Alex Plakias
@alexplakias.bsky.social
philosopher at hamilton college. author of 'awkwardness: a theory' (oup) & 'thinking through food' (broadview press)
eating, thinking, writing in various orders of priority.
eating, thinking, writing in various orders of priority.
Philosophy friends: planning a spring meta ethics seminar. I haven’t kept up much the last 5 years or so— what books did I miss that would be fun to read with advanced undergrads?
August 26, 2025 at 3:45 PM
Philosophy friends: planning a spring meta ethics seminar. I haven’t kept up much the last 5 years or so— what books did I miss that would be fun to read with advanced undergrads?
Hmmm, I have been thinking of teaching a meta ethics seminar again— maybe it’s a sign…
Engaging review of my favorite book last year:
"Moral error theory, to paraphrase Philip Larkin, began in 1977... Or did it?"
www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...
"Moral error theory, to paraphrase Philip Larkin, began in 1977... Or did it?"
www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...
June 16, 2025 at 7:50 PM
Hmmm, I have been thinking of teaching a meta ethics seminar again— maybe it’s a sign…
And rolling it out at Kann— wonder what the other 3 restaurants will be, v curious to try this!
Whoa - congrats to WildType on FDA approval for its delicious cultivated salmon. No antibiotics, no microplastics, no pesticides, no dead fish. And it’s made in the USA - no need to import salmon from the ends of the earth!
ampsinnovation.org/statement-fr...
ampsinnovation.org/statement-fr...
Statement from AMPS on Wildtype Becoming the First Cultivated Fish Available for Sale in the World– Approved and available NOW in US restaurants - Association For Meat, Poultry And Seafood Innovation
AMPS congratulates leading member Wildtype, a pioneer in producing American cultivated seafood, on the world’s first approval for cultivated seafood for their cultivated salmon. This will mean 100% Am...
ampsinnovation.org
June 4, 2025 at 12:14 AM
And rolling it out at Kann— wonder what the other 3 restaurants will be, v curious to try this!
Normalise writing a nice quick note to scholars literally every time you read and like their work. Our world is small and getting smaller. We need encouragement.
May 24, 2025 at 12:04 PM
wrapped up intro to moral theory w/this Aeon piece on annoyance by @dryan149.bsky.social and @evanwestra.bsky.social- big hit, great way to wrap up a semester, by looking to future and thinking concretely about change: aeon.co/essays/why-d...
Why does moral progress feel preachy and annoying? | Aeon Essays
You might feel you can trust your gut to tell right from wrong, but the friction of social change shows that you can’t
aeon.co
May 9, 2025 at 3:47 PM
wrapped up intro to moral theory w/this Aeon piece on annoyance by @dryan149.bsky.social and @evanwestra.bsky.social- big hit, great way to wrap up a semester, by looking to future and thinking concretely about change: aeon.co/essays/why-d...
Reposted by Alex Plakias
Michael Brownstein, Alex Madva and I are thrilled with the cover for our book, Somebody Should Do Something
The release date is 9/16, but you can do preorders now
mitpress.mit.edu/978026204978...
#CoverReveal #Bookstagram @michaelbrownstein.bsky.social tein.bsky.social @mitpress.bsky.social
The release date is 9/16, but you can do preorders now
mitpress.mit.edu/978026204978...
#CoverReveal #Bookstagram @michaelbrownstein.bsky.social tein.bsky.social @mitpress.bsky.social
April 23, 2025 at 1:25 PM
Michael Brownstein, Alex Madva and I are thrilled with the cover for our book, Somebody Should Do Something
The release date is 9/16, but you can do preorders now
mitpress.mit.edu/978026204978...
#CoverReveal #Bookstagram @michaelbrownstein.bsky.social tein.bsky.social @mitpress.bsky.social
The release date is 9/16, but you can do preorders now
mitpress.mit.edu/978026204978...
#CoverReveal #Bookstagram @michaelbrownstein.bsky.social tein.bsky.social @mitpress.bsky.social
new (version of an) SEP entry just dropped, maybe time to give the ol' evolution and morality seminar syllabus an overhaul...
New stuff on third-party punishment and kinship intensity and nonhuman animals and more
In the past 5 years, there’s been an explosion of new work on the philosophy & cog sci of norms. If you want to get up to speed on it, check out this newly revised SEP entry on the Psychology of Normative Cognition by @dryan149.bsky.social, Stephen Setman & me.
plato.stanford.edu/entries/psyc...
plato.stanford.edu/entries/psyc...
February 17, 2025 at 10:53 PM
new (version of an) SEP entry just dropped, maybe time to give the ol' evolution and morality seminar syllabus an overhaul...
usually keep the blackboard page pretty austere but this semester I needed to cheer myself up...
January 22, 2025 at 6:53 PM
usually keep the blackboard page pretty austere but this semester I needed to cheer myself up...
reposting this because I've seen a few people wondering where to direct resources and this seems like a non-obvious but important one.
again tapping the sign: please support Wikipedia and other quality information sources - especially local news, double especially newsrooms that are worker owned and reader funded
it’s becoming increasingly clear the goal of the far right is to defund and buy up every source of reliable information until there is no more objective reality to counter them
January 22, 2025 at 10:12 AM
reposting this because I've seen a few people wondering where to direct resources and this seems like a non-obvious but important one.
what a great idea for a conference, and the associated pedagogy workshops look great too
Come to our conference on Epistemic achievements and Virtues!
We'll have speakers from ten different traditions (Africana, Arabic, Chinese, Early Modern European, Greek, Indigenous Andean, Jewish, Latin American, Medieval Latin, and Sanskrit).
(Also, check out the local workshops!)
Cool, indeed!
We'll have speakers from ten different traditions (Africana, Arabic, Chinese, Early Modern European, Greek, Indigenous Andean, Jewish, Latin American, Medieval Latin, and Sanskrit).
(Also, check out the local workshops!)
Cool, indeed!
Other Epistemic Achievements
Various philosophical traditions, east and west, offer rich and alternative ways of theorizing about varieties of epistemic achievements and virtues. To explore this approach, we aim to bring experts...
sites.google.com
January 19, 2025 at 2:57 AM
what a great idea for a conference, and the associated pedagogy workshops look great too
This is great. A perfect pre-semester read
www.noemamag.com/the-danger-o...
www.noemamag.com/the-danger-o...
The Danger Of Superhuman AI Is Not What You Think | NOEMA
The rhetoric over “superhuman” AI implicitly erases what’s most important about being human.
www.noemamag.com
January 15, 2025 at 1:10 AM
This is great. A perfect pre-semester read
www.noemamag.com/the-danger-o...
www.noemamag.com/the-danger-o...
A while ago I suggested this as an approach to addressing the referee crisis and no one liked it (obviously I know funding is a different thing okay)
I flagged how we are using partial randomisation to allocate our small grants. We check if an application meets a quality threshold (around half of applications might) and then we allocate the funding at random between all those that meet the threshold.
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
The case for lotteries as a tiebreaker of quality in research funding
More funders should consider using randomization to choose grant recipients when decisions are too close to call.
www.nature.com
January 8, 2025 at 7:42 PM
A while ago I suggested this as an approach to addressing the referee crisis and no one liked it (obviously I know funding is a different thing okay)
Reposted by Alex Plakias
Philosopher friends/parasocial peeps, look for me at the eastern, I’ll be the one awkwardly squinting at everyone’s name tag like the borderline prosopagnosic I am
January 8, 2025 at 1:38 PM
Philosopher friends/parasocial peeps, look for me at the eastern, I’ll be the one awkwardly squinting at everyone’s name tag like the borderline prosopagnosic I am
going back to the Eastern APA for the first time since 2011 & already having anticipatory anxiety. no I'm not 'presenting' my work on awkwardness per se, more like demonstrating it in informal settings...
January 6, 2025 at 5:25 PM
going back to the Eastern APA for the first time since 2011 & already having anticipatory anxiety. no I'm not 'presenting' my work on awkwardness per se, more like demonstrating it in informal settings...
the secret to having it all? quantifier restriction.
January 5, 2025 at 10:18 PM
the secret to having it all? quantifier restriction.
hey, if you're looking for something to fill a cold Monday afternoon (or evening), check out this virtual event I'm doing with The Philosopher tomorrow!
www.thephilosopher1923.org/events/on-aw...
www.thephilosopher1923.org/events/on-aw...
On Awkwardness
www.thephilosopher1923.org
January 5, 2025 at 9:49 PM
hey, if you're looking for something to fill a cold Monday afternoon (or evening), check out this virtual event I'm doing with The Philosopher tomorrow!
www.thephilosopher1923.org/events/on-aw...
www.thephilosopher1923.org/events/on-aw...
a little sweet, but also sour: was 2024 the year of the pickle?
Idk, but I did have fun talking to Ted Anthony for this AP article: apnews.com/article/pick...
Idk, but I did have fun talking to Ted Anthony for this AP article: apnews.com/article/pick...
The dill of a lifetime? In a nation that’s enduring its own sour patch, the pickle dominated 2024
When did we know for sure? Was it April, when Nature Made introduced its pickle-flavored gummy vitamins?
apnews.com
December 31, 2024 at 7:01 PM
a little sweet, but also sour: was 2024 the year of the pickle?
Idk, but I did have fun talking to Ted Anthony for this AP article: apnews.com/article/pick...
Idk, but I did have fun talking to Ted Anthony for this AP article: apnews.com/article/pick...
Sorry to report, turns out I’m that person who comes in at the tail end of a 1000 piece puzzle and crows about every piece they place #highlyspecificvices
December 24, 2024 at 2:52 PM
Sorry to report, turns out I’m that person who comes in at the tail end of a 1000 piece puzzle and crows about every piece they place #highlyspecificvices
Charity requires you you interpret ‘gym’ as ‘nap,’ for example when I said I would go to the gym every day this week
December 17, 2024 at 3:57 PM
Charity requires you you interpret ‘gym’ as ‘nap,’ for example when I said I would go to the gym every day this week
9:45am. just put on a pork belly braise while I write down some deep thoughts about pickles. I am going to miss sabbatical, sigh.
December 17, 2024 at 2:54 PM
9:45am. just put on a pork belly braise while I write down some deep thoughts about pickles. I am going to miss sabbatical, sigh.
"What is lost when victims leave philosophy..." Such an important point.
"If only we could redistribute hubris." Maybe we can't, but those of us who teach and mentor can at least try to adjust the balance of confidence and self-doubt.
www.thephilosopher1923.org/post/on-canc...
"If only we could redistribute hubris." Maybe we can't, but those of us who teach and mentor can at least try to adjust the balance of confidence and self-doubt.
www.thephilosopher1923.org/post/on-canc...
December 17, 2024 at 2:01 PM
"What is lost when victims leave philosophy..." Such an important point.
"If only we could redistribute hubris." Maybe we can't, but those of us who teach and mentor can at least try to adjust the balance of confidence and self-doubt.
www.thephilosopher1923.org/post/on-canc...
"If only we could redistribute hubris." Maybe we can't, but those of us who teach and mentor can at least try to adjust the balance of confidence and self-doubt.
www.thephilosopher1923.org/post/on-canc...
grrr, be serious. who is saying 'don't eat microwavable frozen veggies' (which isn't even UPF) or hummus (most wldn't qualify as UPF)? painting critics of UPF as enemies of all packaged food or as denying some UPF worse than others = disingenuous at best.
www.nytimes.com/2024/12/16/o...
www.nytimes.com/2024/12/16/o...
Opinion | Is Ultraprocessing Really the Best Way to Think About Nutrition?
The category of ultraprocessed foods is so broad it borders on useless.
www.nytimes.com
December 16, 2024 at 11:59 AM
grrr, be serious. who is saying 'don't eat microwavable frozen veggies' (which isn't even UPF) or hummus (most wldn't qualify as UPF)? painting critics of UPF as enemies of all packaged food or as denying some UPF worse than others = disingenuous at best.
www.nytimes.com/2024/12/16/o...
www.nytimes.com/2024/12/16/o...
*you* call it lying to my kids about Santa, *I* call it teaching them about non-truth conditional semantics
December 7, 2024 at 12:21 AM
*you* call it lying to my kids about Santa, *I* call it teaching them about non-truth conditional semantics