A new Hillsdale College professor says he wants to talk philosophy with you.
“He said that he was really good at recruiting students, which was part of his selling point to us,” said Thomas Burke, humanities dean and religion and philosophy chairman. “With his bright and energetic personality, I’m sure it will be the case.”
With the addition of Assistant Professor of Philosophy Blake McAllister, Hillsdale’s department of philosophy expands its faculty to five to accommodate the philosophy course requirement in the new core curriculum. For McAllister, it was the pursuit of truth, which defines Hillsdale’s educational mission, that attracted him from the South to the Midwest.
“I view my role as a professor as one trying to instill in my students a commitment to seek out and to submit to truth,” McAllister said. “And while they might use different language to express it, I think Hillsdale believes the same thing.”
McAllister trained in analytic philosophy at Baylor University in Texas from where he graduated in the spring. Burke said the philosophy department was seeking a candidate with this specialty. Analytic philosophy is one of the two main streams of contemporary academic philosophy and is particularly concerned with language, epistemology, and formal logic.
“Dr. McAllister’s qualifications fit perfectly for our department and Hillsdale College as a whole,” Burke said. “We were looking for someone in the analytic tradition, who has an expertise in epistemology and philosophy of religion because a lot of Hillsdale students are religious, and there’s a tremendous amount of work being done in the field of analytic philosophy and the philosophy of religion.”
In his initial interview with Burke, McAllister highlighted his enthusiasm for drawing others into the study of philosophy, citing past success at Pepperdine University, where he recruited many fellow undergraduates to the major.
Freshman Callaghan Huntington said she already feels the pull of philosophy in McAllister’s introductory course.
“I came to Hillsdale hoping it would be a 2.0 version of my high school, and that’s why when I walked into Dr. McAllister’s first day of class, I was really excited when he said that participation is critical for learning philosophy,” Callaghan said. “At my high school, our fundamental idea is that we are a community of learners, and Dr. McAllister really does seem to uphold the idea of a community of learners.”
Will Huntington consider the philosophy major?
“Oh gosh yes,” she said. “Every class I walk into, I think to myself, ‘I could do this.’”
McAllister’s own journey to philosophy was unorthodox, as he began in engineering, switched to law, and finally pursued philosophy for its own sake at Pepperdine and then Baylor’s doctorate program.
“The more I did philosophy, the more I loved it,” McAllister said. “I saw what Plato was trying to do in the ‘Dialogues’ as what my professors were trying to do to me — to seek out and submit to truth. It convinced me that, as a professor, I’d be rendering a valuable service to society and the kingdom.”
Outside of philosophizing with students in the classroom, McAllister said he loves walking his dog, Reid, named after 18th century Scottish philosopher Thomas Reid.
“I wake up giddy every morning feeling very lucky that I get to be one of those people who are in a profession that combines service with my own interests,” McAllister said. “Hillsdale students have surprised me with an unparalleled thirst for knowledge and philosophy is uniquely situated to develop the habits of the mind that we so value here.”
