Author: Baxter, Donald

Recent Graduate Student Placements

Michael Lynch: Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor

Michael Patrick Lynch has been designated a University of Connecticut Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor. Michael is our fourth BOT Distinguished Professor from Philosophy, along with Ruth Millikan, Joel Kupperman, and Jc Beall. As the provost’s website says, “The Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor is the highest honor that the University bestows on faculty who have demonstrated excellence in teaching, research and service” and who have spent at least 10 years of their career at UConn. https://provost.uconn.edu/about/awards/

 

Phillip Barron: Book Award for Philosophical Poetry

Grad student Phillip Barron wins book award for philosophical poetry
Philosophy graduate student Phillip Barron will receive the 2019 Nicolás Guillén Outstanding Book Award for his book of poetry, What Comes from a Thing (Fourteen Hills Press, 2015). The Guillén Award, given by the Caribbean Philosophical Association, recognizes contributions to philosophical literature. The award will be presented at the CPA’s annual conference, June 6-8, at Brown University in Providence, RI.
Barron earned an MFA in creative writing before entering UConn’s Philosophy program. What Comes from a Thing is his first book of poetry. An excerpt from the referee report submitted to the Awards Committee calls the book “a stunning piece of poetic philosophical work. It is a masterpiece of phenomenological description in which poetry is not application or a technique for profundity but instead at the heart of philosophical/poetic evocation. ”

Why Study Philosophy?

From an interview with legendary investor and philanthropist Bill Miller.

Q: What advice would you give students about areas of study and being prepared for the working world?

I was recently giving a talk at a conference, and there was a speaker there who specialized in disruptive technologies and had a PhD in computer science.  He described all the different technologies that would be changing significantly over the next 10 to 20 years and would upend the work force.  During the audience Q and A, somebody asked, “If that’s the case, what should we advise our children to do, because so many of the things that they would be trained for might become obsolete?”

He said, “You need to think about this in a way in which an economist would think about it. Mainly, what’s the scarcest resource?”  The scarcest resources get more valuable, and the abundant resources get less valuable.  He said, “In that kind of an environment, the scarcest resource will be critical and analytical thinking, and moral reasoning.  That would indicate you might want to have them take philosophy, or other disciplines in the humanities that might encourage those habits of mind.”

That was an interesting point, and I think it’s exactly right.

Susan Schneider: Distinguished Visiting Scholar, Library of Congress

Susan Schneider has just begun a four-month appointment as a Distinguished Visiting Scholar in The John W. Kluge Center of the Library of Congress. The award is to enable her to pursue a research project entitled “Mind Design: Artificial Intelligence, Brain Enhancement, and the Nature of the Self.” She will confab with other top scholars, make use of the Library’s rich resources, and interact with policymakers and the public, plus give a public presentation about the nature and results of her research.