophy and promoted the foundation of the UCR’s philosophy Journal, Revista de Filosofía, as well as other public Higher-Education institutions, such as the Universidad Nacional (UNA) and the Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica (ITCR). 

UCR’s School of Philosophy offers undergraduate and postgraduate degrees. Most teaching is offered in Spanish, but in recent years some optional modules are taught in English.The predominant tradition is what we might loosely refer to as “Western Philosophy”. 

Philosophy also has an important presence at the Escuela de Estudios Generales, where it is taught together with other areas of the Humanities, and at the Sede de Occidente of the UCR, located in San Ramón, Alajuela. The philosophy department of the Universidad Nacional (UNA), founded in 1975, also offers undergraduate degrees in philosophy, a Masters in Bioethics and a Postgraduate programme in Latin-American studies. Apart from these institutions, philosophy is also taught at the School of Languages and Social Sciences of the Technological Institute of Costa Rica (ITCR).   

There are decent research opportunities within the Philosophy Departments of State-funded universities. These, however, are primarily accessible to tenured staff. In general, a heavy teaching load and an increasing amount of bureaucratic work – and precarious working conditions faced by untenured teaching staff – are the main obstacles for doing research. Although each Department can allocate some research-time to its academic staff, there’s an increasing tendency to look for external funding – which, according to professor Sergio Rojas Peralta, works de facto as a form of privatisation of research.  

Alongside teaching and research, a core element of Costa Rican Public Universities is “Acción Social” (Community Service), the area that seeks to contribute to effecting the social “transformations needed for the improvement of the quality of life in the country”. This area is however largely neglected by philosophers, according to professor Kattya Arroyo. In Arroyo’s view, “philosophers have stopped dialoguing among themselves and with Costa Rican society”. Unsurprisingly, it is women academics who overwhelmingly engage in community service, which, according to sociologist Dr. Isabel Gamboa Barboza, is configured as a less prestigious area in the University, and with the lowest possibilities for work-promotion. 

A relatively high number of students are enrolled, but often less out of an interest in philosophy itself, than in a bid to get a place, with the prospect of being able to change tack in the future (students need to pass an exam in order to be admitted to university, and some degrees require higher marks than others). This means that many of them are not interested in the lectures, which correlates to a high termly drop-out. 

Systemic exclusions: philosophy is not innocent

We do not have hard data on how the student body is constituted in terms of gender, class, race and other variables, and we lack a qualitative study allowing us to assess how minority students feel about their experience in philosophy departments, but I think it is generally agreed that the majority of the student body in philosophy departments – as well as of the teaching staff – is white/mestizo and male. As an example, in the UCR’s Philosophy Postgraduate programme, only 4 women are enrolled, contra nearly 40 men. In some Departments, female students have informally complained to members of staff about persistent instances of sexism and misogyny coming from professors as well as from male students. 

In all Philosophy Departments here, most if not all Senior Professors (Profesor Catedrático) are male. 

Most women are currently hired in untenured teaching positions. Thus Costa Rica’s philosophical profession suffers from the same endemic problems of exclusion of minorities that characterize most Philosophy Departments in Western Academia. 

Must one submit to conferences before journals?

A reader writes in:

I’m a relatively new academic, and I’m only now in a position to be concerned with my publication record (I work at a teaching institution with virtually no research requirements for tenure). I’m trying to understand the exact role conference presentations play in the pipeline of research and publication. 

Is it really necessary to present a paper at a conference before submitting it to a journal? If a person just submitted directly to a journal without having previously presented it at a conference, is that kind of “cheating” professionally speaking?  I understand that conferences will involve getting valuable feedback, but is that not also true of peer review notes from a journal (even if the paper is ultimately rejected)? Is conference participation just a simpler way of getting a line on the CV since journal pubs take a while? Are they primarily for the purpose of networking?  Part of my concern is that attending conferences would be rather taxing on my ability to perform my job duties (given that I have a huge teaching load [6/6] and no research requirements to speak of, let alone that I would have to fund those trips out of pocket); so I’m wondering if the benefits outweigh the costs. 

This is a good query. I suspect, as with most things like this, that there may be a lot of disagreement. Allow me to share a few thoughts of my own, and then open things up for discussion.

A small milestone

I'm happy to report that the Philosophers' Cocoon surpassed 3 million site visits earlier this week. Many thanks to everyone--full-time contributors, guest contributors, readers, and commenters--for making the Cocoon such a supportive forum!

What is it like to be a philosopher in Taiwan?

This is the sixteenth installment of The Cocoon Goes Global, a series that gives a sense of what the philosophy profession looks like outside of the Anglophone West, written by Lynn (Hsien-I) Chiu and translated and edited by Lynn (Chien-Hui) Chiu. 

Author: Lynn (Hsien-I) Chiu is a Taiwanese public philosopher. She has earned her bachelor’s, master’s, and PhD degree in philosophy (focus: philosophy of biology) from Taiwan and was a postdoc there for four years. She taught as an adjunct for five years and was a visiting scholar at Duke University, USA. For the past five years, she’s been promoting philosophy to the Tauwanese public at Philosophy Medium.

Editor and translator: Lynn (Chien-Hui) Chiu is a Taiwanese philosopher of biology. She was part of a philosophy research group before leaving the country to complete a PhD/MA in philosophy at University of Missouri, USA, a fellowship in Austria, and a three-year postdoc in France. She is currently based in Vienna, working part-time as an interdisciplinary communications consultant while co-running the Philosophy of Science Communication network.

This piece was written by Lynn (Hsien-I) Chiu in Chinese and translated & edited by Lynn (Chien-Hui) Chiu into English. The following preserves Lynn-the-author’s point of view while Lynn-the-editor occasionally interjects. 

What is it like for a Westerner to live in Taiwan? 

Taiwan is an island nation with a population of 23 million. There is a long and complicated story to tell about the nation’s difficult international status, but the focus here is what it is like to live, teach, and do philosophy in Taiwan. Given my experience at Duke University, aside from differences in language and culture, the Taiwanese way of life is not that different from life in an US city. Taiwan is a multi-ethnic nation quick to accept, adopt, and adapt to foreign cultures and fresh perspectives, actively assimilating them into new, constitutive parts of Taiwanese culture. In my experience, Western friends and visiting scholars have unanimously praised the hospitality and politeness of the Taiwanese--to a fault as the kindness can be a bit overwhelming! Western comfort food is easy to find. Overall, Taiwan is a comfortable place for Western philosophers to visit and live: one can enjoy the pleasures of an exotic place while staying within their comfort zones (Editor: English is a mandatory foreign language and people are always eager to converse. The only trick to getting along is to always, always compliment the food!).

What is the state of philosophy in Taiwan?

Taiwan may be small, but we have 160 universities and 13 departments of philosophy. Taiwanese philosophy inherited an early Chinese focus in Confucianism, with contemporary Neo-Confucianism peaking between the 1950s and 80s. Yet with the introduction of Western philosophy in the 80s, Confucianism gradually lost its hold. A wave of young scholars returning from graduate studies in the UK, US, and Europe brought international academic trends to Taiwan. This new generation of philosophers, trained in Western philosophy, taught and raised further generations of philosophers to follow their footsteps, i.e., to pursue doctoral studies abroad (which has now expanded to include Australia, Canada, etc.) and return to Taiwan to teach.

Western philosophy has now gained a strong foothold in Taiwan and continues to rise in prominence while Eastern and Chinese philosophy seem to fail to attract new students and scholars. The 2019 Ministry of Science and Technology survey of academic philosophy shows that scholars specializing in Chinese philosophy now make up about a third of the total faculty. Within Western philosophy, there is broad interest and expertise in the mainstream fields of continental philosophy, analytic philosophy, philosophy of science, political philosophy, ethics and moral philosophy, philosophy of mind, as well as specialized areas such as philosophy of biology, philosophy of technology and scientific practice, etc.

(Editor: Interestingly, new interdisciplinary research programs that organically integrate philosophy (of mind and cognition or philosophy of science, for instance) and the sciences (neuroscience or immunology, for instance) have sprouted rather independently of the philosophy community.) 

In my opinion, Taiwanese philosophy has, in a sense, been “colonized” by Western philosophy: research questions in philosophy are usually framed as responses to the Western canon. In the last decade, though, Taiwanese scholars are increasingly interested in establishing their own subjectivity and a uniquely “Taiwanese” philosophy. A “decolonized” Taiwan is not a return to Chinese philosophy but the development of autonomous research lines and proactive interactions with the West (instead of passively transmitting philosophy from the West) as well as the East (with neighbors such as Korea, Japan, Malaysia, China, etc.). The geographical location and Westernized environment of Taiwan make it a node for “West meets East” and Pan-Asian activities, such as the Asia-Pacific Philosophy of Science Association (APPSA). 

What about the state of women in philosophy?

The same 2019 survey by the Ministry of Science and Technology revealed that there are 33 female professors of philosophy, about a quarter of the total professorship. Of the 2000 undergraduate majors and post-graduate students, 44% are women (47.01% of undergraduate majors and 40.87% of the post-graduate population). 

The results are surprising for both of us (author and editor). In the author’s experience, philosophy is a female-dominated major but very few continue to pursue graduate studies. During her PhD, she was often the only woman in graduate seminars. The editor was a teaching assistant for philosophy undergraduates and the classrooms were indeed primarily female. Based on our conjecture that philosophy is often thought of as a “soft” humanities discipline in Taiwan, the expectation was that survey results will reflect our experiences: undergraduate majors would be predominantly female while graduate programs overwhelmingly male. That neither was the case in 2019 hopefully reflects the progress made in the past decade to make philosophy better known and inclusive. 

What is the job market like in Taiwan?

It is competitive with few faculty positions available, but since the positions are not easily accessible for non-native speakers, the source of competition stems largely from within (Editor: but it is possible to become a faculty in Taiwan without the ability to speak Mandarin Chinese). Having international experience and degrees as well as an impressive publication list is a major plus. It is always helpful to have strong local connections and networks to beat the odds. The Taiwanese education system is currently suffering from a low birth rate crisis. As overall student numbers continue to drop, universities are closing departments and shutting down majors, axing those with low enrollment first. As is the case in most countries, philosophy is not a popular major among students. Therefore, local, Taiwanese PhD degree holders are faced with a harsh job market as the market shrinks but still favors holders of Western PhDs.

That being said, philosophy is becoming increasingly popular in general society. The 2014 student-led political movement (the “Sunflower Student Movement”) and new educational reforms gave the younger generation a strong sense of autonomy and desire for critical thinking as well as a more liberal arts-leaning education. Public philosophers are rising in popularity across all types of media, and more and more philosophy majors are considering or taking up public philosophy as a profession (see below for a list of main initiatives). As far as I know, this is not a uniquely Taiwanese phenomenon. The US society, for instance, also craves philosophy and many PhDs are leaving the academy to teach and promote philosophy outside of the university. There should be increasing recognition in the academy that public philosophy is a fruitful career path for philosophy PhDs and a solution to the employment crisis in philosophy.

The culture in philosophy departments is also changing as they fight for survival. Many adapt by taking a pragmatic turn, offering attractive courses in applied philosophy (e.g., business, medical, and AI ethics, philosophy of mental health and aging) or collaborating with the booming “cultural and creative industry” to produce creative educational and civic training materials for the public. Logic and critical reasoning popular books and courses are particularly in demand. Unfortunately, these efforts do not translate into academic employment opportunities for early-career scholars. 

What is it like to teach and research in Taiwan? 

Editor: Research-wise, public universities are more prestigious than private ones. In addition to university faculty positions, researchers can apply for positions at the Academia Sinica, the national academy of Taiwan equivalent to Max Planck Institutes or the CNRS. Postdocs are available in many departments, but mostly funded by grants. Research is published in local or cross-strait Chinese journals and major English outlets. Workshops, summer schools, conferences, etc., are well-connected with international communities and often held in English. Relatedly, many departments encourage teaching in English and upper-level readings are usually in English (except for Chinese philosophy).

Teaching-wise, Taiwanese universities, like the US, are 4-year undergraduate programs. Unlike the US, students need to go through a 2-4 year master’s program before they can start their doctoral studies.  (Editor: Application channels are much more diverse than a decade ago, but generally students enroll into university by first taking an universal exam that determines their overall rank. Highly ranked students choose their major and university first. The rest then pick what’s left based on their rank order. Philosophy is usually not a first choice, but philosophy majors at prestigious universities are still favored over popular majors in low-ranking universities.)

Compared to students in the Western world, Taiwanese students are passive and timid. They do not tend to ask questions in the classroom and are less inclined to engage in independent, critical thinking. It is rewarding, however, as one will always have students enthusiastic about philosophy. Overall, being a philosopher in Taiwan can be a very enjoyable experience (minus the tedious administrative duties). (Editor: “West” usually refers to North American students, who are more outspoken and proactive compared to their reserved European counterparts. Taiwanese students are quiet mostly out of consideration for other students and expect themselves to "do their homework" first before speaking up. They also tend to trust and defer to authority. This is a cultural disposition Westerns should know before judging “shy” international students.) 

What does the general public think of philosophy?

In our experience, the public holds a negative attitude towards philosophy as a major. Common beliefs include “philosophy is for weirdos,” “philosophers will starve on the streets,” “philosophers are depressed and wallow in self-inflicted worries,” etc. In general, the public does not understand what it means to study philosophy and do not know what it is to engage in abstract argumentation. 

But with the rise of public philosophy in popular media, attitudes are changing. Popular organizations such as Cafe Philo/Philosophy on Friday (哲學星期五) and Philosophical Education Development Organization (PHEDO) (高中哲學推廣協會), businesses such as Philosophy Medium (哲學新媒體) and Watchout Talk Philosophy (烙哲學), public intellectuals and philosophers including Kris Chu Chia-An and Chou Wei-hang, public programs such as the video series 哲學談，淺淺地 and award-winning radio program PHEDO Café (哲學Café), and a wide variety of local "philosophy salons" are driving public curiosity and interest in philosophy. Compared to the relatively listless student body in the university, philosophy instructors are coming to realize that bringing philosophy to the public presents them with a far more passionate and attentive audience.

The author, editor, and many philosophers who have contributed to this piece conclude that philosophy in Taiwan is a dynamic melting pot of Eastern/Chinese Philosophy, Western Philosophy, and science-related philosophy, bubbling with new collaborations and insights while bursting from boundary tensions. Public philosophy is popular and holds great opportunities for philosophers. We look forward to seeing how Taiwanese subjectivity will develop as philosophers navigate their rich, diverse milieu in and out of academia. 

Acknowledgment and Supplementary Materials

Many thanks to Dr. Shiu-Ching Wu for pointing us to statistical resources and Dr. Ruey-Lin Chen for the commentaries and for bringing us together. We are very thankful for extensive comments from Dr. Chia-Hua Lin as well as helpful conversations and input from Dr. Hsiao-Fan Yeh, Dr. Ying-Tung Lin, Dr. Tony H. Y. Cheng, and Dr. Shen-Yi Liao.

Sources: 

• Number of universities as of 2018 October 15
• Number of philosophy departments
• Statistics on academic researchers
• Number of student and faculty
• Excel sheet created by the author

Tips for SLAC Skype interviews?

In our most recent "how can we help you?" thread, anon writes:

I would sincerely appreciate any advice on skype interviews for SLAC's. I have two coming up. I have a general sense of how to prepare but any tips on specific questions to prepare for would be much appreciated and any other general advice.

Any SLAC search committee members and/or SLAC interviewees care to weigh in?

Who reads all that?

A reader writes in:

Has the Cocoon ever run a post asking philosophers to weigh-in on how many of the works in their impressively lengthy reference list they've actually read, start to finish? Thought maybe it'd be good for some of us to hear. 

As a graduate student searching for that first journal pub I often find having to show that you know the right stuff by referencing it pretty paralyzing, because there is so much stuff. And it always seems to me that you can't just reference it, but you should show you know it, to some extent. But then I find myself doubting that this person whose paper I am reading who cites 48 articles has really read them all. And yet, they weren't sniffed out as a fraud. So, what gives? Of course this is related to an issue that's been discussed here when it comes to writing. Namely, do not feel like you have to read everything, and certainly do not read too much first, since that brings on intellectual paralysis. But that's not really what I'm speaking to. Eventually, you do have to get the relevant literature in there. And so the question is, who among us is doing all that reading, and are we fools if we actually only cite what we've read front to back?

Good question, and I'm curious to hear how everyone answers. My own answer, in brief, is that I give things I cite the level of attention they require for the purposes they play in whatever project I include them in. In some cases, this requires very close multiple readings. For example, if I am going to criticize a particular position or author, then of course I need to read their work very carefully and do my best to get all of the details right. Other times, however, I may simply need to skim an entire reading. A case where this occurs might be one where I want to make sure I am not simply giving the same argument as someone else (I might not need to read the entire paper super carefully in order to figure that much out, and hence cite and discuss relevant differences in a footnote). Finally, in some cases, I may only need to read some (but not all) of a paper in order to know enough about the paper to be comfortable citing it. This is sometimes the case for 'literature review' sections of a paper, where I need to recognize the kinds of positions that have been defended by others in the literature. In some cases like these--where the point of citing the relevant sources is to simply 'set the scene' for the paper at hand--one needn't read the entire work to know enough about it to cite it as representing a particular position in the literature (as an example: I doubt very many people have read all of both volumes of Parfit's On What Matters--but, for all that, many of his most distinctive positions are pretty well-known by now).

Although I suspect there may be a few sticklers out there who think that every source one cites should be given close, careful, and complete readings, I'd be surprised if something like this isn't how most people do things. As with most things, there are tradeoffs one has to choose between. If, on the one hand, one insists upon reading from beginning to end every source one cites, then (A) it could be hard to ever get any writing done, or alternatively (B) one may be forced by time constraints to read and cite fewer things (leading, potentially, to under-citation: a common scholarly problem, in my experience). If, on the other hand, one decides how much to dive into readings before citing them, then it is always possible that one will make mistakes in representing the works cited (another problem). The reality, I suspect, is that most of us are probably continually torn between both of these options, reading as much as we can (as completely as we can) relative to the time and other professional constraints we face--and that the kinds of problems each approach results in are best avoided by a division of labor (authors doing their best, outside readers and journal referees calling out errors, etc.) 

But these are just my thoughts. What do the rest of you do and/or think?

Teaching ethics to engineers

6 things to realize when teaching ethics to engineers

By M.A. (Mandi) Astola (Eindhoven University of Technology)

Recently, I had a discussion with 30 people about all our frustrations. There were people from all over the world, from all kinds of backgrounds. “Our colleagues do not understand us,” “people think we are just here to point fingers” and “and because of that we have bad image.” “Students ask me: why do we have to do this?” What connects us is that we teach ethics to engineers.

Luckily for us ethicists at technical universities, ethics as a subject is becoming more and more important in engineering curriculums. At my university, every bachelor student takes a mandatory ethics course. This is obviously amazing. But teaching ethics to STEM-students, especially as a non-STEM teacher, is also frightening. I wrote up a couple of things to remember when teaching ethics to engineers, based on my own experiences and the experiences of my colleagues.

What is like to be a philosopher in Panama?

This is the 15th installment of The Cocoon Goes Global, a series that gives a sense of what the philosophy profession looks like outside of the Anglophone West. This is a guest contribution by Ruling Barragán, Adjunct professor of philosophy at the Universidad de Panamá.

 

Country Profile.

 

The Republic of Panama is a small Spanish-speaking country (about 4 millions inhabitants, 75,000 square kilometers) within the Central American geographical region. Culturally speaking, it is more related to Afro-Caribbean and Colombian culture than to Central American countries. For instance, its food and music have been influenced by Afro-Caribbean cuisine and folklore, while its legal and political culture is heir to its history with Colombia (Panama was a Federal State within the 'Gran Colombia' in the second half of the 19th century).  Panamanian history has also been particularly influenced by the US, in a unique manner within the region, as part of Panama's territory (that surrounding the Panama Canal) was actually a US colony.  Panama achieved complete independence from the US in the year 2000, not without tensions, conflicts and even a military invasion (1989) throughout its history with the North American nation.  Nevertheless, on the whole, Panama has never been foe to the US.  Friendly relations have prevailed between both countries.

 

Culture/philosophy profile

 

To begin with, it should be said that Panama does not have a significant influence in the history of Latin American philosophy comparable to countries like Mexico, Peru and/or Argentina.  There has been an important continuity of the Western philosophical tradition in these countries and some will argue (Enrique Dussel, for instance), even an outstanding non-Western, pre-colonial philosophical tradition.  Whatever be the case, most of Latin American 20th century philosophy has flourished under the influence of late 19th century and early 2oth century European philosophy.  The analytic tradition has been for the most part non-existent in Latin America until (more or less) the middle of the 20th century.  However, there was a prominent positivist tradition (especially in Argentina and Brazil) way before there was an interest along the lines of the Analytical tradition.  This positivist tradition (that goes back to the French philosopher Auguste Comte) influenced especially the legal profession and the political institutions that constituted most of our countries.  Panama was no exception to that.  Its most prominent legal and political thinker, Don Justo Arosemena (1817-1896) was influenced by that culture in his writings.  However outstanding as a political and legal thinker of the Panamanian nation, he cannot be considered, in the academic, professional sense of the word, a philosopher.  Neither that is needed.

 

Professional philosophy and authenticity

To set a price for oneself whereby one becomes no longer a person but merely a cog! Are you co-conspirators in the current folly sweeping over nations, which, above all else, want to produce as much as possible and to be as rich as possible? Your concern ought to hold out to them a counter-reckoning: what vast sums of genuine inner value are being squandered on such a superficial external goal! (Nietzsche, Daybreak, 206).

Like other fields with a high degree of professionalism and lots of competition, academic philosophy exacts a lot of us. It requires we're willing to move practically anywhere, face painful dilemmas about family, finding jobs in the same area of your spouse, relocate multiple times, lose our savings yet again, and--hardest of all--lose our friends or opportunities to be close to parents and siblings. For those of us who are first-generation, or immigrant, or both, it also often requires we cut emotional ties with our friends and home environment. Even if we don't want to cut ties, it happens, almost inevitably. Or so is my experience. 

But to what extent does academic philosophy require that you give up yourself? To what extent does it require the loss of authenticity? 

I've been mulling over this especially after I read this moving piece of philosophical autobiography. The piece is written by Fabio, who ended his career as a philosopher after a two-year postdoctoral fellowship. He writes honestly about his struggles with academic philosophy, 

Philosophy has always been a very personal affair. Well, not always. When it stopped being a personal affair, it also stopped being enjoyable. It became a performance. I realize that many of you are able to seamlessly weave personal involvement and academic performance together. For me, that’s always been impossible. I’m too slow, my thoughts too dim, and too prone to distraction to focus on one single problem. And when I do, I am unable to crystallize my involvement with such a problem to intelligible and coherent terms. And even if I manage that, I can at best produce a competent list of platitudes. When the inexpressible (not because mystical, but because too close to the bone for me to articulate onto the field of discourse) project of shaping (edifying, in both senses of the term) my own individuality — what I thought philosophy was about — became the public performance of puzzle-solving, that’s when I developed a rejection of philosophy.

My first response to this would be to say: but you don't need to choose! Philosophy can be so much more than puzzle-solving. Still, I think it's important to be honest and clear about the trade-offs involved. Philosophy written from the heart is, at least in my experience, more difficult to sell to a journal than philosophy that intervenes in some recent debate that you might have something useful to say about, but not really keeps you up at night. 

Clearly, though, philosophers do prize honesty and authenticity--the voice of the person who seeks and is honest about it. The best philosophy is deeply personal. Augustine's Confessions, which wrestle with faith, grief, family, still resonate today, as do Descartes' or Al-Ghazali's skeptical doubts. We value Zhuangzi's playfulness and Mengzi's earnest optimism. To know such people, even across the ages, is like having valuable friends we can lean back on, and from whose works we can draw wisdom and insights now. We marvel at Fanon's raw insights into racial micro- and macro-aggressions and how his perplexity gives rise to deep philosophical insights. We read along with De Beauvoir's mixed feelings on her mother's death, more recently also Elizabeth Barnes' and Havi Carel's deeply personal insights on disability and long-term illness. We admire philosophers who can weave the personal and the professional. 

Maybe there's a tension between two kinds of philosophy, as Martin Lenz speculates: "The first kind is what one might call a spiritual practice, building on exercises or forms of artistic expression and aiming at understanding oneself and others. The second kind is what one might call a theoretical endeavour, building on concepts and arguments and aiming at explaining the world." --maybe the problem is that we value the second one almost exclusively in professional academic contexts. 

Responding to prospective grad student emails

In our most recent "how can we help you?" thread, just curious writes:

This is a question for faculty in departments with a graduate program. I often receive inquiries from prospective graduate students. These may come from students who have a good shot of getting into the program, but more often, I fear that these students either do not have a shot at getting in, or they don't even apply.

I get about 5-6 of these a year. They can be time-consuming to respond to, and I feel it is not really my professional duty to spend hours of my time informing prospective applicants about our program, especially since a lot of information is available on the department website. Moreover, I suspect that many of these inquiries are meant to get the students an 'in': they are under the illusion that if they interact with some faculty member over email, they will have a better shot at admission. At least in our department, this is not the case. Since a student is often simply trying to interact, thorough responses to their inquiries often lead to even more questions.

What are possible approaches to such inquiries? I feel I should have some ready response to them. Prioritizing these emails means taking away from other pressing matters of business and obligations to people who have (say) actually enrolled in our graduate program. But at the same time, I don't want to be rude. Suggestions?

I don't work in a graduate program, so I don't have any thoughts beyond this I guess: maybe grad programs could (if they don't already) come up with a "frequently-asked-questions" flyer or webpage that grad faculty like this could just point prospective students to, adding a brief comment in the response email that out of fairness to other prospective students they're not able to say much about the program beyond that. I dunno. What do you all think?

The ethics of letter writing

In our most recent "how can we help you?" thread, Amanda writes:

So I have been shocked at the number of people who apparently agree to write a letter of recommendation for a student who they have very little confidence in, or even none at all. I have seen "recommendation" letters that do not say a single positive thing about the person they are supposedly recommending. A letter might focus on describing the class the professor taught (that the student was enrolled-in) describing the content of a paper the student wrote while saying nothing good about the paper, or sometimes straightforwardly expressing doubts about the student's talent, commitment, or attitude. I've seen many letters that are only a few lines long.

Of course, it is possible that these professors told the student that they would write this kind of letter. But I doubt that holds in most cases. So I am curious: what do people think are the ethics of this kind of thing? I would assume most think that it is wrong to agree to write such a letter, but maybe I am off base? Does it matter whether it is a letter for grad school or for a job? Do some think that chairing a committee comes with the obligation to write *some* letter if the student passes? Do writers have an obligation to tell students if the letter is going to be not so strong? And what, if any, is the minimum standard of confidence in a student a writer must have to ethically agree to write a letter? Is it wrong for a program to accept and graduate a student, say at an expensive MA program, but then refuse to write a letter?

I'd love to hear thoughts on this. One part of early career philosophy is that first time you are asked to write a letter of recommendation, and then the increasing frequency with which you get those requests.

These are all very good questions. My understanding has always been that it is an unwritten rule to only agree to write a letter if you can write a positive one--or, failing that, to be up front with the person requesting the letter that your letter might not be that strong. But, of course, as we all well know people don't always follow rules, written or unwritten. Further, I suppose it's always possible that some are unaware of these supposed rules, and that there may even be some who disagree with them (thinking they have some obligation to warn programs about particular candidates). I'm curious to hear what everyone thinks as well!

What do you all think?

Turning Your Dissertation into a Book

A while back, Marcus addressed a question from Big Dawg about how to turn one’s dissertation into a book. I finished a project similar to that during the last semester, so I can provide some timely input on the subject. I’ll start with a short summary of how I got the book contract, and then I’ll say a bit about how to approach a project of this sort.

Background

I got my book contract in a somewhat unusual way. When I was midway through graduate school, my dissertation advisor published an environmental ethics textbook with Routledge. Sometime afterward, Routledge sent him an email asking him to provide some feedback on their editorial process and his experience. Evidently, one of the survey questions was about in-progress work in the field of environmental ethics that he thought might be of interest to the editors who work on their series of books in environmental studies. One of the things he mentioned was that I was working on a dissertation at the intersection of the ethics of procreation and environmental ethics.

Months after this happened, I was contacted by one of the editors from Routledge asking about my dissertation. That was in Summer 2015, and I was only getting started on the project. Even so, I sent her a copy of my prospectus and promised to follow up with her when things were further along. Down the road, after the dissertation was finished, I made good on that promise, and she requested to see some chapters. So I provided them. A while later, I was invited to submit a formal proposal for review. The proposal was essentially a 4000-5000 word pitch for the project. Beyond providing a summary of my main arguments and a sketch of the book’s layout, I needed to explain how it compared to similar books and who the audience for the book would be.

Tenure denials

Thus far in this series, we've discussed clarity of tenure standards at time of offer, different universities' actual tenure standards, the tenure process itself, and life after tenure. In my last two posts in this series (I think), I'd like to discuss tenure denials and tenure appeals. In today's post, I'd like to focus on the former: that is, on tenure denials themselves. Given that tenure denials can be an important (if negative) event in a person's career, affecting their future career path and prospects, I think it may be important to discuss them and try to learn more about how and why they occur, as well as how those who have been denied tenure grappled with the situation. For although there are some online discussions of these matters, I have to confess that I can't ever recall seeing these issues discussed openly in academic philosophy.

Here, at any rate, are some potential questions:

1. When someone is denied tenure, what exactly were the grounds are provided to the person?
2. What level(s) did the decision emenate from (their department committee?, college committee?, Dean?, etc.)?
3. When a person has been denied tenure, how did they grapple with it personally and professionally? Did they appeal the decision? Did they leave academia? Move to a different academic position? What kind of position?
4. Do they have any advice for others, including advice for other scholars facing the situation, but also potential advice for family members and colleagues (in terms of providing appropriate care and support)?

Although I understand that these may be difficult issues to discuss, I do hope some readers choose to chime in--the aim being to potentially help current and future tenure-candidates (and their loved ones and colleagues) to better understand and think about answers to the above questions. On that note, notice that although questions (3) and (4) primarily apply to individuals who have faced tenure denial themselves, others (e.g. members of departmental or college tenure committees) may chime in on questions (1) and (2).

Anyone have any insight or experiences they are willing to share?

Being a philosopher in Brazil

This is the 14th installment of The Cocoon Goes Global, a series that gives a sense of what the philosophy profession looks like outside of the Anglophone West. This is a guest contribution by Nastassja Pugliese, Assistant Professor of Philosophy of Education at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. 

From its lavish biodiversity to the inexhaustible variety of its cultural and ethnic expressions, Brazil is a country where diversity abounds. One exception to this rule lies in the relative unity of the structure of the public system of education across the country. In this post, I will try to show what is it like to be a philosopher in Brazil.

Brazil is a country where access to higher education is a constitutional right^[1]. The fact that higher education is a constitutional right makes Brazilian public universities key actors in structuring Brazilian society. The idea behind the law is that by allowing and guaranteeing access of citizens from all social classes to good institutions of higher education, democracy is strengthened. Under this national policy, the quality of all universities is periodically evaluated by a central federal council (CAPES) and governments sponsor research either through the federal agency for national development (CNPQ) or state foundations for research support (FAPs). This means that most of the teaching and almost all highly specialised research done in Brazilian universities as well as almost every penny employed to run the academic machinery in public universities comes from tax money (either from a federal or a state budget).

Now take a moment to imagine the size of Brazil. With a continental dimension, Brazil has 26 states (and 1 federal district), but it counts 69 federal universities with elite institutions ranked among the best in the world. Its educational system, to be more accurate, is mixed, which means that public institutions (state or federally funded) coexist with private institutions (which can be either for-profit or not-for-profit like the Catholic universities). Now imagine the economic potential of its higher education system if the public sector moved to a for-profit system where education is no longer understood as a right but as a privileged for those who can afford. This has been a permanent threat but today, more than ever before, the public education system is on the razor’s edge.

I will not expose these difficulties here because the particularities of the Brazilian educational experience are so rich and positive that it will do more good if I tell you about the impressive and (I think) exemplar politics of higher education that has been in place for decades.

My report may sound outdated given the current tensions, but the fact is that the public system is still a reality and those that benefit from it do hope that it does not ever become extinct. My report may also sound too optimistic and unproblematic, but this is a conscious choice. I’ll leave the particular - and more complex - problems for another opportunity. I will divide my post in three sections: the upbringing of an academic, the job market, and the life after securing a job. I am not going to talk about my personal experiences but only describe the structure of the educational system in all those stages. I also chose to ignore intersectional variables (problems related to class, race, and gender) here even knowing how important they are for grasping the whole picture.