Establishment

Details like who wins the coin toss.

Your GPA isn't *that* low. Below average, sure, but nothing egregious like below a 3.0. The fact that you're coming from a PGR program, with hopefully good references, and have graduate course experience, all should indicate that you're a serious applicant. Is your GPA ideal? No. Do you stand a chance at PhD admissions? Absolutely. EDIT: Honestly, if you knock the GRE out of the park, I'd say you could completely balance out the GPA issue. *Supposedly* there are individuals still out there who give credence to GPA and GRE scores, and you might be able to lift some worries if you do really well on the GRE. This might be one way to psychologically lift some of your worries about your GPA.

Survey courses do literally nothing for me. I'd prefer an incredibly deep and focused course on something I'm totally opposed to and know nothing about than a survey of something I'm totally interested in and know nothing about. That's in general too. If I have a particular desire to produce a good piece of writing at the end, a survey course is not going to help towards that end.

And in the off chance it gets accepted into The Philosophical Review, you just mail that shit into NYU and tell them that you'll be accepting their future offer of admission.

Well shoot, I'll specialize in epistemology, they can just hire me!

A number of graduate philosophy programs (and probably a few other programs where this would be relevant, say in the Classics) offer language courses for graduate students with this in mind. These courses will be focused on reading ability, and, since the students are graduate students, will be accelerated. In fact, these sorts of courses are nigh on necessary for languages like French and German, unless you're going to study on your own (which is a perfectly acceptable way of doing it), considering how colossally slow and useless it would be for a graduate student to sit through undergraduate 101 language courses, learning how to introduce yourself and talk about food.

Guess which Utah professor has eight letters in his name? ¡¡¡¡¡¡¡¡¡MILLGRAM!!!!!!!!!!

I looked at FSU's program, and I'm concerned that there's no placement record for MA graduates. The thing about the more traditional terminal MA programs like at Virginia Tech and NIU is that their goal is to get students placed into top PhD programs. It's not simply a matter of them bringing in good students and letting them do what they want and then the program throws up a placement record, these programs are structured to help you as much as possible in PhD admissions. It's very possible that Virginia Tech and NIU are going to be able to help you in ways that FSU might not in that process. Things like a writing sample seminar course, sitting down and talking with you about your application list, and so on. (Edit: Granted, that's not to say that an MA at a non-terminal program couldn't be a better choice. A lot of people have gone on to such programs (actually, the cases I have in mind is that they were admitted to a PhD program, and then applied out to much better programs when they got an MA from there) and have had great success with PhD admissions. While you may be lacking in some institutional structure, you perhaps get access to some more renowned professors. Just things to consider.)

There was and might still be some sort of Facebook group for women philosophy grad students that you might want to check out if you haven't already, they might have some good resources on places that are hospitable and those that aren't and other stuff. Shame this stuff isn't more public so that departments that are known cesspools can be burned to the ground.

I think there's a lot of misunderstanding going on here. The people asking "What are you going to do with that?" or "When are you going to be productive?" are asking this in large part because they don't understand what it means to be a graduate student in the humanities more generally. While I might agree this is true, the issue is that people then conflate their ignorance about what philosophers do, with their incorrect assumptions of what we do (nothing, intellectual bullshit). So it'd be one thing if someone is generally curious about what it is that philosophers do, but instead their questions are typically singed with some denigration. In terms of questions of what do philosophers contribute to society... my elliptic answer would be that philosophy helps makes a society great in the same way that Beethoven and Back, Michelangelo and Bernini, Homer and Shakespeare, and Malick and Tarkovsky help make a society great.

Rest in piece, my Marxist friend. There sure have been a swathe of deaths of famous philosophers the last couple of years. Seems like we're seeing a prestigious generation of philosophers passing away.

If you've already accepted one school, then yes, I think it's unethical. I don't think you need to be 50/50 between two departments in order to justify going to both open houses. Even if you're 90/10 between two departments, all that matters is that you have an open mind, and are open to being turned off by the department you're 90% for, and open to be turned on by the department you're 10% for. But again, if you're 100% for one department, particularly if you've already accepted them, it does seem unethical to visit the other place on their dime.

To quote my High School's graduating motto: GO LEMM OR GO HOME!

I'm a huge Leiter/PGR-shill, but this is just terrible advice. It really sounds like a visit to both schools (meeting your future professors and grad. students), and some further investigation (emailing current students about how accessible the professors you're interested in are) would do you a lot of good. Okay, program y isn't courting you as hard, but that probably doesn't matter at all if all the grad. students there seem just as friendly and the professors just as accessible. On the other hand, if when you visit the department feels just as cold as they do now, that might be a good indicate that such a place won't be too conducive towards your own philosophical and personal development. I think your professors are right to caution you. It's easy for a department to put in a lot of effort now in an attempt to woo you, and then back off later. Companies do it all the time. What you want to figure out is whether or not the efforts program x are putting in right now would be sustained over the years. In addition to the considerations I mentioned, and that SMB123 mentioned (how much funding is there for conference traveling?), you might look into differences in teaching responsibilities and summer pay, and keep in mind the stipend/cost of living differences. Although I think these are considerations only come into play if program y checks out to have a good environment. I'll also say too, that though you want to keep these things in mind, I think if the environments are both schools are more or less equal, I think the most important factors are going to be placement and your individual fit (personality wise and interest wise) with your AOI professors. Ultimately, I don't think you should at all include in your considerations that program x is courting you, because it doesn't really represent anything substantive by itself.

EH... If the context as you described obtains, it seems clear that the person who manufactured an innocuous remark aiming to make you look stupid or angry is the one who's going to get judged and not the victim who got baited. To do otherwise is pretty victim blaming.