Today, I’m going to think out loud about the syllabus I’m designing for the coming fall semester’s seminar on Political Philosophy. (I’m conducting this rumination in a public forum in the hope of helping me finalize this pesky business; please do chime in with suggestions, critiques, bouquets, brickbats etc.) My class will meet twice aContinue reading “Studying Political Philosophy via Revolutions (Well, Three of Them)”
Category Archives: Teaching Philosophy
The Walking Dead Claim Another Victim
I have finally succumbed to The Walking Dead. As I had noted in a post earlier this week, I am ensconced in a friend’s apartment, house-sitting, with access to–among other things–an impressive collection of graphic novels. Included in them is the first compendium of The Walking Dead comic book series (Compendium One, May 6, 2009,Continue reading “The Walking Dead Claim Another Victim”
Ursula Le Guin and Philosophy of Feminism Reading Lists
Ursula Le Guin‘s appearance in a recent conversation I had with some friends about favorite science fiction novels brought back memories of the time I used The Left Hand of Darkness in a class. In the fall semester of 2007, I asked to teach Philosophy of Feminism. I had long wanted to do so, andContinue reading “Ursula Le Guin and Philosophy of Feminism Reading Lists”
Teaching Descartes: It Ain’t All It’s Cracked Up To Be
In ‘Five Parables’ (from Historical Ontology, Harvard University Press, 2002), Ian Hacking writes, I had been giving a course introducing undergraduates to the philosophers who were contemporaries of the green family and August der Stark. My hero had been Leibniz, and as usual my audience gave me pained looks. But after the last meeting, some studentsContinue reading “Teaching Descartes: It Ain’t All It’s Cracked Up To Be”
Customer Relations in the Modern University
Satadru Sen has posted an interesting piece on his experiences teaching history at Queens College in CUNY. (I highly recommend Satadru’s blog; every single essay on there is literate and thoughtful.) Because I wrote recently on completing ten years of teaching at Brooklyn College–and what I’ve learned from it— I thought I’d offer some thoughtsContinue reading “Customer Relations in the Modern University”
The Question Asked, Inquiry Begins
Classes for the 2012 spring semester ended last week. And with that, I completed ten years of teaching at Brooklyn College. (I’m well aware that I have yet to complete grading for this semester but for now, I’m trying to put that thought out of my mind.) When I first started, in the 2002 fallContinue reading “The Question Asked, Inquiry Begins”
A Bad Argument Against Same-Sex Marriage
I would have scarcely believed it possible, but a few short hours after teaching the naturalistic fallacy in my Philosophy of Biology class, I was exposed to an argument–from a professional philosopher–that, roughly, same-sex marriage is problematic because a) marriage is all about procreation and the raising of children and because b) evolution tell usContinue reading “A Bad Argument Against Same-Sex Marriage”
Vale Jonathan E. Adler (1949-2012)
On Saturday, along with many others, I attended a simple–yet intensely emotionally moving–memorial service for Jonathan Adler, formerly Professor of Philosophy at Brooklyn College and the Graduate Center of CUNY. Jon and I had been colleagues in the Philosophy Department at Brooklyn College and the Graduate Center; before that Jon had served on two ofContinue reading “Vale Jonathan E. Adler (1949-2012)”
Virginia Held on ‘An Ethics of Care’
Yesterday Professor Virginia Held delivered the annual Sprague and Taylor Lecture at the Philosophy Department at Brooklyn College. On a personal note, it gave me great pleasure to welcome Professor Held to Brooklyn College. My association with her goes back some twenty years, when I first began my graduate studies in philosophy as a non-matriculateContinue reading “Virginia Held on ‘An Ethics of Care’”
Robot Graders: A Professor’s Delight?
Over at Concurring Opinions, Deven Desai makes note of an interesting study–whose details I have not yet had the time to investigate–underwritten by the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and conducted by a team of “experts in educational measurement and assessment, led by Dr. Mark Shermis, dean of the College of Education at The UniversityContinue reading “Robot Graders: A Professor’s Delight?”
Samir Chopra 