bar_scene_gambler

Thank you! They don't offer funding, but I'm waiting on Fulbright funding. I should be hearing in the next few weeks if I make it to the second round of interviews. The 3.3 GPA is a weird condition of acceptance, given that my GPA right now is a 3.9, but I think it's just a formality. My hands are shaking pretty bad right now lol.

I'm starting this, because I thought it would be a nice place to talk about our acceptances. This may strike you as early, but I just received an email from U Warwick regarding the MA in Continental Philosophy, offering me admission on the condition that I maintain a 3.3 GPA. Can we keep arguments out of this thread guys?

I don't know if you've ever been there, but Ann Arbor is a pretty cool place. There's lots of great food and U Mich's campus is pretty nice. I visited their department, and the place seems pretty great. If it had been less analytic, I would have applied.

Actually, to be honest, I did enjoy Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Sure, it's rough in some parts, but it's not exactly terrible. Actually, it's not even the worst thing that Nietzsche wrote. As for Faust, it's not a status symbol, I genuinely enjoyed reading it. It's a work both of tremendous philosophical worth and cultural standing. But outside of that, the story itself is genuinely a good one. I'm sorry that your taste differs from mine, but honestly, what about it was unbearable? Was the language too difficult for you? Did you miss the subtlety of it? I'm genuinely curious. As for Stephen King (though I honestly don't see the connection between the two), I liked some of his things. I thought The Stand was quite nice. I couldn't get into the Darktower series though. I'm not sure he's a genius like Goethe, but he's not a schmuck either.

In a perfect world, where location was my only consideration, I'd probably choose UT Austin. Austin is a great city. Either that or Chicago. My last choice would definitely be Penn State. I can't stand State College, mostly because there's not much to do there, but if theirs is the only program that accepts me, I'll gladly go.

Hey! Back to insulting me huh? Aiming for that permanent ban this time? Dream big dfindley. P.S. If you need help understanding Faust, cliffnotes might be able to help, you know, for a serious scholar like yourself.

Apparently NIU is shut down right now due to bad weather. I tried to email them to ask if they'd received my transcripts and they sent me back an automatic message saying that: "The university is officially closed due to the extreme weather. We will respond to your message as soon as we return to campus."

I've got to say, this has a definite ring of truth to it. Although I understand my family's and friends' good intentions, I prefer commiseration and realism. It feels nice to talk to people who really understand the difficulties lying ahead.

I think Imposter-Syndrome (still not sure if that's a thing) or self-deprecation is rampant among those who study philosophy (I can't speak for other disciplines). So it doesn't strike me as too strange that very few people here believe that they're going to get in anywhere or that they're worth working with the faculty they want to work with.

Only 4 out of the 13 programs I'm applying to required official transcripts.

Fair enough. That's probably the just thing to do. I don't downvote him unless he's being a belligerent ass. But there's a reason why he's -236 or whatever it is now, and I doubt very much that even the majority of those are due to him being misunderstood. We're growing tired of his attitude and his ego, so don't be surprised if the downvotes keep rolling in from others out of sheer distaste. Maybe it's herd-mentality, maybe it's just sheer frustration, who knows? The point is that not all of his posts are quality, and I'd go so far as to say that, regarding the posts he's made in the philosophy forum, the majority of them aren't quality. I can't speak to his comments elsewhere, but from what I've seen, he largely deserves the downvotes he's received.

There are a lot of pointless downvotes being thrown around here, but you're right, Loric did garner 7 downvotes for a fairly neutral post. However, he did not garner 21 downvotes (or even a majority of downvotes for that matter) for a respectful and thoughtful answer, like you've claimed. The majority of his downvotes have come from, like I said, irritation at his leveling down of all disciplines, his ego, and from his general hostility towards others. There's no need to be sensationalist. Of course his reputation in the forum plays a role in how he is interpreted. That shouldn't surprise anyone. If someone is constantly belligerent and hostile, who has a history of spreading misinformation, they're going to be downvoted right of the bat. Whether or not this is just doesn't matter much to me, considering that it's just meaningless upvotes and downvotes. Loric has a poor reputation, and his downvotes are indicative of that. Likewise, Fuzzylogician has a good reputation, and her upvotes are representative of that. The system works the way its supposed to, and it's not as if Loric's posts go unnoticed because of the downvotes. There's no need to be up in arms over it.

I think most of the downvotes were garnered by his outstanding sense of self-importance and demands that Table ought to "man up". Also, he continues to stubbornly attempt to level all academic disciplines down to the same basic components, despite Table carefully explaining why his process might not work with philosophical writing. It's just a repeat of what happened when we tried to talk about the importance of the writing sample, except now he's being belligerent about arguments against the validity of his writing process.

Programs concerning the history of philosophy are going to be more circumspect about such issues, but most programs aren't dedicated to the history of philosophy.

Holy shit. I think I would have just vomited all over the desk.

I didn't read for a full 6 every single day, as my schedule tends to vary widely, but occasionally I'd hit between 5 and 6 hours of independent reading. Mostly I'd be somewhere in the 3-4 range, but others have more time on their hands apparently.

Absolutely. A lot of work in continental philosophy is still being produced in other languages, partially, I think, because continental philosophy is still dominant in Europe (excluding the UK) and partially because a lot of work is done in French and German philosophy (Post-Structuralism, Phenomenology, etc.).

I read a lot as an undergrad. I read books mostly, though occasionally I would look through JStor or something like that for interesting articles. I didn't have any system, which is to say that I read as much as I could when I could, but my work was always my primary focus. I tried to read a variety of topics, though most were either continental or related works. I would never avoid reading a work from another field of philosophy though, it's just difficult knowing where to start. For instance, though I have no particular interest in Hume or Plato, I've taken two advanced independent studies on Hume's corpus and Plato's Republic. If I had to give you advice, I would say this: 1) Don't shy away from studying areas of philosophy which you're unfamiliar with or which seem unappealing at first sight. You may be surprised at how much you can be interested in. 2) Start language preparation early. Even if language requirements might be on their way out, you have no way of knowing what the future holds and you'll benefit from a knowledge of at least one philosophical language. I wish I'd started German earlier, but I decided to do Mandarin first and now I'm playing catch-up.

I like it. Also, everyone should read Goethe's Faust. It's amazing.

I hate that question so much. I know they're being polite, but when I respond with "oh I'm most doing research. Mostly responses to Kant. Nietzsche, and such" either they totally ignore me because they don't know what I'm talking about or they ask for more details, at which point they pretend I didn't say anything anyways. I think they expect something like "I believe that our purpose in life is blahblahblah".

You're right. You're being misunderstood. At any rate, I think how much you need a language depends on the type of research you're doing in philosophy. Many of the people I'm looking to work with in the programs I'm applying to publish in languages other than English, and the type of research I'm looking to do (mainly German post-Kantian stuff and phenomenology) almost requires a fluency in German. But if you're doing, say, philosophy of science or logic, you probably don't need another language. I'm not sure what kind of work you're doing catwoman, so you're probably right about the type of work you're doing.

Why would you use google translate if you'd properly learned the language yourself? Someone with a practical working knowledge of a language would be much better at translating than google translate (I know because google translate's Mandarin-English is only reliable in some situations). Google translate, while probably one of the best translators available, is still not even remotely competitive with a working knowledge of the language itself.

Well, I'm applying to Emory, and their language requirement is pretty intimidating. Personally, I'm glad that language requirements exist though. I did five years of Mandarin and that, in and of itself, has been a rewarding experience. Also, I'm currently taking German courses and working with a faculty member in the Modern Languages department to get to a basic reading comprehension before I leave, and even the barest knowledge in the German language has proved invaluable in terms of understanding Heidegger, Wittgenstein, etc. (assuming you're using bi-lingual copies or the translators make you aware of the translation issues). So I hope language requirements aren't on their way out.

I'm submitting a few close to the deadline. I still have to apply to Georgia State and U Houston

Of course, but at least I won't be telling them I got a spot (hypothetically).