Viva Las Vegas

I was at this conference (in 2000 or 2001), and had the same amused & bemused reaction as Doug:

"American scholars and philosophers are strange and culturally estranged. One need only attend a few philosophy conferences to experience this. But I don’t intend this claim pejoratively—our minds run in different grooves and highways, and that is a good thing. My most memorable picture of this estrangement came when a group of American philosophers, in full tweed, met for a conference in the Tropicana Hotel in Las Vegas. The juxtaposition of slot machines and craps tables with staid discussions of Dewey’s virtue ethics was, in an odd and striking way, a kind of American beauty in itself, at once funny and deadly serious." Philosophy Americana: Making Philosophy at Home in American Culture (American Philosophy Book 18)" by Douglas R. Anderson: https://a.co/gKvNUa8