Dear ISH Colleagues,
Here are the announcements for Late November.
1. LISTSERVE MODERATOR – Please consider serving as the Listserve Moderator. It is an excellent way to be involved in ISH and to satisfy your institution’s Service to your Intellectual Community. It takes a only a few hours per month and has a great impact on the viability of our institution. Email [log in to unmask] for more information.
Fellowships
2. November 30!: ASHG-NHGRI Genomics Communications Fellowship - We have a new NHGRI/ASHG communications fellowship which is open to anyone with an advanced degree (MS, PhD, JD) who is interested in genomics and science journalism/science communication. We are actively looking for applications but the deadline is short, November 30th.
All necessary info and details
Thanks!
Chris Donohue
3. The Department of Philosophy at the University of Alberta (Canada) solicits applications for the Izaak Walton Killam Memorial Postdoctoral Fellowship, which is tenable for 2 years (anytime after May 1, 2024). Citizenship: open. $50,000 per annum plus benefits and one time $4000 research/travel grant. Application deadline: December 10, 2023.
Detailed job ad at https://www.ualberta.ca/philosophy/news/2023/november/2024-killam-memorial-postdoctoral-fellowship-application-now-open.html
Interested philosophers of science can contact Canada Research Chair in Philosophy of Biology Ingo Brigandt ([log in to unmask]) with questions about the fellowship and the application process before submitting an application.
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Ingo Brigandt (he/him)
Professor and Canada Research Chair in Philosophy of Biology
Director of Graduate Programs
Department of Philosophy
University of Alberta
http://www.ualberta.ca/~brigandt
Call for Papers
4. CALL FOR PAPERS: SPP 2024
The Society for Philosophy and Psychology (SPP) invites submissions of papers to be presented at its 50th Annual Meeting to be held June 19-June 22, 2024 at Purdue University (local organizer: Corey Maley).
Please submit an abstract of 750 words or less by January 31, 2024, 11:59pm EST. in any area relevant to philosophy, psychology, linguistics, neuroscience, or cognitive science. The submission portal can be found there:
https://tinyurl.com/2024SPP.
Submissions will be refereed and selected on the basis of quality and relevance to SPP. Submissions are open format, but must be no more than 750 words + 1 figure and must be prepared for blind review. Authors will have the chance to indicate whether they would like to be considered for a poster, talk, or both. All submitters may be first author on only 1 submission (but may co-present any number of submissions). Upload a .pdf and other required information at the submission site.
Further information about the 50th Annual Meeting will be made available on the Society’s website.
Already, we have a stellar program lined up: a 50th Anniversary special session with Susan Carey (Harvard), a keynote by Nathaniel Daw (Princeton), and outstanding invited symposia on Current Issues in Artificial Intelligence chaired by Corey Maley (Purdue), and the Psychology of Misinformation chaired by Gordon Pennycook (Cornell).
Serife Tekin (Center for Bioethics and Humanities at SUNY Upstate Medical University) is organizing the pre-conference workshop: Persons, Algorithms, and Mental Disorders on June 19, 2024.
Dan Burnston and Laura Niemi
Co-Chairs, SPP 2024
Email inquiries are to be sent to [log in to unmask]
Graduate Student Opportunities
5. Available through the PSA are some opportunities for grad students / postdocs to interact with prominent philosophers to discuss their own research. Some of the upcoming 'office hours’ focus on philosophy of biology and medicine and feature Anja Plutynski and Sabine Leonelli and I thought these would be of interest to early-career people or their mentors in your network.
The link with all the information is here: https://www.philsci.org/psa_office_hour.php
Don’t hesitate to let me know if you’d like any more information before posting.
Thanks, Kerry.
Dr. Kerry McKenzie
Associate Professor of Philosophy of Science, UC San Diego
Director of Graduate Studies
Core Faculty, Science Studies Program
Chair, PSA Climate Taskforce
Seminars and Workshops
6. The Center for Philosophy of Science at the University of Pittsburgh invites you to join us for our Lunch Time Talks. Attend in person, Room 1117 on the 11th floor of the Cathedral of Learning at the University of Pittsburgh or visit our live stream on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrRp47ZMXD7NXO3a9Gyh2sg.
LTT: Margherita Harris Tuesday, November 28th @ 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm EST
Title: Some Conceptual Problems in the IPCC Uncertainty Framework and Where to Go from Here
Abstract: Studies of climate change are afflicted by deep uncertainty, the communication of which is made more challenging still by the studies’ immediate policy implications. The world of policy-making has its demands: uncertain information should be communicated in a simple, consistent and relevant manner. To address this, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) uncertainty guide provides both a confidence and a likelihood metric for IPCC authors to characterize uncertainty in their findings. Unfortunately, as I will try to convince you in the first part of my talk, the relationship between these two metrics is far from clear and this ambiguity has worrying implications for how IPCC authors handle uncertainties and the quality of the information provided in IPCC reports. The aim of the second part of my talk is to critically reflect on what an adequate IPCC uncertainty framework could look like. I will begin by assessing two strikingly different proposals for a new IPCC uncertainty framework (Winsberg’s (2018) and Bradley et al.’s (2017)). After arguing that both proposals are conceptually problematic for distinct and yet related reasons, I will offer my own tentative proposal for a better IPCC uncertainty framework.
LTT – Raphael Scholl Thursday, November 30th @ 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm EST
Title: Empirical tests of infectious disease models
Abstract: Epidemiologists have been developing mathematical and computational models to predict the course of epidemics since at least the 1920s. In this talk I will consider how these models were tested empirically, especially in the decades leading up to the Covid-19 pandemic. Tests relied either on data from actual epidemics (such as influenza or ebola) or on synthetic data that were themselves generated by infectious disease models. The questions under investigation included whether the models were capable of predicting the rate at which new cases would occur, the time and case numbers at which the epidemic would peak, and the overall duration of the epidemic. I will focus on two methodological issues raised by such empirical tests of infectious disease models. First, which aspects of infectious disease dynamics were these models intended to represent? Second, what sort of confirmation did the models receive from tests of (mere) predictive accuracy? I will situate my results within an adequacy-for-purpose view of model evaluation.
LTT – Dan Nicholson Friday, December 1st @ 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm EST
Title: The New Physics Behind the Old Biology and the Old Physics Behind the New Biology: A Tale of Two Revolutions (in Three Acts)
Abstract: In this talk I tell the story of the physics-biology dialectic in the twentieth century. It is a tale of two revolutions: one that seemed inevitable but which never came to pass, and another that unfolded spectacularly but in a manner radically different from the way intended by those who triggered it. The first of these intellectual revolutions has been almost completely forgotten, while the second stands today as the most transformative event of twentieth-century biology. The first is the failed organicist revolution that throughout the interwar years seemed imminent and inescapable. The second is the triumphant molecular revolution that transformed biology in the second half of the twentieth century. Despite appearing very different, these two historical episodes are intimately connected, and neither can be fully understood in isolation from the other, or so I will argue. I tell this tale in three acts, opening with a prelude that provides a starting point for my analysis, and closing with a coda that adds a twenty-first century update to my tale. I end by drawing lessons for the historian, for the philosopher, and for the scientist.
7. Call for Abstracts: 8th International Workshop on the History of Human Genetics, Berlin, May 30&31, 2024.
Submission of individual paper and poster abstracts, especially on The History of Eugenics, Evolution of Techniques in Human Genetics and Women in the History of Human Genetics, are invited.
The workshop is a satellite symposium of the European Human Genetics Conference 2024.
***Deadline: Friday, February 14, 2024, 24.00 hrs CET https://www.medizin.uni-muenster.de/egtm/institut/team/dr-heike-petermann.html#gen
Thank you.
All the best,
Heike Petermann
Conference: Call for Proposals
8. CALL FOR PROPOSALS ***DEADLINE EXTENSION: NOVEMBER 30
Revitalizing Science and Values
Conference Dates: April 6-7, 2024
Location: Center for Philosophy of Science, Cathedral of Learning, University of Pittsburgh
The arena of science and values has grown in size and prominence in recent philosophy of science. But debates about the role of science remain fairly limited in terms of both the scope of topics discussed and the range of views expressed. The aim of this conference is to broaden the horizons of work on science and values, partly by making room for new (or new versions of older) ideas and partly by getting it to interact with other parts of philosophy.
In this spirit we invite papers which expand the boundaries of current work in the field, and/or that argue for views that are outside of the current mainstream. These include, but are limited to:
o Views bucking the trend towards value-laden science, and/or defending (new) versions of value-freedom.
o Discussions aiming to bridge work on values in science and general value theory, especially political theory, political philosophy and moral philosophy.
o Work seeking to connect literature on values in science to other core areas of philosophy of science, including confirmation, measurement and experimental practice, explanation, modeling and theory structure.
o Work drawing connections between debates over values and science and topics in epistemology including the ethics of belief and moral and pragmatic encroachment.
Abstracts should be between 500-800 words long and should be sent by November 30 to: [log in to unmask].
End of Announcements
Best regards, Lloyd
Lloyd Ackert, Ph.D.
Department of History
Drexel University
ISH Listserve Moderator
https://www.ishpssb.org/