3 Quarks Daily - Philosophy Blog Post Contest

3 Quarks Daily is conducting a philosophy blog posts contest. These are the steps.

1. Public nominations of particular blog posts.
2. Public voting of these nominations until the night of September 7th, whereby the top 20 will progress onto step 3.
3. The four main editors of 3 Quarks Daily will select 6 finalists from these 20 (with the possibility of adding up to three additional finalists from the remaining original 64 nominations).
4. Daniel Dennett will then read through these finalists and select the first, second, and third place articles, as well as providing some commentary on these three. (Contest information, included prizes, detailed here.)
   

I have nominated the article "Nietzsche's Causal Essentialism" from this blog. Currently, you can read all the nominated articles here. Then you can vote here. Leiter Reports has also provided a generous preliminary opinion here.

Nietzsche on the top-right, hoping that this Nietzsche related nomination will win.

September 22nd:
Dennett seems to be of the opinion that blogs are more likely to be locations for clear writing rather than sporadic, undeveloped thoughts. I'd categorize my entry particularly as a sporadic essay written specifically in the vein of responding to my reading of a particular article (and my essay would be easier to grasp had he read the original article). I'd expect streamlined blogs (those that are presented as self-contained news articles) to be written in the most ordinary language, but numerous philosophy blogs will expect a reader to have a background in the specific areas that that blog discusses. My candidate seems to have fallen into this specialized category and beyond the taste of Dennett, giving him the confidence to call himself an eccentric. Here are his remarks and the three winners.

September 11th:
This is extremely exciting. Having made the top six of the chosen finalists, the blog article will now be read by Daniel Dennett. Three wildcards have been added, and now, Nietzsche must compete against eight other articles in the finals. This is a true reward to have the article read by Dennett. Let's hope that the article makes top three so that we can get some feedback on the article itself - directly from him. Winners will be announced on September 22nd, 2009.

September 8th:
Thanks for your support and enthusiasm. I hope this reflects that the discussion has provided some fruitful insights and inspirations. Here is the list of the semifinalists where "Nietzsche's Causal Essentialism" finds itself in the first position! Let's hope we move onto the final round where Daniel Dennett will decide the winners. Finalists will be announced on September 11th, 2009.









Dennett did not deliver presents to Nietzsche and I this year.