MAPS Schedule: Fall 2022 and Spring 2023

For those interested, here is the schedule for the rest of the Fall 2022 semester and Spring 2023 semester. All the talks will happen between 4:30pm and 6:30pm EST unless stated otherwise.

Elise Crull (CUNY Grad Center)
Tuesday Oct 18 2022
Hierarchy is Malarkey: Flat Ontologies from Quantum Physics 

Christian Wuthrich (Geneva)
Tuesday Nov 15 2022
Laws Beyond Spacetime

Walter Ott (University of Virginia)
Tuesday Dec 6 2022
TBA

Armin Schulz (University of Kansas)
Tuesday Jan 24 2023
TBA

Glenn Shafer (Rutgers University)
Tuesday Feb 14 2023
TBA

Sean Carroll (Johns Hopkins)
Tuesday Feb 28 2023
TBA

Kareem Khalifa (Middlebury College)
Tuesday Mar 21 2023
TBA

Any updates on the schedule, as well as information about the talks will be announced through the MAPS mailing list. To be added to the mailing list please message Diego Arana (da689@rutgers.edu) and Barry Loewer (loewer@philosophy.rutgers.edu).

[Podcast] Barry Loewer on Physics, Counterfactuals, and the Macroworld (Oct 24)

215 | Barry Loewer on Physics, Counterfactuals, and the Macroworld

Upcoming MAPS Talks – Fall 2022

Elise Crull (CUNY)

4:30 – 6:30 EST, Tuesday October 18th
Plaza View Room, 12th Floor, Lowenstein Building of Fordham Lincoln Center
113 W 60th St

Title: Indefinite Causal Ordering

Abstract: TBA

Free Will: Implications from Physics and Metaphysics (Video Recordings)

The Following links contain the video recordings from the Free Will: Implications from Physics and Metaphysics Workshop:

Day 1 (5/11/2022)

Talks:

0:00 Ginet’s Principle: Our freedom is the freedom to add to the given past (Peter van Inwagen)

1:30:06 Causation, Entailment and Freedom (John Perry)

2:57:02 Freedom from the Quantum? (Valia Allori*)

4:00:28 Free will: Back to Reichenbach (Carlo Rovelli*)

Day 2, Part 1 (5/12/2022)

Talks:

0:00 Why We can’t Change the Past (Kadri Vihvelin)

1:31:28 The Consequence Argument Meets the Mentaculus (Barry Loewer)

Day 2, Part 2 (5/12/2022)

Talks:

0:00 Top-Down and Indeterministic Agency: Why? (Tim O’Connor*)

1:30:00 Two Routes to the Emergence of Free Will (Jessica Wilson*)

*Due to technical difficulties, the first few minutes of these talks could not be recorded.

Free Will: Implications from Physics and Metaphysics

(UPDATE May 10th 11:50PM EST: Due to availability constraints, the order of the conferences have changed. You can find the updated schedule below.)

There will be a workshop at Rutgers on issues connecting Free Will, Physics and Metaphysics from May 11th to May 12th. The program can be found here:

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There will be limited spaces for those attending in-person. Although anyone interested who is not attenting in-person can participate through Zoom.

Anyone interested in attending in-person or receiving further information about the event can write to Barry Loewer (loewer@philosophy.rutgers.edu) or Diego Arana (diego.arana@rutgers.edu).

2022 4th SURe Workshop

This weekend (Thursday April 21 – Saturday the 23rd) Fordham University will be hosting the 4th annual workshop of the Scientific Understanding and Representation series. The program wil feature Michael Strevens (NYU) as a keynote speaker, and also a book symposium on Michela Massimi’s (Edinburgh) forthcoming book, Perspectival Realism. The conference program can be found here: https://sure4.weebly.com

Anyone in the NYC area who would like to attend in-person is warmly invited to join at Fordham Lincoln Center. In-person attendees can register by emailing Stephen Grimm (sgrimm@fordham.edu) and Peter Tan (ptan8@fordham.edu).

Upcoming MAPS talks – Spring 2022

Papineau, David (King’s College London)
4:30 – 6:30 EST, Wednesday, Mar 9th

Title: The Causal Structure of Reality

Abstract:

The current pandemic has focused attention on the techniques used by epidemiologists and other non-experimental scientists to infer causal hypotheses from correlational data. I have previously argued* that we need to explain these techniques by reducing causal relationships to dependencies in systems of structural equations with probabilistically independent exogenous variables. In this talk I shall aim to use this account to cast light on (a) single-case counterfactual dependence and actual causation, (b) the content and practical relevance of generic causal claims like “smoking causes cancer”, (c) the temporal asymmetry of causation, and (d) the proper understanding of rational action under risk.

*In particular, I’ve argued this in http://weebly-file/1/8/5/5/18551740/stat_nat_csn_monist.pdf. I will also be giving a talk on it at the CUNY Logic and Metaphysics workshop on Monday 7 March 1615-1815.

Update: The talk will be held at Mudd 633, Columbia University

The zoom link will be distributed through the MAPS mailing list. If you are not on the MAPS mailing list and would like to receive the Zoom link for the talk, please email nyphilsci@gmail.com.

MAPS: Theory Underdetermination and Structural Realism (12/08/2021)

Talk by Kevin Coffey (NYU)

Abstact: The threat of theory underdetermination remains an oft-cited challenge to scientific realism. Why think belief in a particular theory is justified if there are (or likely are) alternative theories equally adequate to the empirical data? In recent years, some philosophers have argued that one particular form of realism—structural realism—is uniquely situated to defuse this threat, going so far as to use considerations of underdetermination as a positive reason to adopt structural realism over competing forms of realism. In this talk I’ll explore the adequacy of these arguments, and the relationship between underdetermination and structural realism more generally. I’ll argue that, far from undermining the underdetermination argument, structural realism is in fact more susceptible to underdetermination concerns than other forms of scientific realism.

MAPS: Updated Schedule – Fall 2021

Kevin Coffey (NYU)
5:30-7:30pm (EST), Wednesday, Dec 8

Title: Theory Underdetermination and Structural Realism

Abstact: The threat of theory underdetermination remains an oft-cited challenge to scientific realism. Why think belief in a particular theory is justified if there are (or likely are) alternative theories equally adequate to the empirical data? In recent years, some philosophers have argued that one particular form of realism—structural realism—is uniquely situated to defuse this threat, going so far as to use considerations of underdetermination as a positive reason to adopt structural realism over competing forms of realism. In this talk I’ll explore the adequacy of these arguments, and the relationship between underdetermination and structural realism more generally. I’ll argue that, far from undermining the underdetermination argument, structural realism is in fact more susceptible to underdetermination concerns than other forms of scientific realism.

The talk will be on Zoom. All are welcome to attend!

The zoom link will be distributed through the MAPS mailing list. If you are not on the MAPS mailing list and would like to receive the Zoom link for the talk, please email nyphilsci@gmail.com.

Edit: The talk has been rescheduled for 5:30pm EST. Please change your calendars!

Upcoming MAPS talks – Fall 2021

Michael Townsen Hicks (University of Birmingham)
4:30 – 6:30 EST, Wednesday, Nov 17th

Title: A Practitioner’s Guide to Pragmatic Humeanism

Abstract: All Humeans hold, roughly, that laws are informative summaries of nonlawful matters of fact. Pragmatic Humeans go further: for them, what makes these summaries the laws is their usefulness to agents like us. By adding elements of our specific epistemic interests and constraints, pragmatists contend, we can arrive at satisfying explanations of otherwise surprising features of our actual laws and our actual scientific practice. But the pragmatic shift is not without problems. The more elements of our particular psychology we add to our nomic formula, the more susceptible we are to idealistic ratbaggery. Intuitively, what must happen does not depend on our particular cognitive architecture: we cannot change the laws by changing us. My aim here is to clarify the role or pragmatic constraints, and thereby respond to this challenge from creeping idealism. My strategy has three parts. First, I argue that pragmatic constraints determine the laws only indirectly, but generating a nomic formula that has no connection to agents. Second, I discuss what sorts of agents are agents like us. I argue that pragmatists should appeal to a particular sort of idealized agent, one whose specific limitations and interests have been idealized away. I conclude with an attempt to draw together to strains of pragmatic Humeanism. For a range of Humeans, including Loewer (2007), Loew and Jaag (2020), Schrenk (2006), Cohen and Callender (2009), have argued that the concepts that we use to generate the best system are determined pragmatically, rather than by the world’s objective metaphysical structure. I argue that the sort of idealized agent-based approach I favour clarifies the way in which these concepts are chosen.

The talk will be on Zoom. All are welcome to attend!

The zoom link will be distributed through the MAPS mailing list. If you are not on the MAPS mailing list and would like to receive the Zoom link for the talk, please email nyphilsci@gmail.com.

Note: The talk was originally annouced for Nov 15th by mistake. If you have added this talk to your calendar, please correct it!