PhD Research Seminar in Philosophy

The Ph.D. students of the Department of Philosophy organize a seminar to discuss each other's work. Because we work in so many different areas of philosophy, the seminar provides a source of feedback that is usually different from the feedback one receives in research seminars devoted to a specific discipline. Furthermore, the seminar allows us to stay informed about each other's work. Meetings are english spoken, and usually held about once a month. For more information, please contact Sander Voerman.

Next meetings

TBA

Past meetings

2009

Tuesday, November 17
Title: Single-Type Semantics
Speaker: Kristina Liefke
Abstract: Recent attempts at formulating an empirically adequate theory of meaning for natural language have neglected results from cognitive science. My talk seeks to compensate for this shortcoming. Through the consideration of recent work in evolutionary and psycholinguistics, I identify a basic kind of object that enables the construction of all other entity-types. More than elucidating the relationship between different kinds of linguistically presupposed entities, the new semantics captures the foundational requirements on any meaning representation system. My talk develops and extends the type-logical semantics of Partee (2007). Despite its formal rationale, my presentation will be non-technical.
Time and place: 15:00-17:00, Room D147

Friday, May 29
Title: Does contextualism solve the sceptical problem?
Speaker: Dorette van der Tholen
Required reading:: circulated via e-mail.
Time and place: 15:00-17:00, Room D151

Friday, April 24th
Title: Consensual Mistakes and the Happy Life Ever After
Speaker: Carlo Martini
Abstract: Recent literature in the field of consensual decision-making and judgment aggregation has posed the problem of the clash that we can sometimes have between right decisions and happy decision-makers. Most notably, the paper "Right Decisions or Happy Decision-Makers" by Katie Steele's et alt., shows that consensus can at times be reached at the pain of deviation from the truth. In general, however, different models for voting or aggregating judgments can be investigated in terms of their capacities for leaving the decision-makers "happy" after the voting or deliberation process has taken place. I will discuss the issues that are at stake when we talk about happy decision-makers, and survey different voting strategies that are likely to affect decision makers in different ways.
Time and place: 13:00-15:00, room D 151

Tuesday, March 17
Title: Kant's Enlightened Religion: Imagination beyond Reason
Speaker: Arthur Kok
Required reading: Kant's Enlightened Religion
Time and place: 13:30-15:30, room D 151

2008

Thursday, November 6
Title: The Demandingness of a Kantian Duty to Alleviate Global Poverty
Speaker: Mandy Bosma
Required reading: Global Poverty
Time and place: 15:00-17:00, room D 151

Thursday, September 18
Title: Voluntary Servitude and Refusal
Speaker: Ivana Ivkovic
Background reading: Vrijwillige onderwerping en weigering
Note: the text is in Dutch; reading is encouraged (for Dutch speaking students) but not required in order to attend the (english-spoken) seminar meeting.
Time and place: 15:00-17:00, room D 147

Monday, July 28
Title: Formal and Behavioral Strategies of Collective Deliberation
Speaker: Carlo Martini
Abstract: Suppose one has to decide whether to take a certain course of action or another. Is it preferable to take that decision individually or to gather in a community in order to deliberate on the issue? A theorem proven by Condorcet seems to show that, given certain conditions, it is always advisable to leave the decision to a group of people, the greater their number the better the results. However, collective deliberation has several shortcomings that are to be addressed if we want to avoid falling short of impossibility results and other unsatisfactory consequences. A brief overview will show the alternatives on the market and possible future lines of research.
Time and place: 15:00-17:00, room D 151

Thursday, June 26
Title: The Liar and the Truth Speaker
Speaker: Stefan Wintein
Time and place: 15:30-17:30, Room D 151

Wednesday, May 28
Title: Personhood and Psychopathology
Speaker: Sander Voerman
Background reading: Personhood & Psychopathology
Time and place: 13:30-15:30, room DZ 1