I’m pleased to report that just over a week ago the Academy of Finland awarded me a grant for a three year Postdoctoral Researcher’s Project, A Study of the Foundations of Metaphysics: The A Priori, Modality, and Essences. This is essentially the Finnish equivalent of a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellowship. The project will be based at the University of Helsinki, more precisely, at the Department of Philosophy, History, Culture and Art Studies in the subject of Theoretical Philosophy. The project also includes up to seven months of research abroad; I’m planning to spend the majority of this at New York University working with Kit Fine, presumably during the first year of the project. A probable option for the remaining time would be Geneva some time during the second year of the project, although this is still open. I spent a month and a half at the eidos Center for Metaphysics in Geneva a year ago as well.

The total funding awarded for the project by the Academy of Finland is 246.240€, which constitutes 80% of the full costs. The remaining 20% is covered by the department. I will start the project in January 2011, but I am already in the process of moving back to Finland. In the current economic climate I’m quite happy to have secured anything, but to secure funding for a three year project is excellent news. I’m looking forward to going back to Finland after spending five years in the UK, although ideally I may have preferred to stay here. In any case, I won’t be stuck in Finland given the time abroad within the project. There is also a good possibility that I will end up back in the UK at some point.

The following is the abstract of the project aimed at a general audience rather than experts. It emphasizes one topic in particular — the relationship between science and metaphysics — although the details of the project deal with rather more technical metaphysical topics, such as the relationship between essence and modality, and specifically the sense in which modality can be said to be grounded in essence.

What is it that we do, when we do metaphysics? There are as many answers to this question as there are metaphysicians. Yet, it seems impossible to engage in metaphysical inquiry if we do not have a very clear understanding of what metaphysical knowledge is about. This project is a survey of the foundations of metaphysics; I wish to offer an account of how we reach metaphysical knowledge, why we need it, and indeed what it is.

The project aims to develop my previous research towards a monograph — first of its kind about the foundations and methodology of metaphysics. The topic has recently gained a central role in analytic metaphysics and the role and nature of not just metaphysics but all of philosophy is currently being re-evaluated. One of the key questions is the relationship between philosophy and other disciplines, especially natural science. To determine the relationship between philosophy and science we must engage in a foundational analysis concerning the nature of philosophy. In this project I will put forward one suggestion as to what that nature is.

As I already suggested in my doctoral dissertation, metaphysics is what Aristotle calls ‘the first philosophy’. The key question here is: how do we acquire knowledge about the structure of reality? The obvious answer is that we do it by engaging in empirical research — perhaps in terms of physics. While I do not wish to question the importance of the natural sciences, I would like to consider their status in more detail. Specifically, what is the structure of empirical knowledge? On the face of it, empirical research is purely experimental knowledge, but in what sense is this the case? It is true that experiments are a crucial part of scientific inquiry, but is there anything else that scientific inquiry needs? It seems clear to me that the answer is: yes, there is indeed something else.

Consider theory-forming in physics. Typically, theories concerning the fundamental structure of the physical world start from mathematical models, not from experiments. These models are generally tested by empirical means, but this is not always possible. In any case, a central part of scientific inquiry uncontentiously concerns modelling possible explanations for our previous empirical observations. This is arguably the most important part of scientific inquiry. What is striking is that it is thoroughly non-empirical. Scientists construct thought experiments, models, theoretical frameworks and other such things with one goal in mind: to put forward a possible explanation as to why the world appears to us in the way it does. The project I am proposing attempts to get in the bottom of this part of scientific inquiry, and my claim is that it is grounded in metaphysics. The details of the project concern the metaphysical framework that enables scientific inquiry, this includes topics such as the possibility of non-empirical, a priori knowledge, and the nature of modal concepts like possibility and necessity.

The external panel that reviewed my application had some concerns about my extremely wide definition of apriority — understandably so because it is rather radical. Already in my ‘A New Definition of A Priori Knowledge: In Search of a Modal Basis’ (2008) I proposed that apriority deals in metaphysical possibilities and that any metaphysically possible statement can be regarded as a priori, whether or not it holds in the actual world. The panel asks, would I consider the proposition ‘It will rain tomorrow in Helsinki’ as a priori? The worry is legitimate, as this proposition does not seem to be a priori, but it might appear to fulfil my initial criteria, since it is surely metaphysically possible. I can certainly address this worry though, since I think that a priori justification requires more than just metaphysical possibility. So, although the above proposition is metaphysically possible, it does not qualify as a priori if someone with no knowledge of meteorology utters it in Paris based on a hunch of some sort. However, if the proposition is based on a predictive mathematical model which takes into account previous empirical information about weather, then it would indeed count as a priori according to my account. More generally, a priori knowledge concerns metaphysically possible scenarios which are compatible with our current best empirical knowledge and employ non-empirical, a priori methods to establish those scenarios. A lot of details remain to be specified, of course, but the account is supposed to rule out mere guesswork.

Although the external panel had this concern about my account of a priori knowledge, their overall assessment of the project states that ‘This is an extremely strong proposal by an applicant who has already built up an international profile in the area’. The panel appears to have been satisfied with my record so far as well, as they comment on my merits as follows: ‘He has built up a significant set of publications in this field already and has international recognition in this area. The other researchers that he plans to consult and work with (e.g. Kit Fine) are all of the highest international calibre’.

On that note, goodbye England!

I note this job advert for a Professor in Theoretical Philosophy (Fixed-term) at the University of Helsinki, Finland mainly due to my interest towards the future of the department (now actually part of the new Department of Philosophy, History, Culture and Art Studies) at Helsinki. This is, yet again, a three year post between Aug 1, 2010 and May 31, 2013 to take care of Ilkka Niiniluoto’s chair, who was first the Rector of the University and is now the Chancellor. Matti Sintonen has had this post for a long time now; ever since I started in Helsinki about 8 years ago. Presumably, it will be Sintonen who continues in the post (although I don’t know whether he has other plans), but I for one would like to see some international candidates going for it. Knowledge of Finnish and Swedish is a formal requirement, however, ‘Persons, who have not been educated in Finnish or Swedish, may be exempted from these language requirements’, so in theory there is no reason why an international candidate couldn’t get the job.

Since complaining about the current job market in philosophy/academia is such a fun and productive activity, I thought I’d highlight some recent discussions about it. This article by William Pannabacker (whose pen name is Thomas H. Benton) about how dreadful the job market in the humanities is sparked a comment from the almighty Brian Leiter, and Leiter’s rather hostile remarks are now being discussed at the The Philosophy Smoker.

Here are a couple of excerpts from these discussions, firstly from Pannabacker’s article:

I don’t think the current crop of humanities graduates can claim that they were not warned about the weak job market, but the situation is actually much worse now, if you are finishing a Ph.D., than you had any reason to expect when you started. If you once thought that a 40-percent chance of finding a tenure-track position was a risk worth taking (after maybe eight years of graduate school), then how do you feel about a 20-percent chance?

Well, I can say that I don’t feel particularly optimistic. Pannabacker goes on to criticse some of the current trends in academia, and many of his comments seem entirely reasonable to me; he for instance recommends that rather than aspiring to eventually get a tenured professorship, graduate students should pursue their degrees ‘simply out of a desire to learn’, and not succumb to the pressure. However, Leiter accuses Pannabacker of lying about the job market and goes on to effectively say that those who can’t get jobs should blame themselves, or their undergraduate teachers:

It is a shame that a lot of those who echo Pannabacker’s reckless generalizations do so under cover of anonymity. Each time the veil of anonymity has been lifted, in my experience, it turns out that the person complaining that there are no jobs for really good candidates is a graduate of a mediocre or worse PhD program. Some of these people may really be good candidates; that’s very hard to know. But what is often easy to know is that they have the albatross of a not very good graduate program around their neck, and their difficulties on the job market are, alas, predictable. It is a shame these people were misled, either by the programs in question or by their undergraduate teachers, and it has been one of my aims to make misleading students this way harder. But the fact that there really aren’t jobs for PhDs from weak programs does not mean one shouldn’t get a PhD in philosophy. It means a student should not get a PhD from a weak program.

So what Leiter is saying is that you shouldn’t do a Ph.D. unless you can do it at a top program (he quotes the placement records of seven top philosophy programs in the US). Now, there is the issue of factual accuracy here, as it’s not clear that even graduates of top programs always manage to land on a job, or a good job anyway. There’s a lot of discussion about this at The Philosophy Smoker, here’s a passage which rings true to me:

Some people are whiners, I agree. I hate people that blame their job hardship on women and minorities. And [some] people do crap work. Fine, I may be one of them. But claiming that the job market is anything other than a crapshoot is just dishonest. When places get 400 job applicants, your application is not going to receive careful review. It’s not anyone’s fault, per se, it’s just how the market is. Some people get lucky and get a lot of attention. Great for them. Most people don’t. Let’s stop lying and start realizing that the job market is just too noisy to guarantee that the best people get the best jobs, and the worst people get no jobs. Sometimes people do better than they expect, and most of the time people end up worse off than anyone would expect. But we currently have people telling us that good people don’t have to worry and they will land great jobs. This, post facto, is a great justification for those with jobs to announce that the system is very good at finding the best people. But it’s not the most honest story to tell.

Now, one issue that hasn’t come up here is that even if you’re roughly aware of how the philosophy job market works and would be able to get into a top program in the US, this doesn’t mean that everyone would want to do this, or that it would be anything like the best choice for them in terms of their philosophical development. And this is a key issue: shouldn’t we be looking into getting the best possible philosophical education rather than choosing a program because it has a good placement record? For one thing, not everyone can, or wants to, go to the US (or Oxbridge etc.), for obvious reasons. Secondly, I’ve always felt that what matters for doing a Ph.D. is who you work with, that is, you go where the person is who is the best expert in the area of your primary research interest.

For me, the choice was obvious: I wanted to work with E. J. Lowe, and he is here in Durham. Ok, with hindsight, maybe I should’ve gone to NYU to work with Kit Fine, since it happens to be the number one department in philosophy in the world and I’d really like to work with Kit Fine as well. But there were other things to take into account too: the UK is much closer to Finland than the US, and perhaps a nicer place to be anyway. So it seems to me that the discussion here is ignoring some rather relevant factors for choosing where to do a Ph.D. — if all you care about is getting a high paid position at a top university in the US, then listen to Leiter. But if you’re looking to do philosophy, the kind of philosophy that you want to do, then you’d better think in terms of the best possible supervisor for you rather than the placement record of the program.

Right, so I wasted way too much time on the whole obesity/discrimination debate (see my previous post, as well as my addendum in the comments), so here is something completely different: what is philosophy good for? There was a link to an article in Newsweek from a couple of years ago circulating on Facebook recently, and I thought it would be worth sharing: ‘I Think, Therefore I Am Misunderstood’ — a philosopher discusses the dreaded question that all of us philosophers have to face from time to time: what is it that you do, exactly?

I’ve got a few other links that I’ve collected about philosophy in media, here’s one in The Guardian which is related to the previous one (and also uses cogito as a basis for the title, what originality!): ‘I think, therefore I earn’. This one is about a sudden increase in demand for philosophy graduates.

But wait, there’s more! CareerCast reports that philosophy is the 12th best job in the US in ‘A Comprehensive Ranking of 200 Different Jobs’. Not too bad given that lawyers and medical experts are way below that.

Finally, if it’s money you’re after, the Payscale College Salary Report tells us that the mid-career median salary of a philosopher is a fairly respectable $76,700. Engineering and computers will earn you more than that, but might not be as good in other respects. Both mathematics and physics seem to be good choices though, as mathematicians top the CareerCast survey, while physicists are at number 13; they both also pay better. Of course, first you have to actually land on a job…

Well, I better go and do some actual philosophy for a change!