lukeprog: Robert,Do you need to have a university library ID to use ‘mylibrary’, or can you do it from any machine on campus?  (Quote)

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&as_q=nagel+&as_epq=secular+philosophy&as_oq=&as_eq=&num=10&lr=&as_filetype=&ft=i&as_sitesearch=edu&as_qdr=all&as_rights=&as_occt=any&cr=&as_nlo=&as_nhi=&safe=off

Constantly on the hunt for quality scholarship on Nietzsche, I regularly find drafts using Google Advanced Search and restriction of domain to edu (and, sometimes, even restricting format to pdf). I’m also finding that PhilPapers is doing a nice job of absorbing a lot of material philosophers are making available from their home pages.

http://philpapers.org/recent?dg=10365tMB5qAj31rVnoGr9FMTD4oMFvm9p4jFxn5aa19dt8KWGodBf3499Cm4Trek&format=rss&in_a=on&in_b=on&in_j=on&in_l=on&in_w=on&jlist=all&latest=1&nosh=1&onlineOnly=on&proOnly=on&tz_offset=-240

lukeprog: Robert,Do you need to have a university library ID to use ‘mylibrary’, or can you do it from any machine on campus?  

I believe that at our campus library, at least, there are several computers that you don’t need to have an ID to use and then you can download it from one of those.

lukeprog: Thanks, Matt.Which are the other university courses on atheism that you know of?  

Cornell had one for a few years, but I hear the instructor retired.

There was a seminar a few years ago at U. Michigan, but I don’t know if it was comparable to a full semester course, and I don’t know if it’s still taught.

U. Chicago had a course, but that was way back in 2004, and one of the instructors, Sean Carroll, has moved since.

The New Atheism seminar at St. Louis U. (a Jesuit university, so I don’t know the approach taken) looks to be current.

Atheism can be mentioned in comparative religion courses, but it is rare that it gets the focus of a full course by itself.

Do you need to have a university library ID to use ‘mylibrary’, or can you do it from any machine on campus?

Which are the other university courses on atheism that you know of?

Photocopying: Very often it’s much faster and cheaper to digitally photograph pages than to photocopy them. I’m surprised how few people have caught on to this – even with a mediocre camera and mediocre camera skills this is easy and practical. Sometimes a librarian will give you a funny look but this is usually not forbidden (and is unobtrusive enough that you can often do it without anyone noticing).

Google Books: If you’re located outside the US you’ll have access to significantly less material on Google Books. But going through a suitable proxy server gives you the American IP you need to get to the full goods. The proxy server I currently use is http://www.proxican.com/ but proxies typically have a very short lifespan so you’ll need to switch every few months. Proxies are also potentially useful for limited preview and such but I don’t have personal experience with that. I hear they’re also great for trolling atheist blogs.

Amazon: Amazon gives you a limited preview of books if you have purchased something from them. Sometimes a useful complement to Google Books.

Friend: Sometimes this is just invaluable. I have physical access to the best libraries in my field and my friends often benefit from that. I don’t mind photographing an obscure article every now and then – usually the stuff my friends are interested in is interesting to me too.