Author: cful

Encontra-se aberto concurso par a atribuição de 3 Bolsas de Investigação para estudantes de Mestrado, no Centro de Filosofia da Universidade de Lisboa, da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa, financiada por fundos nacionais da FCT/MCTES, através do projecto UIDB/00310/2020

Referência: CFUL_39_2022_BI_EstudanteDeMestrado_Base_Junho

3 Bolsas de Investigação (BI) para Estudante de Mestrado, do Centro de Filosofia da Universidade de Lisboa, já foi publicado quer na webpage da FLUL quer no Euraxess. Seguem abaixo os links de acesso.

Prazo de candidatura: 05/07/2022 a 18/07/2022

Mais informações em:

https://www.letras.ulisboa.pt/pt/investigacao/investigar-em-letras/bolsas-de-investigacao#concursos-abertos-2

https://euraxess.ec.europa.eu/jobs/805379

Argument Rodizio
LANCOG DAY 2022

01 July 2022, 15:00
Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa
Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract:
1. Federico Lauria: Desires are not motivational states: The argument of satisfaction conditions.
2. João C. Miranda: Desires are question-sensitive.
3. Gabriel Malagutti: Greco’s dilemma for testimonial knowledge.
4. Domingos Faria: An argument against individualistic accounts of group belief.
5. Diogo Santos: On whether one ought to do what one ought to do.
6. Hugo Luzio: On Human Enhancement at Cryo-Revival.
7. Delia Belleri: Conservatism about concepts: testing the argument.
8. José Mestre: Frege’s objection to Neo-Fregeanism.

The Argument Rodizio is a seminar in which each participant presents a short, desirably surprising, thought provoking and philosophically provocative argument in 5-10 minutes, to be exhaustively (and exhaustingly) discussed in the following 5-10 minutes.

Bolsa de Investigação (BI) para Estudante de Doutoramento, no âmbito do projecto de I&D Tradução Anotada das Obras Completas de Aristóteles (PTDC/FER-FIL/0305/2021), do Centro de Filosofia da Universidade de Lisboa, da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa, financiada por fundos nacionais da FCT/MCTES

Referência: CFUL_34_2022_BI_EstudanteDeDoutoramento_ProjectoCWA6_Junho

mais informação em

https://www.letras.ulisboa.pt/pt/investigacao/investigar-em-letras/bolsas-de-investigacao#concursos-abertos-2

https://euraxess.ec.europa.eu/jobs/802726

On Wednesday 22 June Hans Christian Öttinger (ETH Zürich) will give a talk titled “A robust approach to quantum field theory: A give-and-take situation for philosophy” (abstract below).

The series of online seminars is organized in the context of the activities of the LanCog Research Group at the Centre of Philosophy of the University of Lisbon, and will focus on the foundations of quantum and spacetime physics.

The meeting will be online on Zoom (17:00-19:00 CEST). If you have not registered yet, you can do so here.

You can address any question to Andrea Oldofredi (aoldofredi@letras.ulisboa.pt).

ABSTRACT:

I present an intuitive and robust mathematical representation of fundamental particle physics based on a novel approach to quantum field theory, which is guided by four carefully motivated metaphysical postulates. More concretely, I explore a dissipative approach to quantum field theory [1] and propose a possible explanation of the Planck scale in quantum gravity. Offering a radically new perspective on this topic, my presentation focuses on the conceptual foundations of quantum field theory and ontological questions [2]. It also suggests a new stochastic simulation technique in quantum field theory which is complementary to existing ones.

[1] H.C. Öttinger, A Philosophical Approach to Quantum Field Theory (Cambridge University Press, 2017).
[2] A. Oldofredi and H.C.Öttinger, The dissipative approach to quantum field theory: conceptual
foundations and ontological implications, Euro Jnl Phil Sci 11, 18 (2021).

Desires don’t have desire-like direction of fit
Bence Nanay (University of Antwerp)

24 June 2022, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – WET) | Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract: Desires are widely, in fact, universally, taken to have, well, desire-like direction of fit. The aim of this paper is to argue that – at least on one important understanding of what direction of fit is – this is not so. I give a two-step argument: The goal state of desires is represented by mental imagery and if the goal state of desires is represented by mental imagery, then desires don’t have world-to-mind (or prescriptive) intrinsic direction of fit. In other words, desires don’t have desire-like direction of fit.

The room has a limited number of seats. Pre-registration is required at <info@lancog.com> until a day before the event.

Monism and Qualitativism
Trevor Teitel (University of Toronto​)

24 June 2022, 11:00 (Lisbon Time – WET) | Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract: This talk is about the relation between two venerable yet revisionary metaphysical doctrines. The monist doctrine says, roughly, that reality is in some sense one. The qualitativist doctrine says, roughly, that reality contains no facts about particular objects, but is rather purely qualitative. In this talk I’ll distinguish various versions of each doctrine, and in each case argue that champions of the monistic doctrine should instead embrace an analogous qualitativist doctrine. I conclude that monists should be qualitativists.

Doing things individually in virtue of doing them together
Thomas Byrne (MIT)

22 June 2022, 11:00 (Lisbon Time – WET) | Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract: Just as person A might, e.g., kill person B, so too might A1 and A2 kill B together: if A1 holds B down, while A2 strangles him, then A1 and A2 kill B together. In virtue of them killing B together, it’s also the case that A1 killed B and the case that A2 killed B. Similarly, if A1 lays half the bricks and A2 lays the other half, then A1 and A2 build a wall together; and, in virtue of them building the wall together, it’s also the case that A1 built the wall and A2 built the wall. Those are both examples of A1 and A2 each V-ing in virtue of them V-ing together—and other such examples, abound. I’m interested in the limits of that schema: when is the fact that A1 and A2 (and A3…) , e.g., built the wall together sufficient for it to be the case that A1 built the wall, and when isn’t it?

Three Projects of Social Epistemology
John Greco (Georgetown University)

17 June 2022, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – WET) | Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract: Epistemology engages in at least three projects: The Project of Explanation (What is knowledge?; How is knowledge possible for beings like us?), The Project of Critique (How do we fail epistemically, when we do?), and the Project of Amelioration (How can we improve our epistemic position?). Traditional epistemology has pursued these projects from an individualist perspective — the “we” in our various questions has been understood as “we as individuals.” Social epistemology pursues epistemology’s same projects, but now from a social perspective — the “we” in our various questions can now be understood as a “collective we.” The paper explores social epistemology’s three projects through the lens of social epistemic dependence, or our dependence on other persons and on broader features of the social environment. From this perspective, it is argued, seemingly disparate literatures in social epistemology are in fact fruitfully related.

The room has a limited number of seats. Pre-registration is required at <info@lancog.com> until a day before the event.

The notion of Primitive Ontology (PO) has recently received a great deal of attention in the quantum foundations literature. The PO is the fundamental ontology posited by a certain theory, what is out there in the world which makes the predictions of theory true. Can we make sense of the idea that the PO is indeterminate? And if we do, would this idea be explanatory useful in some way, or would it simply lead us too far from the very reasons we had to posit a PO in the first place? As I will show in this paper, these issues become of crucial importance when it comes to understanding what the ontology of the Mass Density approach to GRW (GRWm) ultimately looks like. Proponents of the PO are never explicit in claiming that the determinacy is a requirement for the notion, yet arguably this is entailed by one of the criteria for a suitable PO, namely its being always well defined in every point in 3D space. I will argue that this requirement is however not satisfied in GRWm. The conclusion I will draw is that the notion of indeterminate PO should be taken seriously, for it is suggested by one the major interpretations of quantum mechanics.

[This event had to be cancelled. It will be re-scheduled in the 2022/23 academic year]

Susanna Lindberg

Leiden University

From Technological humanity to bio-technical existence

7 June 2022, 17h00 (Lisbon Summer Time — GMT+1)

Sala Mattos Romão (Room C201.J – Department of Philosophy) | School of Arts and Humanities – University of Lisbon

Abstract

Our time tends to depict itself as an epoch of technological humanity – not only because its environment is increasingly pervaded by technology, but above all because the human being itself is more and more affected by the technological situation. Some even claim that the technical transformations of the human are leading towards its overcoming, so that the obsolete form of humanity slowly gives way to something called posthumanity. But is this perception justified? Hasn’t the human world always been artificial and haven’t human beings always applied self-techniques on themselves? In my paper I refer to philosophers (Martin Heidegger, Helmuth Plessner, Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida, Bernard Stiegler and Giorgio Agamben) who do not think that attention paid to technology will generate a new figure of the human, but that it will unfold human existence itself as originary technicity. This technicity is not another figure of the human, it is humanity as a capacity of figuration. The question is in the spirit of the times, however: How do technics affect human existence? Are contemporary technologies developing towards an overcoming of humanity, like some trans- and posthumanists claim? Instead of providing a simple answer to such a question, I aim to delve into the terms in which the questions are made. What is called “human” when “humanity” cannot be reduced to “mankind” anymore but is thought in continuity with a more general idea of life, instead? And what is called “technics”? We will see that the term “technics” has the most general possible sense covering tools, instruments, machines, technologies, techniques, disciplines, etc. What is called “technics” when it cannot be reduced to the skillful use of instruments or to the overwhelming machine culture that sweeps off everybody, but is intertwined with every aspect of life, so that contemporary existence turns finally out to be a bio-technical existence in the midst of an overwhelming techno-nature?