from a correspondent

This came from a U.K. acquaintance in a field other than philosophy, just a few hours ago:

“I’ve just seen this morning the news about Middlesex (your blog via Shaviro’s). I’m dumbfounded. Who has ever heard of Middlesex University apart from the philosophy department?”

That’s certainly how I first heard of Middlesex, but of course I’m in philosophy myself. But I suspect my correspondent is not the only person in a different discipline who learned of Middlesex that way as well.

Shock seems to be the theme. I’m still in shock myself.

Obviously, there are certain far-fetched cases where one could easily imagine a university needing to cut one of its premier programs. Let’s say you’re running a world-class university that has an outstanding medical school, and you run up against crippling financial obstacles that place the institution itself in peril. Well, medical schools are expensive, so maybe in that case you have to make a painful call and close yours permanently, despite all protests.

So I wouldn’t want to say that it’s never permissible, because in some cases institutional survival might actually be at stake. But nothing I’ve heard suggests that that is remotely the case here, nor does it seem like the program itself is a terrible drain on resources. And even if it were a bit of a drain, surely the name recognition provided to Middlesex by the program (see the comment above) would be worth a bit of expense.