In Brief: More News from the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies

New Faculty Member: Veljko Dubljevic joined NC State in Fall 2016 as a tenure-track Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Science, Technology and Society, in a new position in the ethics of emerging science and technology. He has a B.A. in Philosophy from the University of Novi Sad (Yugoslavia), an M.Sc. in Economics from Educons University (Serbia), a Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Belgrade (Serbia) and a D.Phil. in Philosophy from the University of Stuttgart (Germany). Previously a postdoctoral fellow at McGill University’s IRCM Neuroethics Research Unit, Dubljevic works mainly on the ethics of neuroscience and technology and the cognitive neuroscience of ethics. He has published over twenty articles and a co-edited book. He is currently working on a monograph called Neuroethics and Justice: Public Reason in the Cognitive Enhancement Debate, which is under contract with Springer.

Postdoctoral Scholar: Shay Logan (Ph.D., Minnesota) was appointed as a Postdoctoral Teaching Scholar for the 2016/17 academic year to teach the Department’s courses in logic and philosophy of language. His appointment has been renewed for 2017/18. Previously a Postdoctoral Research Scholar at the University of Connecticut, Logan has published several articles on logic and is co-author, with Jc Beall, of Logic: The Basics, 2nd Edition (Routledge, 2016).

Phi Beta Kappa Visiting Scholar: Philip Kitcher, John Dewey Professor of Philosophy at Columbia University, spent two days at NC State in October 2017 as a Phi Beta Kappa Visiting Scholar. Kitcher gave a public lecture on “Progress in the Sciences and in the Arts,” was a guest speaker in two philosophy courses, and led a session in the Honors Village’s Research Unplugged series. Read more.

Scholarly Reassignments: Two members of the faculty in Religious Studies were granted scholarly reassignments during 2016/17. William Adler, Distinguished University Professor, received a scholarly reassignment for the academic year, which he spent as a Fellow at the Israel Institute for Advanced Studies in Jerusalem. (Read more.) Anna B. Bigelow, Associate Professor, received a scholarly reassignment for the spring semester, which she devoted to scholarship on sacred spaces.

Faculty Promotion: Stephen Puryear (Ph.D., Pittsburgh), Assistant Professor of Philosophy, has been approved for promotion to Associate Professor in Fall 2017.

Obituary: W. Curtis Fitzgerald, who was a member of the Department’s faculty from 1956 to 1992, died in Cary, NC on August 28, 2016 at the age of 89. He was the Department’s pinch hitter. In addition to half a dozen courses in Religious Studies, he taught the introductory philosophy course, the course on existentialism and a seminar on Kierkegaard. Fitzgerald also made a major contribution to departmental leadership, serving as Assistant Head from 1974 to 1985 and again from 1986 to 1990. He was instrumental in introducing the B.A. in Philosophy with a Concentration in Religious Studies, which became a full-fledged B.A. in Religious Studies in 1994. He was Assistant Dean of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences from 1986 to 1992. The Department’s award for the top senior in Religious Studies is named in his honor.