Dear ISHers,

Many announcements today. Some that I gather here, and some that I will
have to send in separate emails. Sorry about the email load.

Best,
Lucie

*Call for volunteers - ISHPSSB social media*
We are still searching for
a volunteer to take over the role of communication on social media, which
has been handled by Sophie for several years.
Please contact us if you are interested.

*ISHPSSB Porto Meeting CfA/P -* *30 days left*
I'll send back the full call for abstracts/papers/proposals. Remember that
the deadline for application is November 1st. The website is:
https://ishpssb2025.icbas.up.pt/  <https://ishpssb2025.icbas.up.pt/>

[image: reminder_30daysleft_2.png]

*Symbiosis: Emerging Reconceptualizations and Theories (Conference in
Bordeaux, France)*

On Monday, October 14th, we organize in Bordeaux, France (*UTC+2*), an
exceptional international conference with outstanding speakers on the
concept of symbiosis and the many emerging conceptual and theoretical
approaches to symbiosis and host-microbiome interactions in today's biology
and philosophy of biology.

*Program:*

   - Charlotte Brives
   <https://www.centreemiledurkheim.fr/notre-equipe/charlotte-brives/> (Centre
   Emile Durkheim, CNRS Bordeaux, France), “Thinking through pluribiosis: the
   case of phage/bacteria relationships”
   - Gérard Eberl
   <https://research.pasteur.fr/fr/team/microenvironment-and-immunity/>
(Institut
   Pasteur, Paris, France), “How the immune system makes the difference
   between pathogens and mutualists… or not”
   - Hannah Kaminski
<https://immunoconcept.cnrs.fr/people/hannah-kaminski/>
(ImmunoConcept,
   University of Bordeaux, France), “Are damage and repair the features that
   microbiota and host develop to promote a stable association leading to
   symbiosis?”
   - Sarkis Mazmanian <https://sarkis.caltech.edu/> (Caltech, USA), “The
   Gut Microbiome Modulates Brain Pathologies in Parkinson’s Disease”
   - Margaret McFall-Ngai
   <https://carnegiescience.edu/dr-margaret-mcfall-ngai> (Caltech, USA),
   “Symbiosis brings together communities of different expertise: Retaining
   rigor in developing this frontier”
   - Spencer V. Nyholm <https://mcb.uconn.edu/person/spencer-nyholm/>
(University
   of Connecticut, USA), “Illuminating interactions between the immune system
   and symbiotic bacteria of the Hawaiian bobtail squid”

*All practical details:*
https://www.philinbiomed.org/event/symbiosis-conference/
<https://www.philinbiomed.org/event/symbiosis-conference/>

*Registration (either in-person or virtual) is free but mandatory*: please
complete the following form:
https://rdv.immuconcept.org/studs.php?sondage=bf5q4zjqeenn51pe

This is a PhilInBioMed <https://www.philinbiomed.org/> and ImmunoConcEpT
event, organized by Thomas Pradeu, and funded by the Gordon and Betty Moore
Foundation.


*New grant program for history of science in India*
Program for the Archiving of Science and Technology (PAST)

Call for Project Proposals, 2025-26

Funding up to Rs 10 lakhs per project
Proposal Deadline: 15 November, 2024
Project time-line (up to 12 months between): 1 February, 2025 - 15
February, 2026

Grant program to preserve diverse histories of science and technology in
contemporary India, with a focus on archival material relating to
marginalised and under-represented histories.

Full details and submission form: https://archives.ncbs.res.in/past

Grant Program Online Information Sessions: 4:00 PM IST on 15 October, 2024;
29 October, 2024 and 11 November, 2024
Online meeting location: https://bit.ly/archives-ncbs-past-grant-meeting
Meeting ID: 945 4064 6607
Passcode: 230626

This program is thanks to generous funding from Arcadia, a charitable
foundation that works to protect nature, preserve cultural heritage and
promote open access to knowledge.

*LTT - 10/4 and Intro. video - Tushar Menon - Scientific realism as a
normative notion (twice over)*

The Center for Philosophy of Science invites you to join us for our Lunch
Time Talk.  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: Tushar Menon
Tushar discusses his work here at the Center:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r5Tt_RTH9Yo
Friday, October 4 @ 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm EDT

*Title: Scientific realism as a normative notion (twice over)*
*Abstract:* The semantic component of standard scientific realism—sometimes
called semantic realism—is the view that the semantic treatment of
scientific-theoretical terms should be the same as that of observational
terms. This is to be understood, roughly, as the claim that theoretical
claims are descriptive just as observational claims are. But standard
semantic realism does not say anything about why we are right to treat
observational claims as descriptive in the first place. In this talk, I
argue that the justification of the descriptive deployment of observational
terms is best understood from a normative pragmatist perspective, in terms
of what we can use such discourse to do. I thus construe semantic realism
as the claim that this is also the way to assess the correctness of the
descriptive deployment of scientific-theoretical terms. I then argue that
descriptive deployment is itself to be understood normatively, in terms of
a Sellars-Brandom-style inferentialism. The upshot is (i) that we can do
much more justice to the impulses that motivate scientific realism, and
(ii) assess the relative merits of scientific realism across a wider domain
of scientific theories (in particular mathematised physics) if we
understand it in this doubly normative sense.

This talk will also be available live streamed on:  Zoom:
https://pitt.zoom.us/s/93846460443 and YouTube at
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrRp47ZMXD7NXO3a9Gyh2sg.