Scriptorium Philosophia Substack (March 25, 2025)

Writing under the playful pseudonym Hilarius Bookbinder, Substack author of Scriptorium Philosophia declares his concern for the continued decline of academic performance among undergraduates.

Hilarius identifies himself as a 30-year veteran faculty and full professor at a regional public university. With typical students and ordinary faculty, Hilarius provides a charitable but deeply disturbing picture of today’s college co-eds, including chronic absenteeism, inattentiveness (read distractedness), and a poor academic work ethic.

In the end, Hilarius blames the phones (and related technology) that have overrun these students’ conscious lives, as well as the institutional unwillingness to alter the status quo.

[Read the original article here.]

Note: since the original article came out last month, Hilarius has been quoted in the Wall Street Journal, restacked 1100 times, and read by more than 300k people, generating quite a stir of comments. Just last week, Hilarius provided some follow up comments here, as well.