Richard Zach

Canadian PhD programs in the 2006-08 PGR

table.lines td { vertical-align: top; border: 1px dashed gray; empty-cells: show; padding: 2pxWith the kind permission of Brian Leiter, here’s a breakout of the Canadian philosophy departments by specialty according to the Philosophical Gourmet Report 2006-08. The same programs are ranked in 2006-08 as in the 2004-06 edition. This year, only the rank ordering of the top four departments was given in the PGR. As two years ago, I’m providing the the rank ordering based on both the entire survey responses and the responses from Canadian evaluators (with mean scores in parentheses). The numbers following the specialties are: the peer group the program falls in and the rounded mean/median score. The “Notable” category (median of 3.0) is no longer included in the PGR (according to Brian Leiter, merely for reasons of time). See the overall rankings and the specialty rankings from the PGR for explanations.

PS: Because Canadian students wanting to study at a Canadian school don’t exactly have many options for any given specialty, you might consider consulting last year’s rankings as well. That still gives the “notable” category for the various specialties (ie, median scores of 3.0 that just barely didn’t make the official rankings).

Program Ranked Specialties
University of Toronto
Overall rank: 1 (3.7)
Canada rank: 1 (4.1) 		Philosophy of Language (4/24-36, 3/3)
Philosophy of Mind (3/13-25, 3.5/3.5)
Metaphysics (5/25-36, 3.0/3.0)
Philosophical Logic (3/13-21, 3.5/4)
Normative Ethics and Moral Psychology (3/6-12, 4.0/4)
Political Philosophy (2/4-13, 4.0/4)
Philosophy of Law (2/3-11, 4.0/4)
Applied Ethics (2/7-18, 3.5/3.5)
Philosophy of Science (4/13-29, 3.5/3.5)
Philosophy of Biology (3/8-16, 3.5/3)
Philosophy of Cognitive Science (4/12-27, 3.0/3.5)
Philosophy of Social Science (4/16-34, 3.0/3.25)
Philosophy of Mathematics (4/13-22, 3.5/3.5)
Mathematical Logic (3/10-19, 3.5/3.5)
Ancient Philosophy (2/2-4, 4.5/4.5)
Medieval Philosophy (1/1-3, 5.0/5.0)
Early Modern: 17th C (2/2-11, 4.0/4.0)
Early Modern: 18th C (1/1-7, 4.0/4.0)
Kant and German Idealism (4/9-18, 3.5/3.5)
19th C Continental Philosophy after Hegel (4/18-27, 3.0/3.25)
American Pragmatism (1/1-3, 4.0/4.0)
20th Century Continental (4/17-33, 3.0/3.5)
Feminist Philosophy (2/3-13, 4.0/4.0)
University of Western Ontario
Overall rank: 2 (2.7)
Canada rank: 2 (3.1) 		Philosophy of Language (4/24-36, 3/3)
Applied Ethics (3/19-42, 3.0/3.25)
Philosophy of Science (3/4-12, 4.0/4)
Philosophy of Physics (3/4-10, 4.0/4.0)
Philosophy of Social Science (3/7-15, 3.5/3.75)
Decision, Rational Choice, and Game Theory (5/10-19, 3.0/3.0)
Philosophy of Mathematics (4/13-22, 3.5/3.5)
Mathematical Logic (4/20-24, 3.0/3.0)
Medieval Philosophy (5/15-25, 3.0/3.5)
Early Modern: 17th C (3/12-33, 3.5/4)
Early Modern: 18th C (2/8-14, 3.5/4.0)
Feminist Philosophy (4/23-27, 3.0/3.0)
McGill University
Overall rank: 3 (2.4)
Canada rank: 3 (2.8) 		Philosophy of Art (3/7-13, 4.0/4.25)
Philosophy of Mathematics (5/23-32, 3.0/3.75)
Ancient Philosophy (5/13-21, 3.0/3.0)
Medieval Philosophy (5/15-25, 3.0/3.25)
Early Modern: 17th C (3/12-33, 3.5/3.5)
Early Modern: 18th C (3/15-39, 3.0/3.0)
Kant and German Idealism (5/19-32, 3.0/3.5)
University of British
Columbia
Overall rank: 4 (2.2)
Canada rank: 4 (2.6) 		Philosophy of Art (4/14-21, 3.5/4)
Philosophy of Science (4/13-29, 3.5/3.5)
Philosophy of Biology (3/8-16, 3.5/3.5)
Philosophy of Social Science (4/16-34, 3.0/3.0)
History of Analytic Philosophy (4/18-37, 3.0/3.25)
University of Alberta
Overall rank: 5 (2.1)
Canada rank: 4 (2.6) 		Philosophy of Art (5/22-28, 3.0/2.75)
Feminist Philosophy (2/3-13, 4.0/4.0)
Queen’s
University
Overall rank: 6 (2.0)
Canada rank: 6 (2.5) 		Political Philosophy (3/14-27, 3.5/3.75)
Applied Ethics (3/19-42, 3.0/3.25)
Feminist Philosophy (2/3-13, 4.0/4.0)
Simon Fraser University
Overall rank: 6 (2.0)
Canada rank: 7 (2.4) 		Philosophical Logic (4/22-36, 3.0/3)
University of Calgary
Overall rank: 6 (2.0)
Canada rank: 7 (2.4) 		Philosophical Logic (4/22-36, 3.0/3)
Philosophy of Action (incl. Free Will) (4/13-19, 3.0/3)
Philosophy of Biology (4/17-23, 3.0/3.0)
York University
Overall rank: 9 (1.8)
Canada rank: 10 (1.9) 		Philosophy of Law (4/21-33, 3.0/3)
American Pragmatism (3/7-10, 3.0/2.75)
Tri-University (Guelph, McMaster, Laurier)
Overall rank: 9 (1.8)
Canada rank: 9 (2.1) 		Philosophy of Law (4/21-33, 3.0/3)
Early Modern: 18th C (3/15-39, 3.0/3.0)
History of Analytic Philosophy (incl. Wittgenstein) (4/18-36, 3.0/3.0)
University of Waterloo
Overall rank: 11 (1.7)
Canada Rank: 10 (1.9)

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8 responses to “Canadian PhD programs in the 2006-08 PGR”

  1. Anonymous

    Did UBC really not rank at all in History of Analytic Philosophy? If so that’s surprising since Alan Richardson is there and quite good. Posted by Matt

    Reply
  2. Anonymous

    No, UBC isn’t in the list, nor are Carnegie Mellon, Arizona State, or McGill. UBC did rank last time, and Alberta, McGill, and Calgary got “notable”s. Posted by Richard Zach

    Reply
  3. Anonymous

    McGill is in Group 3 in Philosophy of Art. Now I’m worried that other things are missing, too. Posted by Ben Caplan

    Reply
  4. Anonymous

    Thanks for putting this up. I think its striking that no Canadian University has any ranking in Epistemology. Anyone have any theories on why this is so? Is Epistemology just neglected by chance/historical accident? or is there some reason? (UBC, for example, just lost its epistemologist). I’d also have thought that Alberta (with Adam Morton) might get a mention in epistemology, but I guess Adam does too many other things to be considered primarily an epistemologist… Posted by Chris Stephens

    Reply
  5. Anonymous

    Thanks, Ben, for finding this. I added Phil of Art for McGill. I hope that’s the only omission. JC Beall also pointed out to me that I incorrectly listed the specialty “Philosophical Logic” as “Philosophy of Logic”; that’s corrected as well. Posted by Richard Zach

    Reply
  6. Anonymous

    Glad you posted this summary. Three things that no doubt others will notice and perhaps have views on, one generic the others more specific to Canadian philosophy: (i) department size plays a large role in ranking judgments, most obviously in the number of specialty judgments associated each department; (ii) since the vast majority of reviewers are US based, there is a marked difference between overall and local means for non-US programs; I tend to think that the local means provide a more reliable guide to within-region rankings (for all three non-US regions, in fact); (iii) it’s kind of surprising that despite having around 50 and 30 faculty members, and 23 and 12 ranked specializations, the overall ratings of Toronto and Western are not all that much higher than the next cluster of Canadian universities. Posted by rob wilson

    Reply
  7. Anonymous

    I just double-checked on UBC, since that omission struck me as suspicious, and this appears to have been a transcription error: in fact, UBC did rank in History of Analytic, and I’ll get this corrected. Thanks. Posted by Brian Leiter

    Reply
  8. Anonymous

    History of Analytic added to UBC as per BL’s comment. Posted by Richard Zach

    Reply

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