Public Philosophy

Studenting White Quarantined

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson coronavirus, COVID-19, Open Source Pedagogy, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Teaching 0 Comments

I created this infographic for my students. Feel free to steal, share, edit, whatevs. You can also access it at this link.

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Why You Should Care That Artificial Intelligence Can Lie (Part 2)

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Emergent Tech, Ethics, Philosophy, Posthuman, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Technology, Technology and Human Values 0 Comments

If you haven’t already, please read Part 1 of “Why You Should Care That Artificial Intelligence Can Lie” before continuing, because I’m picking up in this post where I left off in the last one. Again, the concern here is whether or not robots (AI systems) can lie. As I demonstrated in Part 1, there…

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Why You Should Care That Artificial Intelligence Can Lie (Part 1)

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Emergent Tech, Ethics, Philosophy, Posthuman, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Technology, Technology and Human Values 0 Comments

Many people, myself included, are willing to affirm the near-future possibility of artificial general intelligence (AGI), or machines capable of performing all of the cognitive functions normally associated with human minds. The most important of these capabilities, not yet achieved by our extant “narrow” AI, is consciousness (sometimes, problematically, called “self-awareness”): an imprecise, indefinite, and…

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What To Assign If You Want To Teach The Future (Redux)

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Emergent Tech, Open Source Pedagogy, Philosophy, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Teaching, Technology, Technology and Human Values 0 Comments

ICYMI, I posted the first iteration of “What To Assign If You Want To Teach The Future” last year at the conclusion of my advanced seminar called “Technology and Human Values.” I’m now teaching that course every semester and, because both emerging technology and the scholarship about it is being produced at a mind-boggling pace,…

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Helping Students Become “One-Handed” Writers

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Ethics, Open Source Pedagogy, Philosophy, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Teaching, Technology, Technology and Human Values 0 Comments

There has been a push recently to encourage more “forward facing” philosophy, a long overdue and welcome development in our profession. However, for better or worse, what gets called “public philosophy”– the aim of this push– remains pretty vaguely defined. On the one hand, some argue that public philosophy should have real-world applications, though their…

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Postmillennial Public Service Announcements

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Ethics, Open Source Pedagogy, Philosophy, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Teaching, Technology, Technology and Human Values 0 Comments

For the last several years, I’ve been trying to incorporate new assignments and activities that encourage students to think of the work they do in my courses as having real impact on their lives outside of the classroom. I’m trying to work against their tendency to sit through a course as if they were a…

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Gender Trouble at SPEP

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Ethics, Philosophy, Politics, Professional Academy, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, SPEP, Women and Gender Issues 0 Comments

Last week, I began my second year on the LGBTQ Advocacy Committee for The Society for Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy (SPEP). This organization and this committee are important to me, personally and professionally, and I take my service responsibilities to both very seriously. Contrary to the general demographics/trends of professional Philosophy writ large, SPEP has…

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Feminism and the F-bomb

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Democracy, Philosophy, Politics, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Women and Gender Issues 0 Comments

I’ve observed a deeply problematic trend on social media of late, one that has been amplified amidst Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearings by the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and the several concurrent allegations of sexual assault leveled against Kavanaugh that have been made public in the past several days. Many people—who are (rightfully) outraged by…

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Why I Don’t Block: On Black Mirror’s “White Christmas”

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Black Mirror, Ethics, Film, Film Reviews, Philosophy, Politics, Pop Culture/Film, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Technology, Technology and Human Values, Television, Women and Gender Issues 0 Comments

[NOTE: This is the another installment in my series of reviews of Black Mirror. These posts DO include spoilers. Stop reading now if you don’t want to know!] When I originally posted my ranking of Black Mirror episodes at the beginning of this year, I didn’t include “White Christmas” in part because, in the grand architecture of the series, “White…

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A Punishing Lesson: On Black Mirror’s “White Bear”

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Black Mirror, Ethics, Film, Human Rights, Justice, Philosophy, Politics, Pop Culture/Film/Literature, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Surveillance, Technology, Technology and Human Values, Television, Torture 1 Comment

[NOTE: This is the another installment in my series of reviews of Black Mirror. These posts DO include spoilers. Stop reading now if you don’t want to know!] “White Bear” (S2E2) is one of only two Black Mirror episodes that I use in class. (The other is “Be Right Back,” which I reviewed here.) In my regular, face-to-face classes, the…

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