iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

What if I told you I am the civil servant, and the reading list is for me? Thank you for the recommendations! Hope you're doing well, thriving even, in Edinburgh

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

Maybe a question for @jowolff.bsky.social @artsofdenial.bsky.social @tomoshea.org, among others (This may or may not be related to the fact I'm starting a new job in September)

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

My first thoughts were: Foucault's biopolitics lectures Theodore Porter's Trust in Numbers Bentham?

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

Imagine you're running a political philosophy class for civil servants, specifically those joining UK gmnt policy teams. What's on your reading list? Bonus points for - diversity across the political spectrum - cultural, historical, and class diversity - anything specific to R&D policy

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 08/04/2025

FWIW, this is precisely the sentiment I read in Nietzsche’s eternal return of the same. More generally: “There is no progress or redemption arc. It is what it is”

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 29/03/2025

The closest thing to success in philosophy peer review: "It my pleasure to tell you that we have accepted your shitty work which you must revise line-by-line before we publish it"

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 29/03/2025

No philosophy journal *acceptance* would be complete without being told by the editor that the paper falls below the journal's standards and to revise the paper "from beginning to end"

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 14/02/2025

Thanks Tom. Hope you’re surviving everything in Edinburgh

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 14/02/2025

Would you mind explaining your reasoning a little Tom? I’m struggling to trust any candidate enough to bother voting, and everything I read from/about the candidates isn’t really helping that

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 08/04/2024

Journal rejection after 11 months. Philosophy is often a callous and cruel profession, and I'm struggling to see how I continue in it. I've been given chances, and I'm getting closer to accepting I've failed to make it work, but today it's hard not to feel that I've been screwed

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Steven Klein @stevenklein.bsky.social · 29/03/2024

I'm hiring two three-year postdocs in political theory for my ERC/UKRI project Systemic Risk and the Transformation of Democracy. One postdoc would ideally have already worked on climate change. Please spread the word! www.kcl.ac.uk/jobs/086948-...

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Dr Vanessa @hpsvanessa.bsky.social · 21/03/2024

Once again for those at the back: doing well in the REF & getting great student satisfaction scores won't save you from politically motivated cuts. It doesn't matter if your research is good, your unit is profitable, or your students are happy if a VC needs to prove their radical vision/pet scheme.

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Dr Keith 🎃 Wilson @keithwilson.eu · 21/03/2024

This is—or rather should be—an absolute scandal. The UK’s University of Kent is closing its highly ranked Department of #Philosophy. This undermines the very idea of a university. #HigherEducation #PhilSky #Academia

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 06/03/2024

Congratulations to my paper and Editorial Manager for 10 months together! Almost made it to that big first-year anniversary🤪

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 23/02/2024

It's not a good day for job worries. Woke up with catastrophising thoughts about what happens at the end of my current job (Sept), and I just learned that even our business school is being forced to pull fixed-term teaching. The picture at (most) UK universities is very bleak indeed

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 23/02/2024

Ah yes. But actions are solidaristic, right? Not people, or collectives i.e. things that have traits

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 23/02/2024

If solidarity is a trait, what is the associated adjective? Like if courage is a trait, we say that a person is courageous. (Answers needn't be in English, of course)

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Rachel Handley 🏳️‍🌈 @rachelahandley.com · 14/02/2024

I am running an online creative writing workshop on 1st March (7 pm - 8:30 pm) UK time to help raise funds for Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP). Writers at every level are welcome! Sign up here: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F... Please repost!

A poster showing the Palestinian flag. "#WriteForPalestine creative writing workshop, led by BSFA longlisted and pushcart nominated writer, Dr Rachel Handley. Where: Zoom, When, 1st March 7 pm to 8:30pm fundraising for Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP)", QR code.

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 13/02/2024

I was already thinking journal of the APA next, good shout

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 13/02/2024

Rejection number 6 on the winner-takes-all paper. Kudos to CRISPP for a 3 month turnaround, albeit with just one report. On the hunt for rejection number 7, open to recommendations

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 09/02/2024

Hello! Could I be on the philosophy list? Thanks!

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 09/02/2024

Are there any philosophy journals that don’t care if your submission is simultaneously under consideration elsewhere? Asking purely out of curiosity of course

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 05/02/2024

Presented this last week (virtually) to a great bunch at a workshop on empirical+normative pol-theory in Prato. The talk covered, among other things, dictators, bankruptcy, capuchin monkeys, and the American Red Cross, and all under 20 mins!

Presentation slide for a talk entitled 'Who wants desert?', featuring a picture of a sliced dessert pie and a hand removing a slice

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Ryan Muldoon @ryanmuldoon.bsky.social · 29/01/2024

Grad Students! Want to learn more about core methods of PPE? Want to build your network? Want to do all of this for free? Join us at the 4th Annual PPE Graduate Summer Workshop! July 22-26. Applications due Feb 15. www.chapman.edu/research/ins...

chapman.edu

PPE Graduate Summer Workshop

Info on the PPE Summer Workshop

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 29/01/2024

Yeah I agree. I think posting on social media is primarily my way of channeling my urge to “do something” away from the submission, the journal, and the editor

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 29/01/2024

Ugh that's awful. This journal has a policy of seeking 2nd reviewer only if 1st doesn't recommend reject, which on the one hand is good news for me, but on the other it more or less double the wait (and of course there is still the possibility of being rejected with a negative 2nd review)

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 29/01/2024

I didn't think so, but I'm starting think it might be based on this

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 29/01/2024

*sigh* closing in on 9 months. I'm 99% sure "reviewers assigned" means "waiting for response to invitation to review". They tell me they have a 1st report and they are looking for a 2nd. My last contact with them was 3 Jan. What do I do? Anything? Nothing?

Editorial manager screenshot reading "date submitted: 6 May 2023", "status date: 3 Jan 2024", "current status: reviewers assigned".

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 27/01/2024

This is a remarkably Nietzschean account of late 19th century scientific method

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 23/01/2024

"Faculty on the move" updates but for all the temp teachers losing their jobs

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Aidan McGlynn @aidanmcglynn.bsky.social · 23/01/2024

Some small steps towards fixing the publishing crisis in philosophy: i. Papers should bounce around quickly between journals, getting rejected without much feedback, then resubmitted somewhere else to be rejected without much feedback again by the same referee. ii. CVs should be in 12pt font.

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Lisa Bortolotti @lisabortolotti.com · 18/01/2024

Our first issue of 2024 is dedicated to the memory of Katherine Hawley and features some incredible papers on trustworthiness. Thanks Elisabetta Lalumera and all the contributors for bringing this project to life. Hope you enjoy! @journalphp.bsky.social #philsky www.tandfonline.com/toc/cphp20/3...

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 17/01/2024

I'm working on a paper scrutinising philosophers' use of empirical data on "common sense" distributive justice intuitions and let me tell you, do NOT take anyone at their word when they tell you what "the data shows us"

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 17/01/2024

Think maybe that particular horse has already bolted

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Joseph Kisolo-Ssonko @jkisolo.bsky.social · 17/01/2024

Pretty happy with my core reading list for Philosophy of Recreation module, but would welcome any suggestions if I've missed any bangers 🤘🚵💄 #PhilSky

Alexander Sager (2013) “Philosophy of Leisure”
Bernard Suits (1978) “The Death of the Grasshopper”
Elizabeth Telfer (1987), “Leisure”
Frank Hindriks & Igor Douven (2018) “Nozick’s experience machine”
Hayden Ramsay (2005) “Reflective Leisure”
Jeremy Gilbert (2008) “Against The Commodification Of Everything”
Gwen Bradford (2013) “The Value Of Achievements”
Christopher Yorke (2018) “Bernard Suits on capacities: games, perfectionism, and Utopia”
Shaun Miller (2022) “BDSM”
Nele Van De Mosselaer (2020) “Imaginative Desires and Interactive Fiction: On Wanting to Shoot Fictional Zombies”
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (2014) “Play and Intrinsic Rewards”
Leslie Howe (2019) “Intensity and the Sublime”
Erin Tarver (2017). “Sports Fandom as Practice of Subjectivization”
Albert Piacente (2020) “Fans and Identity”
Michael J. Roberts (2018) “The Politics of Playtime: Reading Marx through Huizinga”
J.S. Russell (2022) “Idleness would be preferred over game playing as an ideal in Suits’ Utopia”

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Evan @evansmithhist.bsky.social · 16/01/2024

Every. time.

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 15/01/2024

Ethical approval processes for research might be a pain in arse, but don't forget the shenanigans that some researchers used to get up to. Here's a description of a social psychology experiment from the 1950s

A screenshot of a paper that reads: "The subjects were under the impression that they were being hired for a real task and that their employment would continue for several months. In actuality, however, they conducted interviews for 2.5 hours only, after which time they were told about the experiment and were paid for their participation."

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 13/01/2024

Two job rejections in one day, a Saturday no less. That leaves just one more application under consideration and no other jobs advertised that I am eligible for and are within the limits I’ve set for myself and my family. Maybe more will come, but today has not been pleasant

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 12/01/2024

I somehow knew you’d agree with me on this

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 12/01/2024

I agree there are clear advantages to the quick turnaround, and I respect the work of the editors in trying to get back to people quickly, but it irks me that so many are so blasé about a small group making so many decisions at a prestige journal

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 12/01/2024

Wiley can fuck off, but I still feel uncomfortable about everyone sharing stories about instant JPP rejections as if it’s some charming rite-of-passage in political philosophy rather than an accelerated version of peer review’s vulnerability to bias

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 10/01/2024

Thanks, they look like really interesting books

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Elsa Kugelberg @elsakugelberg.bsky.social · 10/01/2024

The Oxford Graduate Conference in Political Theory is now accepting submissions for what will be an amazing event on 22-23 April at Nuffield College. Deadline February 1. oxgradconference.wixsite.com/oxfordgradco...

oxgradconference.wixsite.com

2023 Oxford Graduate Conference in Political Theory

Taking place on April 24 and 25 at Nuffield College, Oxford.

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Anna Alexandrova @annaalexandrova.bsky.social · 09/01/2024

My review of The Tangle of Science is out. Have a look at this book for how to think of reliability of science without appealing to the usual suspects of confirmation, scientific method, rigour etc. I found it genuinely important and refreshing if incomplete. #philsci #philsky #metasci #scipol

academic.oup.com

The Tangle of Science: Reliability Beyond Method, Rigour, and Objectivity, by Nancy Cartwright, Jere...

The Tangle of Science undertakes to change the focus of philosophy of science towards the reliability of scientific products. Both parts matter. Reliability is

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Matt Bennett @mattpbennett.bsky.social · 10/01/2024

Hey does anyone know of any work by experimental philosophers in distributive justice? I'm thinking the kind of thing that economists sometimes do (work on e.g. attitudes towards redistribution) but conducted by x-philosophers?

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