[MD] The Futile Quest for Academic Approval

[Arlo Bensinger]

[John to Matt]
Academia despises new philosophy. More to learn!

[Arlo jumps in]
Egads! This is about as far from my experience as I can imagine! The 
Academy is constantly shifting and adopting new avenues of thought. 
While any one "case" my appear to move slowly by those who wish it to 
move faster, if you gander at the broad range of subjects in the 
Academy you'll see new things added to the syllabus each semester 
(and old things disappear). At PSU we now have a Bioethics Program 
(since you mentioned this), http://bioethics.psu.edu/.

I think, and its an understandable frustration, that things do not 
move as quickly as they "should" at times. But I don't know what a 
good alternative would be. The checks and balances in the system are 
supposed to inoculate the Academy from adopting every fad and theory 
that comes along. And while sometimes that can hinder the adoption of 
something we see as "good", it has served the Academy well for quite 
a long time.

Granted, no Univeristy can offer courses in *everything*, and even if 
they could no student could take them all. The humanities 
(philosophy, literature, etc.) are often relegated to non-mandatory 
"electives" (I could bemoan the death of the true "liberal 
education", but I'll hold off). Even departments offering said 
degrees are limited in scope and expertise. I could imagine the 
budgetary woes if our little philosophy program here suddenly had to 
teach a course (or more!) in every philosopher you could put on a 
list. Decisions are often made by popularity, sadly, no department 
will offer a course repeatedly if no one (or a very few) sign up for it.

[John]
In my view, the professional philosophers can keep their club, their 
secret handshake and their esoteric squabbles.

[Arlo]
We think of ourselves more as a "cabal" than a "club", per se. And 
how did you find out about the handshake?