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August 28, 2004
Plagiarism
Mark Steen is, of course, the god of catching plagiarists in our department. However, after teaching a summer session of 191, I have a rather unique case. I assigned two papers for the six week course: the first was a very specific question on an ethical issue and the second was a question related to an ethical theory covered. In the case of two student athletes I noticed a discernable difference in the quality of their first and second papers. The first student wrote first an eloquent paper on abortion with well-documented footnotes and excellent philosophic and stylistic content. His second paper was a shoddy attempt at discussing utilitarianism. The language was much more informal and gone were the footnotes. The second student also wrote a thoughtful first paper on abortion, but then wrote a paper of much lower quality for the second assignment. The difference was more marked in the case of the first student, but still noticeable in the case of the second. In both cases I mined the papers extensively looking for signs of plagiarism. However, I couldn't find any. These weren't papers that contained anything google could find, and there weren't abrupt sylistic changes, changes in footnotes, or anything else that would indicate they had been taken from a paper mill or been tailored from some other paper. So, I began to wonder if this was a case of the first papers being written by the students' tutors, or something else. And then I began to wonder if anyone else has run into cases like this, and what sort of response would be appropriate for future findings. Usually, when I teach over the course of the semester, the papers aren't a big surprise. Like Mark suggests, when you know your students, you can often tell (especially over the course of a few assignments) what their works is like. But, in teaching such a short course, I was a bit baffled at first and wondered if the intensity coupled with the athletic schedule had led them to turn in lower quality work, or if it was something else.
Posted by jwollam at 2:56 PM | Comments (4)
August 23, 2004
Philosophers' Carnival I
The first Philosophers' Carnival is now up at Philosophy, et cetera... Someone must have submitted Ben's post about which death is worse for the person being killed, because it's there. One of mine from Prosblogion is also in it. I haven't read any of the others yet, but since this is supposed to be the best of the philosoblogosphere, I expect some good quality.
Posted by Jeremy at 2:18 PM
August 20, 2004
Language/Mind
An interesting article on why some cultures are bad at math.
Posted by kkukla at 2:34 AM | Comments (6)
August 18, 2004
Philosophers' Carnival
Richard Chappell of Philosophy, et cetera, has brought to my attention a page he just created which announces the beginning of a Philosophers' Carnival. You can find the explanation there, but, in brief, a 'Carnival' is a collection of 'best' posts submitted by the authors themselves or recommended by others. This is nice, as it will result in, if participation is good, a 'best of the philosophy web'. When you consider how the philosophy interweb is booming, this will nicely compact the content for those less willing to surf all the pages all the time to keep up. So, head on over there and contribute!
Posted by MarkSteen at 11:08 AM
August 17, 2004
Conceptual Analysis of 'Spam'
Jonathan Ichikawa has a hilarious and frustrating conceptual analysis of 'spam' (the internet term, not the canned meat). This is what philosophy is all about.
Posted by Jeremy at 10:35 AM | Comments (2)
August 12, 2004
And another, and another...
I've just received word from Tiger Roholt that a new Philosophy of Art/Aesthetics blog is up and running.
This reminds me--where is the metaphysics blog I've been dreaming of? I thought of starting one up, since I'm lucky to know quite a few excellent metaphysicians who I might be able to cajole into contributing, but I'm already (mis- or under-)managing a few pages/blogs. Any takers? I'd help with invites, but not with admin (or content, at least for a while).
One last note. Things have been a bit slow here of late. I've had word from some folk that entries might be more forthcoming in a few weeks. I'll also attempt mind-control with the incoming grad students as I meet them and install the proper cyborgitry.
Posted by MarkSteen at 10:36 PM | Comments (1)
August 5, 2004
New Philosophy of Biology Blog
is up and running here. Check it out. Thanks to Experimental Philosophy for the info.
Posted by MarkSteen at 10:47 AM
August 2, 2004
Double Positive
Sidney Morgenbesser, philosophy professor at Columbia University, died yesterday. NPR had a little tidbit on him this afternoon, demonstrating that a famous urban legend really happened. One of his colleagues was on the air recounting it.
J.L. Austin was giving a talk formal semantics and pragmatics or something like that, and he said something about double negatives canceling out and making a positive but that double positives never turn to a negative. Morgenbesser, under his breath and not expecting to be heard, said "Yeah, yeah..." Everyone in the room did hear and of course broke out in laughter.
I heard this story without any names and without it being said to be even related to philosophy. I think it was "Yeah, right!" instead. I had assumed it was just another urban legend like most stories about professors, but it turns out to be a true urban legend.
Posted by Jeremy at 7:35 PM | Comments (2)