Hey Steemians! My name is Dr Samuel Douglas, and I’m a philosopher. Being new to the community, I figure I should do my #introduceyourself post. I’ve been interested in cryptocurrency for a while, and I’m constantly thinking & writing, so when @khufu introduced me to steemit, I could instantly see potential for something exciting.
Quick facts:
- Nearly 40
- Married
- Cat owner
- Living in Melbourne
- BA (Hons) & PhD in philosophy from University of Newcastle, Australia
- Interested in lots of different things
- Gets kind of scruffy between semesters
- Rarely as funny as I think I am
Philosophy & work
I teach and undertake research in philosophy. I’ve worked for the University of Newcastle for over 10 years tutoring in mainly ethics & professional ethics (communications, business, psychology, social science, engineering), as well as occasionally lecturing on 20th century analytic philosophers. Even though I’m no physically longer in Newcastle, I’m still associated with them through research projects and online courses that I contribute to. (All that said, I’m hoping to score some work here in Melbourne, home of some of the best philosophy departments in Australia.) Note: unless otherwise stated, my opinions do not reflect those of any employer I might have.
For any serious philosophy of language nerds out there, my PhD thesis can be downloaded from here, and my last peer-reviewed article from here - both on scepticism about linguistic meaning. I’m still interested in questions about what’s going on with language, but would like to apply the theories more than just argue over the technicalities that only 5 people in the world (including me) care about. I’m sure there’s a paper in how Wittgenstein’s theories apply to bitcoin! Seriously though, I don’t think academic philosophers have really considered the implications of blockchain and cryptocurrency technologies as much as they should – these are world-changing technologies.
More recently, I’ve been working with a team of academics, mostly from Newcastle’s School of Education, on a project where we explore the ethical dilemmas that school-teachers experience, with the aim of developing better training materials to help them navigate these difficult decisions. Expect to hear more about this in 2018!
Other writing
Outside of, or kind of overlapping with my academic stuff, I’ve blogged a bit, and written for an independent news site called Independent Australia – all my articles for them can be found via my author profile there.
Overlapping with my writing, which can get a tiny bit political, I try to do my bit to lobby our government on a number of fronts. Mainly this has been to fight for the pay and working conditions of my fellow higher-education workers, but I’ve also been involved in pushing for drug-law reform. I’ve even appeared before an Australian Senate inquiry to talk about the possibility of a better approach to the sale & use of cannabis. I’m hoping spend some time this year advocating for more rational and fair laws surrounding the use of psychedelics. Going to throw it out there: Prohibition doesn’t protect our freedom, and it doesn’t actually protect us from harm. I know it’s a risk committing this opinion to eternity in the blockchain, but I’ve thought about it a lot.
Fun
When I’m not writing or bothering politicians, I like reading science-fiction, talking about ethnobotany, gardening (sometimes successfully), photography (sometimes OK), gaming on PC (mostly Fallout 4 and Path of Exile, and not with any great skill), and generally hanging out with my better half and our cat.
That's about all I can think of for now - this is a good thing as sometimes I can go on a bit. I’m really looking forward to having conversations with this community (not least #teamaustralia) – I really think the best ideas develop when people with diverse experience & backgrounds collaborate and talk things out. Thanks for reading - feel free to comment & ask questions any time.
Welcome!
Welcome to Steemit!
Thanks!
Welcome :) A little bit of Philosophy never hurts - Looking forward to some discussions rising from your posts about it!
Resteemed you via @welcoming, my page for showcasing promising newcomers! Greets, @theaustrianguy
Yeah, it's going to be interesting, I can feel it already. Thanks for the support, it's much appreciated.
Welcome to steemit @samueldouglas !
It's great to have you on-board.
I loved Dune too, Herbert's concept of "spice" doesn't seem as far fetched as it must have appeared when the book first came out.
Indeed.
Greetings from Austria to Australia! :) Good to have more philosophers here and really looking forward to your posts! Thank you and welcome!
Thanks! Given my occasional obsession with Wittgenstein, I've got a soft spot for Austria :)
Welcome, look forward to your posts.
Welcome to steemit @samueldouglas it's great to have you aboard.
I think we actually met once through a horticultural group.
That is entirely possible :)
Welcome. I saw you posted on the Melbourne meetup page. Hopefully we will see you at the next one.
Thanks! Always keen for a beer & and chat if I've got time.
Very interested in hearing more about your philosophy. I will follow you. Welcome to the community! I hope you enjoy it. :)
Thanks Chris. I had a quick look at your intro post, and I reckon we could have some very interesting conversations.
I look forward to it :)
I am pretty interested in philosophy.
Especially consciousness. Will definitely be following you
Welcome to steemit. Feel free to follow me @Tachiraontop
Hi. Welcome in Steemit. I hope we are be family in steemit. And than we share information
welcome to steemit
What kind of Science Fiction? Favourites?
Oh yeah and welcome! :D
Favourites? Um, lots? I grew up reading my dad's pulp and 1950s-1980s stuff: Isaac Asimov, Alfred Bester, Clifford Simak, Michael Moorcock & Frank Herbert (Dune was awesome). One favourite is Last Legends of Earth by A.A. Attanasio (who also seems like a really nice guy), another is Hyperion by Dan Simmons. Love everything by Charles Stross, and am really getting into Stephen Baxter. I may have to write a bit more about it some time :D
I was going to mention Dune. My favourite series. A friend has suggested Hyperion to me.
Hyperion is great, as is the next one in that series.
Welcome to Steemit! That's a great intro post. You will no doubt find many things to take up your time here, not the least of which is DTube, our video platform based on the Blockchain. Glad you are here and I think you'll find the community supportive and engaging.
I hope it works out well. I have a pretty good feeling about all of this.
Your welcome to this great platform, wishing you the best of luck.
Thanks.
Hey there!
I'm trying to run with the philosophy thing myself (as you can tell by my username). I'm more focused on logic, so I'm more of a Fregean or Russellian myself. However, I do appreciate the occasional linguistic confusion joke.
Nice! I'm a big fan of logic, and Russell. And when I finally got Cantor's diagonal argument it blew my tiny little mind. Have you read Wittgenstein's Tractatus?
I actually haven't tackled the Tractatus. I've been wary to try because I've been told it was a difficult read and not very accessible. I have only read excerpts from the Blue and Brown Books. His notion of language games is very interesting.
Your lecturers and TAs/tutors will probably hate me for this, but you totally should take a look at the Tractatus. It's very short. Don't expect to understand it (I know I don't). But if you are into logic, you'd probably get something out of it. If nothing else you can bask in the freakish elegance of it. I'll be posting about that and Philosophical Investigations later in the year, as well as Kripke's Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language (which is a book that will really bake your noodle).
Stoked for some philosophy posts @samueldouglas ! I was a part phlosophy major in college and really miss doing those mental backflips on the daily- welcome friend!
Thanks, and sorry for the delay in replying. If there's any particular mental backflip you want me to write about, just let me know.
you got it!
Hi, I welcome you to this wonderful steemit group.
I invite you to review my blog.-
Hellow man have good luck skrrrrrr
wow i love philosophy
Haha, I did guess that.
Wow you are pretty new. Welcome to steemit!
Nice to see that you've found me pretty fast.
Happy Steeming :-)
Welcome to Steemit! :D
hey I played Path of Exile too. I had zombie witch, spark scion, and totem templar (glacial cascade).
Cool. I didn't play for ages, but then found myself between contracts, bored with most games and not wanting to spend money on new ones. If you haven't played for a while, the new chapters of are worth a look.
Welcome mate! You seem to have a lot of interesting topics to share, looking forward to reading more about them :)
Hi Samuel, welcome to Team Australia, you've found the best community on Steemit.
Thanks. Yeah, I agree - Team Australia is pretty awesome.
Welcome to Steemit :) great to find a fellow #teamaustralia blogger. Look forward to see what you're writing entails. Cheers!
Thanks - some days it's a surprise what to me what my writing entails, so I'll be interested to see what you think.
Hi, I am also new here! I love philosophy and your profile seems to be interesting so I will follow you!!
I will write about education, human being, psicology, travelling photography and quotes.
Hope to share interesting things with u! 😄
Thanks! I hope at least some of what I write is interesting. We'll have to talk education dome time, as that's a big interest of mine too.