Calendar of Events

Monday, February 27, 2012
Charlotte Witt
Professor of Philosophy and Humanities, University of New HampshireCharlotte Witt
“Gender Essentialism: Identity or Classification?"

This talk is co-sponsored by the Philosophy Department and the Gender for Women's Studies Program

Join us for this talk
Kanbar 107 at 4:00 p.m.
All are welcome.

 

 

Tuesday, October 25, 2011
Elliott Sober
Hans Reichenbach Professor and William Vilas Research Professor in the Department of Philosophy, University of WisconsinElliott Sober
“Instrumentalism -- can a false scientific theory be more predictively accurate than a true one?"

It is conventional wisdom to think that the goal of model-building in science is to find models of natural phenomena that are (1) true and (2) observationally testable. In this talk, I'll give a sympathetic presentation of an alternative each.  Instrumentalism maintains that the goal of modeling is predictive accuracy, not truth.  And there is also the idea that some models in science are a priori mathematical truths.

Join us for this talk
Kanbar 109 (The Hazleton Room) 4:00 p.m.
All are welcome.

Event Poster

Previous Events

Monday, November 9th, 2009
Jonathan M. Fischer
Professor of Philosophy at the University of California, Riverside
Stories and the Meaning of Life
Professor Fischer's main research interests lie in free will, moral responsibility, and both metaphysical and ethical issues pertaining to life and death.

Jonathan M. FischerHe is the author of The Metaphysics of Free Will: An Essay on Control; with Mark Ravizza, Responsibility and Control: A Theory of Moral Responsibility; and My Way: Essays on Moral Responsibility.

His recent work includes a contribution to Four Views on Free Will (in Blackwell’s Great Debates in Philosophy series) and his latest collection of essays (Our Stories: Essays on Life, Death, and Free Will) is now out with Oxford University Press.

Kanbar 107
All are welcome.

philosopher Simon BlackburnTuesday, April 15th, 2008
Simon Blackburn, Professor of Philosophy at Cambridge University
Professor Blackburn will be giving a lecture titled “Who’s Afraid of Big Bad Nietzsche.”
The event will be held in Kanbar 107 at 4:30pm.

Omnipotence and the Conflict of Wills
James Baillie, Professor of Philosophy, University of Portland, will be giving a talk on omnipotence and the nature of God.  What is omnipotence?  Can there be more than one God? 

Tuesday, February 26, 2008
4:30 PM  
Kanbar 107

Induction and Altruism
A lecture by Don Garrett, Professor of Philosophy, New York University
In science and ordinary life we often reason and believe inductively – that is, we presume that unobserved things and events will resemble observed ones.  In morality and ordinary life, we often reason and act altruistically, presuming that others matter as much as ourselves.  Professor Garrett will discuss how these two presumptions are related and whether we can justify them.

Tuesday, November 27th
4:30 PM
Kanbar 107

Event poster (PDF).

Religious vs. Secular Approaches to Ethics
A lecture by Michael Smith, Professor of Philosophy, Princeton University
Author of The Moral Problem (Blackwell, 1994), for which he was awarded the American Philosophical Association Book Prize 1994-6; Ethics and the A Priori: Selected Essays on Moral Psychology and Meta-Ethics (CUP, 2004); and co-author of Mind, Morality and Explanation: Selected Collaborations (OUP, 2004)

Event poster (PDF).

What Is and Is Not Wrong with Enhancement of Human Capacities

A lecture by Frances Kamm, Littauer Professor of Philosophy and Public Policy, Harvard University.
Professor Kamm is the author of:

  • Creation and Abortion
  • Morality, Mortality, Vol. 1: Death and Whom to Save From It
  • Morality, Mortality Vol. 2: Rights, Duties, and Status

Event poster (PDF).

War, Terrorism, and the “War on Terror”
A lecture by Jeff McMahan, Professor of Philosophy at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey. He is the author of The Ethics of Killing: Problems at the Margin of Life (Oxford University Press, 2002) and is currently working on the second volume titled Self-Defense, War, and Punishment. This lecture was recently given as an Oxford Amnesty Lecture.

Event poster (PDF).