TheVineyard

It was to a general "you" or I guess to the "past-him" that was thinking the issue through. Thanks for another ad hominem btw. It had been 15 minutes since the last one on these boards and I needed to make sure nothing changed.

Yeah... Again, he said "At the beginning of this process, I had a major internal battle with myself about whether I would take Tufts (if offered) over somewhere like UVA. I never really decided." I was pointing out some considerations that someone in the frame of mind he was putting himself in might want to think about....

Yeah... Why did you point this out? I must have missed something.

Hop aboard the unfalsifiability train!

If you're okay with going through the re-application process, Tufts places most of their MA students into top-15 schools. Personally, I didn't apply to MAs partially because I didn't want to go through this again, but if you do want to go through it, you will have a great chance at a top 15.

http://gradschool.duke.edu/about/statistics/admitphl.htm < Here is the fixed link. As far as the idea that women have better high school and undergrad records...okay. Let's assume that's true. It seems to be reflected in their higher acceptance rates. That's what we should expect. Also, shouldn't the fact that women do better in high school and undergrad be some evidence that women are not disadvantaged in that level of schooling? We don't say, "we need to discover the problematic climate that makes men less successful in high-school and college and makes them uncomfortable during these formative years." Now, what really pisses me off is that you assume I am hindering progress in the discipline or attempting to "minimize the issues." No, I am bringing up concerns I see in the way this is being debated. Don't assume that everyone that disagrees with you does it with evil intentions. Weren't you one of the people trying to give a lecture on reading charitably? You are probably the kind of person that assumes that if someone doesn't like Obama or Hillary Clinton, they are automatically a racist or sexist. (I'm a supporter of Obama and Clinton, by the way). However, I see tons of fellow liberals merely assume that they couldn't possibly dislike Obama or Clinton for any other reason, (just like you are doing regarding me and my arguments) and I call them out for it. l am as full of a supporter as any of you for fairness and equality, and I understand there are issues. However, just because I agree with this sentiment, I don't have to accept ANY AND EVERY argument that comes across the table. I have used this example before and I'll use it again: I believe that climate change and a general trend toward global warming is real. However, I do not consider "it was really hot today in my city" as a convincing argument for climate change/global warming. In fact, I would call out any like-minded liberal who attempted to use this argument. One could say "Vineyard you are contributing to the problem, you are anti-science" and I would be left shaking my head, as I am here. If you don't disagree with the points I'm making, then talk about those points like you did in the first half of the post. However, don't assume that I have evil intentions just because I disagree with you. In a room full of conservatives, I am the vocal feminist. In a room full of fellow feminists, I will be the vocal challenger, making sure assumptions are rigorously thought out. Challenging ideas, exploring those challenges, etc, helps make our positions more than merely socially desirable monologues. I do this with everything. In a room full of philosophers, I stress the importance of science, and the philosophers call me anti-philosophy, scientistic, etc. In a room full of scientists, I stress the importance of philosophy, and the scientists call me mysterious, old fashioned, and think I'm overinflating philosophy's role. Oftentimes, neither understand that we can all come out of this with a better understanding of our own positions and with more solid answers to our critics.

Maybe I shouldn't speculate about the sex/gender of applicants. Edit: Nvm, already been quoted.

Yeah...whatever. It was a relevant fact that showed my position not to be one of myself being jealous/personally offended by the thread. Again, damned if you say it, damned if you don't. Do what you want, see and hear what you want. I've made my position known, and nobody likes it. Nothing left to accomplish here.

Damned if I do, damned if I don't. I removed my acceptance/rejection info from my signature recently, and now I'm bragging just by pointing out that I am NOT leveling these complaints because I PERSONALLY feel hurt/bothered by this thread due to a lack of acceptances? Someone might think that the only reason I was complaining is because I was mass-rejected and salty about it. Somehow I am the braggart for taking the position that although I do have multiple offers, we don't need a thread to humblebrag about the "embarrassment of riches?" I'm not naming schools, I'm not talking about myself as an applicant. I'm purely concerned about this thread becoming a circlejerk for the fortunate among us and nothing more. If that concern is stupid, then it's stupid. I don't really care to defend it any further, clearly all of the accepted people disagree with me (surprise! Don't ruin our fun!) so whatever. Go ahead. Just don't act like I'm trying to brag about my status when I don't include it in my signature and don't name schools.

At the couple schools I have seen that post these kinds of statistics, minorities (including women) are accepted at a significantly higher rate than average. Take Duke for example http://gradschool.duke.edu/about/statistics/admitphl.html . Women always over a 10% acceptance rate, white men from America are always below 10%. There are a million possible explanations of the lack of women+minorities in grad school/professorships phenomenon. It is unfortunate that the only explanation that is allowed to be publicly supported is the position that the power-hungry white man is asserting his dominance and forcing out all of the women and minorities and making them all feel unwelcome, etc. If I were to say something like, "At my university, there is a black female philosopher who gets along famously with everyone and does not at all make any sort of complaints about feeling unwelcome, etc" then it that very piece of testimony will be tossed out because I am a white guy who is part of the problem and is indifferent to my privelaged status, etc. If a black woman said, "Things are great here I never feel any discomfort" then, although it will probably be taken more seriously, it might be said that they have just become numb to the oppression, etc. The position is unfalsifiable. This is not to say that these concerns are not real...but I believe that social desirability concerns are so intense that there is no way anyone posting non-anonymously would ever take the position that...maybe things most of the time are fine in many/most places. Maybe the lack of female philosophers is an indication of a genuine lack of interest in the subject from the majority of women. Again, the commonly publicly taken position, that females/other minorities are under deep unconscious oppression that keeps them systematically out of the academy, is unfalsifiable, because almost nobody is allowed to speak otherwise without being either the "systematically privileged who cannot see faults because privilege has been ingrained in them" or the "systematically underprivileged who cannot see faults because they only know oppression."

lol just got a 3am rejection to UCSD.

@ Ianfaircloud, you should include Indiana HPS, Pitt HPS, and Irvine LPS as separate entries on your blog and in your notification section. Don't forget, a large part of the strength of those schools' PGR rankings is due to the strength of the faculty in those separate departments.

And then that makes me picture how sad I am that Duke apparently doesn't want me =[ @ Ianfaircloud, you should include Indiana HPS, Pitt HPS, and Irvine LPS as separate entries on your blog and in your notification section. Don't forget, a large part of the strength of those schools' PGR rankings is due to the strength of the faculty in those separate departments.

You need to tell us something about yourself. You literally ONLY applied to the top 13 programs, and you applied to all of them except Stanford, UCLA, and Columbia. Then, you go on to get accepted to every single one of them first round? What kind of person does that? I don't mean that to sound mean, I'm just amazed. Who can be so sure that they will get in @ a top 10 school that they only apply to top 10 schools? I know some of the best applicants coming out of Princeton, etc, and even they will pick a couple schools in the top 30 or so for safety or fit. Nobody is a good fit at EVERY SINGLE ONE of the top 10 schools, which makes me wonder why you decided to apply to ALL of them. You certainly didn't apply to them to be "safe" because you knew that you would get accepted to whatever school you wanted with that school list. Basically, I'd like to hear more about you and your history because this whole thing is just incredible. Did you apply to your undergrad institution? Are you the Saul Kripke reapplying for fun?

This sequence is so priceless.

Do you really want to go there? Before you answer, keep in mind that throughout your mighty education, you must have "learned" that when someone doesn't extract the same detailed (and contentious) implications from a source that you do, they are lacking "reading skills." Maybe the fact that you don't know what a "reading skill" is means that you lack "reading skills?" It's hard not to be provoked when someone on a philosophy board commits to a bald and personal attack with intent to anger, but I have to keep in mind that not every person is able to discuss ideas reasonably. In short, I can't hold everyone on the internet up to a philosopher's standard.

I actually don't think he was being sarcastic. If he was, what was the point?

You actually don't understand how a thread for telling others when decisions have been released might be helpful to other applicants hoping to hear back from those programs? You don't understand how saying, "Hey, I checked the website, decisions for XU are up!" might be helpful for an applicant that needs to make a decision? That's incredible. I wonder how you ended up here!

Well shit...I guess I should choose Arizona too!

Maybe we wanted to talk about something else. I didn't read the article, I was responding to objectivity's discussion of consensual relationships.

Have sex. ...Assuming you were lucky enough to be accepted into your bedroom of choice. If you are still on a waitlist, hopefully you will get a decision before April 15th.

Here's what might be helpful: A list of possible considerations that people might make. However, saying "I chose Michigan over UC Davis because, DUH, Michigan is awesome and UC Davis is not as good for these billion values I have" will just make that applicant who has only managed a waitlist at UC Davis feel even worse. Here's something that might be interesting as well: When someone makes a decision, if they made a decision that seems counterintuitive (reject Princeton for...Wisconsin or something) they could say what reasons they had for making such a decision.

When I see something potentially harmful to applicants already in a rut, and at the same time the thing offers nothing helpful, I feel obligated to say something about it. Luckily the meta-discussion doesn't harm anyone, so I'm happy to continue! Its like a bunch of CEOs getting together in the company discussion room and, right there in front of the minimum wage employees, having a big merry chat about how they each are going to decide to spend this year's 5 million dollar bonus check that they received at the expense of the poor wage laborers. Everyone is stressed out, some people are clutching to their single waitlist, and others are just dying to see something...ANYTHING in their inbox. There is no obligation to make any decisions for a month and a half, and hardly anyone has gone on their visits. NOBODY even can be certain about their final acceptance outcome, as we all have schools yet to answer us. The discussion is just breeding ground for humblebrags and can't even help the humblebragging parties.

Personally, I value stipends 1.5x more than average, and I really want the campus to be on a hill. I value hilltops 3x as much as the average applicant. I mean, who cares? What someone else values is not going to change what I value, nor should my values change yours. This thread cannot possibly be helpful to anyone, but will just serve as another circlejerk for those of us lucky enough to have multiple acceptances under the belt. As much as I love circlejerks...I just can't see this being helpful, but I can see it being harmful.

Here is my official decision formula: First, I take the number of interested professors, multiply it by their PGR ranking, then divide it by 2 if I was waitlisted first. I then take the square root of the stipend and add it to the average age of my POIs to determine what I call the "K Variable." At that point, I....... Really, why even post this? There is no set way to decide, its 100% up to you and what you want. You have your own set of values that your mommy should have told you is special and different from all the others. You know why you applied to each school. You know what you like at each school. You applied to CEU? What is CEU? You know, I don't. You obviously know the various sorts of considerations that people make when they choose a school (you listed them), so figure out for yourself how they work. Hearing how I make my decision should have no bearing on how you make yours, and so on. This seems like a thread where people who have gotten accepted to multiple schools can brag about how "tough it must be" to choose between them. Woe is me! As much as I'd like to join in the fun and namedrop my schools, this thread will help nobody, and will instead make those who haven't been accepted feel bad. TL;DR: No need for the humblebrag.