Future role of the MA

[dfindley]

To : Alex Byrne

Subject: Metaphysics of Furniture

 

It just came to me, but I think it might have some philosophical value. Maybe somewhat immature, but I am confident that it might take me somewhere. It is an intuition -- some sort of spiritual connection between myself and my furniture.

 

I will have to do some research but I think that furniture is a common address in the history of philosophy, even if it isn't frequently addressed in itself. I am certain their is opportunity for innovation.

 

Also... I would rather sit on a yellow couch than a red couch -- but I would rather sit on a red chair than a yellow chair. I don't know if you might find that interesting?

 

I am on a quest for truth I must know why O_O

[heliogabalus]

Wait, so you are (or were) interested in going to MIT, but you're making repeated attempts to insult the chair of the department? I mean this sincerely and constructively--Academia and most other professions make up somewhat insular communities. It is not a smart move to antagonize people before you even get in the door.

[dfindley]

I don't think of it is insulting... I am just having fun. I must have giggled for the better part of an hour :OP

[sacklunch]

Frankly I'm surprised more of you guys don't have to get MA's. Coming from religion, almost all of us have to get an MA to get into a top program. Hell, MANY of us get two MA's just to be competitive at top 20 schools. I am in my fourth year of masters work and I will be lucky to get into a top 10. I'm not talking about doing pastoral theology, either, but ancient history. It seems INSANE to me to go straight from undergrad (even at a good school) to a doctoral program (even with an MA as part of the gig). And it's just not religion, but classics, art history, and a lot of the modern language doctoral programs almost always require an MA beforehand. I know it's not all about coursework, but jesus, how on earth can people fit in an adequate amount of substance courses along with things like languages, esp. in advanced courses that expect you to be reading German philosopher x, y, or z, in the original German. Perhaps our language requirements are a bit more strenuous (usually 4-5 languages expected at PhD program)? 

Edited December 25, 2013 by furtivemode

[Cottagecheeseman]

Yeah, my friend is in religious history (Paul and early Christianity) and he's applying to his second MA (after a religious school BA and a seminary MA) and he can't believe that typically one goes straight from BA to Phd program in philosophy. But then, you guys have a better chance of getting published as MA students and have fewer great Phd programs it seems. Also, in analytic philosophy, unless one is doing history of philosophy, language requirements are basically nill. Continental programs generally require knowledge of German and French or Latin or Greek, but only on the reading level I believe.

I really don't know why philosophy typically goes from from BA to Phd. I kinda wish it was BA - MA - PHD, which would mean more funded MA programs and hopefully better ones, and more chances of getting published as Graduate students. But who knows.

 

[SelfHatingPhilosopher]

I'll be fourthing the reaction against:

There is no "getting lucky" in the application process. They don't pick your name out of a hat or roll some dice. Sure, mistakes are probably made, but if one has had an excellent education and been well-prepared, then one will more than likely get in somewhere. 

 

 

There are more qualified students out there than there are slots, and so inevitably students will get shut out. Many are able to apply the following year with zero change in their application to the same school, and have success, merely because they had better luck in various considerations.

 

A few comments regarding:

And you're still ignoring the fact that the list you provided is minuscule in terms of all the MAs available and that, should you not receive an MA, you're more than likely adding to the mountain of debt you've already accumulated in receiving your BA (unless you got lucky). My point was either you buy your way in at a non-funded MA or you're the best of the best and get the funded MA, which seems like a return to philosophy being the course of study of the wealthy or the brilliant. 

 

 

I don't think there's much point in making a distinction between "all of the MAs available" and those that offer funding (excluding the two exceptions of Tufts and Brandeis). MA's that don't fund are more or less cash cows, and are not set up to give focus to MA students and place them well. 

 

Secondly, I don't think it's fair to characterize those with funded MAs as "the best of the best." I certainly don't like it when people characterize MA's as safety schools because I think MA's can be just as competitive as certain PhD programs, but I think going to the other extreme isn't right either. Speaking at least personally, although I think there were a number of aspects of my application that helped me stand out, I was in general, a weak application and I am very blessed to be at my MA program. I had two friends from undergrad who ended up at Top-20 universities.

 

I don't consider an MA as something that was forced onto me. Were there not funded MA's out there, I don't know where I would be now. Probably neck deep in debt picking up a master degree in something more marketable. Instead, I am taking very minimal student loans to supplement my stipend, and considering our track record, statistically am practically guaranteed to end up at a solid if not fantastic PhD program.

 

While I do believe undergraduate education has gone downhill, I don't believe MA's are something that have popped up in order to fix this. This would imply that PhD programs would only accept students of a certain caliber, measurable to the caliber of students 40 years past, and this seems absurd. The growth of MA's aren't a symptom of a disease, but rather the fact that there exists a demand for the function that MA's serve.

 

My undergraduate university had a strong, funded MA program, and now I am at another strong, funded MA program, so I have had experience with two different programs. In my experience, MA programs are not the place where philosophy becomes "a rich-man's field." If anything, they help to equalize that out. 

 

As for other concerns such as:

On the one hand, it's a symptom of the professionalization of the humanities, something which I am absolutely against.

 

I don't really have an argument. We just have two different pictures of what philosophy is and should be. I see the professionalization of philosophy as a good thing. Philosophy, for me, is a profession. I am pursuing it as a career path. I want it to be subject to the rigor that comes with the professionalization of a subject, as it happened to science in the 1600's with the founding of the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. And so I look with great fondness on the 1800's where one sees academic journals for philosophers coming into existence in Germany and England.

 

Also:

It also means "training" for would-be philosophers. I am absolutely opposed to the concept of "here is model x, and this is what philosophers should try to work towards". I think that MA programs will inevitably become training programs, programs which teach you the importance of "professional" work in philosophy. This means education in the importance of journals and conferences, pedagogy, etc. These things are all valuable in their own way, but be trained to be a model of a philosopher also levels creativity. In a sense, being trained to do philosophy, as opposed to being educated (and there is a difference), is the death of philosophical ingenuity.

 

I don't quite understand the context of this complaint. What I'm doing here at my MA program is what I would be doing at a PhD program. If you have a problem with what occurs at MA programs, you're going to have problems with what occurs at PhD programs. This seems more in line with the above point against the professionalization of philosophy, and not so much with there being a problem with the growth of MA's.

 

As for:

So, is this the direction the field is headed? Eventually, will all serious applicants need to have the MA first?

 

Admission committees have remarked that there has been an increase in proportional acceptance of MA students to BA students. I can't quite see how the actual dynamics would work out such that it would eventually become required to get an MA first in America though before pursuing a PhD, because there just isn't the infrastructure set up to support this.

 

With that said though, other countries already have this model, and we are merely becoming a bit more in line with those models. For instance, it's completely customary in Canada that one gets an MA first before going onto the PhD. And I don't believe that the state of philosophy in Canada is an intellectual wasteland or apocalyptic nightmare as suggestions here might be wanting to propose will happen.

[bar_scene_gambler]

I think you may have hit the nail on the head. Perhaps it's the case that we see philosophy from two vastly different perspectives. For me, philosophy being a profession is incidental, and so I feel discomfort at the professionalization. I guess this is just me hitting bedrock and turning my spade, so to speak.

[greencoloredpencil]

I think you may have hit the nail on the head. Perhaps it's the case that we see philosophy from two vastly different perspectives. For me, philosophy being a profession is incidental, and so I feel discomfort at the professionalization. I guess this is just me hitting bedrock and turning my spade, so to speak.

I'm very sympathetic to your viewpoint as well.

[bar_scene_gambler]

I'm very sympathetic to your viewpoint as well.

Awwww. I'm not all alone. I appreciate the empathy, for what it's worth. 

[dfindley]

was I the only one who thought metaphysics of furniture was funny...?

[objectivityofcontradiction]

I recently completed my MA at a quite pluralistic European University where I took a variety of courses and was able to write an MA thesis on two areas of philosophy that I have been studying for quite some time now (German Idealism and the work of Adorno). I chose the MA route partially because I felt my BA university, despite the excellent instruction I received in the Philosophy Dept., lacked recognition in the field (which sucks, but it is what it is). I also knew going into the MA that I would apply to phd programs. So for me the MA was more of a year of concentrated study of areas of philosophy I have been long fascinated by. I received plenty of excellent "professional" training, but that was not why I chose to pursue an MA. 

 

I am not going to mince words: it is a plain fact that if you are accepted into a well thought of MA program in, say, the UK, Ireland, Germany, whatever, you should go. At such places, there is a strong chance the faculty you will have a chance to work with are going to be people in the "know," as opposed to those at the best MA programs in the states. For some one who already had a BA from a state school that lacked a graduate program in philosophy it did not make much sense to me to apply to the UW-Milwaukee's or the Northern Illinois's or the Georgia State's. At my European University I was supervised by a philosopher who took a D.Phil from Oxford, took courses with a professor who wrote his dissertation in Paris under Derrida, and also worked with a professor who was once a colleague of Habermas'. These opportunities flat out don't exist at MA programs in the states. Even for those who are more analytically inclined, the places where the student's of your philosophical heroes teach are most likely not going to have a terminal MA program, so why not look to the U.K., where there is a plethora of top dog analytic philosophers teaching at universities WITH terminal MA programs? In Europe you also get a chance to be thrown into a different "pool" of philosophers, and I think this can be quite beneficial. 

 

Moreover, good schools in Europe are often more than happy to accept U.S. students into their MA programs. And, at such places, you really do a get a chance to work with some truly great professors. I understand that the tone of this response might be perceived as pretentious. I am not dropping my MA professor's educational backgrounds to brag. I mean only to draw attention to the fact that in Europe you can conduct a year of concentrated MA work with people who, were they teaching in the U.S., would no doubt be members of faculty at top 25 Universities, and who thus KNOW people at top 25 Phil departments. Get it?

 

Some truly great MA experiences lie abroad. 

Edited December 26, 2013 by objectivityofcontradiction

[Cottagecheeseman]

But what about funding/expense/financial aid questions? I would love to study in Europe, but i just spent my life savings applying to MA and Phd programsi n the US.

[tomjonesy517]

Yeah, I am a proponent of not going into debt for a graduate degree. Master's programs in Europe aren't free.

[SelfHatingPhilosopher]

At such places, there is a strong chance the faculty you will have a chance to work with are going to be people in the "know," as opposed to those at the best MA programs in the states.... At my European University I was supervised by a philosopher who took a D.Phil from Oxford, took courses with a professor who wrote his dissertation in Paris under Derrida, and also worked with a professor who was once a colleague of Habermas'. These opportunities flat out don't exist at MA programs in the states. Even for those who are more analytically inclined, the places where the student's of your philosophical heroes teach are most likely not going to have a terminal MA program, so why not look to the U.K., where there is a plethora of top dog analytic philosophers teaching at universities WITH terminal MA programs?

 

 

I have to take issue with this characterization.

 

First of all, I don't understand this fetishization of "places where the student's of your philosophical heroes teach." You're not studying under your actual philosophical hero, but just a student of their's, which really doesn't mean much in itself.

 

Second, someone took a D.Phil from Oxford? We have the same. As well as people from Harvard, Michigan, MIT, and Cambridge,  A professor who was once a colleague of Habermas? Okay, well I have a professor who was a direct colleague of Habermas. Another one who was a colleague with Goodman. These are professors from my own programs, and I'm sure those from other MA programs can say equivalent things.

 

More than just that though, I'm not concerned about if my professors have some sort of Erdos-number prestige status. What I care about is that my professors are active publishers and well recognized figures, which they are.

 

So it seems false to say that these opportunities do not exist in the States (or Canada, I'm not sure if you were including them with the States or not).

 

Add on to this that MA programs abroad do not publish their track records for MA placement, and seem to not be in the position as Canadian and American MA programs are to fund students, I just don't see any disadvantage to applying to CA/American based MA programs which have published track records of placing students into top-20 programs.

 

That's not to say one shouldn't apply to European MA programs. I just find your post to be misleading. 

[MattDest]

I have to take issue with this characterization.

 

First of all, I don't understand this fetishization of "places where the student's of your philosophical heroes teach." You're not studying under your actual philosophical hero, but just a student of their's, which really doesn't mean much in itself.

 

Second, someone took a D.Phil from Oxford? We have the same. As well as people from Harvard, Michigan, MIT, and Cambridge,  A professor who was once a colleague of Habermas? Okay, well I have a professor who was a direct colleague of Habermas. Another one who was a colleague with Goodman. These are professors from my own programs, and I'm sure those from other MA programs can say equivalent things.

 

More than just that though, I'm not concerned about if my professors have some sort of Erdos-number prestige status. What I care about is that my professors are active publishers and well recognized figures, which they are.

 

So it seems false to say that these opportunities do not exist in the States (or Canada, I'm not sure if you were including them with the States or not).

 

Add on to this that MA programs abroad do not publish their track records for MA placement, and seem to not be in the position as Canadian and American MA programs are to fund students, I just don't see any disadvantage to applying to CA/American based MA programs which have published track records of placing students into top-20 programs.

 

That's not to say one shouldn't apply to European MA programs. I just find your post to be misleading. 

 

Agreed. I also wanted to add confusion to this section of the post you quoted:

 

"For some one who already had a BA from a state school that lacked a graduate program in philosophy it did not make much sense to me to apply to the UW-Milwaukee's or the Northern Illinois's or the Georgia State's."

 

Why did this not make sense? These programs are fantastic, and they do a great job at placing students into respectable PhD programs. 

[dfindley]

philosophy is a spiritial occupation not s 'job' or 'career' and the 'professionalization' of philosophy is a corrupt tendency for people who dont belong.

when they establish status quo it is a corruption.

[objectivityofcontradiction]

MattDest, 

 

I, of course, knew that some would take issue with my post for the reasons I outlined in the post itself. SelfHating in particular seems angry for the comments I made regarding the pedigrees of my MA instructors (strangely enough, SelfHating tries to one up me by drawing a distinction between "was a colleague" and "was a direct colleague;" tell me who is dropping names now?) 

 

One comment that I would perhaps makes regarding your question as to why it did not seem to make sense to me to apply to those schools I list was because, as I said, I always already knew that I would apply to PhD. programs. However, straight out of undergrad I felt that various aspects of my file were not where they should be and that I could benefit from a more concentrated year of study. Even an undergrad seminars full of philosophy majors is not going to have the same dynamic as a MA seminar full of people who were passionate enough about the subject to pursue it at the grad level. Again, I am sure the classroom environment is the same across the board in MA programs in both America and Europe. However, in my own experience, in Europe, my MA year was not "training" for graduate school, which is what places like UW-Milwaukee or GSU regard as their primary function, it WAS graduate school. 

 

Does this mean I am saying U.S. MA programs are not "graduate" enough? No. What I am saying is that in my program and in others in the U.K. in Germany, your MA year truly does feel as if it is your first year of doctoral studies. Your professors take you and your work seriously right out of the gate. You are not treated as though you still need to learn the finer points of philosophical writing and analysis. These skills will of course improve as you progress through the MA year, but there is no feeling of them being taught to you. For example, the comments I would receive from professors on my papers were almost entirely content-based. They were no longer asking me to adjust my premises, fix my conclusion, etc. Their responses were often simply true academic and exegetical disagreement.

 

I wonder if any of this makes sense. Sorry if I am being unclear.  

[MattDest]

objectivity,

 

It certainly makes sense, I just wonder why you have this view about American MA programs. It sounds alien to my own experience at one of these programs, and from testimony from other grad students I've met, quite unlike their experiences as well. As far as feedback is concerned, I can only give my own experience but it is certainly a mixture of "content-based" comments and comments about structure, about clarity, etc. You seem to think this is a negative, but I find it to be immensely helpful. I'm not a perfect writer, and I would expect a good advisor to give me feedback about how I present my ideas, not just the ideas themselves. 

 

I don't think this type of feedback stops at the PhD level. In fact, in some of the referee reports I've read on papers I co-wrote with a professor, we got feedback that was content-based in addition to suggestions about how to improve clarity, the structure of the argument, etc. (And this is a paper that wasn't rejected!) This isn't a bad thing, and it's not as if it's hand-holding or "professionalizing", but an important part of philosophy as a discipline. 

[dfindley]

hmmm i want that . do you feel as though their comments are genuinely intelligent and worth consideration, or do you just kind of kiss ass and say thankyou sir ill be certain to do that?

i remember my professors, excepting one, didnt help me at all. one was an idiot, one was an arrogant hack, the other didnt give a damn, and the last, while proficient in his teaching, was sort ...lacking in judgement. so never anywhere did i get (let alone decent,) help.

maybe it was in large part i was crazed stoner undergraduate and they just didnt realize where i was going with my work?

..i remember one time, stoned as usual, i wrote one and explained how if you took a powerful beam of light and shot it through space, that objects travelling in it would accelerate at increased speeda (a conclusion i drew from my 'metaphysics/physics' when it was still in an early research and development phase)

...i mean in retrospect it sounds a little far out ... but it was forward thinking and had some quality rationale to it!!! ..constructive criticism would have gone a long way....

...ir maybe it was best that i be left to figure it out for myself.... ...which i did.....

[dfindley]

how brave are you with your philosophy, by the way?

[dfindley]

i still quack at my thesis advisor. he just listens -- i love him so much.

just today i talked about breaking a taboo in academia and arguing for psychic connection between people.

i said i can feel attenrion. like at the gym when i work out -- even if theyre not looking at me i can often feel it when theyre paying attention to me. you just feel it -- and you know ypure veing watched and you sort of 'put on a little show'.

...its like when you lok at someone fron across the room and they turn to look back at you

i said fuck academia i want to explore this.

i think the daoists explored the significance of the 'attention'. it is like a non-localized loci. very aignificant in itself .

im reading the critique of pure reason now and kant hasnt talked about it. maybe husserl or aome other phenomenologist? the attention, per se, is non-trivial aspect of consciousness obviously somewhat taken for granted.

anyways i love philosophy you guys blow

[SelfHatingPhilosopher]

objectivity,

 

It certainly makes sense, I just wonder why you have this view about American MA programs. It sounds alien to my own experience at one of these programs, and from testimony from other grad students I've met, quite unlike their experiences as well. As far as feedback is concerned, I can only give my own experience but it is certainly a mixture of "content-based" comments and comments about structure, about clarity, etc. You seem to think this is a negative, but I find it to be immensely helpful. I'm not a perfect writer, and I would expect a good advisor to give me feedback about how I present my ideas, not just the ideas themselves. 

 

I don't think this type of feedback stops at the PhD level. In fact, in some of the referee reports I've read on papers I co-wrote with a professor, we got feedback that was content-based in addition to suggestions about how to improve clarity, the structure of the argument, etc. (And this is a paper that wasn't rejected!) This isn't a bad thing, and it's not as if it's hand-holding or "professionalizing", but an important part of philosophy as a discipline. 

 

Agreed. I am just not seeing any difference between the the MA's objectivity is describing and the MA's I've experienced and heard about from others.

[dfindley]

hi selfhating

why dont you steal my ideas? youd never add up just by yourself.

what were you working on anywaya?

Edited December 28, 2013 by dfindley