The APA Blog editorial staff is presenting at the APA Eastern this year. We’ve chosen different topics to cover, including “The Value of the APA Blog,” “The Platform of the Internet,” “Challenges and Responses,” “How Blogging Differs from Other Academic Writing.” This session gives us an opportunity to reflect upon our successes and failures as a prominent voice of public philosophy, brainstorming how we can improve in the future. I’m looking forward to hearing what the other editors and audience have to say.
It’s likely that saying we need more public philosophy is axiomatic here, but it’s still controversial in society. Every semester I encounter students who feel their required course in philosophy is a waste of time, or who believe the discipline is so biased that listening to its members is pointless. Changing these views is difficult since people must be open to critical thought to do so, and numerous people love the truths they already have too much to submit them to interrogation. Perhaps asking the right question at the right time will spark their interest and show them the joy that comes from thoughtful investigation. I know I speak for all the editors in saying we’re going to continue doing that; I hope you will all join us.
- Scott Smith, “Reexamining America’s Public Philosophy,” Modern Age, Spring 2014.
- Bethany Stich and Chad Miller, “A New Public Philosophy for a New Railroad Era,” Administrative Theory & Praxis (M.E. Sharpe), December 2012.
- “21 Still Missing: A Public Philosophy?,” Political Quarterly, September 2012 Supplement.
- Arvind Sivaramakrishnan, “Pragmatist Democracy: Evolutionary Learning as Public Philosophy – By Christopher K. Ansell,” Political Studies Review, January 2013.
- James Carr, “Theology and Public Philosophy: Four Conversations,” International Journal of Public Theology, 2013.
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