I just got off the phone with an admitted student choosing between Stanford and Brown who wanted the inside story on what the Symbolic Systems program is like. I told her the program was just about perfect for me, because it gives you so many different perspectives on the kind of questions I think are interesting: what is meaning and how might it work, or what makes something a mind? Intellectually, this is fantastically exciting stuff.
It was funny how poorly the metrics she was asking about tracked my preferences. She was worried about classes being large, impersonal lectures, which I love if the professor is a good speaker. Some of my favorite classes have been big lectures, because they were taught by people like John Perry or Eric Roberts. Can you go get to to know the professor during office hours? Certainly, but for some reason once you're there it doesn't seem all that important.
Finally, she asked what I thought of Brown, to try to get a feel for its reputation. You know, like on the streets. I danced around the point, carefully avoiding using the word "nonserious." She'd said word on the street back East was that Stanford kids weren't all that intellectual outside of class. That's about right, too. I had no idea cross-country rumors could be so accurate. More disturbing, though, was the idea that there are places where college kids actually DO sit around having midnight discussion about Aristotle. Does nobody think of the children?
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