The UTM Philosophy Academic Society (PAS) is a group of philosophy undergraduates with a mandate to represent philosophy students at UTM, and organize a variety of entertaining and instructive events throughout the year, including special lectures, membership meetings, movie nights, and more. Come join our ever-expanding community on our Discord server! We’d love to see you!
The PAS office is located in Maanjiwe nendamowinan room 6156.
Discord: https://discord.gg/8GexaFSSRk
Email: philosophy@utmsu.ca
Instagram: @utm_philosophy
Facebook: facebook.com/utmphilosophysociety
UTM PAS Executive 2020-2021
President: Alex de Guzman
My name is Alex de Guzman, and I am honoured to serve as President of the Philosophy Academic Society this year. I am a fourth-year philosophy specialist student, where my main areas of interest are moral philosophy, aesthetics, and ludology. Currently, I am specifically interested in the ways boredom and attention shape aesthetic experience, and what an analysis of these concepts may reveal about our increasingly more virtual and technology-immersed lives.
Now more than ever, the vitalness of community, specifically for us students, has been made profoundly apparent to me. Above all, what is most important to me is that the Philosophy Academic Society fosters a flourishing philosophical community at UTM which students may call their home to discuss ideas, meet new friends, and find invaluable support for all philosophical pursuits.
“True heroism is a priori incompatible with audience or applause or even the bare notice of the common run of man.” – David Foster Wallace, The Pale King
Vice President: Daniel Mampilly
Hello everyone! My name is Daniel Mampilly and I am deeply grateful for the opportunity to serve as Vice-President for PAS in the 2021-2022 academic year! I am a second-year student dabbling in an English Specialist alongside a Philosophy Major and a Creative Writing Minor. Like many others, my love for philosophy emerged from a feverish hobby of reading books (Shout-out to my high school library that had some eye-opening philosophy books!) I’ve explored the philosophy of religion quite deeply and, as I finish university, I hope to better understand the intimate connection between language and philosophy. Specifically, I wonder about the stretching of literary interpretation in the imagination and “How much of a ‘stretch’ is too much?”
My philosophy quote for this year is Socrates’: “The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing”. I have also felt out of place. Do I need to be a philosopher to have this position? Is a second-year student who just started to take off his shackles in the darkness of Plato’s cave someone who leads a philosophy society at a university? And in my desperate searching for these answers, I have realized that even the prisoner who is in the process of removing his shackles is a philosopher. After all, the philosopher is one who loves wisdom- not particularly one who is wise, or is knowledgeable, or old with several gray hairs.
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