This is an excerpt from an interview with Spencer Case, international research fellow at the Wuhan University
This is an excerpt from an interview with Spencer Case, international research fellow at the Wuhan University school of philosophy in China, discusses pros and cons of growing up Mormon, lingering regrets, contemplating proto-philosophical questions before college, Miles Davis, debating politics at Idaho State University, getting swept up in post 9/11 patriotism and enlisting in the military, being deployed to Iraq as an undergrad, moral fanaticism, the culture of repudiation, collateral damage, Atlas Shrugged, open borders, what it is like to be a woman in Afghanistan, grad school at CU Boulder, moral realism, swing dancing, being deployed to Afghanistan as a grad student, Obama’s Nobel Peace prize, working with Mike Huemer and Alastair Norcross, writing for National Review and Quillette, his philosophical weaknesses, the connection between epistemology and ethics, escaping Wuhan and the COVID-19 pandemic, his podcast, McCain, Trump, Das Boot, and what he would do if he was king of the world…
What was your dissertation on and who did you work with?
My dissertation was a defense of moral realism, further developing a strategy that Nathan Nobis and Terence Cuneo also explored (Cuneo was the outside member on my committee). Basically, the argument is this: we have to be realists about epistemic assessments, and epistemic assessments are linked with moral assessments in such a way that we have to be moral realists, too. Oddie, as I said, was my advisor. Also on my committee were Norcross, Huemer, and Chris Heathwood.
Moral realism? Non-naturalist or naturalist? How does moral epistemology work?
My argument is just for generic realism, compatible with either naturalismor non-naturalism. I’m inclined toward non-naturalism because I’m skeptical that normativity can be naturalistically accounted for, but I remain open-minded about that. I’m interested in exploring moral epistemology. My default view is that I happen to have all the right intuitions. Lucky me.
More seriously, I think moral intuitions are important, but I suspect that the way in which we experience things as valuable is likely to be an important piece of the puzzle.
You’ve published in National Review. How did that come about?
I’ve always enjoyed writing commentary, and so I thought I might as well see if I could get into a larger venue. In 2013, I started writing for the College Fix just because it wasn’t hard to get published there and then put together a portfolio for an application for the 2014 summer internship. And, lo! I got the interview, then the job. It was stressful because I wasn’t ever sure what, exactly, was expected from me. My only instructions were “pitch five story ideas to Rich Lowry every morning during the meeting.” I ended up writing about three stories a week that summer.
It was good experience, though I left thinking I wasn’t sure how I felt about producing that much opinion writing that quickly. In order to do that consistently, you have to have your opinions already formed and ready to go in response to the news cycle. And there are some things I’d rather mull over a bit. I worry about having a career in punditry because I fear it would incentivize me to rush to judgment — especially if I’m writing in an environment where most people agree with me. There are certainly epistemic dangers there.
So I still send articles there, but I like doing it at my own pace. I think the articles I published there were better after the internship was over. I ended up shifting a lot of my work to Quillette because they are generally more amenable to the longer pieces I like to write. But recently, I’ve resumed writing with National Review.
In your estimation, what were your strengths and weaknesses as a grad student?
I’ll mostly just talk about my weaknesses for the benefit of anyone who can relate. I’ve had pretty severe math phobia since I was a kid. In school I excelled in subjects that emphasized verbal skills, but hit a wall with math, and later with logic beyond the basics. Studying these subjects makes me feel like Aquaman in the Sahara Desert, my powers neutralized. But I’m working on it.
I’ve read quite few popular books on mathematics, like George Polya’s How to Solve It, in pursuit of a breakthrough that has so far eluded me. However, there have been a few encouraging signs. My friend Bill McCurdy at ISU, who works on the mathematical elements of C.S. Peirce’s logic of relations, has over the years helped me see how high-level math can illuminate philosophical problems. I’ve also seen a number of very good videos online, some of which Bill has brought to my attention, that show how mathematics can be interesting and counter-intuitive in fun ways. He helped me understand Georg Cantor’s “diagonal” argument for the plurality of infinities.
The other weakness is that I’ve never been able to write a publishable history of philosophy paper. I couldn’t even really get anything workable out of my 2012-2013 Egypt Fulbright project after spending years learning Arabic. So I respect people like Bob Pasnau and Dom Bailey who can do history of philosophy well.
On the plus side, I came in with a strength in writing which got better as the years went on. I was also hardworking, and able to get along with pretty much anyone. I gained a reputation for asking good questions during talk Q&As. I finally did get some good publications, but man did it take me a while!
Job market horror stories?
Well, I had to get evacuated from Wuhan several weeks ago, and then quarantined for two weeks at Travis Air Force Base, California, because of the COVID-19 crisis. Now I’m living with my parents in Idaho, waiting until I have the opportunity to return. Days before Wuhan opened up again for domestic travel, China imposed a travel ban that prevents almost anyone outside of China from entering the country, which is just fabulous. So I think I’m going to have to wait out the crisis here. But I fear the real horror story is the one that awaits all of us going on the market this year.
The full interview will be available at What Is It Like to Be A Philosopher? You can get early access to interviews and support the project here.
Clifford Sosis
Cliff Sosis is a philosopher at Coastal Carolina University. He created, and in his spare time he runs What Is It Like to Be a Philosopher? in-depth autobiographical interviews with philosophers. In Sosis's words, "Interviews you can’t find anywhere else. In the interviews, you get a sense of what makes living, breathing philosophers tick. How one becomes a philosopher. The interviews show how our theories shape our lives and how our experiences influence our theories. They reveal what philosophers have in common, if anything, and what our goals are. Overall, the interviews give you a fuller picture of how the people who do philosophy work, and a better idea of how philosophy works. This stuff isn't discussed as often as it should be, I think, and these stories are extremely interesting and moving!" He has a Patreon page here and tweets @CliffordSosis.
