The Scandal of Closed Access to Taxpayer Funded Research
On January 21, Timothy Gowers of Cambridge announced he would no longer publish papers in Elsevier’s journals or serve as a referee or editor for them. This boycott has now been joined by thousands of...
View ArticleOne Read, Another One Beckons. What Could Be Simpler? Or So You’d Think
It never gets old: I still get a thrill out of finishing one book, and then walking over to my book shelves to pick out the next one to be read. There are many unread tomes in there; who knows what...
View ArticleCopyright Protection for Academic Works: A Bad Idea, But Who’ll Bell The Cat?
Richard Posner has written yet another interesting critique of patent and copyright law; it includes a remark of particular interest to me: At the other extreme is academic books and articles (apart...
View ArticleA Nerdy Break-Up: Leaving the Academic Life
In the past few weeks I have had several conversations–electronic and face-to-face–with folks–friends and acquaintances–that have walked away from academic careers. Though I do not have numbers to back...
View ArticleOn Being a ‘Professional Philosopher’
A recent post in The Philosopher’s Magazine blog set me thinking about some of the strictures on being a professional or academic philosopher, which today amount to pretty much the same thing. (I...
View ArticleOn Being a ‘Professional Philosopher’, Contd.
In my previous post on being a professional philosopher, I had emphasized the scholarly world: publishing, writing, theoretical orientation etc. Today, I want to take note of another very important...
View ArticleChanging Philosophical Career Paths
I began my academic philosophy career as a ‘logician.’ I wrote a dissertation on belief revision, and was advised by a brilliant logician, Rohit Parikh, someone equally comfortable in the departments...
View ArticleMeritocracies, Rankings, Curricula: A Personal Take On Academic Philosophy
Some six years ago, shortly after I had been appointed to its faculty, the philosophy department at the CUNY Graduate Center began revising its long-standing curriculum; part of its expressed...
View ArticleCioran on Academic Writing’s ‘Forms of Vulgarity’
In ‘The Addict of Memoirs’ (from Drawn and Quartered, Arcade Publishing, New York, 1983/2012), E. M. Cioran writes: Is there a better sign of “civilization” than laconism? To stress, to explain, to...
View ArticleAcademia As Pie-Eating Contest
Some wag once said that academia was a pie-eating contest in which the prize was more pie. The reason this evokes rueful chuckles from academics is that, like all good jokes, there is truth in this...
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