Coming fashionably late to the culture-war party, The Economist published a piece this week on the evils of "Critical Race Theory" (CRT), a body of scholarship associated with ideas such as "intersectionality," "white privilege," and (though so far as I am aware it did not originate the phrase, much less create the phenomenon) "systemic racism." Though I … Continue reading Enlightenment Means Never Having to Say You’re Sorry
Men of Their Time, Standards of Ours
It's a common idea that figures of the past -- and what this really means, without exception, is heroic or widely celebrated figures of the past -- should be forgiven what look like misdeeds to us, because they were "men of their time." The claim has several variants, some more specious than others. With respect … Continue reading Men of Their Time, Standards of Ours
Writing the Second Book
Yesterday I submitted the first full manuscript of my second book to what I very much hope will be its publisher. (Note to editors: I love you. Please love me back!) As with the doctoral dissertation and the first book, submission felt impossibly distant at every moment up until the moment it happened. I'd say … Continue reading Writing the Second Book
Can ‘Progress Studies’ Contribute to Knowledge? History Suggests Caution
By Shannon Dea, University of Waterloo and Ted McCormick, Concordia University (republished from ; original here) According to tech entrepreneur Patrick Collison and economist Tyler Cowen, academia needs a new discipline called “progress studies.” But their proposal overlooks two crucial facts: human progress has been an object of study for centuries, and innovators ignorant of that scholarship … Continue reading Can ‘Progress Studies’ Contribute to Knowledge? History Suggests Caution
History is Bad for You. Science Told Me So
When -- as Alex Rosenberg did in Salon the other day -- you publish a piece with the title "Why Most Narrative History is Wrong”, and subtitle it “Even the best histories fail to identify the real causal forces that drive events. Science explains why”, you create certain expectations in a reader. To wit: You … Continue reading History is Bad for You. Science Told Me So
Matters of Faith
Tuesday brought news of the latest self-indulgent hoaxing of academic journals by a trio of "academic exiles" intent on establishing that the academy is a at once a hothouse of left-wing ideological orthodoxy and, at the same time, a credulous fantasy-land where anything couched in the language of "theory", however nonsensical, can get published. (How … Continue reading Matters of Faith
I Shall Return, No, Really
I didn't intend to take such a long break from writing this blog. (Sorry if anyone was waiting around.) But I've been working through a book manuscript slowly but surely, but slowly, and working on a new course, and tidying up various other larger and smaller writing and reading commitments -- a couple of articles, … Continue reading I Shall Return, No, Really
Perpetual Motion: Technology, Slavery, and History
Once we stop thinking of the past as a failed but noble attempt at the present, many of its inexplicable, repulsive, or ridiculous aspects take on a new colour. A good example is alchemical transmutation, an evident impossibility that nevertheless occupied -- and not just occupied, but motivated -- the likes of Newton or Boyle, … Continue reading Perpetual Motion: Technology, Slavery, and History
Merit, Luck, Privilege
A few days ago I wrote a thread on Twitter on the subject of the roles of luck and merit in getting academic work. I was prompted by, though I was not directly responding to, a blowup between a senior academic and others on the subject of the financial and personal sacrifices involved in taking … Continue reading Merit, Luck, Privilege
The University in a few years: some predictions
A few years from now, there will be two kinds of faculty member. Researchers will be hired, retained, and promoted based on a formula combining external funding amounts and bibliometrics. Instructors will be hired on a casual basis. A few years from now, faculty hires will be not only set and approved but also designed … Continue reading The University in a few years: some predictions
