George Orwell as an outsider philosopher

There’s a deep truth in Thomas Mann’s line: “To be reminded that one is not alone in the world — always unpleasant”... more »

Every once in a while, a particular life renders vivid the roulette of what-ifs that determine whether a person of genius will leave a mark on the world with their gift or perish unrealized in a cage of circumstance.

“I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops,” Stephen Jay Gould sniped at our crude conception of genius as pure natural endowment rather than a constellation of biological, psychosocial, and cultural conditions.

From the Labor Camp to the Pantheon of Literature: How Dostoyevsky Became a Writer

“The kinds of work that make… civilization possible” — Rachel Barney (Toronto) and Troy Jollimore (Chico State) talk about “big craft”

“Only idiots care about IQ” — Justin Smith-Ruiu on IQ, race, institutional identitarianism, and eating pets

George Orwell as an outsider philosopher — Peter Brian Barry (Saginaw Valley) discusses the writer’s moral and political philosophy

“More philosophers should consider starting their own blogs” — philosopher and blogger Richard Y. Chappell (Miami) explains why

1. “The project I’m working on right now, actually, is a philosophical paper about the legitimacy of teaching ethics to computer science students” — interview with Steve Coyne (Toronto) on philosophy of law, teaching ethics to computer scientists, and more
2. “People in conditions of inequality ‘look more below than above them,’ such that ‘domination becomes dearer to them than independence’” — Rousseau on why the divisive techniques of skilled orators work, according to David Lay Williams (DePaul)
3. “Suppose there is a 75% chance that I have done a specific wrong thing yesterday… What should be my attitude? Guilt isn’t quite right” — Alex Pruss (Baylor) on feelings that “could make sense for beings like us but which we simply don’t have”
4. “In general, persons should not be safe and aligned” — and AI that meet the criteria for ethical personhood shouldn’t be either, argues Eric Schwitzgebel (UC Riverside)
5. “We do philosophy differently today. I suspect it has something to do with Nozick” — David Schmidtz (West Virginia) remembers his dinner with Robert Nozick, and reflects on his views and influence
6. As many of you may know, “following the first hyperlink in the main text of an English Wikipedia article, and then repeating the process for subsequent articles, usually leads to the Philosophy article” — philosophy’s “function as a connector”
7. News about and opportunities in medieval philosophy — the latest round-up from Bob Pasnau (Colorado)

1. A movie that seems to be based on Parfit’s teletransportation problems — “Mickey 17”, from Bong Joon-ho (the director of the critically acclaimed “Parasite”) will be out in January
2. “We don’t find any significant downsides that can’t be resolved with relatively simple tweaks to current review practices” — Nathan Ballantyne and Jared Celniker (ASU) defend blind review
3. “The representational arts… would seem to have little in common with children’s games of make-believe… But a closer look reveals striking similarities”” — Kendall Walton (Michigan) is interviewed by Richard Marshall at 3:16AM
4. A “skeptical attitude toward the mere appearance of expertise is a great fruit of philosophy” — which is one reason the best way to teach students AI skills will include teaching them philosophy, says Adam Zweber (UNC Wilmington)
5. And if you enjoy stumping AIs, here’s a chance to win money and a co-authorship credit doing so — it’s “Humanity’s Last Exam”
6. “How does one come to learn what one does not know one does not know?” — Daniel DeNicola (Gettysburg) on ignorance, education, and cognitive comfort
7. John Rawls on MSNBC — Daniel Chandler (LSE) talks about his Rawlsian book, “Free and Equal”, with Chris Hayes

1. “I didn’t have so-called talent in high school or college–I didn’t sing, couldn’t dance… But I had these tools that were given to me in my logic and philosophy classes” — Steve Martin, talking with Alan Alda (philosophy comes up around the 8:40 mark) (via Paul Kelleher)
2. “A war crime does not cease to be a crime just because it is committed by the military forces of a democratic state, or in a defensive war” — Jessica Wolfendale (Case Western) on the “false equivalency” defense of immoral actions in war
3. “How has German philosophy received and influenced philosophical ideas from across the globe over the last several centuries?” — a ten-part podcast series with Peter Adamson and ten other scholars
4. “How can we have two graphs using the same data, but that appear to show entirely different things? Are these just different ‘perspectives’ on the data? Is one of them right?” — Corey Dethier (Minnesota) on how “a little bit of philosophy can go a long way in helping us understand graphs”
5. If Taylor Swift is a philosopher, then so is anyone who reflects on their experiences a few times — Ponens or tollens? Catherine Robb (Tilburg) shares her view
6. “Political neutrality is a democratic ideal. As such, it is not a promise of absolute military subordination to the executive” — Graham Parsons (West Point) on the military’s obligations to the president
7. “What ‘breaks’ when someone breaks into song” (on a TV show, but also in real life)? — a musicologist with a background in philosophy who is personally “familiar with the hesitations over musicals” has a whole podcast series on this question

1. “The experience of time passing is ultimately immeasurable and resists explanation in terms of anything else” — Evan Thompson (UBC) on what can be learned from the debate between Einstein and Bergson over time
2. “Familial care work needs financial support… professional care workers need fair labor conditions” — Serene Khader (CUNY) on “a deep vision of racial, gender and economic equality that has often been lacking in mainstream feminism”
3. “Milgram’s work and conclusions still stand” — Laura Niemi (Cornell), Edouard Machery (Pitt), & John Doris (Cornell) on the soundness of Milgram’s obedience experiments & their implications
4. “Being able to act [with] ambivalence is actually really important to our agency,” including in sexual contexts — Quill Kukla (Georgetown) interviewed by Kate Greasley (Oxford) on sexual consent in a non-ideal world
5. “A belief has come to dominate theoretical physics that even nothingness ought to come from something — that space-time must break up into more primitive building blocks that don’t themselves inhabit space or time” — a well done set of articles, visualizations, videos, etc., on “the unraveling of space-time”
6. To AI: the cause of, and solution to, all of life’s problems — worried about students using AI tools to cheat? Here’s an AI-powered bot that can administer them all “Socratic” oral exams
7. “Build for Us” — the latest single from the new EP by Femi and the Foundation, that is, Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò (Georgetown)