Moral Dimensions of Offsetting Luxury Emissions

Stearns Broadhead

6 December 2024, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – WET)

Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa

Sala Mattos Romão [C201.J] (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract: This work addresses moral aspects of using carbon offsets for counteracting individuals’ luxury emissions. After introducing and outlining the main topics and terms related to carbon offsetting, it answers three objections that have been leveled against carbon offsetting: objections from the indulgences analogy, objections from the directness of the duty not to harm, and separateness objections. The work argues that advocates for offsetting have resources to defend against these criticisms by pointing to particularities of individual emissions’ harmfulness, as well as the preemptive nature of offsetting. The work then shows that in spite of these defenses there is reason to regard not emitting as a better option because of a host of problems that plague offsetting in its current forms. This work concludes that offsetting enhances individuals’ options for discharging their duty not to harm, but that standards of justice and efficacy need to be adopted.

Physicalist, Reductive Definitions of Concepts

Arvid Båve (LanCog, University of Lisbon)

29 November 2024, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – WET)

Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa

Sala Mattos Romão [C201.J] (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract: I have previously argued that Bealer’s argument against reductive functionalism does not affect a version of the latter which incorporates a functionalist (or conceptual role) view of contents. That response raises questions about the nature of contents, however. Reductive functionalists clearly cannot take them to be physical, on grounds of multiple realizability. It seems the only option is therefore for them to take contents to be “second-order” entities, i.e., merely token-identical with physical entities but, type-wise, definable in physical terms in some way analogous to the way ordinary mental states are. The big question is then how such definitions might read. To explain how, I first make some assumptions about the nature of contents (propositions and their constituents, which I take to be concepts). They have been defended and discussed in detail in other work. On the basis of these assumptions, reductive definitions of concepts (including propositions) are proposed. A potential problem arises but I argue that there are many satisfying responses to it.

What is it to Use a Word?

Indrek Reiland (University of Viena)

29 November 2024, 12:00 (Lisbon Time – WET)

Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa

Sala Mattos Romão [C201.J] (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract: What is it, in producing a noise (mark, bodily movement), to use a word, sentence, or other expression? The most common suggestion is that this has something to do with the speaker’s articulatory intentions: the intention to repeat a previous use (Kaplan 1990) or simply the intention to use a word (Hawthorne & Lepore 2011). On some versions of the view, intention isn’t wholly constitutive; the product (noise etc.) also has to satisfy some conventional standards specifying the canonical articulation, within limits of toleration (Hawthorne & Lepore 2011). In this talk I will offer two ways of working out this idea in detail and defend one of them over the other. On the offered view, to use a word is to intend, in making a noise, to put a rule in force that requires the noise to match the canonical articulation. I will end by showing how this view enables us to make sense of LLM-based chatbots like ChatGPT as using words, even if they lack intentions and other mental states.

Constitutivism in Ethics and Epistemology

University of Lisbon, Lisbon, Portugal

September 4–6, 2025

Constitutivism is the view that the normative standards for something are based in its nature. In ethics, the view is that the standards for human action are based in the nature of our action. In epistemology, the view is that the standards for belief are based in the nature of belief. This conference aims to investigate the promise and power for constitutivism in ethics and epistemology, individually and together. Both papers developing the constitutivist view and those critical of it are welcome.

In addition to the invited speakers, there are 4 open places for speakers. Please submit a long abstract of no more than 1000 words, anonymized for review, to constitutivism.lisboa.2025@gmail.com, no later than January 31st, 2025.

Accommodation and dinners for speakers will be covered by conference funds, but we cannot help with travel.

Papers presented at the conference will be considered for a special issue of the Canadian Journal of Philosophy, who are generously partially funding the conference. Deadline for submission of final drafts of the papers will be December 31st, 2025.

The conference is hosted at the Centre of Philosophy of the University of Lisbon.

Organizers (in alphabetical order):

Luca Ferrero (University of California, Riverside)

Jeremy David Fix (Keble College, University of Oxford)

David Horst (University of Lisbon)

Invited Speakers (in alphabetical order):

Kate Nolfi (University of Virginia)

Hille Paakkunainen (Syracuse University)

T.A. Pendlebury (University of Chicago)

TBA

Structural Essentialism as an Ontology of the Physical World

Tomasz Bigaj (University of Warsaw)

15 November 2024, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – WET)

Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa

Sala Mattos Romão [C201.J] (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract: In this talk I will introduce and discuss a structural version of essentialism with respect to the identification of individual physical objects. The adopted approach will be fundamentally generalistic (qualitativistic): the only way to identify a given individual is by reference to its place in a qualitative relational structure designated as “essential”. I will extensively discuss the problem of the multiplicity of alternative identifications of objects in possible scenarios (modality de re) using a broadly Lewisian concept of a counterpart function. Particular emphasis will be put on the possibility of the existence of qualitatively indistinguishable counterpart functions which differ merely haecceitistically, and on the threat such possibility poses to the position of generalism.

How to Start Changing Your Mind

Elise Woodard (King’s College London)

8 November 2024, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – WET)

Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa

Sala Mattos Romão [C201.J] (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract: Is it ever rational to change your mind based on others changing theirs? This talk answers affirmatively. Changes of mind are doubly epistemically significant. First, they provide compelling reasons for further inquiry. Second, they offer second-order evidence about the existence or quality of first-order evidence. However, critical evaluation is crucial to distinguish meaningful changes from irrelevant ones. By outlining key questions about reported changes and discussing potential pitfalls, we can better identify which changes are epistemically significant. If correct, my proposal highlights mind-changing as a valuable yet overlooked source of information when exploring complex and contentious issues.

This work/event is funded by Portuguese national funds through FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, I.P., within the project UID/00310/2020

Evidentially Hedged Assertions

Dario Mortini (LOGOS, University of Barcelona)

25 October 2024, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – WET)

Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa

Sala Mattos Romão [C201.J] (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract: Speakers make evidentially hedged assertions whenever they weaken commitment to what they assert in virtue of disclosing imperfectly reliable sources of evidence in their assertions. A novel and recently influential case for the knowledge norm of assertion appeals to conjunctions of evidentially hedged assertions and knowledge ascriptions. This paper challenges this novel case: I introduce additional conjunctions that cast serious doubt on the presumed robust connection between evidentially hedged assertions and knowledge ascriptions. The upshot calls for a reassessment of this new linguistic evidence for the knowledge norm, and it also highlights noteworthy but underappreciated features of evidentially hedged assertions.

This work/event is funded by Portuguese national funds through FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, I.P., within the project UID/00310/2020

Reliability and Closure

Sven Rosenkranz (LOGOS, University of Barcelona)

18 October 2024, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – WET)

Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa

Sala Mattos Romão [C201.J] (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract: First, we argue that to make room for the closure of epistemic justification under competent deduction, reliabilists had better endorse the principle that the (unconditional) reliability of a given belief-forming method m implies the (unconditional) reliability of any method of competently deducing the logical consequences of the contents of the beliefs produced by m. Secondly, we undertake to show that this principle of reliability closure fails and that, therefore, reliabilists encounter difficulties in the attempt to accommodate the closure of epistemic justification under competent deduction. To the latter end, we first briefly lay out a theoretical framework in which to think about methods, their outputs, and the ways in which methods may build on others – with methods that are the single-premise closures of other methods being prime examples of such constructions. We then proceed to distinguish different plausible reliability measures, without taking a stand on which is best. Lastly, we develop an argument against reliability closure, by showing that a method may be reliable, while its single-premise closure is not. This argument succeeds irrespective of which of the plausible reliability measure is assumed. We conclude that we should either abandon the idea that epistemic justification is closed under competent deduction, or else abandon reliabilism. (Joint work with Julien Dutant [King’s College London].)

This work/event is funded by Portuguese national funds through FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, I.P., within the project UID/00310/2020

Consciousness and Solipsism

Giovanni Merlo (University of Geneva)

22 November 2024, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – WET)

Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa

Sala Mattos Romão [C201.J] (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract: In a characteristically thorny passage of his Philosophical Remarks, Wittgenstein invites us to envisage a language for speaking of pain and other sensations of which any person whatever could, in principle, be the ‘centre’. In this language, one wouldn’t say ‘I am in pain’, but ‘There is pain’ or ‘It hurts’. And, when speaking of individuals other than oneself, one wouldn’t say ‘A is in pain’, but ‘A is behaving as the Centre does when there is pain’ or ‘A is behaving as the Centre does when it hurts’. In this talk, I will identify some aspects of our ordinary conception of pain and other sensations that appear to make the way of speaking about them envisaged by Wittgenstein, not only perfectly appropriate, but also inescapable. I will then outline a metaphysical view that, instead of revising those aspects of the ordinary conception, tries to accommodate them without falling into the pitfalls of solipsism.

Objective Disagreement and Perspectival Differences

Matheus Valente (LanCog, Centre of Philosophy, University of Lisbon)

4 October 2024, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – WET)

Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa

Sala Mattos Romão [C201.J] (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract: Could rationality require you and I to disagree about something objective like the outcome of a coin toss even if, knowing we’re equally rational, we have transmitted all of our relevant evidence to each other via communication (reaching a point where we have common knowledge that there’s nothing informative left for any of us to say)? It would be surprising if it could, for that would entail a particularly revisionary form of perspectivalism according to which some peers ought to agree to disagree in their worldly credences just because, as they would put it, “I am I, you are you”. Though most would be inclined to repudiate that type of perspectivalism, I’ll develop an argument inspired by Robert Stalnaker’s discussion of the Sleeping Beauty problem to argue that one cannot both repudiate it and side with authors such as David Lewis who subscribe to the Halfer position on that case. By itself, this amounts to an exceptional, and so far unaddressed, challenge to a reputable philosophical view. But the implications of the argument extend beyond this particular case. In particular, it suggests that there’s nothing essentially private or incommunicable about the epistemic import of the ‘I’ and ‘now’.