Karl Aho

As it so often does

whoops. food processing thread turned into philosophy again

I look forward to looking through these while preparing to teach Environmental Ethics next semester.Thanks Drs. Millstein and Boyd! 🌎

I…worked on that book for five years…and…they just…they TikTok bro’d it out

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Lecturer in Philosophy: Academic Year 2025-26 (Anticipated) University of California, Merced is hiring. Apply now!

Do you know someone with a PhD in Philosophy who would like to teach in the Central Valley of California this year? We have teaching needs in ethics; "a reasonable estimate for an initial appointment is $70,977". Please share with anyone you think may be interested!

aprecruit.ucmerced.edu/JPF02002

Sounds like a great conference session if you figure it out 🤓

I learned a lot at this philosophy pedagogy workshop 10 years ago; it's an honor to be co-facilitating it now. If you're in the greater DFW area on 8/14, I'd love to work with you there.

David Brooks had this piece about the rejection generation that I think encapsulated it really well. He said: The Gen Z-ers are facing rejection after rejection. First it’s hard to get into college, and then when you graduate college it’s hard to get a job.

It is harder to get into elite private schools and flagship campuses of public universities than it was a few decades ago. But this is not the case at the vast majority of institutions of higher ed, where one can get a great education. Many of these schools are desperate to attract students.

Congrats and welcome to Texas!

Huge W for philosophy

Blocking universities from selling their product to foreigners will drive up the cost of tuition for Americans. More and more student debt for Americans.

The day that MacIntyre died is a good one to recall how fucking nowhere we are when it comes to a shared account of moral rationality.

Here’s my off the cuff attempt: Asking questions that don’t fit neatly in science or art or other fields, but also asking questions that don’t get asked in other friends. For example, my grad students this week were talking about whether we should be grateful to nature.

"Once again a year has passed, heavenly Father! We thank you that it was added to the time of grace and that we are not ter- rified by its also being added to the time of accounting, be- cause we trust in your mercy. The new year faces us with its requirements, and even though we enter it downcast and trou- bled because we cannot and do not wish to hide from our- selves the thought of the lust of the eye that infatuated, the sweetness of revenge that seduced, the anger that made us un- relenting, the cold heart that fled far from you, we neverthe- less do not go into the new year entirely empty-handed, since we shall indeed also take along with us recollections of the fearful doubts that were set at rest, of the lurking concerns that were soothed, of the downcast disposition that was raised up, of the cheerful hope that was not humiliated. Yes, when in mournful moments we want to strengthen and encourage our minds by contemplating those great men, your chosen instru- ments, who in severe spiritual trials and anxieties of heart kept their minds free, their courage uncrushed, and heaven open, we, too, wish to add our witness to theirs in the assurance that even if our courage compared with theirs is only discourage- ment, our power powerlessness, you, however, are still the same, the same mighty God who tests spirits in conflict, the same Father without whose will not one sparrow falls to the ground. Amen."

Kierkegaard's Prayer for the New Year...

YouTube video by Jims Big Ego Another Revolution

Another year, another @jiminfantino.bsky.social new year’s post, but this time, a new song.

Friends, I’m glad to find you here.

What's happening in the world of gaming in higher ed?

Tomorrow we're hosting a group of practitioners and researchers to see what they're doing and learning:

shindig.com/login/event/...

#FTTE

Whenever I see people talk about how soft we are becoming as a society I'm reminded of J.S Mill's point that a strong man should want more equality, since he should be enormously repelled by the slavish attitudes induced by subordination and aspire to live among his equals.

The really wicked thing is that Oz has better trains than we do.

Jim, a (unnamed) large turkey decoration with the PANKUS logo, and Karl. Jim and Karl are wearing purple bandanas from the PANKUS students’ fundraiser

I’m grateful for great students like PANKUS, fellow employees like Jim, and for y’all whose algorithms still show you my posts. Happy Purple Thursday and everything else you’re celebrating.

That’s the plan—if folks want to make content for it, I’ll gladly share it. I was going to aim for a Monday launch.

People are often surprised when I tell them this: both Twitter and Facebook/insta/threads are now specifically engineered to downgrade, hide, suppress real journalism. If this platform is different, that's a huge change

Dear white male academics: your demographic traits are not to blame for your troubles on the job market. The root problem is that there are drastically too few survivable jobs FOR EVERYONE.

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Aging gracefully (?) with Zhuangzi Or, what we can learn from our spontaneous reaction to Bryan Johnson's Dorian Gray arc

Wrote a blogpost on Zhuangzi, death and that weird tech bro with his regime to reduce his biological age.

Done With Toxic Positivity? Here's How to Actually Feel Your Feelings No "therapy dupe" is going to get you there.

Am I the first philosopher to write for Teen Vogue? I feel like there's a good chance that's true.
https://www.teenvogue.com/story/emotional-realism-toxic-positivity-alternative

if zoom isn't going to let us opt out of them feeding our faces & voices & conversations into their LLMs, I'm going to very loudly stop using Zoom, by which i mean "actively marshaling resistance w/in my university home departments & multiple affiliate organizations." Just sayin'.

“I don’t owe anybody anything!” Actually we are perhaps nothing but dizzyingly intricate webs of obligations to other beings and ourselves. The sheer weight of our obligations is all that keeps us from floating away into space. We can never do enough but we must try.

hello world (azure, aerial)