Brian Leiter's Blog, page 7

It did happen here

Not in the way Sinclair Lewis imagined, with Mussolini and Hitler as his paradigms, but in the way established in the 21st century by soft authoritarians, like Orban in Hungary and the Orwellian "Law and Justice" party in Poland: weaponize...

Great moments in obscure rock 'n' roll: Link Wray, "Juke Box Mama," 1971

Guitarist Link Wray gained fame in the 1950s with two instrumental numbers, "Rumble" (with its introduction of distortion and power chords to rock 'n' roll) and "Rawhide," but he continued recording for decades thereafter. This comes from one of his...

Gustafsson from York to Texas

Johan Gustafsson (decision theory, ethics & applied ethics, political philosophy), previously Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of York, has accepted appointment as Professor of Philosophy at the University of Texas, Austin starting in 2025-26.

Texas state representative James Talarico is worth watching

He knows it's about class warfare, against the class that actually matters ("the billionaires and their puppet politicans"). He also gives a good account of "distraction ideology" in the Marxian sense. Like AOC and Bernie Sanders, he's onto the one...

Texas state representative James Talerico is worth watching

He knows it's about class warfare, against the class that actually matters ("the billionaires and their puppet politicans"). He also gives a good account of "distraction ideology" in the Marxian sense. Like AOC and Bernie Sanders, he's onto the one...

Blast from the past: The crisis of the humanities is the lack of jobs, not "white privilege"

From 2019. And now it's also an authoritarian federal government! But it is amazing how stupid some humanities professors have been.

Open access philosophy books: a thread, Part II

MOVING TO FRONT (ORIGINALLY POSTED MARCH 13) SINCE SEVERAL SUBMISSIONS GOT CAUGHT IN THE SPAM FILTER--see what counts as a suitable submission below--no anonymous posts The last thread had 39 submissions, so I thought it's time for a second thread....

RFK Jr's plan to kill us all: mRNA vaccine edition

The imbecile has now cancelled $500 million in mRNA vaccine development contracts: The new cancellations dismayed scientists, many of whom regard mRNA shots as the best option for protecting Americans in a pandemic.... Unlike traditional vaccines, which can take years...

Columbia's deal with Trump, a faculty member's perspective

Pretty grim, and confirms the depths of the violation of academic freedom of scholars in certain fields: [I]t is impossible to teach this course [on modern Middle East history] (and much else) in light of Columbia���s adoption of the International...

Another feature of authoritarian societies is that government data becomes unreliable...

...as will soon happen to labor statistics, thanks again the monster child. The Republican Party has long represented the imprudent wing of the ruling class, but Trump is taking this to a whole other level, since markets will respond unfavorably...