Thanks to all my friends who helped celebrate my dissertation defense. (Especially those, pictured above, who decided to celebrate with a drunken arm-wrestling tournament!) I had a great time. And this rosey-blurry-mostly-indistinct photo is exactly how I remember it!
Read MorePart two of the “Just Ask” challenge finds this (from Daniel B.):I immediately thought of a softball question, such as “Derrida: great philosophy, or greatest philosopher?” Instead, I will test your mettle: What are the moral implications of the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics? First, let me take the softball: great philosophy and great philosopher….
Read MoreHere’s my first response in the “Just Ask” challenge. (By the way, I still need more questions!) Elena put forth the following query: How much does grass grow overnight? What is the deal with the American desire to mow grass daily? First, Elena, I love this question… it hits close to my Memphis heart. Memphians…
Read MoreToday marks the end of my first full year of (relatively regular) blogging. So, I wanted to take a moment to thank all of you who have helped to keep this blog alive and healthy by reading and commenting over the last year. (Especially Kyle, Petya, Chet, bernadette, Booga Face, melanie, kirsten, nazareth, Ideas Man…
Read MoreRecently, I’ve been editing my dissertation bibliography, which included an article that I wrote a few years ago and that I referenced in my dissertation. (I figure that noone else is citing me right now, so I might as well get the ball rolling.) I noticed that in my bibliography, I am situated between Fredric…
Read MoreAs I head down the home stretch of finishing the PhD, I’ve noticed that I am suffering from an acute case of completion anxiety. To be honest, I don’t know what’s scarier–trying to finish the dissertation, or having to think about it actually being finished (and, consequently, my new “post-graduate school life” beginning). It’s really…
Read MoreI’m often amazed at the size of my students’ egos and, to be honest, their cajones. An illustrative anecdote: I recently read several midterm papers by students who lambasted Plato, Aristotle, Kant and other great thinkers of the West for being, variously, “naive”, “idiotic”, “illogical”, and “close-minded.” While seemingly unburdened by the assignment’s requirement that…
Read MoreBefore you undertake the massive project of writing a dissertation, you should be forewarned of the strange physiological anomalies that will accompany it. Some of them are obvious and expected (loss of sleep, anxiety, depression), but others are…well… mysterious. Fortunately, I haven’t developed anything remarkably strange (like my friend Kyle’s apotemnophiliaphobia), but here’s my own…
Read MoreFor those of you who have been following my trials and tribulations with finishing the last stages of the PhD, I am happy to announce that I have finally defeated my arch-nemesis, the Logic Exam. Yeah, that’s right, the sun even shines on a lame dog sometimes. Only one last (big) hoop to jump through…
Read MoreI was eager to read the “10 Questions About the Future of the Humanities in America” posed by Thomas Mallon in the current issue of The American Scholar. Then, alas, I actually read them. If you haven’t already seen them, here they are: ——————- 1. How can American professors learn to write about literature in…
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