Adrian Razvan Sandru

MainenLab – Champalimaud Foundation

Re-presenting the Familiar – The Cognitive and Moral Role of Art in Kant’s Aesthetic Theory

22 October 2024, 17h00 (Lisbon Summer Time — GMT+1)

Sala Mattos Romão (Room C201.J – Department of Philosophy)

School of Arts and Humanities – University of Lisbon

Abstract

Starting from Kant’s statement from his anthropology lectures that “the role of the artist is to present the familiar (das Gewöhnliche) in such a way that it stands out” I will try to reconstruct the role of art in Kantian aesthetic philosophy. I will argue in 4 steps: 1) to present the familiar as standing out means for Kant to present the familiar in such a way that the habitual application of concepts is questioned; 2) the experience of an uncertainty in the application of concepts is treated in the first instance by the subject as displeasure which leads the subject to enter into a reflective process aimed at resolving the cognitive conflict; 3) if the reflective process indicates a possible integration of the new perspective on the familiar it will lead to the experience of pleasure; 4) pleasure will finally open the space for two possible experiences: a) awe at the aesthetic ideas presented by the artwork in question and experienced as a feeling of the possibility of the supersensible and b) reflective awareness of the habitual nature of the subject as well as the possibility of reconstructing this nature into a second moral nature.

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’.

Inclusivity and dense connectivity: tensions between two democratic ideals

Catarina Dutilh Novaes (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam)

2o September 2024, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – WET)

Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa

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

Abstract: Two widely discussed liberal democratic ideals are inclusivity and dense connectivity (to ensure extensive interaction among citizens). Inclusivity is a foundational democratic value, based on the idea that all those who are affected by political decisions should have a say on public matters. Dense connectivity as an ideal is reflected in the influential Millian desideratum that all arguments and ideas should receive equal consideration in an epistemic community. In a community where dissenting voices are not heard, dead dogma is likely to prevail, as received opinions are not suitably challenged. By contrast, if arguments and ideas are exposed to the widest range of objections and counterarguments, then the ‘better arguments’ will prevail—or so claims the Millian. In this talk, I argue that the properties of inclusivity and dense connectivity are in fact in tension with each other. I highlight two such tensions, with conceptual tools borrowed from network epistemology and the epistemology of attention: the problem of scale, and the problem of (in)tolerance (drawing on Popper’s paradox of tolerance). The tensions between these two ideals suggest that they cannot be simultaneously fully achieved; I argue that privileging inclusivity over dense connectivity is to be preferred to safeguard democratic institutions.

Argument Rodizio

05 July 2024, 15:00 (Lisbon Time – WET)

Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa

Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia)

The Argument Rodizio is a session in which each participant presents a short, desirably surprising, argument in 5-10 minutes, to be discussed in the following 5-10 minutes.

Abstract:

1. Robert Michels – “At the End of Human Inquiry”
2. Ricardo Santos – TBD
3. João C. Miranda – “Why Are You Booing Me? I’m Right!”
4. Hugo Luzio – “Dream Irresponsibility”
5. Ned Markosian – “The Paradox of Suffering”

The Curse of Satisfaction: Paradoxes of Desire

Ronald de Sousa (University of Toronto)

28 June 2024, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – WET)

Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa

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

Abstract: Plato was perhaps the first but certainly not the last philosopher to take a dim view of desire. Lust, in particular, offers a model of desire reducible, in Shakespeare’s famous phrase, to ‘expense of spirit in a waste of shame’: and other poets and philosophers have argued that desire is essentially pain, that its object is often not what we think it is, and that satisfaction (in the limited measure in which it is even possible) only makes it worse. This talk begins by distinguishing semantic satisfaction (getting what you thought you wanted) from emotional satisfaction (actually enjoying what you are getting). It discusses some findings of recent brain science and psychology, due to Kent Berridge and others, that show that the natural and expected correlation between wanting something and getting pleasure from it can be disrupted. This helps to explain the phenomenon of ‘dust and ashes’—the absence of emotional satisfaction following semantic satisfaction—as well as other ways in which ‘satisfaction’ can fail to prove satisfying. Such explanations, however, don’t altogether resolve the problem of the ‘curse of satisfaction’.

Biologically Autonomous Teleosemantics

Carl B. Sachs (Marymount University)

14 June 2024, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – WET)

Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa

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

Abstract: Teleosemantics remains one of the more promising approaches to naturalizing semantic content. Two long-standing objections to teleosemantics are the normativity objection and the intensionality objection. The normativity objection states that the proper functioning of a cognitive state can only be understood in terms of whether states of that kind are normal or abnormal in a population. The intensionality objection states that teleosemantics can only account for tracking and mapping relations, which are themselves purely extensional. I shall argue that the normativity objection can be addressed by grounding cognitive functions in the organizational approach to biological autonomy, rather than as traits distributed across populations. This approach does not solve the intensionality objection, but it does show that the two objections can be addressed separately.

LanCog is pleased to announce that the 2024 Petrus Hispanus Lectures will be delivered by Professor Susan Schneider (Florida Atlantic University, Boca Raton), on June 25th and 27th.

Abstract

The topic of these talks is the Global Brain Hypothesis, according to which, in the near future, humans will become nodes in a distributed information processing network implemented through AI technologies. On this view, the AI ecosystem will feature ‘Emergent hyperintelligences’ arising from ‘megasystems’ of AI services. Humans, as users of AI services, are “nodes” in a larger algorithmic system that I call the computronium.  Eventually, parts of the system, fuelled by advancing generative models, global sensor systems, extensive amounts of users and data (including from brain-machine interfaces), become a ‘Global Brain system’. There may be several global brain systems competing for power (a multipolar system), two foes (a bipolar system), or a single hegemonic Global brain system. This hypothesis has unexplored philosophical implications in a wide range of areas, including: the extended mind, the nature of knowledge, chatbot ‘epistemology’, sentience (is the global brain conscious?), the metaphysics of the part/whole relationship of human nodes and how they relate to the computronium and global brain, and ethical considerations relating to the global brain—how to avoid a dystopia, ways the algorithms manipulate humans and what to do about it.

Lecture I

The Global Brain Argument: Nodes, Computroniums and the AI Megasystem

25 June 2024

16:00 (WET)

Anfiteatro II

Faculty of Letters, University of Lisbon

Lecture II

Illusory World Scepticism and the Simulation Argument

27 June 2024

16:00 (WET)

Anfiteatro II

Faculty of Letters, University of Lisbon

Free Attendance. No registration required. All welcome!

Encontra-se aberto o concurso para atribuição de uma Bolsa de Investigação Pós-doutoral (BIPD), no âmbito do projeto 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, financiado por fundos nacionais através da FCT/MCTES.

Referência: CFUL_134_2024_BIPD_ProjectoCWA6_Junho

• AUTORIZAÇÃO DE ABERTURA DE CONCURSO
• ACTA N.º 1
• AVISO DE ABERTURA
• EURAXESS NOTICE (Offer ID: 242658)

Prazo de candidatura: 06/06/2024 a 28/06/2028

• ACTA N.º 2
• DECLARAÇÕES DE CONFLITO DE INTERESSES

Período de audiência prévia dos interessados: 04/07/2024 a 17/07/2024

Resumo:

Área Científica: Filosofia

Requisitos de admissão:
Os candidatos devem ser detentores de Doutoramento (Bolsa de Investigação Pós-Doutoral) em Filosofia ou em Estudos Clássicos.
Os candidatos devem residir de forma permanente e habitual em Portugal à data de início da bolsa.
Os candidatos têm de ter obtido o grau de doutor nos três anos anteriores à data da submissão da candidatura à bolsa.
O candidato não pode ter desenvolvido os trabalhos de investigação que conduziram à atribuição do grau de doutor no Centro de Filosofia da Universidade de Lisboa, excepto se a parte maioritária desses trabalhos não
tiver sido desenvolvida na unidade.

Condições de elegibilidade:
São elegíveis os seguintes candidatos:
a) Cidadãos nacionais ou cidadãos de outros Estados membros da União Europeia;
b) Cidadãos de Estados terceiros;
c) Apátridas;
d) Beneficiários do estatuto de refugiado político.

Duração da bolsa: A bolsa terá a duração de 9 meses, com início previsto em 1 de Agosto de 2024.

Métodos de selecção:
Os critérios de seleção, avaliados numa escala de 0 a 20 valores, serão os seguintes:
1. Mérito do Candidato (MC):
1.1. Currículo Pessoal (70%);
1.2. Carta de motivação (20%);
1.3. Cartas de recomendação (10%).
2. Mérito do projecto de trabalho (MPI): o projecto deverá situar-se na área disciplinar da filosofia antiga e
ter um máximo de 2500 palavras, excluindo bibliografia.

Avaliação final = MC (50%) + MPI (50%)

The Copernican Argument for Alien Consciousness: the Mimicry Argument Against Robot Consciousness

Eric Schwitzgebel (University of California, Riverside)

11 June 2024, 11:00 (Lisbon Time – WET)

Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa

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

Abstract: On broadly Copernican grounds, we are entitled to default assume that apparently behaviorally sophisticated alien species would be conscious. Otherwise, we humans would be inexplicably, implausibly lucky to have consciousness, while similarly behaviorally sophisticated species elsewhere would be mere non-conscious “zombies”. However, we are not similarly entitled to default assume that apparently behaviorally sophisticated robots would be conscious, at least in the present and near-term future. This is because such robots (unlike, we conjecture, most aliens) are normally designed to mimic superficial features associated with consciousness in humans. The Copernican and Mimicry Arguments jointly defeat a parity principle that one might have thought to be plausible, according to which we should apply the same types of behavioral or cognitive tests to aliens and robots, attributing or denying consciousness similarly to the extent they perform similarly. Our approach, instead of grounding speculations about alien and robot consciousness in metaphysical or scientific theories about the physical or functional bases of consciousness, appeals directly to the epistemic principles of Copernican mediocrity and inference to the best explanation. This permits us to justify default assumptions about consciousness while remaining to a substantial extent neutral about such metaphysical and scientific theories. (This is joint work with Jeremy Pober.)