Oi! Ref!

Another year, another plethora of referees to thank! The BJPS continues to go from strength to strength, and while our authors can bask in the limelight, as editors we get to see behind the scenes, to all the hard work done by the referees in taking strong drafts and turning them into shiny, publishable gems. As the list of names below makes clear, the number of people it takes to make a journal work is not small, and that’s before we include all the editors and the team at OUP. What’s more, this list isn’t nearly complete—not everyone consented to be named—and there are more than a few (heroic!) people listed who have written a number of reports for us throughout the year. We are incredibly grateful for all of he considered, thoughtful reports we received throughout the year from these referees—they certainly make our job as editors easier!

Popper Prize 2015

The Editors of the BJPS are delighted to announce that the winner of the 2015 Popper Prize is Matthew Slater for his BJPS paper, ‘Natural Kindness’.

It’s Hard Being Popular…

Due to the very welcome fact of the BJPS’s ever increasing popularity, we’ve been forced to make some tough decisions. All print journals work with tight page budgets, which in our case has been fixed by joint agreement between the BSPS and our publishers, OUP. The upshot of this is that it’s often impossible to publish everything we would like to. Competition for space has always been fierce in the BJPS and, as the last few years have seen a 50% increase in submissions to the Journal, things have become that much tougher.

Triple-Masked Peer Review Is GO!

We are very pleased to announce that the British Journal for the Philosophy of Science has adopted a triple-masked system for peer review, whereby neither the referees nor the editors […]

Envoi | Marc Lange

I am honored to have been an Associate Editor of BJPS. I thought of my role not so much as a gatekeeper, but more as a teacher. My aim was […]

All Is Change

There have been some changes in our editorial make up over the last couple of months. First, the sad news. Michael Wheeler and Marc Lange have both stepped down from their roles as Associate Editors for various reasons, including the pressure of other responsibilities. Both have been with this editorial team from the word go and have put a lot of time and energy into supporting the journal. We’d like to thank them both for all their support, and for their careful and thorough reports that helped not just us but also many authors.On a happier note, we have two new additions to the team: Alyssa Ney and Lara Buchak! We are delighted to have both on board.

Acknowledgements

The lone philosopher, working in a dingy attic by the scrap end of a guttering candle might have some cultural purchase, and certainly the working conditions might sometimes be a little Dickensian, but what’s apparent from working behind the curtains at the BJPS is that good philosophy is not the result of the heroic efforts of single individuals. We are lucky enough here to receive submissions from the best and brightest in our field, but the distance between that first submission and the finished product should not be underestimated. That gap is bridged by the time, hard work, and thoughtfulness of our referees, in conversation with our authors. For myself, I have learnt more about how to do philosophy in reading the back-and-forth between author and referee than I could ever have imagined, and it has been a huge privilege to be able to eavesdrop on these conversations.

The Sir Karl Popper Prize for 2014

The decision of the Co-Editors of the British Journal for the Philosophy of Science is that the Sir Karl Popper Prize for 2014 should be awarded to Rachael L. Brown for her paper ‘What Evolvability Really Is’ (Br J Philos Sci [2014], 65, pp. 549-72).

Weekend Reading

If our new virtual issue on the philosophy of psychology and cognitive science wasn’t enough to keep you busy, here are more new things for your reading pleasure.