Keith Douglas' Web Page
| About me | Find out who I am and what I do. |
| My resumé | A copy of my resumé and other documentation about my education and work experience for employers and the curious. |
| Reviews, theses, articles, presentations | A collection of papers from my work, categorized and annotated. |
| Current research projects | What I am currently working on, including some non-research material. |
| Interesting people | People professionally "connected" to me in some way. |
| Interesting organizations | Organizations I am "connected" to. (Some rather loosely.) |
| Intellectual/professional influences | Influences on my work, including an organization chart. Here you can also buy many good books on philosophy and other subjects via amazon.com. I have included brief reviews of hundreds of books. |
| Professional resources | Research sources, amazon.com associates programs, etc. |
| What is the philosophy of computing? | A brief introduction to my primary professional interest. |
| My intellectual heroes | A partial list of important people. Limited to the dead. |
| My educational philosophy | As a sometime teacher I've developed one. Includes book resources. |
Organizations
Various philosophy, science, technology, etc. organizations I at least "morally" support.
Philosophy of Science Association. The professional organization for philosophers of science. They have a bi-annual conference which I was lucky to attend while it (and I!) were in Vancouver (2000) and publish a journal, Philosophy of Science. I am a (dues paying) member.
International Association of Computing and Philosophy. IACAP is a free to join professional association for philosophy and/of computing.
CAAE. CMU's Center for the Advancement of Applied Ethics. CMU is a rare place: they have philosophy laboratories (the other is the LSEC - Laboratory for Symbolic and Educational Computing). I was employed at the CAAE while a logic student at CMU.
talk.origins This is the website companion to the newsgroup of the same name. Devoted to scientifically answering the challenges of evolution-deniers in all their stripes (creationists, intelligent design proponents, etc.), this organization's mission is a largely thankless and yet unfortunately necessary one. Even my home, Canada, is not free from these pesky anti-science sorts, and so even ignoring the importance of education for the world as whole, the site is remarkably useful. I have learned a lot of biology by reading the articles here.
Panda's Thumb. Another anti-evolution denier site focusing on specific news items.
Pharyngula. A blog by an interesting biologist.
Leiter Reports. A blog by a philosopher of law/legal scholar at the University of Texas at Austin. Brian Leiter also coordinates the famous Philosopher's Gourmet which rates graduate programs in philosophy around the world.
CSI. Formerly CSICOP, CSI is the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry. They publish a magazine, "Skeptical Inquirer" which is often fun (and somewhat sad) to read.
JREF. The James Randi Educational Foundation has similar aims as CSI. James Randi is a stage magician - conjurer, as they say - and makes the successful case for including members of his entertaining profession in nonsense-investigating. Scientists often assume everyone is honest; magicians remind us that people can be deceptive in many ways - and precisely how. His foundation offers a large prize to anyone who can demonstrate a paranormal power under controlled conditions agreed to in advance by him and the applicant. Nobody has ever claimed the prize successfully. Randi's lectures cum magic shows are a wonder to watch.
Quackwatch. This amazing website is run by Stephen Barrett, a physician who is about as incensed by medical and health care quackery as I am. I am a lurker on the organization's mailing list and have contributed remarks on the philosophy of science where appropriate. On the website you will find detailed, referenced articles to all aspects of medicine, health care, and their abuses.
Butterflies and Wheels. An interesting news service and paper-publisher about, broadly speaking, "intellectualism in public life". They are humourously condescending to postmodernists. In some ways the editorial policy is similar to an intellectual's Fark.com.
Social Justice Committee. Montreal based NGO that promotes social justice, human rights, etc. particularly in Central America and Mexico. At the time of writing, I am volunteering two or so days per week as both a computer support person and as someone working on science and technology policy.
Z Magazine. I routinely read the daily news articles on this site about social justice, huamn rights, public policy, world politics, etc. I don't always agree with the stances taken on science and technology, but the articles are often very interesting regardless.
Salon. General news magazine, though primarily with a US focus. I started reading it while living in Pittsburgh as one perspective on local (country) events. Their technology columns are usually refreshingly good compared to most of the mainstream press.
Democracy Now. News radioshow, available as an MP3 and in other electronic formats. Week-daily show with world news.