Yarden Katz writes per email:

There’s a new site out — videolectures.net — where anyone can post videos of academic lectures. Right now it’s dominated by (very good) machine learning and statistics lectures, but there’s nothing on logic or philosophy. I was looking online for videos of logic-related lectures to add, but found virtually none. There are three links to logic-type talks by Martin Davis, Saul Kripke and John McCarthy at:

http://broodsphilosophy.wordpress.com/2006/06/15/online-videos-of-philosophical-lectures/

But they do not load for me. Perhaps others know of lectures on logic available online? It’d be a great idea to make lectures available online, if anyone has access to them. Maybe your readers will know.

Also, Merry Gödelmas! Kurtele would have been 101 today.

Recent posts on the status of women in philosophy made me want to know what the situation is in logic. In philosophical logic it’s not good. I have a hunch that it’s better in logic generally, but haven’t had time to check this. The data I used is the number of publications in the Journal of Philosophical Logic for the past 7 years. Out of 247 (non-unique) authors, 22, or 9%, were women. That’s lower by several percentage points than any of the other publication rates for top journals reported by Sally Haslanger. You might think, oh, well, logic is “technical” and “math-y” and so that might explain the low percentage. But in mathematics generally, the numbers are usually in the 20s or 30s (percentage of math faculty and math doctorates at US departments), so that can’t be the whole story. Now, what’s really shocking is that out of the 94 authors from the US and Canada, only 2 = 2% were women. That’s even lower than the 6% rate of women authors in Mind! (The percentage for the UK was a somewhat larger 3%, for the rest of Europe 11%, and for Australia and New Zealand 16%). When I have time, I’ll repeat this with the Journal of Symbolic Logic as a check, but just looking at a few of the latest issues suggest the figure is somewhere in the 10-15% range.

Via LtU, David Turner on Church’s Thesis, the lambda calculus, and the development of functional programming languages [PDF].

As Shawn said, much of Terence Tao’s advice applies not just to mathematician, but also to philosophers (especially the “be considerate to your audience” and “talks are not the same as papers” parts, although disciplinary culture in philosophy seems still to deny at least the latter). I sometimes wish more people would use the wastebasket, too.

The Department of Philosophy, University of Auckland, seeks to appoint a Lecturer in Logic. (Vacancy number: A248-07O. The position is a continuing one.) The successful applicant will be expected to undertake research, and to teach at introductory undergraduate, advanced undergraduate and postgraduate levels, and to supervise research students for the MA and PhD degrees. Applicants will be expected to have a PhD or equivalent in Philosophy, some research publications and some teaching experience.

For further information and to apply online please visit http://www.vacancies.auckland.ac.nz/positiondetail.asp?p=5057 or alternatively call + 64 9 373 7599 ext 83000. Please quote the vacancy number. Applications close 18 May 2007. The University has an equal opportunities policy and welcomes applications from all qualified
persons.

For queries on academic matters relating to this position please contact the Head of Department, John Bishop, jc.bishop@auckland.ac.nz.

At LanguageLog.

Another one of the SEP entries commissioned by Paolo and me: The Early Development of Set Theory, by José Ferreirós, author of Labyrinth of Thought.