Sexy Science

Isabella Rossellini lends her alluring beauty to the purpose of science education in these two green pornos, in which she examines the mating behavior of insects, spiders, whales, and barnacles. I love the straight-talking, anthropomorphizing, gender-bending sexiness of it all: 

If I were a male bee...I would have many brothers, and we would do nothing, just waiting to have sex. 

The question is: can I come up with a reason--and the courage--to show any of these in class?

Environmental Decisions: No Easy Answers

As sustainability and conservation become more prevalent concerns, there is no hiding the ways that some environmental values conflict with other environmental values. While such conflicts could be used to help us refine our sense of what matters and why, ethical reflection is likely to be swamped by politics.

Serenity, a student in my environmental philosophy class, passed along this article on the environmental value of the Mojave Desert. Senator Feinstein has proposed that 570,000 acres of federal land be set aside as a national monument to prevent the most pristine lands from being developed. Who would want to develop land in the desert? Companies who would like to capture solar energy.

The argument for preservation seems to hang on Feinstein's assertion that there are other, better places for siting solar power facilities:

“While I strongly support renewable energy, it is critical that these projects move forward on public and private lands well-suited for that purpose. Unfortunately, many of the sites now being considered for leases are completely inappropriate and will lead to the wholesale destruction of some of the most pristine areas in the desert.”

Certainly, there are multiple options for energy production and conservation, and only the one shot at preservation. But it can also be difficult for environmentalists to convince others that deserts, which seem to be wastelands, have ecological and aesthetic value.

Tips for Would-Be Philosophers

Here is a philosopher's letter to his Intro to Philosophy class, explaining what philosophy is and how to do it.

"Welcome to My Philosophy Class"

After sharing guidelines for how to read philosophy and write a paper for a philosophy class, Wayne Buck points to the value that can be found even in lower-level classes:

There are practical benefits to be gained from studying philosophy. First, it will improve your ability to reason, and to think originally. In reading and writing about abstract problems, you practice and develop analytical, critical and argumentative skills which are useful in many other endeavors. In turn, this will give you confidence in yourself and in your ability to think through problems and come to your own conclusions. It will make you less dependent on others and their thoughts, and put you in a better position to understand yourself and others.

Second, you will learn something about the philosophical tradition. Philosophy has been and still is a central force in Western culture and intellectual life. It is philosophers who have most clearly and thoroughly elaborated the values, ideals and theories which shape the way we live and think, even today. This is true not only for morals and religion, but also for the natural sciences, for political science, for economics and for literature.

Making Wise Choices About Environmental Goods

In my environmental philosophy class, this week we discussed preference utilitarianism, cost-benefit analysis, and whether we should trust people's stated preferences about how highly they value environmental goods.

I tend to be skeptical about economists' measurements of preference, though I don't know of a better and simpler tool that can be substituted.

Preferences can be discovered (only) by introspection, so it seems illogical to say that someone could be mistaken about what they prefer. The claim that someone can be mistaken rests on several observations:
1. Sometimes our actions do not follow our expressed beliefs. Which is the real preference: how we act or what we say?
2. People change their minds depending on how a choice is presented.
3. What we think will make us happy does not always, in fact, make us happy. Predictions of future happiness and unhappiness are wrong in systematic ways.

We talked about some of the mistakes that people make in estimating the value of their preferences and watched this video, from 6:00 to 12:54. I think Leroy's lottery ticket fallacy is particularly telling.

Socratic Showdown

A. O. Scott reviews a documentary film, Examined Life: Philosophy is in the Streets (trailer here), in which the filmmaker Astra Taylor interviews (and goads, as a gadfly should) seven prominent theorists: K. Anthony Appiah, Martha Nussbaum, Cornel "I'm a jazz man in the world of ideas" West, Peter Singer, Judith Butler, Slavoj Zizek, and Avital Ronell.

Scott says

Part of the fun of “Examined Life” comes from watching these very intelligent people try to make themselves intelligible.

and

Cornel West, the Princeton professor whose back-seat ramblings punctuate the film (everyone else has a single, uninterrupted minicolloquium), clearly takes great pleasure in talking, and it is hard not to share it, at least in small doses. A man of great, one might say compulsive, erudition — not one to drop the name of a single great writer, composer or sage if five are available — he makes the case that thought can be a kind of performance art.

Showing at the Dryden Theater April 11 and 12.

A Philosophy of Science Course Blog

This past quarter, I experimented with my philosophy of science class by devoting a large percentage of class time (about 1/3) to student presentations on problems in the special sciences. 

What a success! I had a great time, the presentations were fascinating, and we all learned a lot.

Please visit our jointly produced blog--Planet Paradigm--to see the results! It's a treasure trove of links on interesting topics in philosophy of science. There's hardly a monster that we don't cover: zombies, two-headed dogs, bigfoot, and destructive microscopic black holes.

A footnote: my dependence on the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy grows year by year!

Still Lifes on Life

Still life photographer Kevin van Aelst brings scientific images to life with everyday objects.

"Chromosomes"

© Kevin van Aelst

Global Warming and Realistic Expectations of Science

In my philosophy of science class last week I taught Wendy Parker's article on pluralism in climate science. (W.S. Parker. 2006. Understanding Pluralism in Climate Modeling. Foundations of Science 11:49-368) One of the topics that my class is spending a good deal of time on is the unity of science, methodological pluralism, and the more thorough forms of pluralism (metaphysical pluralism?) argued for by Nancy Cartwright, Phillip Kitcher, and John Dupré. This article fit well into that schedule because it examines a case in which the best contemporary science provides incompatible models which are nevertheless viewed as complementing each other, rather than competing with each other.

I expected that the class discussion which might develop out of this case would evaluate whether it is the levels of uncertainty involved in climate science which supports the current pluralism. In principle, at least, more certainty about climate processes and better datasets would be more likely to bring some of these models into actual competition with each other (even though such certainty is out of our reach for the foreseeable future).

But the discussion which actually developed came out of shock that our climate models are uncertain to this degree, that our data about past climate is not more complete, and an examination of whether, failing absolute certainty, the climate change skeptics have a correct assessment. I do not think that the students leaning this way started with any sympathy for the deniers. So, is this a case of a little knowledge being a bad thing?

In truth, I find this reaction to be an extension of the disillusioning about science which is a regular part of the philosophy of science class. The science students are comfortable with the revelations that there is not "a" scientific method, that science is not certain, and that when we want to explain why science is rational and progressive, the structure of its social institutions is one place to look for that explanation. My engineering students are less receptive.

I discovered that it's not wise to talk to smart, engaged, advanced undergraduates about the uncertainty in climate science because, unless they've taken an ecology class (which only 40 students a year at my institution enroll in), they may be completely unaware of the evidence in support of global warming. And if they're not aware of the evidence, they're certainly not able to evaluate it.

I don't think that only scientists can engage in issues surrounding global warming. But my students have taught me, again, how important science education is.

Here's my course blog, where an environmental science student reacts to the class discussion.

Is it getting hot in here?

Today is the National Global Warming Teach-In!

RIT is living up to its newly developed self-image as a leader in educating for a green economy. In just the last month, we revved up our program from 0 to this.

I'm participating in two ways:
1. in my philosophy of science class, we're discussing Wendy Parker's article "Understanding Pluralism in Climate Modeling" (Foundations of Science 2006, vol. 11, pp. 349-368).
2. a panel discussion with colleagues from the social sciences. Our comments will be directed by questions from our dean on the ways in which the liberal arts contributes to conceptualizing and addressing global warming.

Statistics on the Profession: A First Look at Race

I've been asked several times to extend the figures I collected on women in philosophy to include race. I've been reluctant to do so. The reason is purely practical. I use government figures and I analyze them at the most superficial level. To get the statistics, I just go to the table and divide a couple of numbers. But the figures on race are collected in a different way and so I think that calculating them does not provide an accurate picture of our discipline.

The figures on sex (from the Digest of Education Statistics) can be broken down to include only degrees in philosophy. However, the figures on race bundle philosophy with religious studies. Are there more or fewer racial minorities in philosophy than in religious studies? Are the profiles of the two fields the same? We can't assume they are. For example, at the undergraduate level, religious studies is evenly split between men and women, but philosophy graduates about twice as many men as women.

Here are the 2006 figures for bachelor's degrees in philosophy AND religious studies, bundled together:
White: 81.8%
Black: 5.7%
Hispanic: 5.4%
Asian and Pacific Islander: 5.2%
Native American: 0.5%
Non-resident alien: 1.3%

2006 figures for doctoral degrees in philosophy & religious studies, bundled together:
White: 70.9%
Black: 7.1%
Hispanic: 3.6%
Asian and Pacific Islander: 4.2%
Native American: 0.5%
Non-resident alien: 13.7%

These figures are additionally broken down by sex, and I thought it would be interesting to see whether the percentage of minorities is the same for men and women. But the numbers of individuals are so low that it's difficult to make comparisons.
% of male PhD's who are white: 70.7%
% of female PhD's who are white: 71.5%
% of male PhD's who are black: 6% (25 out of 420)
% of female PhD's who are black: 10% (16 out of 158)

But keep in mind: out of the 158 women in that last statistic, only 95 received philosophy degrees. I don't know of any way, using this published set of figures, to tease out the data on race for philosophy alone.

Women in Philosophy: Update

Just over a year ago I posted a series of statistics on women in philosophy. A new set of statistics has been released by the National Center for Education Statistics, to include graduation rates for 2006.

Bachelor's Degrees:
Since 1994, there has not been a significant change in the percentage of philosophy undergraduate degrees awarded to women. In 2002 it reached a high of 33.0%. Two years later it was at its lowest, at 29.2%. Last year the percentage of bachelor's degrees which went to women was 30.8%, right in line with past rates.

Master's Degrees:
26.6% of the master's degrees in philosophy went to women. I don't keep track of gender distribution among master's degrees, since not all graduate students pursue a terminal master's.

Doctorates:
The percentage of doctorates in philosophy earned by women has been about 27% since at least 1991. In 2006 (the most recent data), it is 27.1%.

Look at the bright side: women aren't falling out of the ranks of students.

Clean Air, Clean Water, Good Music

Here's a blog that discusses music and environmental concerns:
http://rockandecology.blogspot.com/. Check out the comparison of thrash metal bands' environmental awareness!

A post on Grist by Bill McKibben about environmental music.

A list of environmental songs

The Singing Climatologist

Captain Sea Level

Thanks to Richard Wallace, Ursinus College Environmental Studies program, for these links! A student in my Intro to Ethics course passes along this humorous video by Tim Minchin:

Teaching Philosophy of Science

When I was an undergraduate, one of the best courses I took was philosophy of science, and that was years before I thought about turning in this direction as a career. I've finally found the confidence, time, and support to teach the course using the technique that I so enjoyed as a student, satellite presentations on problems in the special sciences.

Why do we teach philosophy of science courses with confirmation and explanation at their center, maybe winding up the course with Structures of Scientific Revolutions and a few thoughts about realism or constructivism? Judging from the textbooks that are out there, this is the standard format.

But whose research is general, or in confirmation and explanation? Our research interests are problems in molecular biology, levels of evolutionary selection, evaluations of climate models, how economics represents the rational mind, and so on... Those are the truly interesting questions, and we keep our undergraduate students out of them because we think the problems are too complex or require too much technical sophistication. Or maybe because our own expertise is in one narrow area of biology, and so we wouldn't be able to tackle the problems in psychiatry, physics, and information processing with the appropriate level of skill.

I bit the bullet. I'm requiring a student presentation on a philosophical problem in the special sciences, but I'm adjusting my expectations to account for my own levels of expertise and my students' inexperience with philosophy, with science, and with presenting. We've had three weeks of our term, and many students have clearly expressed their excitement about doing independent research.

My hope is that these presentations will build skills, but also that they will be fun and interesting, and so will build curiosity. I don't remember much of anything from the lectures my undergraduate philosophy of science professor gave, but I do remember a half dozen of the student presentations--17 years and many many philosophy of science talks later!

I expect the format to accomplish several goals:

1. giving student presenters the opportunity to see what it is like to be the expert in the room.

2. giving student presenters the opportunity to present philosophical material. I allow but discourage PowerPoint for these 15-minute presentations. Several students were dismayed by this policy. "What are we supposed to do for 15 minutes if we don't use PowerPoint?"

3. open-ended questioning that models philosophical inquiry. Many of the topics that were chosen will lead us into the territory of metaphysics, logic, confirmation or explanation, methodology, and even religion.

4. student presenters acting as teachers--providing questions as much as answers; or, if answers, then answers which they have to defend.

The first weeks' presentations--on emergent properties (via Steven Johnson's popular book) and on the classification of mental illness--provoked a lot of quality discussion. I had suggested the latter topic as a possibility, but I didn't realize at the time how many questions it raises:

• To what degree are disease concepts socially constructed?
• What does social construction mean in this context? That a disease has an environmental component, e.g. one may have a genetic disposition but not be an alcoholic if never exposed to alcohol? Or that abnormality depends on acceptance and approbation?
  
• To what degree does labeling the cause of unacceptable behavior a disease release the patient from responsibility from illegal actions?
• Does identification of symptoms as the result of a physical illness rather than a mental illness depend on the sophistication of our science? That is, neurological disorders, in which a harm to brain tissue can be identified, are not classified as mental illnesses, but chemical imbalances are equally physical but as of yet unidentifiable.

The NYT reports on the development of the DSM-V, which will bring some of these questions about responsibility and social construction into wide discussion. Commentary by Christian Perring here.

Take a breath of fresh air

What's a walk in the woods worth? And to whom?
Is it just "nature lovers" that unwind in the great out-of-doors?

A study in Psychological Science finds that people perform a memory task better after walking through an arboretum than after a walk in a streetscape. Even viewing scenic images is a better treatment for mental fatigue than pictures of buildings. Science does occasionally prove the obvious--in this case, that strolling in the forest really is relaxing.

CFP: "Science, Technology, and the Humanities"

This would be a great opportunity to hear Karen Barad speak, and it's within spitting distance of Manhattan.

CALL FOR PAPERS

SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY AND THE HUMANITIES: A NEW SYNTHESIS

April 24-25, 2009
College of Arts & Letters
Stevens Institute of Technology
Hoboken, New Jersey 07030

KEYNOTE SPEAKERS:
DAVID LOWENTHAL, Professor Emeritus, Department of Geography, University College London
KAREN BARAD, Professor of Feminist Studies, University of California, Santa Cruz

Several scholarly disciplines focus on science and technology. Especially since World War II, the fields of the history, philosophy, literature, and social studies of science and technology have become well established as academic programs, and they have brought us ever richer and more subtle appreciations of science, technology, and their social dimensions.

As valuable and productive as these research endeavors have been, it is also the case that their principal purpose has been to produce better understandings of the enterprises of science and technology. Even where “external” or socially-oriented considerations have been brought to bear, by and large the goal has remained to shed new light on science and technology and the continuing roles they play in our lives. What remains of mere incidental or peripheral concern are the humanistic disciplines themselves.

In many ways, the traditional humanities and liberal arts have hardly felt the impact of these studies of science and technology. In recognizing this circumstance, the College of Arts & Letters at Stevens Institute of Technology has taken as its institutional mission to rethink the traditional humanities and liberal arts with science and technology as our points of departure. In so doing, we aim to reverse the analytical arrow and to focus more directly on the ways science and technology impact, inform, and redefine our disciplines.

Our upcoming conference, Science, Technology and the Humanities: A New Synthesis seeks to inquire—both on theoretical levels and in case studies—how by taking science and technology into consideration, we might enrich our understanding of history, philosophy, sociology, literary analysis, and the arts.

We invite as wide a range of speakers and papers as possible. We anticipate the speedy publication of conference proceedings. The closing date for consideration of proposals is January 15, 2009. Please send abstracts to CAL Conference, Spring ’09, c/o Prof. James E. McClellan III, College of Arts & Letters, Stevens Institute of Technology, Castle Point on Hudson, Hoboken, New Jersey 07030