Why do so many Anglo-American philosophy departments still prefer to teach ideas that depend on symbolic logic? Or in another light, why is so much contemporary philosophy in America still dedicated to analysis and ideals of "clarity" that depend on "higher order" languages?

I have heard that undergraduate philosophy majors are some of the most imbalanced university programs when it comes to gender, being a bastion of male enrollment even though most universities now have more women than men, and other traditionally male fields are seeing near-equal enrollement, and even female majorities. First off, is it true that a disproportionate majority of undergraduate philosophy majors are men? Where might I find such figures? And second and more interestingly, if this is the case, why do you think things have turned out this way?

Many philosophers who specialise in religion are atheists. How can they speak about the fundamentals of a religion without believing in those fundamentals? Won't this inevitable lead to condescension?

I presently working through Grayling's Introduction to Philosophical Logic (Blackwell), after studying philosophy at university in the late 1960s. Can anyone recommend a follow-on text (for when I feel I have assimilated this book)? (I have seen the interesting replies to the August post about further reading on symbolic logic.) Peter

What can make a philosophical theory "trivial"? Is triviality different from circularity?

Are there any academic papers that you would recommend to a student of philosophy, regardless of subject area being studied, as valuable foundational reading?

In response to a recent question about philosophy (http://www.askphilosophers.org/question/3529/), Oliver Leaman made the claim that, "there are no facts in philosophy." Briefly reviewing the definition of "fact" I see "something that actually exists; reality; truth." Can it really be that there is no truth in philosophy? It seems like the respondent has made an assumption that it very broad, fundamental, and contestable.

I am a philosophy student in my second year and was disturbed by a conversation in my "philosophy of mind" course. The students were bashing philosophy as a discipline: "a fun waste of time", "sitting and thinking" for a living rather than finding a real job, etc. I'm sure you get the picture. I was discouraged by this. rather than being surrounded by others with a deep passion for philosophy, i am surrounded by shallow thinkers. My question is, how should one go about handling criticisms of this kind, both internally, as well as in social situations as mentioned above? it seems useless to defend myself to those who hold such opinions, but that doesn't mean i want the majority (and it really is most people i meet) to be holding on to those negative stereotypes. How often do you find yourself in these kinds of situations?

Do philosophers ever completely agree and should they?

Is there a point at which a person can rightly dismiss a philosophical statement or even an entire philosophical system because it originated with a person of dubious character or intent, but (here's the catch) without committing the ad hominem fallacy in doing so? I am thinking of extreme examples, such as (alleged) philosophical systems created by, say, New Age healers, cult leaders, etc. Or, conversely, would it be necessary even in these extremely examples to address only the philosophical claims made by these movements -- one by one -- instead of addressing the character of the founders themselves in order to avoid the ad hominem?