The Philosophers' Cocoon

Floyd protests & philosophy: what can we do?

In the comments of my Saturday Sounds post, a graduate student writes:

[C]an you please do a post about the current protests going on around the country? What can philosophy professors do? Maybe this community can start a thread where people post pictures of their donations to local communities combating the police.

I think this is a really great idea, and would like to open up the comments section below for discussion. I also want to note that Helen De Cruz and I are in the process of putting together a new series of guest-posts on how philosophy faculty and students can help support our black colleagues, students, communities, and the cause of racial justice. We already have a few guests lined up, but I would like to put a call out to our readers to contact either of us (marvan@ut.edu / helen.decruz@slu.edu) if you would like to contribute a post. Our hope is that the Cocoon can be a helpful forum featuring diverse voices and perspectives in pursuit of truth and long-overdue social change. 

Coming back from academic disillusionment

On Twitter, a well-known tenured faculty member at a Leiter top-10 program writes:

An exchange with a colleague yesterday left me feeling hopeless about my place in my dept and my profession. I hate my job so very much. If I didn't have a family to support I would quit today (years ago, actually). Has anyone come back from feeling this way about academia?

I am very curious to hear readers' answers. I will be honest: this is something that I have struggled with many times. Eight years ago, I shared my own tale of disillusionment during graduate school and how I found my way back. In brief, I came to grips with my disillusionment in two ways. First, I just tried to focus on enjoying the work I do, writing on things that truly interest me, trying to be a good teacher, and not worrying so much about what other people think of my work. Second, I tried to focus on developing better relationships with other people of good will in the profession--relationships that in the long-run have been very rewarding. Still, I will be honest: disillusionment remains something that I struggle with from time to time, as there are many things that about the profession that get me down from time to time.

But these are just some quick thoughts of mine. What are yours? Have you struggled with disillusionment in academic philosophy? If so, were you able to come back from it? How?  

Alt-ac jobs: some simple things programs can do

In my previous post, I explained why I think philosophy grad programs should be motivated to help their students pursue non-academic lines of work. In brief, doing so is likely to be in the interest of grad programs in an increasingly tenuous higher education environment. Even before COVID appeared, university enrollments are expected to plummet around 15% in the next five years--and when the inevitable fiscal belt-tightening happens at universities, the humanities are likely to be the first to go. For better or worse, one way to increase our departments' survival odds is to increase the amount of outside funding we get from donors--and successful people in industry are the kind of people who make those kinds of donations.

In response to my post, there was some inevitable skepticism. For example, one reader wrote:

[T]hinking that philosophy graduate programs should train their students to do things other than academic philosophy would be like thinking that a program for electricians at a technical college should train their students to be something other than electricians.

Another reader then added: "I do not think people who work in philosophy departments are really qualified to help their students with most alternative careers." However, then Amanda gave what I take to be exactly the right response:

The comments about, "philosophy professors aren't qualified to do this," drive me batty. They aren't. But the point is they can and should be. This does NOT mean philosophy professors must become experts in tech and project management. All it means is that philosophy professors should make efforts to cultivate relationships with alum in working in tech and project management. Connections couldn't be more important re employment. So philosophy professors simply keeping in touch with former students in non-academic jobs is all they need to be qualified to "prepare students for the non-academic market." Of course philosophy professors are not going to give a lecture on project management. But what they can do is invite their former students to do that lecture (i.e. former students who are currently in project management). It really puzzles me why so many people think either (1) philosophy professors are incapable of this, or, (2) philosophy professors have no obligation to put effort into the non-academic market. Philosophy professors are capable, because it is as easy as just described, i.e. staying in touch with former students. 

Look at the Philosophers in Industry directory I've put together. It shows that former philosophy grad students can transition effectively into a diverse variety of careers. Philosophy programs are surely not in position to 'train their students' for all of these jobs. That's a fool's errand. Yet each and every time we have these types of conversations on the Cocoon, many readers seem to me to make the same mistake here...over and over and over again: the mistake of thinking that 'helping philosophy students find non-academic jobs' is a matter of training. The fact is, about 70% of job openings are never even publicly listed, and 85% of jobs are found through networking. This suggests that what philosophy grad programs should do is really quite simple. Let me explain.

Consider first what almost certainly tends to happen when students leave a philosophy grad program without a degree--say, because the student never finishes their dissertation. I can't recall where I came across the number, but I recall seeing somewhere that roughly 50% of PhD students never finish. How do departments treat these students upon and after they leave the program? Although it's been a while since I was in grad school, my sense is that the following tends to happen: the student leaves with little support--rather, they are simply "shown the door" and the department washes their hands of them. I've heard that something similar tends to happen with students who graduate but leave for non-academic careers. Often (or so I've heard), their professors express disappointment about the decision and send them on their way. If this is what does indeed tend to happen, then notice what isn't going on. There isn't any:

• Positive, supportive relationship with the student upon their leaving for non-academic work.
• Effort put into maintaining such a relationship with the student in the years and decades after they leave.
• Attempt to use the former-student's later-developed non-academic expertise, such as by inviting them to give talks in the department on how to transition into and succeed in the non-academic world.
• Attempt to list the person on the department's website as a successful non-academic.
• Attempt to host networking opportunities featuring former students, such as annual department events where former students in non-academic careers are invited to a department gathering (at, say, a restaurant) to catch up with professors and get to know current students.
• Etc.

Indeed, how many PhD program placement directors even have a list of former students who went into academic industry, let alone stay in touch with people on that list by phone or by inviting them to department events? Similarly, how many grad advisors (including dissertation advisors) do this with their own students? I don't have the answer, but I suspect the answer to both questions is probably: not many. If this is correct, these are all missed opportunities of the worst sort. I say, "of the worst sort", for three reasons. First, as Amanda notes, these sorts of things seem (A) fairly simple and easy to do, and (B) are likely to have the "most bang for your buck" in terms of actually helping students find non-academic work. The third problem here is equally bad: by failing to maintain good relationships with former students in industry, departments almost certainly shoot themselves in the foot in terms of gaining donations (for programs, endowed chairs, etc.). I mean, who would want to donate to a program or profession that ignominiously "showed them the door"? 

Now, I actually know of a (very highly-ranked) program or two that started doing some of the above. And who knows? Maybe more programs do these things than I know of. However, judging by the many conversations we've had here and interviews of non-academic philosophers I've read, it doesn't seem like many programs do any of the above. If so, then they are missed opportunities indeed, and ones that seem easily fixed--if only programs begin to realize why they should be motivated to change.

Motivating PhD programs to focus on industry jobs

Following the Philosophers in Industry directory I'm working on, I had an interesting conversation the other day about what grad programs could do better in terms of helping to place their students in good non-academic jobs. I have been out of grad school for quite a while now, so I am not entirely sure what current practices are like. But when I was in grad school, the focus within the program was entirely on academic jobs. Like most PhD programs, mine had a placement director--and a very good one at that. Our placement director helped candidates workshop academic job-market materials, strategize, do mock interviews, and so on. Still, the focus was overwhelmingly on academic jobs. And while I have heard through the grapevine that some programs may be doing a better job focusing more on non-academic work, I suspect that many programs still probably focus primarily on the academic market. In my next two posts, I want to discuss two things:

1. Some steps grad programs might take to better support students pursuing non-academic work.
2. Why grad programs should be motivated to do so.

I want to focus on the second issue first, and here's why. Laying out a series of steps that grad programs might take in order to better place students in non-academic jobs isn't likely to be very effective if grad programs aren't motivated to change. And, on that note, one issue that I have heard may stand in the way of grad programs doing more when it comes to non-academic work is that grad faculty simply may not be motivated to change what they do. On the one hand, faculty in grad programs simply may not value their students leaving academia for non-academic industry jobs. Anecdotally, I have heard these sentiments to be quite common, with grad faculty sometimes expressing extreme disappointment or disregard toward students who let them know they plan to leave academia. On the other hand, grad faculty may not do much when it comes to helping students find non-academic work because they, the grad faculty, have never had a non-academic career themselves, leaving them at a bit of a loss about what they can do to help students find non-academic jobs.

Here, though, is what I think we should say to grad programs to better motivate them: in today's post-COVID environment, graduate programs are likely to need non-academic support in order to survive and flourish. Let me explain.

Setting Boundaries: Personal & Professional (Guest post by MAP)

The following is a guest post by Elise Woodard (Michigan), Carolina Flores (Rutgers), Milana Kostic (UCSD), Angela Sun (Michigan), and Jingyi Wu (UC Irvine), graduate students who comprise the organizing team of Minorities and Philosophy (MAP). 

‘Boundaries’ has become a buzzword in academia. We often hear about the importance of setting boundaries and cultivating work-life balance, yet many of us still struggle to set boundaries effectively and confidently. Moreover, the language of boundaries is often not subject to explicit scrutiny, yet like other buzzwords such as ‘self-care,’ it is liable to be co-opted or misunderstood. 

At our Central APA session, Minorities and Philosophy (MAP) attempted to open up the conversation about how to set boundaries and how to talk about them. Here we share some tips on how to set, communicate, and think about boundaries in a salutary and non-individualistic way.

Backup career paths in the COVID era?

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

It would be useful to talk more about the back-up career paths for mint philosophy PhDs. And how to switch to them. This is more necessary than ever since Covid19 will disrupt the already competitive academic job market. If people like me had some hope before the pandemic, now university cuts on jobs and post-docs lead us to face reality: fresh PhDs have passed from having little chances to zero chances — not only in Humanities. So, many would be grateful if even more space could be given to non-academic careers in either the US and Europe. At least, I see also the positive side-effect: the situation will push to think more about the prospectives philosophers have outside academia. Thank you in advance!

This is a really important query, for obvious reasons--as the academic job-market is almost certainly going to be a disaster this year (even more so than normal, sadly). Anyway, here are a few resources to begin with:

• The APA's Beyond Academia Network: mailing list for philosophers searching for non-academic opportunities.
• Phil Skills: a website of interviews with philosophers in non-academic careers.
• Helen's series of interviews with philosophers outside of the academy at The Philosophers' Magazine.
• Our own Alt-Ac Workshop and Alt-Ac Jobs series featuring tips and guest-posts.
• Free range philosophers: more interviews with philosophers with non-academic careers.
• A helpful 'Plan B' article with practical tips at Chronicle of Higher Education.
• Beyond the Professoriate: a website and membership service featuring free (?) career events as well as (paid?) job-search courses, coaching, and other resources (I just discovered this and have no idea whether it's any good).

Finally, because I was curious, yesterday I did simple Google searches for "philosophers in industry", "philosophers outside of academia", and "philosophers non-academic careers. Because (1) to my astonishment I wasn't able to find anything like a list or directory in 15 seconds (let alone after a little more digging), (2) as we've discussed before networking is how the vast majority of jobs are found and filled, and (3) ex-academic philosophers are probably the best people to appreciate the talents and job situation of philosophers, I just decided to create a Philosophers in Industry Directory of my own. As of now, I am taking suggestions for additions, updates, and deletions by email: marvan@ut.edu. I hope some of you find it helpful, especially those of you who need a job or will need one soon (e.g. post-graduation).

Basically, I just did a little bit of digging and decided to list people alphabetically by last name, linking to their professional pages and listing their line of work. Although I imagine an individual listed here or there might email me asking to have their name removed or whatever, given that all I've done is list publicly available information on LinkedIn, an informal directory like this seems to clearly fine to put together--especially given that it might drive viewers and talented new employees to their company. Who knows? Among other things, I think it's kinda cool to see in one place all of the interesting and diverse things ex-academic philosophers have gone on to do in their careers. And if the directory turns out to be more trouble than it's worth, then I can always take it down. Until then, enjoy - and feel free to suggest additions, etc.!

In any case, do any of you have any helpful tips or resources for the original commenter?

Has philosophy made progress?

A few of my philosopher friends on social media have been sharing this interview with Tim Maudlin (NYU), where Maudlin contends that philosophy has made plenty of progress. This issue comes up time and again, and Daniel Stoljar wrote a recent book defending the existence of philosophical progress. On the other hand, there are a number of works arguing that philosophy has made no real progress and has no good claim to truth-aptness. See for example:

• Jason Brennan (2010). Scepticism about philosophy. Ratio.
• Eric Dietrich (2011). There is no progress in philosophy. Essays in Philosophy.
• Peter Slezak (2018). Is there progress in philosophy? The case for taking history seriously. Philosophy.

The last of these works, for what it's worth, directly addresses Stoljar's work. I'm curious what readers think, especially given broad and persistent divisions over what the most defensible answers are to most (if not all) basic philosophical questions.

My own view is that while I think some real progress has been made, it's probably a lot less than defenders of philosophical progress seem to think. Moreover, how one views the matter depends, presumably, on one's own substantive views. For example, Maudlin sides with the the 59% of philosophers or so today who report leaning toward or accept compatibilism about free will--even going so far as to say, "I think Locke and Hume nailed free will, and since then there has been no interesting debate about it." Notice, first, that this only indicates that majority of philosophers lean toward compatibilism (hardly a ringing endorsement), leaving a full 41% of philosophers who think it's not the right answer. Second, surveys of ordinary laypeople show a similar split. Consequently, there are at least two possibilities here: (1) philosophy has made real progress on free will, or (2) about 60% of people are psychologically inclined to compatibilism, and that's just a psychosocial fact about human beings, not a form of real philosophical progress. How are we to discriminate between these two hypotheses, especially when some of us suspect that compatibilism may be the worst of all answers to the free will problem?

Similarly, consider moral philosophy. Does it make progress? Well, here are some relevant philpapers results:

Meta-ethics: moral realism or moral anti-realism?

Accept or lean toward: moral realism	525 / 931 (56.4%)
Accept or lean toward: moral anti-realism	258 / 931 (27.7%)
Other	148 / 931 (15.9%)

Normative ethics: deontology, consequentialism, or virtue ethics?

Other	301 / 931 (32.3%)
Accept or lean toward: deontology	241 / 931 (25.9%)
Accept or lean toward: consequentialism	220 / 931 (23.6%)
Accept or lean toward: virtue ethics	169 / 931 (18.2%)

Metaphilosophy: naturalism or non-naturalism?

Accept or lean toward: naturalism	464 / 931 (49.8%)
Accept or lean toward: non-naturalism	241 / 931 (25.9%)
Other	226 / 931 (24.3%)

By my lights, its hard to even know what to make of these results. First, in the best cases (questions 1 and 3) the leading positions in these polls only indicate that approximately 50% of philosophers lean toward the view. Second, the views all seem in tension with each other. Moral realism is generally understood to to be the position that there are objective moral facts that don't depend upon us for their truth--thus constituting a form of non-naturalism. Yet, the answer to (3) indicates that nearly 50% of philosophers lean toward naturalism, and the answer to (2) shows that philosophers are widely split on what the moral facts are (deontology, virtue ethics, and consequentialism being vastly different normative positions). 

Let me be clear, I don't mean to say that there's no moral progress. I wouldn't do philosophy myself, writing books and articles defending new theories, if I didn't think there to be some truth the arguments. What I am inclined to think, however, is that confident pronouncements about philosophical progress go too far. We should admit, as Russell does in the passage below, that philosophy has serious epistemic limitations:

Philosophy, as I shall understand the word, is something intermediate between theology and science. Like theology, it consists of speculations on matters as to which definite knowledge has, so far, been unascertainable; but like science, it appeals to human reason rather than to authority…All definite knowledge—so I should contend—belongs to science; all dogma as to what surpasses definite knowledge belongs to theology. But between theology and science there is a No Man’s Land, exposed to attack on all sides; this No Man’s Land is philosophy. (Russell 1945: xiii)

We should then aim to improve upon those limitations by doing better metaphilosophy and putting that metaphilosophy into practice, including testing empirically whether the kinds of premises philosophers appeal to really are ones that people in general take to be true.

Or so I'm inclined to think. What do you all think?

Constructive vs. destructive philosophy

In my recent post discussing our dialectical obligations in research and publishing, Amanda writes:

The overall point that I can't stand about philosophy these days is this: it is not a philosophy paper unless you are disagreeing with another philosopher and showing them how they are wrong. The idea that a philosophy paper could be about improving the views of someone else is just a laughable concept (unless you are doing that through the conduct of showing that another critic was wrong.)

Mike then responded:

While some people (editors, referees, philosophers sitting in a Q&A) may think that "it is not a philosophy paper unless you are disagreeing with another philosopher and showing them how they are wrong", I think there's enough room within the philosophy publishing ecosystem for creative, constructive papers that are "about improving the views of someone else".

I'm curious what other people think about this. Has academic philosophy become too 'destructive' instead of constructive?

What are our dialectical obligations?

I took part yesterday in a very interesting methodological discussion with other philosophers on social media that got me thinking about some questions I have long wondered about as a reader and journal reviewer: namely, questions about what our dialectical obligations are when writing and publishing our work. Let me explain.

Sometimes when I read a paper in a journal or serve as a reviewer, I find that a paper seems to me in certain respects dialectically unfair. Here are a few examples of what I have in mind:

1. The paper presents itself as refuting a particular view, but only by appealing to a premise that proponents of the view supposedly being refuted will clearly reject given their background commitments.
2. The paper predicates its argument on a view that some people have defended previously, but which has been subject to numerous refutations (claiming to show in pretty clear terms that the view in question is not supported by any good arguments).

"Now", you might say, "I don't see anything dialectically unfair about that. We're entitled to base our work on premises and positions we find compelling, and as far as we can convince reviewers and editors of this, all is well and good!" And indeed, as I have thus far described the above cases, I would agree. The questions I have about dialectical fairness arise rather with how articles that adopt the above approaches sometimes appear to present themselves. For example, it would be one thing if in case (1) the paper recognized explicitly that proponents of the position being criticized would reject one of the author's central premises; and similarly if, in case (2), the paper recognized that the view they are taking as their starting point has been argued by others to be based on serious confusions. But, my sense is that sometimes this doesn't happen. Instead, sometimes case-(1) papers seem to present themselves as though they are based on premises that anyone (including proponents of the view being argued against) accept or should accept as true, even when (by hypothesis) it seems clear that that is precisely what proponents of the view being criticized would contest. Similarly, sometimes case-(2) papers don't even seem to recognize that the position they are adopting as their starting point has been the subject of multiple claimed refutations.

Now, you still may be wondering what the issue is. In case (1), if the paper in question is published, isn't it just open to proponents of the view being criticized to argue in follow-up papers that the initial paper was based on a premise they reject? Similarly, in case (2), isn't it possible for people to respond in the literature, pointing out the paper in question is based on a presupposition that others in the literature have claimed to definitively refute? My answer is that of course these things are possible--but I still think there is a problem, and here it is: In almost every philosophical field at any given point in time, there are dominant positions that seem to 'run the dialectic' to the exclusion of minority voices (see e.g. here, here, and here). Those in the minority position who think the dominant dialectic is badly mistaken in some way are already at a dialectical disadvantage. They may have already published claimed refutations of the dominant position, only to see the refutations never engaged with or mentioned in papers coming out in the dominant position. Then, when yet another paper is published defending the dominant dialectic but (in type-1 cases) ignores that those in the minority position reject a premise they are appealing to, or (in type-2 cases) ignores that the dialectic being assumed has been vigorously criticized, the result is another new contribution to the literature that makes the dominant dialectic look stronger than those in the minority position think the overall literature supports (since their favored premises and refutations are in effect being 'suppressed' in the paper's mode of presentation).

For my part, I think the answer to this issue is straightforward: when writing and publishing things, we have some real dialectical obligations--specifically, to be as perspicuous as possible about what we are and are not doing. If we write something appealing to a premise that those we are criticizing would reject (as in case 1), we should flag that, making it clear that we know they would have a problem with it. Similarly, when adopting a starting point that others have argued to be confused (as in case 2), we should recognize that our starting point has been argued to be confused, even we disagree with the supposed refutations (which we can also note). These, it seems to me, are ways to be dialectically fair to our readers and interlocutors. As an important final note, I do not claim myself to be beyond all reproach here--as it's entirely possible that readers of my work might find errors of the above as well (I'm not sure!). The epistemic difficulties we face in appreciating whether the dialectic we adopt seems fair to others in the above senses is, I think, exacerbated by our present approach to peer-review. In our present peer-review regime, it's standard to get 'feedback from your friends' (who may share your general outlook on things), and then submit for anonymized review. In this process, there is precious little opportunity to address potential cases of dialectical unfairness. In the kind of more public ArXiv-approach to pre-publication peer-review that some of us advocate, this might be less of an issue--as people in a more public setting could draw attention to these kinds of dialectical issues prior to journal review.

But these are just some of my thoughts, and may be totally off-base (I'm willing to listen!). What are yours?

On norms against self-promotion (Guest post by C. Thi Nguyen)

By C. Thi Nguyen (Utah Valley University / University of Utah)

The following is a post I made to Social Epistemology Network, a Facebook group that has become the de facto online hub for social epistemologists. I started out just wanting to suggest a small change in the social norms of the group — to encourage people, especially less well-known people, to post more about their work. But it evolved into a discussion of the unfair social impact of various norms of humility in our discipline. Basically: who benefits from the norms of humility, and who loses out?

(This post was originally composed on my phone, with a toddler in my lap, while supervising him on a vaguely educational app. This circumstance that may have resulted in some extra warts in the writing, but also more honesty. Take it for what you will.)

——

Hey all. I wanted to talk about the norms for using this group, to encourage better information dissemination.

Let me briefly claim some credibility first. I think this group exists because, at an APA a few years back, I met Sandy Goldberg and asked him if there was an mailing list or group for disseminating social epistemology Information, and he said, “You know, I don’t know if there is. That’s a great idea!” And a week later, this group was born.

This was super important to me because, at the time, I had zero connections into the social epistemology world. I had no ins to the conversation. I didn’t know what to read or what people thought was important. There was no place to find out about conferences. I would pick up random bits of information, but I was definitely not PLUGGED IN.

When this group started, I had a particular hope: that people would post all their new papers. That it would become a one-stop shop for finding out about new relevant publications. This seems particularly important for us, since social epistemology publications are scattered across all sorts of journals. And the group seemed to be headed that way for a while, but then the norms settled in a different direction. Most people now seem to be following some kind of norm against self-promotion.

Basically: I think this de facto norm is a bad one, and I’d like for us to talk about it. And I would like to throw my support towards a different norm. I will, as is appropriate, offer a quick social epistemology argument for this.

Here are two plausible norms:

The No Self Promotion Norm (NSP): you should not post about your new articles here, nor should you mention when you have a relevant article in another person’s query thread. This is bad self-promotion. The properly humble thing to do is let others mention your articles when relevant.

The Expected Publicity Norm: when you have a new article or potentially useful blog post, post about it once here. Also mention it when relevant on other people’s threads. No shame for basic self-promotion. (Perhaps there should be some shame for spamming many posts to the same article).

The Expected Publicity Norm seems standard in science networks on social media, and works very well, in my opinion. But philosophy tends toward the No Self Promotion Norm on social media.

But the NSP seems bad to me, because it preserves status quo social imbalances that are often arbitrary, unjust, or simply not useful. NSP best serves people that are already well known and well connected in the field. It makes it very difficult for people that aren’t already well-embedded in the community to make their work known, or to find out about new work.

Before social media, a lot of knowledge dispersal happened through whisper networks and informal social networks - like chatter at conferences. This is particularly good for people who are well-known, or who have ready access to various forms of casual professional contact. You have a major advantage here if you have good travel funding, or live in one of the metropolitan hubs for active philosophy, or already know tons of people in the field and chat all the time. But if you don’t have these advantages, you’re cut out of the information network. NSP is a norm that amplifies inequities — many of them arbitrary ones.

Groups like this one could help to even that out. They offer the hope of better and more equitable access to information and distribution for all. But when we adopt the NSP norm, we push things back towards the old imbalances. (Also: some people seem to have adopted a norm where they post about new work on their personal thread, but not here. But this also preserves imbalances in social connections. This group is nice because anybody can join and get access to the information.)

So: I think we should try to shift norms. It would be better if the norms were such that it was expected, normal, and almost obligatory to post your new articles, with brief description, so we can ALL keep track of all the posts. Creating better awareness of relevant articles inside our community is an epistemic good. (I think a lot about Karen Jones’ suggestion in “Trustworthiness”: that the fully trustworthy person works to predict other people’s epistemic needs and actively tries to fulfill them - especially when others aren’t yet aware that they have a need.)

And also: if you’re afraid that this would create too much traffic: if this ended up generating one or two posts a day with new articles, that’s a drop in the bucket. Do you seriously think that I’m going to be annoyed to see a daily new article SE article pop up between the zillion baby photos, COVID armchairing, and social media crap? I mean, this group is 100% voluntary and mutable and filled with people whose lives are devoted to this topic.

Posting your articles isn’t the noise; it’s the signal.

Grad programs rescinding offers/funding?

A reader wrote in here:

Some schools (I have heard of [redacted]) are rescinding funding for already admitted students. I’ve heard other schools are not accepting anyone waitlisted. Can we get a discussion thread on this issue? It strikes me as morally wrong to in effect rescind an admission. Those students probably turned down other offers to go to [redacted], and are now completely screwed. Do they count as some of the precarious workers deserving of protection?

As I don't think the Cocoon is a place to make public allegations of impropriety, I've redacted parts of the comment. Still, do readers know: has this been happening? If so, what should be done about it? 

APA Grad Student Council (GSC) statement

The APA released today a statement by its Graduate Student Council entitled, "Supporting grad students during COVID-19." I think it's a really good statement worth reading, disseminating, and acting upon to whatever extent possible.

What to do if you're plagiarized?

In our newest "how can we help you?" thread, Elisa (editor's note: not our own Elisa!) writes:

Hello and thanks for the great work you have been doing so far! I was wondering if you would consider dedicating a post or thread to plagiarism in academia. I would be interested in hearing from people whose work has been plagiarized in some way or another by their advisors, colleagues, or students. Sometimes plagiarism is very difficult to detect (people can steal your working arguments, ideas, and project plans not simply your unpublished drafts) but it hurts deeply. As an early career scholar I have seen my project being taken and used by a more senior colleague I was collaborating with. I presented my project in multiple occasions, so my drafts were very well-known, and I only published a paper that drew on some parts of the project I presented. It's difficult to broach the subject with the colleague who was so interested in my project to the point of appropriating my own ideas and arguments (even the bibliography!). I would appreciate some help and advice by people who have been in a similar situation, if possible. Thank you!

Another reader ('me') responded:

Elisa
I do not think this is the place to resolve such issues. You need to talk to someone on a research ethics board at the institution or institutions where you work. Begin with a consultation. Then they may advise you to raise a complaint formally, but within the institution's framework.

I certainly don't think the Cocoon is the place to make plagiarism accusations, or to 'resolve' them. But I do think the general issue is worth discussing, for several reasons. First, my sense--from things I've heard people say online and in person--is that this sort of problem, while perhaps not common, is not exactly uncommon either. Second, my sense is that for early-career people in particular, things just aren't as simple as 'me' suggests (i.e. talking with a research ethics board at your institution). Why? The problem, of course, has to do with actual and perceived power differentials. As some of the sexual misconduct scandals in philosophy illustrated years ago, institutions and individuals in them can be all too willing to protect eminent figures, even going so far as to retaliate against accusers. Imagine, then, being a grad student faced with an unethical advisor stealing your ideas. What are you going to do: lodge a formal accusation against your advisor? Perhaps. However, I assume that many of us might be so afraid of what that might mean for our career or reputation in our department and beyond that we might be too afraid to say anything to anyone about it, let alone lodge a formal accusation.

Blogging in times of COVID-19

By Gottfried Schweiger (University of Salzburg)

At the moment most of us are sitting at home and are observers of events that are radically changing our lives and for which the outcome is open. The universities are closed and what remains for philosophers is online teaching, writing papers and books. As long as there are no childcare obligations that make all professional activities much more difficult and tedious, if not completely impossible, one might think that the COVID 19 pandemic does not change much for philosophers. Yes, there are no more conferences and jetting from one talk to another is no longer possible. Also the change to online teaching is challenging, but is possible in philosophy in principle, unlike laboratory-based teaching. My impression from my own experience and conversations with colleagues is that productivity is decreasing. On the one hand it is often not so quiet at home, on the other hand the overall situation is stressful, exhausting, even frightening for some. The COVID-19 isolation at home is not a nice writing retreat for most people. This can become a problem especially for early-career colleagues who depend on publications for job applications.

But since we are all thinking about the current situation and what is probably still to come, it is a chance for philosophy and especially for philosophical blogging. Many philosophical questions arise: Allocation of scarce resources, the weighing of different goods (health vs. economic losses), the legitimation of far-reaching state measures and surveillance. At least three debates are now needed: First, a public debate in which all sciences with their different expertise should participate. Secondly, internal debates within the discipline, including a debate in philosophy on the above questions. Thirdly, a debate on the role of philosophy in interdisciplinary and public debate and what role philosophy can play for the public right now. The COVID-19 pandemic has an existential dimension, which is also reflected in all kinds of practical advice on how to deal with it and reflections on the changes in our everyday lives. Questions about the meaning of life and one's own vulnerability now arise for many. This should also be a field for philosophy.

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.

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. 

The philosophy social media dilemma

After over 10 years of being on FaceBook, I quit the platform over increasing worries and concerns I had about transparency, privacy, and other issues. This was the culmination of a gradual withdrawal. First, a few years ago, I deleted the app from my phone. Soon thereafter, when the Cambridge Analytica scandal broke, I deleted all its permissions to log in to other websites I use (Typepad did not make the switch easy). Then, I asked on Twitter what revelation, if anything would cause people to quit, and many people responded that nothing would make them quit. I thought the same, that I was stuck for good, and that thought worried me. A couple of days ago, in what I feel to be a moment of clarity, I deactivated and cut ties brusquely. 

It's early days now but I feel happy and liberated with the decision. I notice how my behavior had become too dependent on it, I still check it often without thinking, as I take a break from writing, even though checking it will now bring me to the login screen. These habits will take a long time to unlearn. I worry that other media I am still part of (such as Twitter) might soon take over and play the same role. I'll decide what to do when I get to that point. 

I thought it would be difficult to quit, as I have moved country several times and use the platform to keep in touch with friends (my extended family, fortunately, are social media shy and so I keep in touch with them through other means). But especially, I used the platform for professional engagement.

This started a few years ago, maybe around 2015 or so, when the philosophy blogs I contributed to started to dwindle (except when it concerned "issues in the profession"). Concurrently, informal philosophical engagement on Facebook increased. Soon, there seemed little point to blogging and I put blogging on the back burner. This brings me to the central point of this blogpost, to which I have no answer: the philosophy social media dilemma. What happens and what should a philosopher do if the academic community massively has moved on to making its informal engagements happen on one platform, specifically, Facebook? 

Survey results: non-TT faculty issues

A couple of months ago, I began a new series on the rights of non-tenure-track faculty. In the first post in the series, I asked the blog's non-TT readers to chime in on what they take to be important professional issues they face. The issues identified were:

• Absolute deprivation (e.g. poor pay and/or benefits)
• Relative deprivation (less pay, benefits, and/or job security than similarly qualified individuals)
• Lack of job-security (e.g. year-to-year or semester-by-semester contracts)
• Lack of opportunities for promotion
• Lack of union representation
• Never feeling like you belong (always feeling like a 'visitor' in your own department/institution)
• Being treated as a second-class citizen at work
• Lack of respect in the discipline of academic philosophy (e.g. only people with tenure-track jobs matter)
• Unjust inequity (unequal pay for equal work)
• Lack of academic freedom

Then, in the next post in the series, I ran an informal survey asking the following questions about the issues identified:

• Q1 - This is a serious problem I face as a non-tenure-track member of academic philosophy.
• Q2 - The American Philosophical Association (APA) should do more to address this issue.
• Q3 - Please rank the following in terms of importance to you as a non-tenure-track member of the profession.
• Q4 - My answers to the above questions are based on my experiences working as:

Although this was only an informal survey (with all of the attendant methodological issues thereunto), here are the results (N = 44 respondents):

Q1 - This is a serious problem I face as a non-tenure-track member of academic philosophy.

Here is the breakdown by mean (1 = strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree):

1. Lack of job security: 4.65
2. Lack of opportunities for promotion: 4.23
3. Relative deprivation (less pay, etc., than similarly qualified individuals): 3.95
4. Unjust inequity (unequal pay for equal work): 3.86
5. Lack of respect in the discipline of academic philosophy: 3.79
6. Never feeling like I belong (a visitor in my own department): 3.62
7. Being treated like a second-class citizen at work: 3.42
8. Lack of union representation: 2.98
9. Lack of academic freedom: 2.93
10. Absolute deprivation: 2.88

Some interesting results here are that respondents agreed most strongly with lack of job security, opportunities, and relative deprivation as serious issues, whereas the mean responses to (8)-(10) (union representation, academic freedom, and absolute deprivation) align with "neither agree nor disagree."

However, when eyeballing the data, the latter results appear to be confounded by the respondent's type of job. Respondents who self-reported as adjunct instructors appear more likely to agree that union representation, academic freedom, and absolute deprivation are important issues they face (though there was some considerable variance on all three issues even among the adjunct respondents).

Query on IHS

In our most recent "how can we help you?" thread, left-winging writes:

I have been hearing that it is bad for an early career scholar's reputation to have received funding from the Institute for Humane Studies (George Mason). Any opinions?

I haven't heard anything like this myself. On the one hand, it is always possible for people with moral opposition to libertarianism or classical liberalism to hold IHS's ideological background against people. On the other, my guess is that if an early-career scholar does work with that kind of background anyway (as I would expect people who receive IHS funding generally do), then libertarian or classical liberal themes will show up in their CV and publication-list, in which case receiving funding from IHS is probably a moot point.

In any case, my general stance on these kinds of things is simple: "you do you." Although I'm not a libertarian or classical liberal myself, my sense of philosophical and moral integrity is that if this is the work you do and believe in, then living in fear of what people may or may not think of IHS funding is no way to live. Sure, it's always possible some people may not look favorably on it--but other people may: namely, those who are more sympathetic with libertarianism or classical liberalism. And so I guess I'm inclined to say: just do work you believe in, and let the cards fall where they may.

But these are just my thoughts. What are yours?

New series on tenure

Yesterday, I came across an interesting discussion on social media on what tenure requirements are at different schools. Because it is clear from that discussion and others discussions I have encountered that tenure requirements differ greatly at different institutions, I thought it might be good to run a short series on the tenure process and tenure requirements. It occurred to me that such a series might be of interest to a variety of the blog's readers, including job-marketeers (who might benefit from better awareness of differences in the tenure process and standards across institutions), tenure-track faculty who have not gone up for tenure yet, and members of the profession more generally.

Anyway, I tentatively plan this series to cover the following topics:

• What tenure processes themselves are like at different institutions
• How clearly and consistently tenure standards are stated and conveyed to job-candidates
• What tenure standards are like at different kinds of institutions
  • R1 (research) institutions
  • Elite liberal arts universities
  • Non-elite liberal arts universities
  • Regional public state schools (non-R1's)
  • Community colleges
• What tenure-denial is like and involves (including potential for appeals)

Are there any other topics the series should cover? If so, please let me know in the comments section below this post. Because the quality of information this series provides will depend on reader comments, I'd like to encourage readers to share posts in the series, so that readers who may have experience and insight in these matters can chime in! For now, I'd just like to solicit suggestions on any additional topics to cover in the series. The first substantive post in the series will come in the next day or two!

Mentioning age in recommendation letters

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

I am a professor at an European University, and I would have a question concerning letters of recommendation.
Is it appropriate to write something like "This is an impressive list of accomplishments for someone who has not reached their 30s yet"? I want to emphasize that these accomplishments are exceptional for a 28-year-old. Or should I never mention or refer to the student's age?

Interesting question. I guess I'm inclined to think one shouldn't discuss age (so as to avoid unwittingly playing into ageism). I think there's nothing wrong with saying in a letter that someone has an impressive list of accomplishments for their career stage--but again, I'm inclined to think it is best to leave chronological age out of it. What do you all think?

New survey: non-TT faculty issues

Last month, I began a new series on the rights of non-tenure-track philosophers. My aim in this series is to learn more about the issues that non-TT members of the profession face, the relative importance of those issues to them, what might be done to address those issues, who ought to address those issues and how (such as the APA), and finally, which issues ought to be considered rights of non-TT faculty.

In the first entry in the series, I held an open discussion on the question, "non-TT faculty, what do you take to be important professional issues you face that you would like to see addressed in some way?". I personally learned a lot from the discussion, and put together the following list of issues that commenters identified as important issues to them:

• Absolute deprivation (e.g. poor pay and/or benefits)
• Relative deprivation (less pay, benefits, and/or job security than similarly qualified individuals)
• Lack of job-security (e.g. year-to-year or semester-by-semester contracts)
• Lack of opportunities for promotion
• Lack of union representation
• Never feeling like you belong (always feeling like a 'visitor' in your own department/institution)
• Being treated as a second-class citizen at work
• Lack of respect in the discipline of academic philosophy (e.g. only people with tenure-track jobs matter)
• Unjust inequity (unequal pay for equal work)
• Lack of academic freedom

I have now put together this informal survey to elicit how important these different issues are to non-tenure track , as well as to solicit non-tenure track people's opinions on which issues the American Philosophical Association (APA) should do more to address. If you are a non-tenure-track member of the profession (e.g. working as an adjunct, postdoc, lecturer, VAP, etc.), please consider filling out the survey. Although it is only an informal survey, not a formal study, my hope is that the answers respondents give to it will be illuminating for further discussion in this series. Please only fill out the survey if you have worked or are working in the above non-tenure-stream capacities. Please do not fill out the survey if you have only worked as a graduate teaching assistant or graduate student instructor in your MA or PhD program while in graduate school. While I think the professional issues that graduate students face are important (and indeed, I hope to do a series on the rights of graduate students in the near future!), I would like for this series to focus squarely on non-tenure-stream members of the profession beyond their work in their own graduate program. Many thanks in advance to everyone who takes the time to fill out the survey!

Poll results: service and the market

A couple of discussions the past few weeks got me thinking about the role that service (to one's department, university, the profession, etc.) plays on the job market. First, a little over two weeks ago, Daily Nous hosted a discussion on whether graduate students should receive compensation for service work. Second, around the same time, a colleague in the discipline at a research university mentioned on social media that they actively discourage their grad students from engaging in service, the rationale being, if I recall, that it's just not worth grad students' time and energy. I weighed in on this discussion, saying that my experience working and hiring on four search committees at a liberal arts university is very different: namely, that service may substantially benefit candidates on the market for jobs at universities like mine. 

Anyway, both of these discussions got met thinking: do search committee members, and search committees as a whole, care about service? Do candidates' service records affect how they are evaluated by search committee members? If so, how?

Because these seem to me to be important issues, I decided to run an informal poll asking search committee members to weigh in on a few questions. To be clear, it is just an informal poll with a relatively small sample size (N = 29), not a formal study--so the results should be presumably taken with a serious grain of salt. However, here are the results:

• Number of respondents: 29
• # self-reporting as from R1 research universities: 18
• # self-reporting as from regional state universities: 4
• # self-reporting as from non-elite liberal arts universities: 3
• # self-reporting as from elite liberal arts universities: 1
• # self-reporting as from community colleges: 1
• # self-reporting as from 'other': 2

Q1 - A job-candidate's service record (viz. service to their department, university, community, etc.) can play a real role in how I personally evaluate their candidacy as a search-committee member:

Q2 - The search committee(s) I have been on have taken candidates' service records (viz. service to their department, university, community, etc.) into account in their collective deliberations on who to interview or hire:

Q3 - Depending on your answers to Q1 & Q2, what kind(s) of service may play a role in how candidates are evaluated?:

All responses, complete and unedited:

• "Diversity related service, public philosophy, service that brings in media attention, service that attracts grads to the department, undergrads to classes or the major."
• "All forms, but especially technology, diversity, and proactive, positive contributions to the profession."
• "Course development, curriculum reform, labour organizing, establishing MAP chapters, etc."
• "Student outreach, diversity initiatives, reading and discussion groups, syllabus reform."
• "Service with students."
• "Anything that indicates that they would be a responsible member of my department--graduate representative, serving on committees, organizing events, etc."
• "In a UK context, it really is a must. You need to be able to show some "admin" experience, e.g., being part of committees, taking on admin roles in your department."
• "Has the candidate been involved in any diversity initiatives on campus, or leadership/shared governance roles. At my institution we need people to do a lot of service because we are badly understaffed, and we also need people who can help with diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts."
• "Undergraduate mentoring; teacher training related initiatives; diversity related initiatives (e.g. MAP chapter)."
• "It's not so much that kinds of service matter, but when debating candidates with differing research outputs, variations in teaching and administrative loads become relevant to predicting future performance."
• "Anything that indicates that the candidate is a team player."
• "Stuff that shows experience working with grad students, stuff that shows they would be a leader in enriching our intellectual community."
• "I don't care about journal refereeing. I take an absence of departmental service, or only insubstantial-looking service lines on the CV, as something of a red flag; it suggests to me that the candidate won't pull their weight in the department. Larger professional service roles suggest the candidate is becoming connected, which is a weak positive sign of reputation-building (which can matter for tenure)."
• "Work that showed a serious commitment to various kinds of diversity (running a MAP chapter, teaching philosophy in urban schools, etc)."
• "I was not allowed to officially consider any service, only the vague 'capacity' to take on roles within the department. This is a serious issue, and I wish that I could take into account junior colleagues that have undertaken senior roles (perhaps to the detriment of their research outputs). If able to, evidence of taking on important departmental roles would be great to ensure that we are hiring someone that can cope in those roles (i.e. future chairs of departments!)."
• "Primarily we have looked at administrative experience--has this person served as a chair, been in charge of adjuncts, performed class scheduling, served as an advisor."
• "Founding/running undergraduate clubs, recruitment efforts (with data to show their personal involvement), conference volunteer work, tutoring/mentoring students in an official capacity."
• "Philosophy club, public philosophy, pedagogical committees."
• "None."

Q4- I answered the above questions on the basis of my experience serving on search committee(s) at:

Again, this is just an informal survey--but I for one find the results intriguing, especially the qualitative answers to Q3 (indicating the kinds of service respondents care about, and their reasons for doing so). Anyway, I hope you all find this information helpful, and would be curious indeed to see what a more formal study might find!

Reader query on overdue reviews

A reader writes in:

I would like to ask about review practices. I have a submission under a decent journal. At one point, correspondences with the editors indicated that a review was overdue several weeks, they will contact the reviewer, and hope to come to a decision soon; later, at 7 weeks overdue, they mentioned that the reviewer needs more time. I’m not exactly sure how to phrase my question. Is this normal? And what should I do, if anything? What do reviewers and editorials normally do in similar situations? The context is that I’m going on the job market now, but I feel that I don’t have enough publications to be competitive.

I'm glad this reader wrote in, as this indeed appears to be a very common issue. I often see posts by friends on social media (including more senior members of the profession) relating similar stories. Generally speaking, the advice I've seen people given is to simply contact the editors again for an update after a reasonable amount of time has passed. However, if it has only been a few weeks after the initial exchange with the editors (as seems to be the case here), then it may make sense to wait a couple of more weeks (though I'm note sure). Another possibility, if things go on too long, is to simply withdraw the paper and submit it elsewhere, though I understand from experience why you wouldn't want to do that after you've already waited this long. I've been in a similar situation many times (including when I was on the job market in need of publications, and I never really felt like I knew what to do here aside from contacting the editors every month or so after the deadline. 

What does everyone else out there think? One thing to consider moving forward is to try to submit papers to journals with consistently good turnaround times. This 'Waiting for the Editor' webpage by Jonathan Weisberg is a great resource here, and I'm always surprised by how many people don't seem to be aware of it. 

Department chairing do’s and don’ts?

A little while back, Helen asked me if I would be willing to write a post or find someone to write a guest post on how to be a good department chair. I thought it was a great idea—but naturally because I'm a chair, things have been really busy, so I hadn't been able to get around to it. However, in our newest "how can we help you?" thread, a potential future chair made a similar query, asking:

Would you be willing to run a "do's and don't's" post on being a chair? I want to see what kind of consensuses there are.

So I figured I should try to finally write something up, and then ask you all what you think some department chairing do's and don'ts are. I think it would be great to hear not only from department chairs, but also people who aren’t, as it's not just department chairs who can have views about these things! 

Age and Phd Programs

In our newest "how can we help you?" thread, Anon #21 writes:

How old is too old to be admitted to an elite philosophy PhD program? (the type capable of placing at least some students some of the time in tenure track positions at research universities)

And, how can older (30-35 yo) candidates make themselves credible to elite PhD programs?

In my case, I have studied and worked in another academic field at very prestigious universities for many years after doing my undergraduate degree in philosophy. I know that I am unsatisfied with the kind of work I can do in my current field and that working as a philosophy professor would be incomparably more satisfying and fulfilling than being a professor in my field. I have publications in credible peer-reviewed philosophy journals though not top journals.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

I'm curious to hear from readers about this who are in the know. For my part, I've known a few older people who entered PhD programs after other careers who fared very well in the profession--but beyond this, I don't know much here. Anyone have any insight?

Network for European Early Career Philosophers

A reader brings my attention to this relatively new organization, which looks to me on its face to be a great resource for early-career philosophers in Europe!

Public Philosophy for the Common Good

This is a guest post by Mike Austin (Professor and Coordinator of Philosophy & Religious Studies, Eastern Kentucky University):

I’ve always wanted to do something meaningful with my professional life (the lack of scare quotes around the term meaningful is intentional!). With all of the caveats and qualifications, being a professional philosopher has turned out to be an excellent choice for me and my family. It’s enabled me to spend my days doing things I love, at least mostly. It’s given me great freedom to pursue questions I’m interested in, as well as the flexibility as a parent and spouse that I’ve really valued over the years. I’m certainly fortunate that I received a tenure-track offer and have found a professional home for the past 15 years at Eastern Kentucky University.

Being a tenured full professor means I have less time for research than I had during the early years of my career. I have a 4/4 teaching load and teach one course every summer. Other responsibilities eat into research time as you progress in your career, at least at a teaching-focused institution. I’ve continued to make scholarship a priority. I’ve also made writing for a popular audience a priority for over 10 years now. I was able to begin doing public philosophy back in 2007, editing a book on running and philosophy. I contributed to several books in the popular philosophy genre, and edited or co-edited several more volumes on popular culture and philosophy. I also regularly write a blog at Psychology Today, Ethics for Everyone.

I think all sorts of philosophical writing has value, from the highest levels of scholarship to the trade publication or blog post aimed at a popular audience. Usually, my scholarly work is the foundation of my writing aimed at a popular audience.

I started doing public philosophy, and continue to do so, because I think philosophy has value for non-philosophers, if done in the right way. So many of the ideas we take for granted can be enlightening and even transformative for the general public. We can shed a lot of light, rather than merely increasing the heat, on a variety of significant or controversial issues.

APA leadership nominations

If you are a member of the American Philosophical Association, you may have received a notification recently soliciting nominations for APA leadership positions. The announcement, which is also here at the APA blog, reads:

The American Philosophical Association is now accepting nominations for APA leadership positions for terms beginning July 1, 2020.

Visit the online nominations system.

There will be member vacancies on seventeen APA committees, as well as vacancies for associate chair positions on five committees. There will be one vacancy for member-at-large of the board of officers, and four member vacancies on the graduate student council (GSC). Most committee terms are three years in length; GSC terms are for two years.

To see the full list of vacancies, and for more information, sign in to the nominations system using your APA member credentials.

Please note that both nominators and nominees must be current APA members. Please be sure to renew your membership. Self-nominations are welcome, and members may nominate or be nominated as many times as they wish.

We will only accept nominations through the online nominations system. Please do not submit nominations via email, phone, or postal mail. The deadline to submit nominations is October 31, 2019.

Service on the board of officers, an APA committee, or the graduate student council is a significant opportunity for leadership in the profession and the association, and I encourage you to take the time to nominate qualified candidates for these important positions.

Readers may recall that earlier this summer, I suggested that the APA might benefit from broader representation, including more representation by faculty from liberal arts universities and community colleges, as well as part-time faculty and philosophers in non-academic industry (for further discussion, see this Daily Nous thread). I'd like to encourage readers of the Cocoon who are APA members to consider nominating philosophers in these broader categories!

Journals being unable to find referees

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

What to do when top journals reject papers without sending them for review not because the paper is bad but because they simply cannot find referees? My manuscript has been rejected from two top journals. One of the journals rejected the paper and the editor basically said that we do not have time to find competent referees for every paper and for that reason we have to reject some promising papers. Another journal rejected my paper after it has been "under review" for 6 weeks or so. They first contacted me and told that they have not yet found a referee for it because people keep rejecting referee invitations but that they will continue to find the referees. Just a day later I received another email saying that they have rejected my paper without any comments from the referees.

Is this practice common? Is it morally permissible? What an author can do to avoid this? Should I only submit papers to specialized journals that know more referees? (The problem is that if one does not publish in top philosophy journals, some philosophers think his/her work is not "real philosophy"). Should an author always recommend possible referees in a cover letter when submitting a paper? (at least some journals ask the author to recommend possible referees).

This is interesting, as similar phenomena happened to me for the first time recently as both an author and reviewer. In one case, an editor wrote to me apologizing for a long review time due to inability to find referees for a paper I submitted. Then, in another case, an editor for a different journal wrote to me asking me to review a paper because reviewers kept turning their requests down. In all my years, these are the first times I've encountered this phenomenon, and both instances happened in the past few months. I wonder what's going on, and whether this some kind of trend due to the professional conditions that David Velleman recently termed 'the publication emergency'.

Anyone else have any experience with this? On the one hand, it seems to me that members of the profession have a presumptive duty to take on review requests (viz. contributing their fair share to a system that plays a central role in our profession), so if people are turning down review requests left and right, then that's concerning. On the other hand, reviewing is 'unpaid labor' of sorts, so I know there's not much incentive for people to accept requests. But in any case, rejecting papers due to inability to find suitable referees seems super unfair to authors. So, I'm really not sure what to say on this. What do you all think? It might be good to hear from editors, reviewers, and authors on their experiences here!

Should more journals do 'targets and replies'?

In the comment section of my recent post on citation rates and journal rankings, Anon writes:

AJOB's journal structure is a main article and reply structure. There is one or two main ("target") articles, and then the other articles are replies to the main one. I actually think this is a cool format for a journal, as it motivates engagement.

I wasn't aware that AJOB does this, but I agree: it sounds like a really cool idea. As I've mentioned before, I think our current publishing model creates serious and unnecessary barriers to philosophical discussion. For example, many journals only permit 'replies' to articles published in their own pages. The result is that many published papers are never engaged with at all, and academic philosophy ends up more akin to a series of loosely connected monologues than a discussion. 

AJOB's 'target and replies' model seems to me a healthy antidote to this: a way of incentivizing greater engagement with published work. It would also make finding responses to published articles easier, as a journal might continually publish new replies to a given article on an ongoing basis below the original target article, enabling anyone who visits the article at the journal to see what other people have written on it in response (at least in that journal). 

What do other people think? Would it be good for the profession if more journals adopted this model? I suppose there might be logistical challenges, as it would probably significantly increase the number of reply submissions to journals, some of whose editors already report being overwhelmed with too many submissions. Still, given that AJOB evidently pulls it off, it seems like there is some way to handle these issues. Any ideas? Anyone know how AJOB does it?

Citation rates and journal rankings

Yesterday, this Google Scholar report on h5-index statistics of philosophy journals started going around my social media feed, and a few questions occurred to me: what, if anything, should we take statistics like these to indicate? Should they lead people who rank journals, or use journal rankings in hiring, tenure, and promotion, to revise how they think about these things? Although I tend not to care much about rankings in general, I still found myself curious about these questions.

In brief, my understanding is that in STEM fields, disciplinary journal rankings tend to follow journal impact-factors--that is, that people in those fields tend to identify the 'best journals' with ones that have the biggest impact in the literature. In philosophy, however, impact-factors rarely seem to be mentioned. Many journals do not even appear to report them. I found the above Google Scholar report interesting, in that although many highly-ranked philosophy journals appear in the list (with Nous and PPR in particular featuring at the top of the Google Scholar list), the list as a whole diverges fairly significantly from common journal rankings in the discipline.

One reason I found myself curious about this is that it is not clear what kind of validity subjective polls on journal-rankings have. If those kinds of common rankings merely represent people's beliefs about various journals' reputation, there is always the further question of whether a given journal's reputation is accurate. On the other hand, impact factors (such as h-indexes) merely reflect how often a journal's work is cited--which is a very imperfect (at best) measure of the quality of work. Further, journal citation-ranks may in part reflect the sheer number of articles a given journal publishes (as some journals publish far more articles than others).

Anyway, I don't have much of a well-developed view about any of this--aside again, from being skeptical about rankings in general. Still, I'm curious what others think.

How to write a referee report (John Greco)

This guest post is by John Greco, currently Leonard and Elizabeth Eslick Chair in Philosophy at Saint Louis University, and soon in McDevitt Chair in Philosophy at Georgetown University 

I am sure that there will be varying opinions about how to write a referee report. In keeping with the spirit of this series, I here offer my own opinion, based on my own experience as someone who has written and read quite a few such reports. I have written them as a referee, of course. I have read some as an author, but many more as the editor of a major philosophy journal. It is this last perspective, I believe, that is most useful for present purposes. For referee reports, remember, are written primarily for journal editors.[1] That is, the defining purpose of a referee report—its raison d'etre—is to help a journal editor to make a decision about a submission. And that is what gives us insight into the criteria for a good referee report.

Already I have said something (at least one thing) that is substantive and controversial. That is, I don’t think that everyone would agree that this is indeed the primary purpose of a referee report. Many writers of such reports seem to think (or at least this is what I gather from reading their reports) that referee reports are primarily directed at authors, and for the purpose of improving the paper that is being evaluated. In my opinion, this is a mistake, and it leads to many of the problems that are typical of referee reports. In any case, below I will describe what I think are the essential elements of a good referee report, guided by my understanding that referee reports are supposed to help editors make a decision on a submission. Following that, I will go over what I take to be some common mistakes and unhelpful practices.

The elements of a good report.

In my opinion, the best referee reports have a few essential elements.

Propriety, good structures, and justice -- thoughts on leadership in academia

In spite of its meritocratic aspirations, academia is not a just place. There is a striking disconnect between the ideals of academia - meritocracy and an emphasis on talent no matter where it comes from - and the reality. This includes prestige bias (in graduate admissions and hiring, see also my earlier paper here), an unwelcome climate for minorities such as trans people), ableism, sexual harassment and assault cases, and so on. 

What can we do to improve our departments, and particularly, our profession? In this post I'll focus on leadership in academia, but the post might well apply to other domains, such as the corporate private sector, any kind of sector that has problems in equal opportunity for employees, sexual harassment, and so on.  I'm going to explore two ideas from Chinese philosophy (both mainly from the Warring States period) that propose two different kinds of intervention, one is more focused on civility and change of culture, the other more on institutional and legal frameworks. 

The aim of both kinds of interventions should ideally be to promote both harmonious relationships and flourishing of members of the profession (not only of tenure-track professors but also, graduate students, adjuncts, etc), and to promote justice, particularly for people who are not in positions of power, such as graduate students, adjuncts, and members of various minorities.

Admitting 'wildcards' into grad programs?

I assume at least some of you have seen Eric Schwitzgebel's recent update to his 2007 series on applying to grad programs in philosophy. As many other philosophers have remarked on social media, some of the information Schwitzgebel shares is remarkable. Consider:

Looking at data on eight of our eleven admittees [at UC Riverside] this year (excluding one international applicant whose transcripts aren't comparable and two who quickly declined UCR for higher ranked programs), all but one had GPAs over 3.85 at their most recent institution, with a median GPA of 3.92/4.00. While it's not impossible to be admitted to a mid-ranked PhD program without stellar grades, it is rare. If you are applying as an undergraduate or M.A. student, you want straight As, or very close, in your upper-division philosophy classes. 

Many of my philosopher-friends on social media--many of whom are very successful and well-published--have remarked how, given the above numbers, they would almost certainly be rejected by such programs today. For my part, I had a 3.6 coming out of my undergrad at Tufts. Other friends of mine online noted that they got into philosophy grad programs with undergrad GPA's as low as a 2.7. Presumably, me and many other people who I've seen comment online would never be admitted to good programs with these kinds of numbers today. And I will be honest: this concerns me. Let me explain.

Taking time off work/the market for motherhood?

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

Would it be career suicide to skip the job market and adjuncting for a year (or maybe even two) to expand my family and be a stay at home parent for a little while? I would still attempt to write, publish, and present at conferences (in fact I'd have much more time to attempt to do these things if I wasn't adjuncting and on the market while parenting a young child). I was on the market during my first pregnancy and adjuncted right up until my due date. I'm not keen to try that again while also parenting a toddler. I also don't want to put off having another kid until after I get a permanent job (since it may never happen anyway). Would schools consider hiring someone with this kind of gap in teaching? If so, would there be a good way to explain it in my cover letter and/or CV when going back on the market at a later time?

'B' then answered:

Make a point of listing it on your c.v. or in your letter that you were on maternity leave. There are civilized departments out there. Hopefully no one will ask you to show the placenta to prove it.

While I think this is right--and I think this is an important issue--I also think that whether Anonymous should bet on 'civilized departments' may be a difficult question to answer. Allow me to explain.

I have heard two things anecdotally from a number of people. The first is that search committees may have a tendency to look askance at 'gaps' in one's employment record. The second is that, at many places, there may be fairly clear discrimination against women on the basis of motherhood. For example, I have heard from women academics I know personally that things like the following have been said in their presence, "Oh, she just had a child. Say goodbye to her productivity." Not only that: there is plenty of empirical research showing a very real "motherhood penalty" in hiring and wages--whereas men actually appear to benefit in the workplace from being fathers (whereas motherhood is prejudicially associated with less productivity, fatherhood appears to be prejudicially associated with greater productivity).

If you put these two (very) unfortunate things together--the anecdotal possibility that hiring committees may hold 'employment gaps' against candidates, and real evidence that motherhood is used against mothers in hiring--then B's advice may, sadly, not be the best advice to follow (at least if Anonymous does not want to risk these things, as the concerns in her comment suggests she is concerned about). That being said, I am neither a father nor (obviously) a mother, so I cannot pretend to speak to Anonymous' situation beyond this.

What do you all think?

Representation in professional organizations

Updated: 7:10pm, 6/11/2019

Last week, the APA announced the results of its most recent elections. I think everyone elected is highly qualified and deserving of their new positions, and I congratulate them all wholeheartedly. Nevertheless, I would like to make a modest suggestion to the APA and other professional organizations about representation. To be clear in advance, the suggestion I will offer is not intended as a criticism. I appreciate what the APA does, and have benefited from it tremendously as a member. Further, a voluntary association, I think the APA is probably well within its moral rights to represent its members in the way it currently does and traditionally has. Rather, I merely want to make the positive suggestion that it might be good for the APA, the profession as a whole, and many of its members for it--and other professional organizations like it--to pay additional attention to some issues concerning representation. Allow me to explain.

Upon receiving the notification of the APA's election results, I quite naturally looked at who was elected. I was in turn pleasantly surprised that a number of people I voted for were elected--which made me happy, both for them and for the profession. However, I then noticed something interesting: that of the nineteen people elected, 18 are from research universities (the lone exception being Rebecca Copenhaver from Lewis and Clark College). Because I found this striking, I looked at the APA's Board of Officers page to see what the composition of its Board has been. When I went down the list of 26 people listed, I found that 23 officers work at research universities. Of the remaining three officers, two--Rebecca Copenhaver and Jeffrey S. Dunn--work at liberal arts universities, and the third (Matthew O'Brien) has a non-academic affiliation. In other words, across both pages I found that 41 of 45 the APA's officers, or 91.1%, are from research universities.

While I understand that research plays a central role in the discipline, this strikes me as potentially a missed opportunity in several respects.

What It's Like to Be on the Philosophy Job Market: A Simulation

About a month ago, I gave a presentation to a group of graduate students about the philosophy job market. During that presentation, I showcased a short video that was designed to be a simulation of what it's like to go on the academic job market in philosophy. I think it's fair to say that it's not the most optimistic portrayal of how the job search can go. But given what was going on at the time I came up with this idea, that's probably not surprising. On the bright side, it did provide some use for the rejection notices that I had been accumulating over the past few years, and my search this past year was ultimately successful (though that story will have to wait for another post).

Anyway, I have now uploaded that short video to YouTube so that you can have the experience of going on the philosophy job market condensed into a mere 75 seconds. The video is embedded below, but I'd recommend full-screening it if you want to actually read some of the text. Note that all the rejection emails in the video are legitimate except one, and you'll probably be able to figure out which one that is.

To promote one’s work, or not?

Updated: 2:50pm, 6/4/2019

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

Should I be trying to get people to notice my papers in some way other than just publishing and putting them out there? Cold emailing relevant interlocutors, posting about them in a public Facebook post, something like that?

I think these are great questions, one's I've wondered about on a number of occasions given the visibility the Cocoon provides. Here, in brief, are the conclusions I've come to: some people may look down on promoting one's work - but I think there is nothing to be ashamed of in doing it, and it probably benefits the profession and individuals who do it, at least on balance. Let me explain why.

Job-market catastrophizing? It is not the only way

[EF: I discussed the blogpost "Job-market catastrophizing?: a conversation" with Krishna Del Toso, who continues to write and think as a philosopher but is no longer paid as one. He agreed to share his reflections below:]

Here's my two cents.

I must say that, as I see it, the root of the "catastrophizing" lies in the fact that as far as the academic work is concerned (whether it is philosophy, literature, physics etc.), you aren't totally in control of the effects of your choices, whereas in other domains you are. This condition that characterizes wannabe academics bring about two aspects: 1. you don't need to train the instant reactivity to external stimuli (I'm talking about the kind of reactivity that can make the difference between leading a business brilliantly… or not), 2. you enter a sort of vicious circle in which the "catastrophizing" is nothing but a passive, fruitless, element that nourishes, and is nourished by, the observation that things go as they go because of a sort of inviolable and tacitly admitted norm (kind of Heidegger's "das Man world").

Of course, I was myself in this very vicious circle when I was hoping (mind the word: hoping!!) for a position at the university, long ago, and I was wearing myself out of "I've never done enough", not to speak of the struggle for publications (a struggle often driven by the aim of adding an extra title in my cv: mere form, devoid of real substance… should research be like this? Definitely not!) and of the almost depressing waiting-time in the maybe-you’ll-be-the-next "parking lot" for researchers after a position. I was waiting for others to decide for me, and that, back then, looked quite obvious, normal.

Fortunately all this no longer wears me out, fortunately we live in a fast-changing world… and fortunately the Aristotelian saying, often remembered but rarely put into practice, according to which "being (and so philosophy too) can be said in many ways" remains always valid.

Now I'm bringing my knowledge of philosophy into non-strictly-philosophical fields, such as early-stage business (I'm currently working on a book on this subject) and personal growth (a colleague recently asked me to make together Youtube video conversations on this matter). The time to actualize the aforementioned Aristotelian message is ripe: consider that Google inaugurated the CPO position, Chief Philosophy Officer, not because it's cool but because they need philosophers. I also continue as an independent scholar with my research in the spare time, avoiding all boring stuff and focusing only on arguments that really tantalize me (of course now I write less articles than before, but they're published on the same international journals). But the most important aspect is that now I know (I mean, crystal clear awareness!) that if I work well, I pick up all the fruits of my actions because I damn deserve that, if I don't, the bad effects are entirely on me… because I damn deserve that. Such a huge relief!

The Special-Skills Fallacy

In my first post in this series, I argued that our profession--grad programs and professional institutions--should do far more to foster alt-ac opportunities for early-career people, and offered some simple suggestions for feasible things I think can and should be done. Then, in my last post, I suggested that for these things to happen, we probably need to combat the 'academia or bust' mindset in the profession, a mindset that seems common in grad program faculty, grad students, and job-marketeers. However, it occurred to me after reading comments in both threads that in order to combat this mindset, we may need to combat something more specific: what I will call The Special-Skills Fallacy. Allow me to explain.

Consider what 'job marketeer' wrote here:

The faculty at my PhD program did a good job reminding grad students that the market is tough...On the other hand, they didn't seem to acknowledge the possibility that those who intend to complete the program may also want to consider alt-ac employment. The biggest reason this seems like an oversight is...there are no obvious alt-ac career choices for philosophers. (my italics)

Similarly, consider what 'postdoc' wrote here:

If we fail at the TT objective, then there aren't too many other jobs a PhD in philosophy (without a STEM background) can do that match the status of University Professor (if any). (my italics)

Comments like these appear on the Cocoon startlingly often (I vaguely recall dozens of them). Consequently, it appears as though many people in our profession--grad students, job-marketeers, and grad faculty--probably (at least implicitly) believe something like the following argument, which I will call the Special Skills Fallacy:

The Special Skills Fallacy

1. Philosophy graduate students, MAs, and PhDs (without an additional STEM background) have no special skills relevant to obtaining good alt-ac careers.

2. If (1) is true, then there are no obvious alt-ac career choices for philosophy grad students, MAs, or PhDs.

3. Thus (from 1&2), there are no obvious alt-ac career choices for philosophy grad students, MAs, or PhDs.

4. If (3) is true, then screw it: philosophy grad students, MAs, and PhDs have no real shot for good alt-ac careers.

5. Thus, (from 3&4), screw it: philosophy grad students, MAs, and PhDs have no real shot for good alt-ac careers.

In other words, this line of reasoning seems to me a very common argument that many people implicitly accept to justify inaction--both individually and institutionally. However, should we actually believe this argument? I think it is (informally) fallacious in not one but two different respects.

The Shadow Self

Last year in November, Alia Wong published an article in The Atlantic that detailed the various ways that PhD students often suffer from mental illness. The factors that put a strain on these students’ mental health are familiar: long-term employment prospects are poor, some students accumulate massive debt, and getting the the PhD is an intellectually taxing enterprise. Mix that together, and you get a recipe for stress and unhappiness.

The article focuses on a study of economics PhDs, and according to the survey mentioned, they are three times more likely to experience depression than the general population. (About 6% of the general population experiences depression; roughly 18% of those surveyed did.) But economics is far from the only field where concerns about mental health loom large. A recent study at UC Berkley found that a much higher proportion of their student population suffered from apparent depression, including an astonishing 64% of surveyed students in the arts and humanities. Broadening to the full spectrum of mental health issues, a recent study found that 50% of academic scholars have experienced mental health issues due to their academic work, which is roughly double the rate at which the general population experiences mental health issues. And last year, Teresa Evans and her colleagues argued that there was sufficient evidence of a mental health crisis in graduate education.

I could list other findings, but you get the point: a lot of graduate students struggle with their mental health. Philosophy graduate students are no exception, and even after graduate school, most early career scholars who find employment spend time in temporary appointments where they are forced to go back in the job market within a year or two. Facing the need to continue publishing and teaching well so that they can brave the job market gauntlet again, these positions are often just as stressful as the tail end of graduate school. And even when stable employment is secured, many departments are just one change to the general education program away from their existence being in jeopardy. A tenure-track position is often not a panacea for the challenges of academic life.

When we consider all this, it should not be surprising that many of our colleagues are struggling to with depression, anxiety, and their ilk. The victims of these conditions are all around us, and yet we so rarely acknowledge this fact. Consider these remarks from Peter Railton’s 2015 Dewey Lecture:

And what of depression?  Perhaps we all know the mask of depression, that frozen, affectless face we catch glimpses of on our students, colleagues, and friends. I can’t do anything about that. But perhaps I can do something about the face of depression—its visible image in the minds of our children and parents, teachers and students. Because in truth, we are still to a considerable degree still in a world of “Don’t ask, don’t tell” with regard to depression and associated mental disorders, such as anxiety, even though these will severely affect one in ten of us over the course of a lifetime, and often at more than one point in a lifetime.

Changing the 'academia or bust' mindset

In my recent post, "Alt-ac: how our profession can do better?", I suggested that grad programs and professional organizations (such as the APA) should do more to foster alt-ac opportunities for their students. At the moment, our profession leads all too many its early-career members into an awful situation. As anyone who has gone to grad school or sent off undergrads to grad school knows, many people enter grad school with a false sense of their chances (youthful optimism is surely a very real thing). They then spend anywhere from 5-10+ years doing little else than academic philosophy, often while racking up student debt. Then, after 5-10+ years, only around only around 35% of those who finish the PhD end up getting permanent academic jobs. And the rest? As Ben Sheredos' paper on professional failure illustrates--and countless discussions both online and offline attest--those who don't end up with permanent academic jobs can end up feeling like abject failures utterly ill-equipped to make a living in the non-academic world. Insofar as this is our profession--and insofar as grad programs often seem to entice students to enroll with optimistic pictures of career success--I believe we should make changing this situation our responsibility. But how?

In my last post, I suggested there are a few simple things that grad programs and professional organizations might do:

1. Grad programs (placement directors, dissertation supervisors) could cultivate contact-lists of students of theirs who have entered non-academic industries, staying in touch with them personally for the purposes of helping students network for alt-ac opportunities.
2. Professional institutions (such as the APA) could also publish a "who's who" directory of philosophers in industry, as well as organize alt-ac networking events at major conferences (much like other disciplines do, where industry representatives have informational tables for potential job-candidates).

Readers who commented seemed to like these ideas. However, although I think simple steps like these might dramatically improve things, one major difficulty is getting them to happen.

Alt-ac: how our profession can do better?

In recent years, my primary focus on the Cocoon has been to help early-career people navigate the profession, particularly the job-market. To this end, Helen and I did things like the Job-Market Boot Camp and Job-Market Mentoring Program. Although I plan to keep doing these kinds of things--as a number of readers have said they find these kinds of things helpful--from time to time some readers in comments sections have been critical of these endeavors, saying that they don't do anything to deal with the deeper problems grad students and job-candidates face: specifically, features of the profession that put grad students and job-candidates in such awful positions to begin with. If, as appears to be case, only something like 35% of job-candidates can get permanent academic jobs at all, what does job-market advice really accomplish in the end...besides helping out this candidate or that candidate, while still leaving 65% of job-candidates without jobs? Ben Sheredos' paper on the phenomenology of professional failure really drove this point home to me: that for all too many candidates, all of the well-meant advice and encouragement in the world (viz. "You can do it...if only you improve your dossier materials and interviewing skills!") may not only ring hollow, but may even be harmful in a hard-to-quantify way (by perhaps fostering false hope, followed by many hours harder and harder work to become a better candidate, only to again be met with failure in the end). In this way, Ben's paper made me begin to reevaluate what in the world I am trying to do here at the Cocoon.

A Phenomenology of Professional Failure

Ben Sheredos (UC San Diego) drew my attention earlier today to his manuscript, 'A Phenomenology of Professional Failure.' I gave it a read this afternoon, think it is very much relevant to some recent discussions we've had, and think it is well worth reading, both by early-career people and more advanced members of the profession. First, it may help prospective graduate students better understand and appreciate the actual stakes involved in pursuing a philosophy PhD. Second, it may help other people in Ben's situation--by perhaps helping them better understand their own experiences, as well as by letting them know they are not alone. Third, it may help more advanced members of the profession better understand and sympathize with the point-of-view of a seemingly growing number of early-career people disaffected by the profession. Finally, to that extent, perhaps it can lead our profession to do something that is surely long overdue: namely, better grapple with the fact that this is the kind of situation that all too many early-career members of our profession find themselves in. I hope I am not alone, when reading Ben's piece, in thinking we need to do better. For, to summarize just one of his piece's many takeaways, our profession seems professionalize the vast majority of its members (the 60+% who do not obtain tenure-track jobs) to regard themselves as failures. We need to (A) stop professionalizing our PhD students into conceiving themselves as failures if a permanent academic job doesn't work out (which I have heard is a very common attitude in PhD programs), and (B) do a much better job of professionalizing our PhD students so that they have greater capacities to be successful--for example, by better preparing them for opportunities for success outside of the academy. 

Anyway, although I found early sections of the paper to be a bit protracted, the latter parts (sections 5 and 6)--where Sheredos gets to explaining the phenomenology of professional failure--contain some pretty moving passages that got me thinking about how I have responded in certain discussions, and how to do so in the future. So, rather than summarize and comment on Sheredos' analysis, I'd like to simply quote some choice passages that struck me as particularly meaningful and worth reflecting on, and then open things up for discussion:

Sweat Equity on the Philosophy Job Market

By Greg Stoutenburg (York College of Pennsylvania)

gstoutenburg@ycp.edu

In light of a recent post about basing one’s choice on whether to start a PhD in philosophy on the disvalue of not getting a tenure-track job, and a somewhat related post about choosing a non-tenure-track position over a tenure-track one, I thought I’d share something I have been thinking about for a while, which is my personal experience of four years on the philosophy job market. There is an abundance of job advice available to would-be philosophy graduate students and those late in their PhD progress, but very little of it comes with context that might help with figuring out what one ought to do. A lot of people with interest in philosophy have backgrounds like mine and hope to work their way on to the tenure-track. I now believe that such an approach is fundamentally misguided, as I will share in this story of what I did to prepare for the market that I have now given up on.

Since this is a personal story, I invite anyone who is interested to check out my website. It includes my CV and lots of job market materials: gregstoutenburg.com. You might use that information for comparison.

Feminist Philosophers is closing down - reflections on blogging as service to the profession

Feminist Philosophers is closing down. I'm sad to see yet another blog go. It played such an important role for me when I was an early career scholar, a postdoc with little job security navigating an uncertain environment. For me as for many other people, Feminist Philosophers was an authoritative and distinct voice in the profession, providing a valuable service.

As I wrote in a blogpost for the Daily Nous on philosophy blogs, I see the main value of philosophy blogs as service to the profession, and perhaps also as service on a broader scale, to people who are interested in philosophy and want to learn about it in a low-threshold, friendly and open environment, away from paywalls, specialist terminology, and pleasing referees.  

Have philosophy blogs run their course? I want to briefly respond to a few points by Jennifer Saul in her farewell post on FP, not in a way to contest or criticize their decision, as I think the blog's existence was already supererogatory and I'm very grateful for the service the bloggers did over the many years of its existence. I want to just briefly look at these points to see to what extent they might apply to blogging in general, particularly blogging conceived of as service to the profession.