New APPS: Art, Politics, Philosophy, Science

This may be the worst review of 2013

Graham Oppy is "Professor of Philosophy, and Head of the School of Philosophical, Historical and International Studies (SOPHIS) at Monash." He is "Chair of Council of the Australasian Association of Philosophy" and "elected Fellow of the Australian Academcy [sic] of Humanities in 2009." So, I was very surprised by this unprofessional and self-absorbed review. For, he uses almost 2,000 words (out of a 2100 word review) to offer a taxonomy "not directly addressed anywhere in the work under review" in order to provide us with the mere assertion that, "while not denying that there has been an increase in serious activity in philosophy of religion, I am sceptical that there has been any movement at all in the first kind of project that I have identified." (The first project is "the 'neutral' assessment of competing worldviews in terms of global theoretical virtues -- simplicity, fit with data, explanatory scope, predictive accuracy, and the like.") Oppy then concludes with an entirely gratuitous list of authors who wrote "some outstanding chapters," including one from which he says he "learned many things that I am now pleased to know."

Let's grant that writing a review of (yet another) Handbook is no easy task; one often doesn't have space to even summarize all the chapters and, even if one did, mere summary is not the fundamental aim of any review worth having. Reviews play a crucial role in maintaining standards in a field, for explaining to the community what a book is about and at whom it is (primarily) aimed (a non-trivial issue with Handbooks), and what contributions it makes or should have made, etc. A review of a handbook also allows one to evaluate the 'state of play' in an intellectual community. There is a lot of room for different approaches to reviewing a Handbook, of course. Yet, Oppy's pontificating review does not meet the minimal standards for reviewing.

The review is a disgrace to NDPR.

Reviewer welcomes newfound confidence...

"Refreshingly, and in stark contrast to the essays in the recent Metametaphysics anthology (Chalmers, Manley, and Wasserman (2009)), most of this anthology's essays confidently assume that ground is a vital and respectable notion."--From this review.

"This book should not have been published."

This review by Jill Vance Buroker concludes with: "This book should not have been published because it adds nothing to the literature. It is difficult to imagine a Kant specialist recommending its publication."

The review looks fair to me because it offers a whole number of arguments for the conclusion. (I have some minor quibbles, but I am no Kant expert.) While I might not have used those exact words, I believe that critical book-reviewing plays an essential role in the discipline's quality control. What do readers think? I prefer signed comments on this one.

Book reviews and gender distribution in edited volumes

(It is usually Eric’s job to comment on noteworthy features of various NDPR reviews, but this time he’s having technical issues with his computer and thus asked me to cover this one.)

Besides the underrepresentation of women at conferences and other academic events, here at NewAPPS and elsewhere we also talk about the possible negative consequences of all-male volumes (see an old post by me on this here). Now, one is starting to see comments on the gender distribution of volume line-ups also in book reviews, such as in this excellent DNPR review by Alisa Bokulich (Boston University) of The Continuum Companion to the Philosophy of Science, edited by Steven French and Juha Saatsi.

A second, problematic feature of this volume is that out of 20 contributors spanning the entire philosophy of science, there is not a single female philosopher of science included. While this omission may be understandable for a very small collection on a highly specialized topic, it is more difficult to excuse for a volume of this size and breadth. While I am sure this was an unintentional oversight, it is part of a disturbing larger pattern within the philosophy of science, and philosophy more broadly. Such omissions are particularly troubling when it comes to pedagogical works, such as this Companion, that are designed to help recruit the next generation of philosophers of science. These volumes then become not only a symptom of this problem, but also part of its source, by giving the impression that the philosophy of science is not a field to which women make significant contributions.

Subtle conflicts of interest in Book Reviewing

The genius of NDPR lies in the way it consistently provides competent reviewers for a very high number of books published in philosophy on a daily basis. In doing so it functions as one of the main pillars of quality control in the discipline. By providing fair and critical reviews on a wide number of topics approached from (nearly) all philosophical traditions it also functions as a check on the pervasive buddy system within philosophy. I try to start each working day by reading their interesting reviews--I learn a lot, and I am constantly amazed by philosophy's diversity today. It impressive how long and successful NDPR has been at providing this essential service to philosophy. It's a constant cause for celebration! The Guttings and their editorial board deserve praise for providing (what the economists call) this valuable collective good.

Of course, like all human institutions NDPR is imperfect. For example, a few months ago, I posted some reservations on a review that seemed to be written by somebody a bit too close to the Kripke-circle (I quoted the author's own admission about that). Today, I noticed that a book was reviewed by a post-doc in the same (European) institute as the author of the book under review. In Europe a post-doc is not really an 'independent contractor,' but subtly dependent on his/her institutional sponsors. This seems to me the kind of conflict of interest that NDPR would do well to avoid in the future. (It is quite possible that in this instance when the reviewer was approached, there was no such conflict of interest. Even so, that is just an argument for finding another reviewer.) Such a policy would prevent bland reviews and would also block many of the unpleasantries involved when a junior scholar must review his or her indirect paymaster.

McGinn's bullshit

[VIa Kris McDaniel on Facebook.] This brilliant review is worth reading in all, but here is a choice-quote: "At times, [Colin] McGinn seems aware of the improbability (or “boldness”) of his claims. He assures us that he puts this theory forward only because “I know of no other theory of the origin and function of disgust that seems to me even remotely plausible.” In a book with all of fourteen citations, only one of them written by a scientist active in the last century (Paul Rozin), it’s little wonder that McGinn is so flummoxed." --Nina Strohminger (a graduate student by the way).

An irresponsible reviewer can still be interesting

This review by the great Elijah Millgram is utterly irresponsible--it makes no effort to review the contents of the volume reviewed. It manages to mention as many Mighty Dead (Nozick, Williams) as chapter contributors, whose contributions are not discussed (with the exception of Carol Rovane's position). But this is not to deny that Millgram's narrative does not call attention to what I take to be an important issue:

Our present ways of thinking are what is reconstructed by conceptual analysis, and it appears that they do not equip us to handle the urgent practical demands faced by a society of experts and specialists [who do not share conceptual frameworks--ES]. Consequently, the solution to the philosophical problems posed by recent technological and economic development will not be provided by conceptual analysis: a methodological shift of key will be needed, to inventing new solutions to new problems, as opposed to retelling and clarifying the old solutions our ancestors devised to older problems long ago.

"Regrettable" and "Equally inexplicable"

Is the reviewer being too polite here? Or does the restraint make the message even more clear?

Precisely because this volume is likely to be widely read and used, however, it is worth critically reflecting both on its construction and on the tradition of political philosophy it represents. In particular, some commentary on the choice of thinkers and topics for a book claiming the authoritative title "Political Philosophy in the Twentieth Century" is inevitable. In the introduction, Zuckert lists a number of thinkers who "could and perhaps should have been included," (p. 15) among them Simone de Beauvoir. Beauvoir's inclusion would have assured some direct reflection on the question of gender, as well as served as a marker of one of the most fundamental social and political developments of the twentieth century, the dramatic challenges to traditional gender roles and the expansion of women's rights and participation in politics. That a chapter on Beauvoir was not included is indeed regrettable.

Equally inexplicable is the exclusion of any sustained engagement with questions of race (indeed, no thinker primarily concerned with race even makes Zuckert's "B" list of should-have-been-includeds). Insofar as race was one of the central, constitutive components of twentieth-century politics and the central pivot point for civic activism and debates over social change in the postwar United States, this exclusion is impossible to justify. Further, insofar as one of the main uses of this text will be (as noted above) to allow different parts of the political tradition to speak to one another, it would have been a great virtue if the volume had slightly broadened the conception of what it is to do political philosophy by including a social theorist like W.E.B. DuBois, Oliver Cromwell Cox, or Frantz Fanon -- or alternatively, an essay focused on the rich discussions of the meaning of democracy and by extension the political condition found in mid-century African-American authors such as James Baldwin, Ralph Ellison, and Richard Wright.

Readers are invited to suggest authors for inclusion, and / or to discuss how "political philosophy" is conceived such that the choices of this volume are possible.