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    • A Theory of Jerks, and a Query about the Term “Idiot”

      I have a new theory of the jerk, just out in Aeon.

      The piece uses the term “idiot” in several places to characterize how the jerk sees the world: “I’m important, and I’m surrounded by idiots!” In light of Shelley Tremain‘s remarks to me about the history of the word “idiot”, I’m wondering whether I should have avoided it. I’d be interested in the thoughts of NewAPPS folks about this. In my mind, it is exactly the sort of word the jerk is prone to use, and how he is prone to think of people — and of course he thinks of people in offensive ways and won’t be bothered by offensive terms unless that’s his particular moral high horse. So there’s a conflict now between my desire to capture the worldview of the jerk with phenomenological accuracy and my newly heightened sensitivity to the historical associations of that particular word.

      [illustration by Paul Blow]

    • Zaretsky’s list of things academics should never do (hat-tip Rod Dreher)

      At the CHE, with discussion, here:

      1. Never give copies of your books to friends and family.
      2. Never call students by their first names.
      3. Never try to be cool.
      4. Never lament the building of new football stadiums rather than new library wings.
      5. Never become an administrator.
      6. Never allow the Internet in the classroom.
      7. Never teach a class outdoors.
      8. Never refer to yourself by the title "Dr."—unless you are a real doctor.
      9. Never confuse a syllabus with reality.
      10. Never turn down a plum administrative position.

      Rod Dreher is soliciting additions to the list. I would add: (11) Never become visibly angry in the classroom, and (12) Never try to influence your students' political beliefs.

    • Europe after Habermas and the Populist Surge

      Shortly after elections to the European Parliament, and in the midst of political jostling over the name of the next President of the Commision, is a timing that makes a post on European politics and  the idea of Europe  timely, though the issues are constantly with us and I suspect that problems in the European Union will keep it constantly in the news. What looks like serious legitimacy problems for the European Union also has the consequence of creating a European public opinion of a kind, in that Europe is in the news across the nations of the continent. 

      One theoretical approach to Europe seems to me very much questioned  though advocates presumably will not think so. That is the approach of Habermas, who has become the uncrowned philosophical prince of the European Union. The radical egalitarian who makes some claims to some continuity with Marxism is invited to speak events with the highest EU dignitaries present and so appears to be de facto accepted by the European centre right as well as the more left inclined, as the philosophical voice of the European project. His version of Neo-Marxism, Post-Marxism, Liberal-Marxist fusionism,  or however else his thought is best described, is an interesting case of apparent radical critique becoming part of the self-understanding of an elite. His emphasis on the rationality and ethics of political discourse evidently has some appeal to those who make a living from the European Union, and researchers close to that world. The thinking of such people (and I have been personally acquainted with some) is very much along the lines that the EU institutions represent reason and informed decisions making, while strong criticism reflects 'populist' ignorance, stereotyping, and scapegoating.

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    • Canonical report on financialization of higher education

      AlfredENeuBernankeVery nice report from the folks at Debt and Society here about higher ed's tango with Wall Street. Lot's of distressing stuff, including the change from old fashioned bonds to newer, more risky types of debt:

      Private and public colleges in the past more commonly issued municipal bonds that would be repaid using only tax revenue or revenue from a particular project like a dormitory. Investment banking houses like JP Morgan and Barclays today have helped some higher education institutions to issue general revenue bonds that collateralize all college revenue in exchange for lower interest rates. Such bonds pledge state appropriations, project revenue, and even future tuition increases if necessary to repay bonds. Other institutions have gone a step further, adding variable rate bonds to their debt mix. Other institutions still, from Harvard to the Peralta Community College district have securitized these variable rate bond offerings with derivatives known as interest rate swaps. For-profit institutions, on the other hand can turn to corporate bonds, stock offerings, and private equity capital.

      There is also a nice history of higher education financing, describing how and why student and institutional indebtedness has exploded recently. In one decade alone the amount of institutional debt has tripled, much of it spent on new buildings and things related to athletics programs. It's a vicious circle. Colleges take out loans to expand amenities to attract students who will pay higher tuition, which requires raising tuition to pay off the debt, which requires expanding amenities, which requires taking out loans to expand amenities. . .*

      It's a very weird thing to have happened right after the financial crisis that caused the current recession.** Maybe not that weird though. . . If history teaches anything it's that very smart people can collectively do very stupid things.

      [*Also remember that, as recounted here, universities with the highest paid administrators and coaches also are the worst at larding their students up with debt and adjunctifying the faculty.

      **Also, check out Ed's piece from March here, which has a nice discussion of how the expanded institutional indebtedness ends up dictating administrative policy.]

    • How Wall Street Skims Higher Education

    • Goldfish-Pool Immortality

      Must an infinitely continued life inevitably become boring? Bernard William famously answers yes; John Fischer no. Fischer’s case is perhaps even more easily made than he suggests — but its very ease opens up new issues.

      Consider Neil Gaiman’s story “The Goldfish Pool and Other Stories” (yes, that’s the name of one story):

      He nodded and grinned. “Ornamental carp. Brought here all the way from China.”

      We watched them swim around the little pool.”I wonder if they get bored.”

      He shook his head. “My grandson, he’s an ichthyologist, you know what that is?”

      “Studies fishes.”

      “Uh-huh. He says they only got a memory that’s like thirty seconds long. So they swim around the pool, it’s always a surprise to them, going ‘I’ve never been here before.’ They meet another fish they known for a hundred years, they say, ‘Who are you, stranger?’”

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    • Harvard releases its internal report on Mark Hauser (h/t Eric S.)

      here.

      Its pretty damning.  The most appalling behavior, in my opinion, is the manner in which he threw the people below him under the bus to protect his fraudulent findings.

    • NYU Abu Dhabi Faculty letter to CHE (hat-tip Mathew Silverstein)

      Letter HERE, containing an explanation of what they are trying to accomplish, a discussion of labor issues in the gulf region, and what the university is doing about the recent scandals. It takes a lot of guts to be this forthright, and I think overall the letter's a good advertisement for the virtues of the kind of education they are delivering.

    • Brazilian music on Fridays: ‘Fio Maravilha’

      Continuing the football-themed series I started last week, today I’m posting ‘Fio Maravilha’ by Jorge Ben(Jor). In January 1972, the iconic team Flamengo was playing a friendly game against the Portuguese team Benfica in the Maracanã, and Jorge Ben, a fanatic Flamengo supporter, was among the spectators. Less than 15 minutes before the end of the game, the score was a frustrating 0 x 0, and so the spectators started to demand that João Batista de Sales, a much beloved player who was benched for that match, be let in the game. Coach Mário Zagallo finally decided to comply, and Sales was brought in as a substitute. In no time he scored an astonishing goal, sadly not immortalized on video. The goal is however immortalized in the song ‘Fio Maravilha’, which was the nickname given to Sales after this match; it was an angel’s goal, according to Jorge Ben. The song became very popular and won a national song festival in 1972, in the voice of singer Maria Alcina.

      Jorge Ben recorded 'Fio Maravilha' a number of times: I'm posting here 'Fio Maravilha' on its own, and also a hugely popular medley of this song with two other Jorge Ben classics: 'Taj Mahal' and 'País Tropical'. (And let me say for the 1000th time that Jorge Ben is an effing genius.)

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    • Another open access journal – αnalytica

      With the successful launching of Ergo,  it seems worth highlighting a recent announcemnt of another open access journal that has arrived on the scene:  αnalytica. It is:

      …an open-access, English-language electronic journal dedicated to the philosophy of science. αnalytica is edited by a younger generation of Greek philosophers of science, with the aid and support of an international advisory board. It provides a platform for peer-reviewed original contributions in philosophy of science, and is hosted by the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens.

      Dare we hope that more open access philosophy journals are on the way?