Babel and the Ivory Tower: The Scholar in the Age of Science

Alan Belk, Ph.D., is a sessional instructor in the Philosophy Department
at the University of Guelph.

In Babel and the Ivory Tower, W. David Shaw attempts to address the
question of whether scholarship is still viable in the modern university
or if it has been destroyed by professionalization (accounting,
business, computing, dentistry, engineering, etc.) and science. There is
an empirical component to this issue. Shaw eschews empiricism and often
uses a single example to support some universal claim. Example: Karl
Popper, the great falsificationist, became incensed when his ideas were
challenged; this shows that “often, [scholars] are more likely to pay
homage to qualities they lack.” As Aristotle said, one swallow does
not make a spring (Nicomachean Ethics 1098a, 20). We need more examples
and more empirical data to support this and many similar claims.

A book written by a scholar is not necessarily a scholarly book. Other
than showing that he can string together quotations from various
authors, Shaw demonstrates little of what I consider to be scholarship
(he does not adequately address just what does constitute scholarship).

To produce this book Shaw was awarded two Senior Research Fellowships
from the Killam Foundation, a Connaught Research Fellowship from the
University of Toronto, and a three-year research grant from the SSHRC.
Go figure.