DID THE INSTITUTE OF PHILOSOPHY COVER UP A FRAUDULENT PROFESSOR?

After the scandal at the beginning of this academic year in the faculty of Arts – a professor openly admitted plagiarism, but was only given a slap on the wrist – it seems K.U. Leuven still is not in the clear as it finds itself deeply involved in another controversy. In silence a renowned professor at the Institute of Philosophy suddenly and mysteriously disappeared for ‘personal reasons’. Naturally this sudden vanishing left the philosophy students with many question  marks. When The Voice heard about it, it dug into the story and came up with the following reconstruction of shocking events.

The academic year quietly began with the procession of the togati in late September and students started trickling into town. For the students of philosophy however, a sudden and unexpected change would take place. About two months into the semester they got the message that their professor, Martin Stone, would not return for the year. Another professor took over his classes, as it was announced that professor Stone had left for “personal reasons” and had “fallen ill”.

ESTEEMED & KNOWLEDGEABLE
Teaching courses such as ‘Renaissance Philosophy’, ‘Philosophy of Religion’ and ‘Philosophical Anthropology’ in Leuven, professor Stone was by no means a lightweight in the Philosphy Institute. Moreover, as head of the international programme, he travelled the world to establish ties with other  universities. Holding a BA degree in Classics and Philosophy from King’s College London and a MA degree in Philosophy from the University of Paris, he later spent some time at the University of Cambridge, finally finishing his studies with a Ph.D degree from the University of London.

In his function as the head of the international programme professor Stone used to welcome international philosophy students in Leuven, introducing the students to the Institute and giving them an idea of what they could expect. As returning part of this general speech he also used to warn students of the consequences of plagiarism. He made it very clear that it would be considered a crime that would under no circumstances be tolerated by the Institute.

An ex MA-student: “I took professor Stone’s class ‘Renaissance Philosophy’ when I was doing my MA. He appeared to me to be very knowledgeable. When I was new, at the beginning of the first semester, I attended a talk of his about doing research. He said something like ‘write everyday; work everyday;  writing a thesis requires a lot of work. It is possible that you do not exert any effort and still get employed by a university, but somebody will find out  eventually.’ When I first heard the rumours of him having committed plagiarism, I could not believe it.”

RUMOURS VS. FACTS

Rumours however did not die down easily, on the contrary: they became more and more persistent and even seemed to multiply. People said Stone  plagiarized other papers, some said 19, others were convinced that he plagiarized an astonishing number of 28 papers.  A prestigious Aquinas lecture he delivered would be a fraud too. Moreover he would according to others have taken literal citations from the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosphy and used  them for his own benefit in an article in the Cambridge Companion to Augustine. It was even alleged that he plagiarized his own colleague, professor Carlos Steel. Still, none of this is confirmed or to be taken for a fact. What is certain, however, is that even on other faculties, professors talk about it.

Also, the profile of professor Stone has been removed from the K.U.Leuven website and so are his publications on Lirias, the digital repository for research work at K.U.Leuven. It seems as if every trace of professor Stone had been intentionally erased. The question is: why?

SOME CONFIRMATION
With so many people being bothered by persisting rumours, the suspicious and all too efficient removal of all information concerning professor Stone’s existence at K.U Leuven clearly indicates that for whatever reason, the academic staff are trying to hush up the story. Still, The Voice thinks that where there
is smoke, there is fire and decided to further investigate the rumours. One rumour was that this story had appeared in the Finnish media. The Voice checked this and indeed found a small article in the online Finnish newspaper Demari.fi, published on the fifth of November 2009. It stated that professor Stone had plagiarized on the conclusions of the dissertation of the current Finnish social democratic party’s vice-president Ilkka Kantola. Kantola published his doctoral thesis “Probability and Moral Uncertainty in Late Medieval and Early Modern Times” in 1994. The plagiarism was brought to Kantola’s attention by an American researcher, who discovered Stone had borrowed information from several tens of pages of the key conclusions Kantola had drawn, without having asked permission and without reference to the original work...

UNFAIR SILENCE
While this of course does not confirm all the rumours that have been going around at the Institute of Philosophy, it nevertheless does prove that the Institute and the K.U.Leuven together intentionally kept silent relevant information on the functioning of a highly-esteemed member of the academic staff. Though protecting the professor and the reputation of the Institute can be seen as an act of nobility, it is unfair towards the students – as they have the right to know what is going on. Apart from that, it becomes clear once more that the university uses different standards when it comes down to deciding on cases of sentencing plagiarism committed by either students or professors. Also ex-students who were supervised by professor Stone and especially the ones who earned their PhD under his guidance may have been treated unjustly by covering up info of this matter and size.

It would be good if the Institute would open up on what really happened, especially since some months after the actual events rumours have still not died down and alleged plagiarism has been proven. By being honest the Institute could even regain some of the credibility it lost hiding crucial information from its students. On top of that, as an Institute that is highly concerned about ethics, it should realize that when one does something wrong and is caught, one will have to suffer unwanted attention and humiliation. The least the Institute and professor Stone can do is to publicly apologize for the mistakes they made.

REACTION
Asked for a reaction, the dean of the Hoger Instituut voor Wijsbegeerte, the Higher Institute of Philosophy, Mister Toon Vandevelde, answered this:
“As demanded by the regulations of the KU Leuven, the charge of plagiarism was, as soon as we took notice of it, passed on to the Commission of Scientific Integrity of this university. Prof. Marijnen, vice-rector on research is responsible for the communication about this case.” (…) “Professor Martin Stone has resigned last year from his duties at KU Leuven. These are the facts as we see them. The Higher Institute of Philosophy has no special version of those facts. We are sure that in this particular issue, nothing can be blamed on us.” |