F the Future

http://www.npr.org/…/a-glut-of-ph-d-s-means-long-odds-of-ge… A Glut Of Ph.D.s Means Long Odds Of Getting Jobs Only one in five Ph.D.s in science, engineering and health end up with faculty teaching or research positions within five years of completing their degrees. But universities keep churning them out. npr.org Like · · Share William C. Haynes likes this. Joseph Andrew http://media.npr.org/.../phd071114s_custom... February 28 at 12:13am · Like · Remove Preview Joseph Andrew Jeremy Abramowitz February 28 at 12:14am · Like Jeremy Abramowitz This is an interesting observation but I think misses the point somewhat. The point of this article is that the supply of labor in the academic job market has increased and driven down the price of labor, but the only people competing in that market in...See More February 28 at 12:16pm · Like William C. Haynes I have read before that 90% of PhDs are not employed in academia. February 28 at 1:54pm · Unlike · 1 William C. Haynes I don't know if that is true. February 28 at 1:54pm · Like William C. Haynes Science has proved that 76% of all statistics are made up. February 28 at 1:54pm · Edited · Like · 1 Joseph Andrew 76 percent of science is science February 28 at 3:56pm · Like Anthony Budny 76 percent of made up science is false February 28 at 6:06pm · Unlike · 1 William C. Haynes If you had a powerful enough microscope you could study the entire multiverse with it because of science. February 28 at 6:18pm · Unlike · 1 Anthony Budny But can you find if we live in a world? February 28 at 7:19pm · Unlike · 2 William C. Haynes Nononononono February 28 at 8:05pm · Like · 1 Jeremy Abramowitz I think there is a more insidious narrative here that rationalizes the adjunctification (is that a word?) of universities as a wholly economic phenomenon. There is a story in the background about the marginalization of non-tenure track faculty and of h...See More Yesterday at 11:30am · Like Joseph Andrew I can agree with a lot of that. I'd also say there's a more intellectual problem that you have the hard sciences on one hand and then "everything else" on the other. Because the current narrative within academia (and much of society) is that knowledg...See More Yesterday at 11:37am · Like Joseph Andrew I'd highly recommend this podcast that's relevant to this conversation: http://backstoryradio.org/shows/degrees-of-freedom-3/ Degrees of Freedom As college students across the country return to campus, so does BackStory, for an episode exploring the history of... backstoryradio.org|By CO+LAB Multimedia Yesterday at 11:42am · Like · Remove Preview Joseph Andrew For the record, I think cultural studies has a place within legitimate knowledge. My concern is that many empiricists and many within the cultural studies discipline do not, which I think is a problem. Yesterday at 12:06pm · Like William C. Haynes YOUR MOM GOES TO ACADEMIA. Yesterday at 2:49pm · Unlike · 1

CW: rant; Democracy Now with Amy Goodman TW: Zizek Ebooks @zizek_ebooks: "Sam Harris. Fuck"

One of the most annoying interviews I've ever heard is linked below. I found myself awake and listening to it at 5:30 a.m. on a Sunday. The guest (Sam Harris) is definitely the more intelligent of the two in this interview, but that doesn't keep him from frequent, and often stunning, incoherence. The host (Maureen Fiedler) is oblivious to one of the few interesting arguments that Harris manages to make (in fact, she is a perfect caricature of one of his points, as illustrated by her total lack of understanding said point). When I think back to the few interviews from this show that I've enjoyed, the interviews were good because the guests were exceptionally interesting, so that even the most basic questions elicited thoughtful answers. I watch Democracy Now even when I disagree with it because it has interesting coverage on foreign policy, race, the prison system, etc., and I value hearing its wide range of opinions on a number of other subjects on which I don't always agree. Interfaith Voices is everything that I manage to tolerate about Democracy Now, now purified into a single uniform substance that makes it rather intolerable, and then supposedly applied to a single subject (interfaith dialogue) -- though I don't think that's what the show is about, honestly. The show discusses religion and spirituality, but the main theme is Maureen Fiedler's political projects applied to religion (typically in the form of interviews with various religious adherents talking about politically liberal subjects). Which is fine. Any show covering the subject this show purports to cover will have some of this coverage because it's relevant. My complaint is that the show is disingenuous in what it claims to be because the host is far more interested in relating all religious conversations back to their coherence with progressive talking points than in providing objective coverage of old and great traditions that deserve better than to be viewed through the lens of American party politics. Lest anyone think I'm criticizing Fiedler for being "too liberal," I'm not. I can just as easily imagine a politically Republican show doing something of this sort and it being terrible. I don't believe one can be politically "neutral," but one can make efforts to try to get outside of one's self and hear what another has to say, without resorting to simple partisan divides that are rendered nonsensical by other belief systems. (See incoherent pope coverage) May I suggest Krista Tippet's On Being? I'm confident of her liberal credentials (for those who care about that sort of thing), but she has far greater diversity, both politically and religiously (and atheistically and agnostically), in guests than Fiedler, and Tippet asks questions with the intention of finding out what her guest believes, not because she wants to know the guest's opinion of Elizabeth Warren. And Tippet's voice isn't annoying. http://interfaithradio.org/…/Sam_Harris_Gets_Spiritual__But…

Oh, Hitchens.

Hitch, I love you, even when you bitch and when you're wrong. There's pretty good evidence that your criticisms of 1930s Catholicism [ask me about this, I'll provide you sources] and your generalizations of contemporary Islam are not as complex as most things that are in reality, which ought to be a warning sign that you're wrong. And your false dichotomies on faith and reason are nonsense. I pity the Sufi Muslim who should have known better than to ask you that sort of question. If you know Hitchens, why would you ask this? Douglas Wilson, who is a Calvinist, a system I strongly disagree with, and who I have some other issues with, asked a question, and elicited a response, from Hitchens, which left Wilson stunned -- not because Hitchens provided a good answer, but because Hitchens was unaware of how inadequate his answer was, and Wilson was shocked at how poor the answer was and was incapacitated by despair. Love, Me. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sEcBzxoMB8