This morning I desperately tried to get ready to teach a PHIL 101 section where I was going to tell my students what sorts of things they needed to improve in their papers and try to get them to understand Descartes’ modal argument for dualism. I got to section a minute or two late, but I think I more or less succeeded in my first task and probably failed in the second. As soon as section was out, I rushed to lunch with Allen Wood, a visiting professor from Stanford. Then back to campus for a philosophy grad student meeting where I was appointed coordinator for a series of colloquia by visiting speakers that we hope to organize for next year. Then immediately headed over to Allen’s talk. Then the reception. Then went to get my car so that I could take him and one of our faculty members to dinner. (My best moment was when a bunch of people were talking about going out for drinks after dinner and Andrew Chignell asked Allen if he had a favourite bar in town and Allen said that that was like asking him what his favourite cell in Abu Ghraib is. I’m glad to know that I’m not the only philosopher in the world who doesn’t care for bars.) Anyway, dinner took ages (though it was a lot of fun) and so we only got home from campus after 11pm.
And tomorrow we plan to leave at 6:30am for New Haven. Wait, why am I spending time writing a blog post?
Sydney
Alan Schmierer