let's not get too personal

The Grouch Reads Blogs.....
In recent months, Brian Leiter, over at the "Leiter Reports" has done a pretty good job
of keeping up with the attack on tenure at universities in the USA, and sometimes the attempt to get rid of philosophy departments.....

Over at "On Fiction" they are crowing about a new journal devoted to the scientific study of literature... a journal which, of course, will be readily available if you work at a decent university,--and otherwise not---.... The other day I was looking at some philosophy articles being sold individually for about 30 US dollars each...... Insofar as "On Fiction" itself seems to aim at the largest possible public, and it makes available high quality stuff, there is something like a version of schizophrenia here. I can be glad that people doing research in an area I have some interest in are able to talk to one another, but I can't be glad to be prevented from hearing the conversation...In other words, the new journal seems not to be "open access"....

Today I don't personally see any reason whatsoever to jump in the air and click my heels.... In my experience, most people I have met--however good or even charming and attractive they may be in other respects-- have had precious little time to themselves, little or no time to write or think, and have had precious little honest feedback about their thoughts (except, of course, on a very personal level)... .with the result that, what I'm complaining about today would be more or less incomprehensible to them...

And then, the worst case scenario is you work like a dog all week and then fritter your life away with frivolous amusements on weekends and holidays....but you don't know what you are doing because that's what everyone around you is doing. Although you are aware that other people don't even get to enjoy the frivolous amusements that you live for, so you imagine yourself to be "well off"...

So, I myself see absolutely no reason for optimism.