Monday, January 21, 2008
Laying This Blog Down
I think it is time to recognize that it is time to lay this blog down. There hasn't been sufficient interest to continue it. I think it is better to make this as a conscious decision than it just let it happen through inertia. As Quakers we should let our yea be yea and our nay be nay. I wish the blog could have been more of a success but I must recognize that it is not. It is time to lay it down.
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I tend to spend more time on the internet when the semester gets rolling, and not so much during the breaks. If other people feel the same as Richard, let me know and I'll take it down. Otherwise, start posting!
Friends,
I personally would be quite discouraged if this blog were to be laid down, as I am convinced that we as Quakers in philosophy have something to offer to both the Quaker and the broader philosophical communities (I take that as an obligation, not a point of pride), and surely interacting with one another would be a boon - if not essential - to that end.
At the same time, I must admit with Richard that the level of participation has been less than encouraging. Richard has attempted a few times to engage us (and has been the main protagonist of late - thanks, Richard), and there has been less response, and from fewer respondents, than I had hoped, and he too apparently. I’m not accusing anyone here, and have been less active than I might have been myself. And this despite the fact that Q/P is my home-page, and I check in every day. I wonder sometimes whether the limitations of “blogging” isn’t at least part of the problem. I myself have trouble saying anything like what I actually mean in a paragraph or two, and therefore often say nothing rather than risk saying something badly, even when I have ideas I would like to share. Blogging seems to me a good way of provoking, of putting an idea out there, but a bad way of working ideas through in any meaningful way. I am delighted that we have this place to engage one another, but frustrated by the level of engagement it seems to allow. (Although perhaps I have not yet learned how to properly employ the medium.) I dream of a format where we could post longer and more intricate works and encourage more thorough responses, i.e., more substantive interactions - but am not sure what that might be. In the meantime, I am grateful for this little chance at keeping a small flame smoldering, in the hopes of sparking something more lustrous later.
I would like, therefore, to speak in favor of keeping this forum alive for a time yet (if even on life support), at least until we meet again at FAHE for another Philosophers’ Forum and we can discuss, among other things, how we might better facilitate collegiality among Quaker philosophers.
Jeffrey Dudiak
I agree with both Craig and Jeffrey. I have been meaning to participate more myself, and this was one of my resolutions for the new semester (which is just beginning this week). At least keeping it up until the next Philosopher's Forum at FAHE seems like a good idea.
I think we also need to think about how we evaluate the success of a blog. For most blogs, there are a lot more views than there are posted comments. Since I didn't start this particular blog, I have not been able to monitor hits. And so it is hard for me to know how much the blog is being read, or not. There are other ways too that we could promote the blog if we wanted more traffic -- ways we could be more proactive in making sure that both Quaker blogging networks and philosophy blogging networks knew about it.
But maybe Richard is more concerned with our not writing more for it. In my case, this is because my Quaker Philosopher energies have been channeled into preparing for my FAHE presentation. I have been planning to begin to share some of those ideas in advance on this forum, but am not quite ready yet (but should be ready to do so soon).
I do feel discouraged about what I see as the failure of the blog and would be pleased if it does come back to life.
I have found that blogging comes pretty naturally to me since my writing style is concise and straightforward. (Some have suggested that I can write this way because I am basically simple-minded.) Jeff would prefer that we write longer essays. There is value in this but also there is a downside as well. Longer essays take even more time to read and digest. If we are each of us too busy to consistently find time to read short posts, then it is even less likely that we will find time for full-scale articles or book chapters. Still, I for one, would like to get detailed comments on my articles if such a thing is possible.
On a very personal level all of you heard my talk at FAHE last summer and know that I feel estranged from the philosophical community in general. They (the analytic philosophers) have, it seems to me, abandoned the traditional interest in core issues that speak to all thoughtful people and instead turned their attention to mere puzzles. At FAHE I felt that Quaker philosophers shared in some significant degree my concern that philosophy turn back to core questions taken seriously and away from mere displays of verbal sophistication. I had hoped that we could gain strength and encouragement by keeping in regular contact via this blog.
I'll continue to monitor the blog to see if it does come back to life.
I agree with what Richard says about short postings. While it might be nice also to have a way to share longer writings, the blog format does provide a forum for processing ideas expressed in more concise form, and can be seen as a step along the way towards developing longer and more formal academic writings.
But, in response to Richard's larger concern here, I must confess to feeling a little like one emerging from a largely quiet Meeting for Worship that I experienced to be quite gathered, only to hear someone worry that there wasn't enough spoken ministry. I personally don't mind there being spaces between postings.
On the other hand, I also do appreciate being pushed a bit. I think I do have a tendency to hold back a little too much. I am inspired to renew my efforts to post more frequently now.
Thanks, Laura,
for this last post. I appreciate all the efforts Richard has made to get us going, but I also hear your calm encouragement to us to be patient with ourselves and each other and not become anxious if we have times of greater and other times of lesser activity here (or, in more religious language not entirely foreign to us, to allow the spirit to move us as and when it will).
I have taken your counsel to heart.
Jeff Dudiak
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