The Philosophy Club at UMass Boston has been meeting since the 1980s. As far back as the mid-1990s, the club has met weekly. The meetings begin every Friday afternoon at 3 p.m. when, apart from the philosophy fanatics engaged in spirited philosophical discussion on the fifth floor of Wheatley Hall, the campus is otherwise entirely deserted.
Up to twenty-five undergraduates sit (or occasionally stand) around a large conference room table listening intently to another student, who has volunteered to give a talk on a philosophical topic. At the end of the presentation, everyone dives in with questions and objections, which the speaker proceeds to field. Meetings typically run from one and a half to two hours, and occasionally longer. Faculty members make presentations from time to time, but it’s really the students’ show, and therefore the emphasis is typically on them to present. The atmosphere is always friendly and never cutthroat. After a club meeting, if students have time, a group of us still engaged in the topic may go out to dinner together to continue conversing.
The sheer range of topics over the decades has been impressive. These include “The Surprise Inspection Paradox,” “A Brief History of Women in Philosophy,” “Rival Contemporary Theories of the Mind,” “Social Constructivism,” “Truth and Relativism,” “Berkeley’s Ontological Objectivism,” “The Problem of Justification: Epistemic and Teleological Skepticism,” “Truth, Justification, and Conceptions of Knowledge,” “The Value of Philosophy,” “Bioethics of Age and Emergency Use Vaccines,” “Bioethical Concerns of CRISPR and Embryo Implantation,” “Problems of Personal Identity,” “Locke’s Conception of Language,” “A Reevaluation of Zeno’s Paradoxes,” and “Conception of the Self in Caribbean Philosophy.”
Prior to Covid, the club organized two symposia each semester. The symposium is an off-campus dinner bash, attended by students, their friends, Philosophy Department faculty members, and (sometimes) their spouses or partners. (There is no philosophy graduate program at UMass Boston.) Typically, fifteen to twenty people attend any given symposium. During Covid, the symposia were suspended, of course, along with in-person club meetings. The meetings were held at first exclusively via Zoom, and subsequently in hybrid fashion, i.e., simultaneously in-person and via Zoom.
The club performs several indispensable functions. First and foremost, it provides undergraduates with the opportunity to acquire a measure of self-confidence vis-à-vis doing research on a philosophical topic and then giving a talk on that topic. Second, it creates a strong esprit de corps among the members, which they display by the energy that they exude in the philosophy courses they take. Third, it provides students at a commuter school (which UMass Boston largely is) with the opportunity that they might not otherwise have to make friendships with other students. Fourth, it attracts students from other departments who otherwise would have little if any exposure to philosophy, and who, subsequently, find themselves taking philosophy courses and (perhaps) even coming to major in philosophy.
There is a level of conversation and topic branching that occurs at both the meetings and symposia, with a depth that is nigh impossible anywhere else in undergraduate life. This aspect alone makes the club and its symposia to be a truly valuable part of anyone’s education and can shed light on what one may find in further education.
At club meetings themselves, everyone is encouraged to ask questions, pose arguments respectfully, or just listen. Meetings are structured so that there is a presentation, however brief, at the beginning of each meeting, which encourages those with no or little prior knowledge of a subject to feel as though they can participate in and understand what is being discussed. A lack of knowledge can be daunting, but should never serve to separate someone from learning, so this is something to which the club has paid particular attention.
Attending, presenting, and managing the club has helped members gain confidence in speaking and conveying their ideas to others. Many club members have expressed gratitude at having presented, because not only have they learned more about their topic, but have been able to freely express their ideas, something which can also be hard to come by. Those who attend meetings—both students and faculty—are wells of knowledge from which all are encouraged to learn.
Club members have pursued a broad variety of careers. Some have pursued doctorates in philosophy, including at Princeton, Yale, Georgetown, and the University of Texas at Austin—and subsequently have taught philosophy. Others have attended (or currently plan to attend) graduate school in such fields as English literature or psychology. Still others have attended law school.
Many friendships that have weathered both the pandemic and graduation still continue to be strong. A number of former club members who have moved out of New England, and even to other countries, still make time to spend with the club via Zoom or, when in Boston, on campus. Former club members still in the area also often attend both symposia and meetings, and occasionally present at weekly club meetings as well.
As the Philosophy Department Advisor to the Philosophy Club for more than twenty-five years, I see my role as just that: serving as an advisor. It’s the officers who are responsible for making the crucial decisions. There are three officers: president, vice president, and treasurer. Elections are held for all three offices at the end of the fall semester, and then again at the end of the spring semester.
Nelson Lande
Nelson P. Lande has been teaching philosophy at the University of Massachusetts Boston since January 1979. His teaching focuses primarily on logic, metalogic, philosophy of logic, metaphysics, and medieval (Christian, Muslim, & Jewish) philosophy. He has been a recipient of both the Chancellor’s Distinguished Teaching Award and the Philosophy Department’s Robert Swartz Creative Teaching Award. He is the author of Classical Logic and Its Rabbit-Holes: A First Course (Hackett Publishing Co., 2013). He has been the Philosophy Department advisor to the Philosophy Club for over 25 years.
Sarah Lancaster
Sarah Lancaster was president of the UMB Philosophy Club for several semesters, and made many presentations to the Club. She majored in both philosophy and psychology. Having graduated in December 2022, Sarah plans to attend law school.
