Miami and Me

Miami and Me

When I moved to the University of Miami in 2006 the plan was to improve the standing of the philosophy department. The hope was to “do a Rutgers”, where I had worked for the previous sixteen years. Peter Klein, the chief architect of Rutgers’ success, had been approached by the university to become chairman and spearhead of the philosophy department. He declined the offer, though gave the university some sage advice, but I decided to go. Optimism was in the air. The university was prepared to put some money into it. The same thing had happened at Rutgers and in a few years we were on an upward trajectory, though not without concerted effort and university support. In Miami the graduate program was faltering and in danger of cancellation; we had trouble attracting students capable of finishing the program, let alone obtain academic employment. It started quite well, but then the financial crisis of 2008 hit and the money dried up—no more expensive appointments. This really put the kibosh on the whole endeavor. Nevertheless, we struggled to improve the department and had some success. Our ranking made some modest gains, though nothing like Rutgers.

I was keen to initiate changes that might accelerate the process and not be expensive. This called for some creative thinking. It occurred to me that it might be good to associate the department with some promising intellectual movement, like Vienna and logical positivism. Could the Miami philosophy department gain a reputation for innovation and a distinctive philosophical approach? This might give us some good publicity and make us stand out from the crowd, despite our modest size and lowly status in the profession. I also wanted to improve our graduate placement record and put some effort into enhancing student excellence (hence the “Genius Project”). At this time, I was teaching and writing about conceptual analysis in philosophy, which resulted in my book Truth by Analysis. It seemed that several colleagues were of like mind and I conceived the idea of the “Miami Analysts”—a group (a “circle”) of philosophers wedded to analysis as the proper method in philosophy (but a new and improved version of this traditional approach). I discussed it with them and brought it up in a department meeting; there was some enthusiasm, but not everyone liked the idea. I thought it would create “buzz”. I also had the idea of forming a “Center for Bio-Philosophy”, which would seek to integrate philosophy and biology in new ways (this was part of my work on the hand that led to my book Prehension: The Hand and the Emergence of Humanity). This was all part of the effort to put the department on the map—which is what appointing me was supposed to help achieve. I still think these were promising ideas, though I wasn’t too sanguine about cooperation from other members of the department, who seemed content with mediocrity and invisibility. I was trying to give the department some sort of cache, some intellectual sparkle.

All this came to an abrupt end in 2012. I am not at liberty to discuss why this happened, and to this day I am not clear why it did (administrations work in mysterious ways). I am now banned from campus in perpetuity (again, don’t ask me why). The future that could have been was summarily destroyed. I have not seen my erstwhile colleagues for many years, except for Ed Erwin who died a few years ago. I don’t know the state of the department and the graduate program. I am somewhat surprised it still exists. I have noticed that the department’s ranking has sunk even lower, but I don’t know anything about the internal dynamics of the department. It does seem to me that the attrition of senior members of the department will leave it in less than stellar shape. Meanwhile, down the road, I continue my philosophical work, which does nothing to enhance the reputation of the department, since I am no longer there and not even allowed on campus. Does any of this seem good, sensible, wise? Is anyone glad this is the way things turned out? And why do I hear nothing from my old colleagues and friends in the department? I would be perfectly willing to help them, but there is a marked lack of interest in that—where once it was the whole point. Isn’t this all pretty ridiculous? So much for the Miami Analysts.