Kinds, Objects, and Essences
David Papineau (King’s College London)

11 June 2021, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – GMT+1) | Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia) & on Zoom

Abstract: Kripke’s Naming and Necessity reintroduced the traditional distinction between the essential and accidental properties of things. Many philosophers view this distinction with suspicion. I shall show, however, that the observable structure of natural kinds itself picks out certain kind properties as essential. I shall also consider whether a corresponding explanation can be given for the essentiality of origin and constitution for persisting objects.

Free Attendance, but preregistration required: https://cful.letras.ulisboa.pt/lancog/registration/

Disputatio has been ranked in Q1 by the latest Scimago Journal Ranking.

More info here: https://www.letras.ulisboa.pt/pt/noticias/1695-revista-disputatio-sobe-ao-q1-do-scimago-journal-ranking​

Faultlessness and multidimensionality
Diogo Santos (LanCog, University of Lisbon)

04 June 2021, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – GMT+1) | Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia) & on Zoom

Abstract: Many have pointed out that non-evaluative vague predicates can give rise to faultless disagreements. This sort of faultlessness has to do with the gradable nature of vague predicates. This fact is usually not interpreted as undermining the claim that evaluative predicates (which are also gradable) give rise to faultlessness in a different way, because, when it comes to evaluatives, (i) intuitions of faultlessness persist even when the predicates are in a comparative form and (ii) only constructions of evaluative predicates under find are acceptable. While (i) justifies the claim that evaluative faultless disagreements are not due to gradability or vagueness, (ii) suggests that evaluative faultless disagreements occur due to experiencer/judge sensitivity. In this paper I argue that (i) and (ii) do not motivate the claim that evaluative and non-evaluative predicates generate faultlessness via different mechanisms. I argue that a reasonable explanation for faultlessness in the comparative form is due to multidimensionality and not specifically due to experiencer/judge sensitivity. I further argue that, if this is right, then evaluative and non-evaluative predicates give rise to faultless disagreements via similar linguistic mechanisms. I conclude with some remarks on the implications of the latter claim.

Free Attendance, but preregistration required: https://cful.letras.ulisboa.pt/lancog/registration/

The Ontology of Rock Music: Recordings, Studio-Performances or Songs?
Hugo Luzio (LanCog, University of Lisbon)

21 May 2021, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – GMT+1) | Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia) & on Zoom

Abstract: Ontologists of music (generally) agree that classical works are pieces (or compositions) for live performance. But, just as classical works from different historical periods may be ontologically diverse, so may works from different (non-classical or non-Western) musical traditions. In this talk, I discuss the ontological nature of rock works. I start by distinguishing between the fundamental and the comparative levels of enquiry in musical ontology. I then present and discuss the three main ontological accounts of rock music. The recording-centered account (Gracyk 1996, Kania 2006) claims that rock works are recordings for playback in appropriate devices. The studio-performance account (Davies 2001) claims that rock works are for a special kind of performance that takes place in the recording studio. Finally, the song-centered account (Bruno 2013) claims that rock works are songs. I argue, first, that the recording-centered account has unreasonable consequences towards the status of recorded covers, remixes, remasters, and unrecorded (rock) songs. I then argue that the studio-performance account is in tension with the (sometimes, radical) temporal and spatial disunity of some studio recordings. I close by offering some reasons for thinking that a song-centered account can accommodate the distinctive importance of recording and performative practices in rock music.

Free Attendance, but preregistration required: https://cful.letras.ulisboa.pt/lancog/registration/

Reasons in Deception
Artūrs Logins (University of Zürich)

14 May 2021, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – GMT+1) | Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia) & on Zoom

Abstract: According to a popular and pretheoretically appealing view, victims of radical deception (e.g., the New Evil Demon scenarios, cf. Cohen and Lehrer (1983) and Cohen (1984)) are epistemically justified in their beliefs about the external world (after all, they have no clue about the appearances being radically misleading). But what reasons are there for them to believe as they do? According to the Sameness Thesis, the reasons for deceived subjects to believe as they do are the same as the reasons for their non-deceived counterparts. I argue that this thesis is false. Once we get a better grasp on how normative reasons work in general, we can see that there are good grounds for doubting the Sameness Thesis. My argument relies on the connection between normative reasons, answers to normative questions, and premises of good patterns of reasoning. Moreover, given additional assumptions about the justification – reasons connection, this conclusion seems to provide a further theory-driven argument against the view that victims of the radical deception cases and their non-deceived counterparts are the same justification-wise. I argue that this conclusion is not as crazy as it might initially appear.

Free Attendance, but preregistration required: https://cful.letras.ulisboa.pt/lancog/registration/

Varieties of Risk and Recklessness
Philip Ebert (University of Stirling)

07 May 2021, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – GMT+1) | Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia) & on Zoom

Abstract: A number of philosophers have recently argued that danger or risk judgments do not track underlying probabilities of a bad outcome and have argued for non-probabilistic notions of risk or danger (Williamson 2009, Pritchard 2016, Ebert, Smith & Durbach 2020). However, the intuitive examples used so far to motivate non-probabilistic notions were often found unconvincing. In this talk, I first present some new experimental work on intuitive risk/danger and recklessness judgements. The data raises a challenge for the probabilistic notion and I discuss different ways in which these intuitive judgments could be explained within a probabilistic framework. In the second part of the talk, I will outline and explain two recently defended non-probabilistic notions: the modal and the normic notion of risk and show how they could explain the relevant data and assess in what way they do better (or worse) than the probabilistic notion of risk. In the last part of the talk, I discuss the notion of recklessness and show how a normic notion of risk can underwrite and motivate a distinctive non-probabilistic notion of recklessness that may do well to explain some of our intuitive judgements about recklessness.

Free Attendance, but preregistration required: https://cful.letras.ulisboa.pt/lancog/registration/

NeoRussellian Logicism
Bruno Jacinto (CFCUL/LanCog) & José Mestre (Stirling/LanCog)

30 April 2021, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – GMT+1) | Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia) & on Zoom

Abstract: Frege’s and Russell’s original projects of deriving the basic laws of arithmetic in pure logic were based on contrasting conceptions of the natural numbers. While Frege thought numbers were logical objects, Russell took them to be attributes of attributes of objects. Both projects failed. The Fregean conception of numbers has been at the basis of attempts to revive the logicist programme. Alas, neoFregean logicism has been the target of devastating objections. All the while, the Russellian route for establishing arithmetic’s logicality has been neglected. Yet, Russell’s is the more promising view on natural numbers. In this talk we show that our NeoRussellian Logicism is capable of finally sustaining the view that arithmetic is nothing but logic. We furthermore indicate one of its striking consequences: that arithmetic is an inherently modal discipline.

Free Attendance, but preregistration required: https://cful.letras.ulisboa.pt/lancog/registration/

The Problem of Logical Omniscience: aboutness and impossible worlds approaches
Francisca Silva (LanCog, University of Lisbon)

23 April 2021, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – GMT+1) | Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia) & on Zoom

Abstract: Possible worlds semantics has been applied successfully in many areas in Philosophy, including in the construction of epistemic logics in which knowledge is treated as a necessity operator over epistemically possible worlds. This application, however, has been criticized on grounds that it cannot capture non-ideal agents’ systems of knowledge, as logics for knowledge construed in this way have as a consequence that: i) all agents know all logical consequences of what they know; and ii) all agents know all logical truths. These are two very prominent variations of what has come to be known in the literature as the problem of logical omniscience. In my talk I’ll survey and assess two aboutness approaches (Yalcin (2018) and Hawke, Berto and Özgün (2020)) and two impossible worlds approaches (Jago (2014), Berto and Jago (2019) and Bjerring (forthcoming)) to the aforementioned variations of the logical omniscience problem. From this survey some conclusions will follow for what a solution to the problem of logical omniscience should look like for the cases of explicit and normatively relevant implicit knowledge.

Free Attendance, but preregistration required: https://cful.letras.ulisboa.pt/lancog/registration/