Today ends the second year of these (near) daily Digressions. There have been now more than 500 of these posts and each of them is visited slightly more than 800 times (a number that is still creeping up, but relatively stable), although the variance remains large (but is reducing). However, there has been a shift away from frequent engagement with professional issues (compare the midterm review and last year's), and this is reflected in the nature of my top 25 most popular posts of 2015:
- 12 of these are on issues in the profession and the academy more generally (including two guest posts by Audrey Yap, here and here).
- 7 are on the nature and history of analytical philosophy (including a previously unpublished letter by Quine to Benardete).
- 2 are on the history of pre 20h century philosophy (which is probably the bulk of the posts)
- 1 a guest post on pitch perception (by Adam Morton)
- 2 posts on issues in higher education more generally
- 1 primarily devoted to autobiographical musings
Obviously these categories blend practice. (My posts on the philosophy and history of economics have very steady readership, but are not in the top 50.)
Your continued interest is gratifying and a source of inspiration. As I wrote last year, it is very gratifying to see that my 'back-list' of non-polemical posts are found day in day out by readers, who follow the myriad paths of links through D&I (my systematic anti-system).* But I want to add that I especially treasure the letters and inquiries from readers that have sparked further conversations and explorations.
I wish you all a lovely holiday, and I intend to return to these Impressions in January.
*If that's too pretentious feel free to view these Digressions as the shadow CV of my thoughts that are parasitic on, yet more vital to me, than my official CV.
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