Duns Eith

You've brought up a different criticism than the one offered by the poster above.
 
Some people do post quotes from letters or whole letters in order to self-promote. Many of us are pretty anonymous on this site, so our reputations don't extend at all beyond this forum. There are only a few people on this forum who know my real name.
 
It sounds like your real worry is that some people may be brought down by reading another person's admission letter (hence your mention of a posting on a public help-wanted board next to an ad for the position offered).
 
You know, it's true that much of what we say and do on Grad Cafe may bring down someone in a vulnerable position. A lot of people avoid Grad Cafe altogether because they're worried about the psychological effects (perhaps including the effect of watching others do well). I'm not sure what that means for those of us who do participate in the forum. Maybe it means that we should be sensitive and understanding.
 
I aim to be sensitive. I hope that people don't post letters in order to self-promote. I also hope that people who might be hurt by seeing others' letters would not visit this thread. 
 
(I'll point out that people post quotes and letters of admission on various threads of this forum all of the time. The responses are overwhelmingly positive. This is largely a group of people who aren't first and foremost self-promoting; the people on this forum are other-promoting. When we see one among us do well, we congratulate the person and try to share the joy. I'm not saying that there's a "right" way that one should feel after seeing someone else do well. When I see someone do well, I'm sure deep inside there's a part of me that feels some regret that I didn't get admitted to a program last year. That's a completely normal reaction. When I see someone do well, I extend my congratulations-- unless the person is a jerk or something. I don't think of those people as doing anything analogous to what you offered above, regarding the post on the help-wanted board next to an advertisement for the position. I'm speaking in generalities; of course, some people are here to self-promote. But by and large, the people on here genuinely want to see others do well. I don't want to call your analogy ridiculous or out of touch with the culture of this forum. I can see why you have the worry that you do. From my perspective, it's not a real serious worry in this context. The people who are pretty worried about how they may feel about someone's admission offer-- those people are avoiding this place. I totally get that and respect it.)

I completely "get" the frustration. It's hard to react in a way that honors your feelings without alienating the people who are shut-out altogether. Two years of applications and not a single admission-- I get that. But look, you still have time (assuming you applied to some of the programs that haven't yet released). And, as an encouragement: you must be a good applicant to have been wait-listed by UVA last year and by Miami this year. You know how many people apply; even a wait-list is a high honor. I hope Miami comes through for you. I concur with the other posts that suggest you should be optimistic. It *is* very common for programs to go through the wait-list. Programs do *not* like to give false hopes, in my experience. I'm very optimistic for you, and I hope you'll keep us informed. Good luck, my friend.

I have a quick thought: I know many people here are anxiously waiting for news concerning positions on waitlists. Is it permissible, perhaps, to start a separate thread for accepted applicants to note when they have declined offers? I'm new to the forum, so I apologize if this already exists somewhere...
 
Of course, just a thought.
 
Thanks!

 
 
http://certaindoubts.com/complete-hirsch-number-rankings-of-us-philosophy-phd-programs/

Here is the link of Hirsch rankings.

Congrats!
 
I applied there, but no such news yet. :/

I was flipping through Kant's First Critique today and noticed that he uses the same convention in his dedication. So there's a venerable philosophical history of signing off like that!

Why are people downvoting grace9012? Seemed like a reasonable question with no offensive content...am I wrong? 

I think he's actually used what used to be an acceptable construction in formal letter-writing, though it seems to be less common these days: 'with such and such/in such and such/thanking you, I am sincerely yours'
 
e.g.
 
+ other examples on Google: https://www.google.com.au/search?q=%22i+am+sincerely+yours%22+letter

I'm guessing no one. I hadn't seen it before this thread either, just suspected it was an older convention (and so Googled) because it reminded me of a formal way of signing off I'd once seen in a German letter.

Wait, ....
 
You didn't add the facetious remark ("P.S....") at the end?

Oops! Should have posted here. Yeah, rejected from Pitt HPS.
 
Though, after careful consideration, I've decided to reject their rejection.

Lonergan's one of the foremost Catholic theologians/philosophers of the 20th century - and rather difficult, but incredibly rewarding. I haven't yet had a chance to spend too much time reading his stuff, but he's near the top of my summer reading list. Hope you enjoy him!
 
I have two principal reasons to be interested in Malebranche - one negative, one positive. I think his work brings to its culmination a trend in Christian philosophy and theology that grows out of Augustine and finds itself most fully expressed in the Jansenist and Calvinist movements of the 16th and 17th centuries and that, out of a fear of compromising God's omnipotence, seeks to remove agency (whether natural or human) from world. I think Malebranche represents the culmination of this weltanshauung, and inadvertently performs a reductio ad absurdum in regards to such beliefs through his philosophical system. So I'm interested in exploring his occasionalism, its historical antecedents, and its subsequent reception within the Western philosophical canon, because I see Malebranche's rejection as a rejection of many of the intellectual tendencies that originate with Augustine. On a more positive note, I'm fascinated by Malebranche's notion of Vision en Dieu - I also see it as the re-articulation of a chain of discourse in the Western canon that originates with Plato, is carried through the ancient world by Epictetus and Plotinus, and then finds its Christian articulation in the works of Augustine and Aquinas (among many others). I'm really interested in that entire chain of thought, and Malebranche functions as a relatively prominent link in that chain, so I'm interested in his work! 

I'm also interested in the understanding of human freedom that seems to bind together many of the rationalists (from Descartes and Malebranche to Leibniz and Arnauld)... But that's probably more than you ever really wanted to hear when you asked that question, so I'll stop myself from going on further!

Keep it professional & brief: just tell the emailing professor that you don't think their project matches your research interests. You don't need to justify anything to them, it's enough to say No Thanks. Thank them for their time and wish them luck in finding a suitable student, that's all the politeness you need.

Hmm why not try asking your current advisor for some advice? In my experience usually when I consulted my advisor for this sort of situations she always gave me very good suggestions -- ones that only could only come from someone who is older and much more experienced in handling tricky social scenarios like the one you are dealing with.

Hey all. I've been lurking a little bit. My friend recommended me to the site, and I finally signed up and started posting.
 
Here's my profile:
 
Undergrad
Institution: Central Michigan University
Major(s): Philosophy, Psychology
Major GPA: 3.96 (phil), 3.84 (psy)
Cumulative GPA: 3.74 (at graduation, 3.75 after taking more courses)
Honors: Cum Laude
 
Graduate (if applicable; delete if not)
Institution: Westminster Theological Seminary
Program: MA in Religion
GPA: 3.67
Research experience: None.
Publications: None.
 
GRE (revised, non-revised)
Quantitative: 155
Verbal: 157
Analytic: 5.0
 
Schools applied to
PhD: Ohio State, Purdue
MA: Ohio University, Purdue, Texas A&M, Texas Tech, Western Michigan
 
Interests, thesis, focus: Early modern history of philosophy, philosophy of religion, philosophy of science, (realist) metaphysics, epistemology