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DateNameRoomInstitutionWebsiteTitleAbstractRestaurantEmailNotesEventID
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Anytime 2024Note: Hold for Miriam Ronzoni
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Feb-08Sina FazelpourRSSS 1.28Northeastern UniversityA Diversity of Human Factors in the Lifecycle of AI SystemsThere has been a surge of recent interest in systematically incorporating considerations of participation and diversity in the design and evaluation of AI/ML systems. Currently, however, there is a gap between discussions of measures and benefits of diversity in AI research, on the one hand, and the broader research on the underlying concepts of diversity and the precise mechanisms of its functional benefits, on the other. This gap is problematic because diversity is not a monolithic concept. Rather, different concepts of diversity are based on distinct rationales that should inform how we measure diversity in a given context. Similarly, the lack of specificity about the precise mechanisms underpinning diversity's potential benefits can result in uninformative generalities, invalid experimental designs, and illicit interpretations of findings. To address these challenges, in this talk, I draw on research in philosophy, psychology, and social and organizational sciences to make three contributions: First, I introduce a taxonomy of different diversity concepts from philosophy of science, and explicate the distinct epistemic and political rationales underlying these concepts. Second, I provide an overview of mechanisms by which diversity can benefit group performance. Third, I situate these taxonomies—of concepts and mechanisms—in the lifecycle of supervise ML (SML) systems and make a case for their usefulness in responsible AI/ML. I do so by illustrating how they clarify the discourse around diversity in the context of ML systems, promote the formulation of more precise research questions about diversity's impact, and provide conceptual tools to further advance research and practice. I end this talk by discussing some of our ongoing projects in this space that focus on human-AI collaboration and the evaluation generative AI systems.
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Feb-15Dept. Interviews
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Feb-22Dept. Interviews
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Feb-29Velislava MitovaRSSS 1.28University of JohannesburgSocial group moral encroachmentAccording to moral encroachers, the moral stakes of a belief partly determine how much evidence we need for the belief to count as knowledge. This view concerns the beliefs of individual believers. In this talk, I argue for a social group version of moral encroachment: dominant groups, such as white people or men, need to have more evidence than the marginalised in order for some of their beliefs to constitute knowledge. I argue for this claim in four steps­. First, I spell out the group moral stakes involved­—the harms dominant knowers cause the marginalised and the knowledge economy. Second, I defend the idea that social groups can have beliefs. Third, I show off the theoretical benefits of having the notion of social group moral encroachment at our disposal: it can be an invaluable tool for decolonial and feminist epistemologists if they want to avoid the relativistic ring to their views (a ring that tends to put off many well-wishers). Finally, I start on a positive account of social group moral encroachment by addressing a potential puzzle.
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Mar-07Laura Schroeter RSSS 1.28University of MelbourneConcepts as Regulative IdealsWhat is it to share the same concept? The question is an important one since sharing the same concept explains our ability to non accidentally coordinate on the same topic over time and between individuals. Moreover, concept identity grounds key logical relations among thought contents such as samesaying, contradiction, validity, and entailment. Finally, an account of concept identity is crucial to explaining and justifying epistemic efforts to better understand the precise contents of our thoughts. The key question, then, is what psychological and social facts could play these roles? Elsewhere, we have argued for a specific relational model of concept identity, the connectedness model (e.g. Schroeter 2012, Schroeter and Schroeter 2014, 2015). Our aim in this paper is to further explain the motivations behind that account, to address worries about transitivity and vagueness, and to contrast our approach with closely related accounts of concept identity developed by François Recanati and Simon Prosser. What’s distinctive of our approach is that we seek to vindicate the first-person epistemic perspective of concept users. Concepts, on our account, play a crucial normative role in setting regulative ideals for the representational practices in which individual subjects participate. This focus on the normative role of concepts – as opposed to a purely causal explanatory role –motivates our approach to concept identity and our toleration of vagueness and borderline cases.
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Mar-14Emanuel ViehbahnRSSS 1.28
Freie Universität Berlin
Is lying morally wrong?While few hold that lying is always morally wrong all things considered, many take lying to be pro tanto (or prima facie) morally wrong. This talk will explore whether the view that lying is pro tanto morally wrong can be grounded in features essential to lying. The talk will focus on two features commonly thought to be essential to lying: deceptive intent and assertoric responsibility. Taking into account recent work on the nature of lying and assertion, I will argue that there are cases in which neither deceptive intent nor assertoric responsibility can ground the pro tanto moral wrongness of lying.
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Mar-21Michelle LiuRSSS 1.28
Monash University
Mental Simulation and Language ComprehensionAccording to the simulation view, language comprehension often constitutively involves perceptual-motor simulations. In this talk, I will survey the empirical evidence for the simulation view. Drawing on recent work on semantic representation, I make suggestions as to how the simulation view can be reconciled with the traditional view on which language comprehension constitutively involves amodal symbol manipulation, elaborating on when perceptual-motor simulations may be deployed for language comprehension. I shall also illustrate how the simulation view can illuminate a particular puzzling behaviour of polysemous words. I end the talk by noting how perceptual-motor simulations can have a significant impact on language users through different forms of language.
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Mar-28Ines HipolitoRSSS 1.28Macquarie UniversityCognition on the Edge: The Free Energy PrincipleCognition stands as one of the most formidable challenges in scientific inquiry. Living organisms exhibit behaviour teetering on the precipice of chaos. The Free Energy Principle (FEP) has been proposed as a pertinent approach to apprehending cognition. Conventional discourse on the FEP characterises the brain as a predictive apparatus. Instead, I posit that while predictive coding is a valuable tool for deciphering the conduct of complex systems, living systems do not function as detached computational prognosticators. Given their dual status as operationally closed and open systems, they exist in a state of delicacy, fostering an unbroken and pivotal interplay with their surroundings. This state of affairs, amenable to scientific explication through the FEP, provides a nuanced understanding of cognition within living systems.Mike is away on this date, Sean will convene
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Apr-04Neri MarsiliRSSS 1.28UNED MadridAssertion Without its Constitutive NormThere is philosophical disagreement about which norm regulates assertion. Proponents of factive accounts argue that only true propositions are assertable, whereas proponents of non-factive accounts insist that at least some false propositions are. An alternative solution is to understand truth as the aim of assertion: in asserting, you describe reality as being in a certain way, and you succeed only if reality is indeed in that way. This principle, which dovetails nicely with widely accepted assumptions in Stalnakerian and Gricean pragmatics, tells us under which conditions assertions are successful, but not under which condition they are permissible. This paper explores the possibility of deriving assertability constraints from assertion’s aim, appealing to communicative expectations of rationality and cooperation, and taking inspiration from naturalist accounts á la Millikan. The assertability expectations predicted by this account are loose, complex, and sensitive to features of the context. The resulting model has a number of advantages over traditional views: it comes with a plausible genealogical story about assertoric norms, with an explanation for the substantial philosophical disagreement about the norm, it is able to account for context-sensitivity, and it does without some assumptions about the norm of assertion that have attracted severe criticism (the assumption that the norm must be unique, constitutive, that it must individuate assertions, etc.).
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Apr-11Emanuela Ceva RSSS 1.28
University of Geneva
The Architecture of Institutional ActionThe paper analyzes the internal structure of institutional action. Institutions are broadly conceptualized as structures of interrelated embodied rule-based roles. The paper explores the possibility to develop a conceptualization of such a structure that makes sense of the working of both public and non-public institutions (with a special focus on private firms). The exploration runs along one main scalar property of institutional action: its being open-textured. This is an important property to understand how an institution works because it shapes the kind of rules for power exercise and the practices of accountability between institutional role occupants. The paper’s conclusion is that a conceptualization of the architecture of institutional action across sectors is possible and promising to the extent that the internal structure of public and private institutions can be aligned along the same axis of “open-texturednes,” thus emphasizing the internal reflective dynamics of officeholders’ interactionsCanceled
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Apr-18Arc KocurekRSSS 1.28Cornell UniversityKnowing what to doMuch has been written on whether practical knowledge (knowledge-how), i.e., knowledge ascriptions embedding a how-to question, reduces to propositional knowledge (knowledge-that), i.e., knowledge ascriptions embedding a that-clause. Less attention has been paid to knowledge ascriptions embedding other infinitival questions, like knowing what to do, where to meet, when to leave, and who to invite—what we call deliberative knowledge (knowledge-to). We argue against reducing deliberative knowledge to propositional knowledge, whether or not a similar reduction for practical knowledge is successful. Knowledge-to, unlike knowledge-that and knowledge-how, requires the agent to have formed certain conditional intentions. We offer an analysis of deliberative knowledge that captures this as well as explains some of the conflicting data around such ascriptions. Time-permitting, we’ll discuss some of the philosophical implications for knowledge-how, practical questions, and virtue.
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Apr-25[ANZAC day]
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May-02Brandon YipRSSS 1.28Australian Catholic UniversityA Genealogical Argument for Radical Moral EncroachmentAccording to radical moral encroachment, certain moral considerations encroach on epistemic norms to avoid making conflicting demands on agents. In this paper, we provide a genealogical argument for this view by focusing on the kinds of doxastic wrongs that involve forming beliefs based on problematic generalisations. Our genealogical argument reveals that possession of knowledge requires sensitivity to agency-based moral considerations that are flouted in situations of doxastic wronging. Here is the basic thought: given that we participate in interdependent practices of knowledge acquisition, our epistemic norms will be sensitive to ways of believing that threaten the cooperative nature of those practices. More specifically, our genealogy will reveal that to possess knowledge, good inquirers need the virtue of epistemic respect: the capacity to adopt the right sort of epistemic engagement to the target of one’s inquiry. Forming beliefs based on problematic generalisations involves a lack of epistemic respect and so those beliefs will fail to amount to knowledge.not indian
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May-09Brian EpsteinRSSS 1.28Tufts UniversityHow to theorize about social constructionThe claim that basic kinds and categories in the world are “socially constructed” is perennially debated in philosophy and social theory. Over the years, lots of categories—races, genders, sexes, morality, commodities, corporations, and many more—have been put forward as cases of social construction. But what is social construction, and how is a theory of social construction to be developed and assessed? I propose a framework for understanding the metaphysics of social entities by distinguishing questions of social construction (i.e., what socially constructs the entity to be what it is) from questions about the characteristics of the entity (i.e., what is the product of social construction). Focusing on the former, I consider families of theories of social construction and argue for the demands that a theory of social construction should meet. maybe italian
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May-16Luara FerracioliRSSS 1.28University of SydneyJustice in Gestation and Moral Integrity: A DilemmaPolitical philosophers have recently turned to the topic of justice in gestation, emphasising that the uterine environment contributes to future health outcomes and talents enjoyed in adulthood. In this presentation, I argue that bringing justice to bear on gestation is more difficult than it may seem at first glance. The fact that there are no unmediated channels between foetuses and the state makes foetuses among the least accessible subjects of justice. It also means that for the state to protect the interests of foetuses, it must command full compliance on the part of pregnant women, which comes at a very high cost to this group. I show that even the most plausible principle of justice in gestation leads to the state demanding the unthinkable from some of its citizens. I conclude the discussion by defending a solution that allows the state to realise justice for biological parents and their foetuses.Indian
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May-23Rachel RudolphRSSS 1.28Auburn University
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May-30Raphael MilliereRSSS 1.28Macquarie University
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Jun-06Heidi MaibomRSSS 1.28University of Cincinnatineed to confirm
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Jun-13Alexandre LefebvreRSSS 1.28University of SydneyLiberalism as a Way of Life
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Jun-20Daniel StarRSSS 1.28Boston University
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Jun-27Richard ArnersonRSSS 1.28University of California San Diego
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Jul-04Neil SinhababuRSSS 1.28National University of Singapore
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Jul-11[AAP]
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Jul-18Orri StefánssonRSSS 1.28Stockholm University
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Jul-25Armin SchulzRSSS 1.28University of Kansas
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Aug-01RSSS 1.28
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Aug-08RSSS 1.28
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Aug-29RSSS 1.28
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Sep-05Jeanette Kennett (sometime in Sept, need to confirm date)RSSS 1.28Macquarie University
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Sep-12RSSS 1.28
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Sep-19RSSS 1.28Mike is away on this date; will need another convener
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Sep-26RSSS 1.28
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Nov-21RSSS 1.28
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Nov-28RSSS 1.28
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Dec-05
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