Philosophy rebuilds after recent losses

Despite the recent loss of several prominent professors in the philosophy department, University students and faculty — as well as professors at other institutions — agree that the department remains strong.

In the past few years, senior professors David Lewis and Richard Jeffrey GS '57 passed away and Harry Frankfurt retired. The three were leaders in their fields. Meanwhile, assistant professors Beatrice Longuennese and Jim Pryor '94 GS '97 recently left to teach at New York University (NYU).

These faculty departures were not "out of the range of the ordinary ebb and flow," assistant philosophy professor Adam Elga '96 said. "But compounded with the deaths and retirements, it seems like an unusually great loss."

While philosophy major Olivia Albrecht '05 said the departures have not had great effect on undergraduates, Dan Bekavak '04 said he was saddened by the departure of Longuennese, who advised his junior paper.

"She is a fantastic professor who was really helpful," Bekavak said. "I was basically lucky enough to have her for her last semester. I think that losing her and losing some of the other professors was definitely not a good thing for the department."

Albrecht praised the department's strong sense of continuity. Facing the challenge of hiring new professors, the department has already hired many topnotch professors and continues to actively seek new ones.

Last year, the department recruited Michael Smith, the former Chair of the Australian National University's (ANU) philosophy department. The department also hired Michael Fara GS '01 and Delia Graff, a husband and wife team from Cornell.

Graff, who left the University for Cornell, gained popularity during her time here as a professor of logic and philosophy of language. Fara is best known for coauthoring an article with Tim Williamson, a well-known philosopher from Oxford.

This spurt of losses and gains is just part of the regular shuffling back and forth in the philosophy field, especially among young professors, philosophy professor Daniel Garber said.

"If you're a top department like this one, you get the best young people. But we then become the prime target for other departments as they look to recruit the best faculty," Garber said.

This was the case with Longuennese, who left Princeton in January 2004 for a position at NYU. However, Longuennese had no complaints about the University's department, where she taught for ten years; she said she simply received a more desirable offer from NYU.

Longuennese said it is becoming more difficult to retain philosophy professors everywhere since more universities have improved their philosophy departments. Princeton, Yale and Harvard are no longer the only choices for a top professor, she said.

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NYU, for example, has recently begun to recruit philosophy professors from top universities in an effort to make their department one of the best in the country. With a larger budget, NYU is now able to offer higher salaries. There are rumors that NYU also lures professors with other incentives, such as a lower requirement for teaching introductory classes.

Graduate student Colin Klein called such aggressive recruiting tactics "poaching" and attributes much of the volatility in the philosophy department to them.

Stephen Schiffer, chair of the philosophy department at NYU, said that NYU makes no such teaching deals. He said their standard teaching mode is identical to Princeton's — all nonadministrative professors must teach three courses a year. "We're not raiding Princeton by any means," he said.

While many young professors are attracted to NYU's location, Albrecht said Princeton's location may be a disadvantage in attracting young faculty. "I think a lot of the young [professors] don't like how quiet Princeton is," she said.

Despite the rise of philosophy departments at other universities, many do not see Princeton's loss of top faculty as permanent.

"A lot of it is quite natural, nothing the department could have done about it," said Brian Weatherson, a philosophy professor at Cornell. "I think the department's done quite well in the people they've hired and are keeping up their standards."

He added that Princeton continues to have one of the best well-respected philosophy departments in the country. Klein asserted that it remains in the top five.

Longuenese said that, among professors at other universities, "There is a sense that the Princeton department is in a transition time and there is a question about how it will develop in the future."

Philosophy professors expressed optimism and excitement about the new hires. After observing Smith's energy in the ANU department, Elga called hiring Smith a "big victory."

"When I was visiting there, he was the social nexus, present at all the teas. He was like the father of the department. I'm hoping he'll bring some of that 'tea spirit' to Princeton," he said.