Day 14 - Emollient gamification challenge

 

Another monday morning rolls around. I find it so hard on mondays to snap back into philosopher mode, after a weekend of refereeing squabbles and the mad dash to locate water bottles that is a monday morning. I tend to feel pretty shell shocked by the time i get in from the school run, and the fact that is was pouring with rain so i had to locate wellies and raincoats as *well* didn't help. It was a lovely weekend, actually, the kids were on good form and we had a cosy sunday with lots of stories and cuddles.

Day 5 (Am i regretting this numbering system yet?)

 Time to do some reviewing of the week, before i sign out and into parent mode till monday. 

Did i meet my goals? Did it turn out as i planned? Do i need to make some changes for next week?

Ha, i'm sometimes sniffy about business-style evaluation systems, but that two-line exercise just revealed my first rookie error. I didn't set any goals last week! At least, i only set them for one day, and they were pretty vague. I should probably set some writing goals, as in actual numbers of words written each week. except i don't think i'm ready for that yet. I'm the kind of person who can spew out words numbering in 4 or even 5 digits in a day without particularly trying. In fact, it takes a concerted effort not to. Because its often useless - they're either random tangents or repetitions of things i already wrote. I do it when i'm avoiding the more taxing labour of actually *thinking*.

What i did do last week was make progress on some more specific goals. I sent off a review, read a couple papers that were on my list, attended a bunch of awesome talks at EPSA, and got my talk for next week mostly into shape. Oh and i started blogging and updated my website. That's not horrible going for a week. *but* its very hard to measure the extent to which any of it furthered my book. 

Here is an attempt at some plausible goals for next week though:

• Today: Reread James Di Frisco's excellent paper on Sortals, projectibility and selection.
• Tuesday and Wednesday: work on my talk in the mornings, then attend the workshop for the rest of the day
• Then by the end of the week i should capitalise on everything being fresh in my mind, and get a first draft of the whole metaphysics chapter finished.

ok go!

Workshop: Metaphysics of biological individuality

 Dear All,

 

There will be an online workshop (Zoom) on Metaphysics of Biological Individuality on Monday 20th and Tuesday 21st of September 2021, from 13:30 to 16h30 each afternoon (UK time). This workshop is hosted by the Sorbonne University and the CNRS. All are welcome to attend, and no registration is required. 

 

Monday 20th September (UK time)

13:30 – 15:00: Samir Okasha (University of Bristol): "On the very idea of biological individuality"
15:00 – 15:05: (Short break)
15:05 – 16:35: Will Morgan (University of Sheffield) "Biological individuality and the foetus problem"

Tuesday 21st September (UK time)

13:30 – 15:00: Ellen Clarke (University of Leeds) "On the need to keep hold of biological individuals"
15:00 – 15:05: (Short break)
15:05 – 16:35: James DiFrisco (KU Leuven) "The individuation of biological characters"

 For the zoom links, please email  martens.johannes@free.fr

Day 2 Group selection for Maynard Smith and Sober

 

So yesterday went really well. To my surprise, i did everything i'd planned!  My brain was working, i made some good headway on the talk.

Today - meh. I often find that a good, smart day is followed by a dip. And i didn't even get drunk! I just woke up and couldn't face going back to the notes i'd finished the evening before. It's not the end of the world because i was in and out of EPSA talks and meetings today anyway. 

But then this book arrived in the post and has saved me. It's a book that's kind of hard to get hold of. At least, libraries rarely have it,  and pdfs don't seem to circulate online, so i had to stump up and buy it. Which is another reason why scholars without much cash - say early career folk who pay for a lot of childcare - are disadvantaged in academia. But i don't have eye-watering childcare costs anymore, so worldofbooks got my money.

It was so worth it! For a random edited collection from 1987, its pretty widely-cited, and now i can see why.  Chapter 5 'How to Model Evolution' by John Maynard Smith, and the ensuing back and forth he has with Elliott Sober, is gold.

I think i can build one of my chapters around it (not the one i was meant to be working on, but hey)  so i'm going to put my initial thoughts about it down here.

Day 1. (or approx 548 if we're counting since i actually *started* the project)

 I've got a relatively long day at my disposal today - 9.30 till 5 - because my kids do after school club on tuesdays. Mondays are short - 9.30 till 3 - and wednesdays to fridays are long, because my ex picks the kids up on those days at the moment. In theory its a pretty good weekly schedule for writing, because i've got a short day on monday to ease myself back into thinking after a weekend of pritsticking and wiping things, and the days gradually get longer till by the end of the week i can go on full on crazed-immersion and pull all nighters, just in time to be a weird starey robot for my kids on saturday.

In practice, of course, there are all manner of obstacles in the path of extended concentration. This week is EPSA, the meeting of the European Philosophy of Science Association, in Turin. I'm not presenting, but since i'm on the steering committee i will definitely attend some talks and meetings, virtually.  I also have a deadline coming up on a paper i'm supposed to referee. And next week i'm presenting (virtually) at a meeting in Paris. Happily, there is some overlap between the topic of those two.

So, the plan for today is to write my referee's report (i already read the paper yesterday - i like to sleep on it before i write my report, if i can), read a second  paper on a similar topic, and then start assembling some thoughts that will double as (i) content for my talk next week and (ii) the basis for chapter 7 of my book - on metaphysical problems associated with biological individuality.

Ok, go!

How to finish a book (?)

 It's 9.24 on a tuesday morning. I've just got back from the school run, fed the cats and unloaded the dishwasher so i could make myself a coffee. And i'm acting on an idea i had while falling asleep last night.

Last spring i was lucky enough to be awarded a semester of research leave, by the Leverhulme Trust. It's to complete a book project that i began the spring before last, when my sabbatical was interrupted by you-know-what. The title is 'The Units of Life: Kinds of individuals in biology'. I managed to get two chapters and a proper book proposal finished in the car crash formerly known as 2020. On the one hand, this was cool, as it enabled me to get a contract with OUP and a Leverhulme Award to actually finish it. On the other hand, this leaves 6 chapters still to go, and now that people have paid me money i actually have to do it (whose idea was this?! why did i only ask for a semester of leave? why is the school holiday so long waaaaaaaaaaa etc.)

The kids went back to school last week, so i've finally got a suitable amount of bandwidth to get down to writing in earnest. and i'm pretty petrified 😬

I've also been thinking for ages that i want to try to get back to blogging a bit. It's not so much the done thing any more, compared to when i first started blogging in 2013. Most former bloggers have moved on to tiktok or become influencers by now, but i'm waaaaay too old and daggy for those. 

So i've hit upon the idea of using this platform as a sort of veruccas-n-all diary of what it's like to be a 40 year old academic with two young children, trying to complete a book manuscript in four months. At worst it will be a boring displacement activity. At best it will serve me as a commitment device and way to mull ideas over. It might even make someone chuckle, and maybe someone senior will even read it and spot some terrible error i'm making in time to save me from it!

So the plan is to log on every  few days to make a note of what i'm planning to do, what got in my way and what miserable level of sanity i'm currently operating at.

Good luck reader!