Arbitrary Marks

Philosophers of language will appreciate this one. I recently had a Fregean moment when I realized that Hannah Montana is Miley Cyrus. Yes, make fun of me in the comments all you want. I had heard about the Miley Cyrus photo and knew she was some Disney star. And I’d heard about Hannah Montana. But somehow I never connected the two together.

(In this moment I also got a glimpse of my future self as a parent, struggling to keep up with my kids’ pop culture consumption…apparently reading science and philosophy blogs, listening to NPR and reading The Atlantic Monthly isn’t going to cut it.)

Just a while ago, I had one of those fun conversations that I’m sure to enjoy for the rest of my life, while I’m doing philosophy. My cubicle-land boss asked me what I’d be doing in Austin, and so I told him about classes and then the upcoming conference. He asked me to describe it [...]

My friend Dru sent me this link which contains a summary of Alvin Plantinga’s argument against evolutionary naturalism. It’s an interesting proposal, one which I think has some connections to the earlier discussion here about radical translation.
The post at per Caritatem looks to be taken from a recent lecture (the author, Cynthia Nielson is a graduate student [...]

Experimental Philosophy: What are Intuitions?
Resources in current analytic philosophy on the question “What are intuitions?”
(tags: philosphy.epistemology)

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Class is out for the summer–I passed both of my education courses and passed the students in my philosophy class–and now it’s time to dive into the reading for the UT Austin Philosophy Methodology Conference. There’s quite a bit of it, and I’m already forming some questions specific to Buddhist philosophy, which hopefully I can [...]

‘Teaching Nonmajors’ (Inside Higher Ed)
A new book offers advice on teaching these students. Teaching Nonmajors: Advice for Liberal Arts Professors (State University of New York Press) is by P. Sven Arvidson, a senior faculty fellow at the Center for Excellence in Teaching at Seattle University
(tags: education)

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In my last post, I asked a roughly formed question about connecting experience and ontological claims. I recognize that many of these posts need to be more carefully exposited in light of actual Buddhist texts and specific traditions–but while I’m in a bit of a summer holding pattern and reading mostly Western analytic philosophy, I [...]

As a plot mover, the Joker was less an agent of chaos and more like the TA for a freshman philosophy course, leading everyone through twisty little exercises in artificial circumstances that present the poor student with difficult choices. (link)

I’m not sure whether I should take that as a compliment or an insult.

Out of Work for Doing Extra Work? (Inside Higher Ed)
Adjuncts beware - adding supplemental materials to a course in order to clarify material might be grounds for firing…
(tags: education philosophy.jobmarket)

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Assume it is the case that there is no privileged ontological way to “carve the world at its joints” and so some form of mereological ontological nihilism is correct.
Also assume that the sense of oneness that meditating persons receive can be explained in terms of neurobiology.
Is there any connection, logical or causal between the two [...]