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Number 12
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The |
Summer 2006 |
PHILOSOPHY
NEWSLETTER
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A newsletter
published by the University of Oklahoma Department of Philosophy |
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Number 12
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The |
Summer 2006 |
PHILOSOPHY
NEWSLETTER
|
||
|
A newsletter
published by the University of Oklahoma Department of Philosophy |
||
GREETINGS FROM THE CHAIR
Welcome to the 10th
newsletter for which I have been writing the greetings. Whew!
Time flies when you are having fun.
I’ve been looking over the past newsletters and have noticed that I
appear to be getting wordier and wordier.
A professional liability, I suppose.
Well, it is time to change and keep things short – not because a lot has
not happened, but because the newsletter can speak for itself.
I am thrilled to welcome
Professor Sherri Irvin who joined our department this Fall. Sherri received her doctorate at Princeton
and recently has been teaching at
During the year, we
completed a successful self-study; celebrated Linda Zagzebski’s Romanell-Phi
Beta Kappa Professorship lectures and our ninth David Ross Boyd Lectures with
Professor Hilary Putnam; completed our 10th annual undergraduate colloquium;
continued our active colloquium series; taught numerous students; and awarded
17 B.A.s in philosophy and ethics and religion and three M.A.s. Perhaps the most exciting news of all is that
Linda was awarded a George Lynn Cross Research Professorship at this spring’s
Faculty Awards Ceremony. A GLC is the highest research award that the
University bestows and it is well deserved. Congratulations, Linda! Next year promises to be exhilarating as
well. As you can see, this continues to
be an exciting time in the life of the program, and we have no intention of
sitting still.
Finally, I would like to
thank all our alumni who have responded to our previous newsletters and various
questionnaires. A special “thank you” goes to those of you who have contributed
financially to the department. It is important, however, to hear from all of
you, especially as we try continually to improve our program. The Philosophy
Department has a Web site at http://www.ou.edu/ouphil.
Among other things, the site has an online form alumni can fill out to provide
information about themselves. Please, let us know how you are doing!
Hugh H. Benson, Chair
During the calendar year 2005, the following students graduated with a
degree in Philosophy or Religion and Ethics:
Andrew Kaeleb
Call, Gregory Pierre Chansolme, Matthew Ted Dorius (with
distinction), Nathaniel Garrett Foell (with
distinction), Tyler Emory Haas, Devon
Julian Holcombe,Thomas Russell Hunter, David Lee Kersey, Jonathan Christian
Lewis, Jennifer Brooke Mullins (with distinction), Sarah Beth Piazza, Sarah Kelly Price, Edward Lee Robertson, Damian
Collin Russell, Gabriel J. Thomas, Joshua James Valentine, Mary Elizabeth
Wikswo and Emily Anne Pain (Ethics and Religion)
In Spring 2006, the following students graduated with a degree in Philosophy or Religion and Ethics:
Philosophy
Ryan Mitchel Collins, Bryan Anthony Cook, James Dizikes (summa cum
laude), William Floyd Hilderbrant, Christopher James Schaefer (summa cum
laude), Zachary Don Troutt, Michelle Chanleur Verges, Kendall Morgan White (cum
laude)
Ethics and Religion
Chelsie Lynn Elkouri, Kent David Gonser (summa cum laude)
The following students are to be
congratulated for successfully defending their Ph. D. dissertations:
Clint Barrett, Jesse Butler, Dara Fogel, Kyle
Johnson and Elliot Welch.
Dara Fogel is moving to
Kyle Johnson received
a visiting assistant professorship at King’s College in
Rusty Jones has broken all
records for research by graduate students in his first two years as an M.A.
student. He presented "Self-Love and Friendship: Reexamining the Argument
of Nicomachean Ethics IX.4" to
the Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy at the Pacific Division Meetings of
the American Philosophical Association, March 24. His paper was one of only
three chosen out of more than 30 submissions, and the only one by a student. He
presented the same paper to the 29th Annual Workshop in Ancient
Philosophy,
Rusty also presented
"Christian Belief, Platonic Rationality, and Expert Opinion" at the
Fifth Annual Donald G. Wester Philosophy Conference,
Elliot Welch will be taking a job at
PHILOSOPHY
DEPARTMENT AWARDS and HONORS
Brian Barnett was the recipient of a number of honors: the Elizabeth Wade
Scholarship, established in honor of Elizabeth Wade (a Philosophy alumnus) by
her parents, Larry R. and Mary Jane Wade, of
Nathan Foell received the J. Clayton Feaver Scholarship for 2005. This scholarship
honors the memory of
J. Clayton Feaver
(1911-1995), who was the first Kingfisher Professor of the Philosophy of
Religion and Ethics at the
Congratulations to Brian and Nathan, and
many thanks to the donors whose generosity made the awards possible.
Neera Badhwar
Presentations: “Friendship and Commercial Societies,” 2005 Joint
Session of the Mind Association and the Aristotelian
Society, University of Manchester, England; “Carnal Wisdom and Sexual
Virtue,” Colloquium on Sex and Virtue, American Philosophical
Association, March 2005; “International Aid: When Giving Becomes a
Vice,” Panel on Philosophy, Politics, and Economics, Association for Private Enterprise Education,
April 2005;
“Is Realism Really Bad
for You? A Critique of Some Critiques of Realism,” The Carl M. Williams
Institute of Ethics and Values, Conference on Virtue Ethics and Moral
Psychology, October 2005;
“Philosophical, Psychological, and Economic
Perspectives on Happiness,” Association for Private Enterprise Education, 2006;
“Happiness as the Highest Good,”
▪Neera was invited to visit the
Publications:
▪“Friendship and Commercial Societies,” in Bernard Schumacher, ed. L'amitié (
▪“Friendship and Sexuality,” Sex
from Plato to Paglia: A Philosophical Encyclopedia, ed. A. Soble (2005),
390-97.
▪“International Aid: When Giving Becomes a Vice,” Social Philosophy and Policy, issue on Justice and Global Politics,
Vol. 23, Winter 2006, 69-101.
Hugh Benson
Presentations: “Plato’s Dialectic
Method” at the Arizona Colloquium on Plato
“The Socratic Method” at the XVIth International Symposium of the Olympic
Center for Philosophy and Culture,
▪The Olympic Center for
Philosophy and Culture awarded him an Honorary Commendation for his work on
Socrates and Plato. (Congratulations, Hugh!)
Publications:
▪“Plato: The Republic” in Central Works
of Philosophy 1: Ancient and Medieval
Philosophy, ed. J. Shand (2005);
▪“Plato’s Rationalistic
Method” in Blackwell Companion to Rationalism, ed. Alan Nelson
(2005).
Monte Cook
Presentations: "Desgabets as a
Cartesian Empiricist" at the
Publication:
▪"Desgabets on the
Creation of Eternal Truths," The Journal of the History of Philosophy,
January 2005, pp. 21-36.
Reinaldo Elugardo
Presentations: “Core Meaning” at the Canadian Philosophical
Association Meeting in May 2005 in an “Authors Meet Critics” session on
Cappelen and Lepore’s Insensitive
Semantics. He also participated in
an APA Pacific Division Symposium on Roger Wertheimer’s “Quotations, Displays,
and Autonomes” and commented on Jon Cogburn’s “Notes from the Ungerground” at
the APA Central Division and APA Pacific Division Meetings (although Jay Newhard had to present the
comments, as Ray fell ill).
Publications:
▪An anthology coedited with Robert Stainton, Ellipsis and NonSentential Speech (Kluwer, 2005);
▪“Fodor’s Incompleteness Argument” in ed. E. Machery, G. Schurz, and M.
Werning, The Compositionality of Concepts
and Meanings: Foundational Issues (Ontos).
James Hawthorne
Presentations: “Another Representation
of Jeffrey Updating and the Uniformity Rule,” Second Annual Austin–Berkeley Formal
Epistemology Workshop, FEW 2005,
UT–Austin, 2005;
“Nonmonotonic Conditionals that Behave Like Conditional Probabilities
Above a Threshold,” Fourth International Workshop on Computational Models of
Scientific Reasoning and Applications (CMSRA IV),
“Graded Belief or Degrees of Belief: A Friendly Amendment to
Christensen’s Probabilism,” American
Philosophical Association, 2006.;
“On the Logic of Comparative Confidence and Belief;” Decision Theory Workshop,
Publications:
▪“Degree of Belief and
Degree of Support: Why Bayesians Need Both Notions,” Mind.
▪“Nonmonotonic
Conditionals That Behave Like Conditional Probabilities Above a Threshold,” Journal of Applied Logic.
Sherri Irvin
Presentations: “Artists, Institutions
and the Shaping of Contemporary Artworks” at the meeting of the American
Society for Aesthetics,
“Apprehension and Interpretation of Artworks” at meetings of the Canadian
Philosophical Association and the Society for the Philosophic Study of the
Contemporary Visual Arts,
“Everyday Aesthetics” at the meeting of the Société de philosophie de
Québec,
“Museums, Curators and the Nature of the Artwork” at the Thinking About
Museums conference in
▪Sherri won the American
Society for Aesthetics John Fisher Memorial Prize for the best paper in
aesthetics by a philosopher within five years of receiving the doctorate. She
also was awarded some cushy Canadian grants she had to give up to come to OU.
▪In April 2006 she ran
her first marathon in 4:19:13. She hopes that by the time the newsletter comes
out in 2007, she will have her time down to four hours.
Publications:
▪“The Artist’s Sanction
in Contemporary Art.” Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 63 (2005),
315-326.
▪“Appropriation and
Authorship in Contemporary Art.” British Journal of
Aesthetics 45 (2005), 123-137.
▪“Interprétation et description d’une œuvre
d’art.” Philosophiques 32 (2005), 135-148
Kenneth Merrill retired the first of July 2005, after 47 years at
OU. He still goes to his office every
day – or rather, every midnight — but no longer has to grade papers — or edit
this newsletter. Nor does he have to attend department or committee meetings or
advise or …. (all of which, in any case,
take place during the day). For a while, he took positive delight in not
attending those meetings, but eventually decided that his attitude was verging
on Schadenfreude (though he was never glad that others were obliged to go).
He saw his final Ph.D. student through the commencement exercise in May 2006 —
a distinctly happy way to end his academic career. So far, he is finding retirement very much
to his liking. He completed A Historical Dictionary of Hume’s Philosophy
and sent it off to his publisher.
Wayne Riggs and his wife, Karen, stopped being
faculty-in-residence in May 2005, and moved out of the
Chris Swoyer
Presentations: Chris gave the presidential address to the Southwestern Philosophical
Society in
▪Chris says he would be happy to take on some of the American philosophy
courses that Ken used to teach, but having just taught a seminar on American
philosophical naturalism, he’s finding that mastering the material is more work
than he’d expected (so is he still happy about teaching some of Ken’s courses?
“Yeah, I guess so.”). He also remains concerned about how well the critical
thinking and introductory logic courses work for students.
Publications:
▪“Conceptualism” in Sir Peter Strawson and A. Chakrabarti, eds., Universals,
Concepts and Qualities (Ashgate), 2005.
▪Review of second edition of Layman’s The Power of Logic.
▪Chris’s critical reasoning manuscript, available on his Web site, has
now been used by at least the following people in one or more sections of
critical reasoning (or comparable courses elsewhere): Jesse Butler, Monte Cook,
Ed Cox, Dustin Denson, Steve Ellis, Mary Gwin, Mark Gutel, Vassiliki
Papapostolou, Michael Silberstein, Sara Sweet, Chris Swoyer, Robert Thompson,
Stuart Barnum, Randy Ridenour and Jason Oakes, and portions have been used by
others. At least 2,500 students have used it. Perhaps some day he’ll try to
publish it, but he’s mindful of its limitations (he thinks it’s the best thing
out there, but it still has a long way to go and he doesn’t know how to improve
it).
Zev Trachtenberg
Presentations: a paper at the biannual meeting of the Rousseau Association, comparing
Rousseau's and Henry David Thoreau's attitudes toward nature.
▪Zev continues to serve on the City of
Publications:
▪ An anthology co-edited with a team of social scientists, Swimming
Upstream: Collaborative Approaches to Watershed Management (MIT, 2005).
In November he
appeared on a panel about the book at the annual meeting of the American Water
Resources Association — he was the only philosopher at the meeting!
Linda Zagzebski
Presentations: Linda gave talks at SUNY Brockport, the University of Notre Dame, the
▪Linda was named the Romanell Professorship of Phi Beta Kappa for 2005-06.
As part of this professorship, she delivered three lectures at OU (see
“Speakers”).
▪On April 6, Linda was awarded the George Lynn Cross Research
Professorship at OU, the highest research award in the university. (Congratulations
again, Linda!)
▪Linda is president of the Society of Christian Philosophers and
co-editor of the Philosophy of Religion section of the Stanford Encyclopedia of
Philosophy.
Publications:
▪“Sleeping Beauty and the Afterlife”
▪“The Ethics of Belief and the Primacy of What We Care About”
▪“More Suggestions for Divine Command Theorists.”
▪Portions of Linda’s book, Virtues of the Mind,
were translated into French and published in a French anthology.
__________
_STAFF CHANGES_________________
In case you have not heard, Susan Nostrand retired from the University last September. Susan has been caring for the department for over 36 years, and it was traumatic for those remaining in the department to see her leave. From all reports, Susan is enjoying her retirement. Some say that she has not stopped smiling since her last day in the department. I myself have seen the smile a few times since September. Congratulations, Susan! A well-deserved respite!
Shelley Konieczny has moved into Susan’s office and is holding down the fort. As all of us know, there is a lot to do in that office and much to learn, but the department is in good hands.
Lindsay Rice joined the department in August. Some of you may already have met her. She is the pleasant voice of the department,
among her many other duties. Welcome
aboard, Lindsay!
Susan Alvarado (M.A., 2001; Ph.D. in Education, 2006 from
Lee Basham (Ph.D.,
1998; Labash@earthlink.net) is assistant
professor at
Lee won two awards for his paper, “Zionism as Rape? The Nakba and
Palestinian Self-Conception” (2003):
Publications:
▪"Conspiracy Theories, Resilience and Ubiquity," in Conspiracy Theories: The Philosophical
Debate (Ashgate, April 2006), ed. David Coady.
▪“Living With the Conspiracy,” Philosophical Forum, 2001,
reprinted in Conspiracy Theories: The
Philosophical Debate
▪“Malevolent Global
Conspiracy,” Journal of Social Philosophy, 2003, reprinted in Conspiracy Theories: The Philosophical
Debate.
Two other chapters in the book are replies to Lee’s views concerning the
epistemic status of conspiracy theories. (Lee is not a conspiracy theorist, but
he sure looks like a Metaconspiracy Theorist. He defends a studied agnosticism
toward many of the more ambitious conspiracy theories, past and recent.)
Greg Bassham (B.A., 1982; M.A., 1985; Gregbassham@aol.com)
is professor of philosophy and department chair at King’s College,
Publications:
▪Coedited
anthology, The Chronicles of Narnia and Philosophy (
▪Essays in More
Matrix and Philosophy (2005).
▪Essays in Poker
and Philosophy (2006).
(Greg still claims to be the planet’s Most
Clueless Person about popular culture except, perhaps, for Ken Merrill. Ken may
disagree.)
Fred
A. Bender (M.A., 1968) died in June 2005. Fred taught at
Charles Brown (Ph.D., 1983, professor at Emporia Stare University, Emporia, Kan.).
Publications:
Co-edited anthology, Eco-Phenomenology:
Back to the Earth Itself, SUNY Press, 2003.
Stephen Brown
(Ph.D., 2003; Stephen.Brown@briarcliff.edu)
is an assistant professor in the Department of Theology and Philosophy at
Bill Ferraiolo (Ph.D., 1997; bferraiolo@deltacollege.edu)
has been teaching at
Publications:
▪“Against Compatibilism: Compulsion, Free Agency
and Moral Responsibility,” Sorites
(2005).
▪“Eternal Selves and the Problem of Evil,” Quodlibet
(2005).
Curtis Hancock (M.A., 1974 Curtis.Hancock@rockhurst.edu)
is professor of philosophy at
Peter Hutcheson (Ph.D., 1979; hutcheson@txstate.edu)
is professor of philosophy at
John Link (B.A., 1965; M.F.A. in painting, 1968; johnlink@wmich.edu) is professor of art at
Publication: “Perceiving Beauty,” http://www.newcrit.org/plain/JLbeauty.html
Harry Moore (Ph.D., 1998) has been teaching at
St. Gregory’s
University in
Albert B (Bert)
Randall (Ph.D., 1972; RANDALLA@apsu.edu) continues to teach in the Department
of History and Philosophy at
Publications:
▪Strangers on the Shore: The Beatitudes in World
Religions (Peter Lang, 2006).
Randy Ridenour (Ph.D., 2000; Randy.Ridenour@okbu.edu)
Congratulations are in order for Randy, who was granted tenure and promoted to
associate professor at
Rafael Rondón (Ph.D., 1997; rafaelrondon@msn.com)
teaches at
Michael Silberstein (Ph.D., 1994; silbermd@etown.edu)
is associate professor of philosophy at
Michael presented a
paper on quantum mechanics and special relativity at the American Institute of
Physics at an annual conference sponsored by UMD called New Directions in
Physics (2005). He gave that same paper at The Centre for Time at the
University of Sydney, Australia (2005). He also presented a paper on emergence
and causal closure at various places, including the Rutgers philosophy
department and also the philosophy department at
Earl Spurgin (M.A., OU, 1988 and Ph.D., University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill,
1995; espurgin@jcu.edu ) is chair of the
Department of Philosophy at
Don Viney (Ph.D., 1982; dviney@pittstate.edu),
Publications:
▪”A Lamp to Our Doubts: Ferré, Hartshorne, and Theistic
Arguments,” in a festschrift for Frederick Ferré (Heritage Press).
Spencer K. Wertz received his Ph.D. in 1970 and has been on the faculty at
_________________________________________
We celebrated the 10th anniversary of the Undergraduate
Colloquium in April 2005 with a special t-shirt and catered dinner at Hugh and
Ann Benson’s home. The driving force behind these special events was Michelle
Verges, who has since graduated from OU.
Robert Johnson was the program
director. Mary Gwin and Michelle Verges also were on the committee. Two of the
papers were given by OU undergraduates Justin Donathan and Sarah Price. OU
graduate students Carl Gustafson, Rusty Jones, Robert Johnson (whose comments were
presented by Josh Spears), Jason Southworth and Andrea Taylor served as commentators on the papers delivered at
the conference.
In April 2006, we held our 11th
Undergraduate Colloquium with Rusty Jones as the program director. Brian
Barnett, Grant Mowser and Andrea Taylor also were on the committee. One
of the papers was given by OU undergraduate Christina Leinneweber. OU graduate students Ruth Dysart, Rusty
Jones, Robert Mackey, Buffy Price, Jeff Schaffner and Paul Franks served
as commentators.
___________________________________________
SPEAKERS
___________________________________________
Spring 2005
·
January 28, Bryan Frances,
·
January 31, Matthew Boyle,
·
February 4, Matthew Weiner,
·
February 11, Sherri Irvin,
·
February 25, Kathleen Dougherty,
·
Eric Mack,
▪April 8: "Prerogatives, Restrictions and Rights."
▪April 9: Keynote address, "Lockean Provisos,
Self-Ownership, and the Most Abject Proletarian."
Fall 2005
● In the
week of Sept. 26, Linda Zagzebski,
1.
Lecture I: “The Admirable Life and the Desirable Life”
2.
Lecture II: “The Desirable Life and the Ethics of Belief
and Assertion”
3.
Lecture III: “The
Ethics of Belief and the Diversity of Religions”
● In the week of October 23rd, Hilary Putnam,
“William James, John Dewey and the Future of
Philosophy”
1.
Lecture I: "The Story of Pragmatism"
2.
Lecture
II: "Some Reflections on the
Story"
3.
Lecture
III: "Pragmatism and the Future of
Philosophy"
Spring 2006
▪April 7: "Art and the Divided
Self."
▪April 8: "DuBois and Douglass on the Sorrow
Songs."
REPORT
OF ALUMNI
We welcome
your updates and comments. Please fill
out this page and return it to Editor, OU Philosophy Newsletter,
Department of Philosophy, 455 West Lindsey, Room 605, The University of
Oklahoma, Norman, OK 73019-2006; or fax it to (405) 325-2660. You can also respond online at the
department’s Web site http://www.ou.edu/ouphil Thank you.
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