Events

Conference: “Understanding Philosophical Progress” (June 19 – June 21st, 2024, University of Bergen, Norway).

An international conference on philosophical progress will be held at the University of Bergen on June 19-21, 2024, organised in collaboration with Torfinn Huvenes (Bergen) with the generous support of the Icelandic Research Fund. The purpose of the event is to bring together interested researchers for a sustained discussion about the nature and extent of philosophical progress, and how it might best be achieved.

Confirmed speakers currently include:

Samuel Baron (Melbourne)
Helen Beebee (Leeds)
Herman Cappelen (Hong Kong)
Finnur Dellsén (Iceland)
Tina Firing (Iceland)
Torfinn Huvenes (Bergen)
Insa Lawler (UNCG)
Kerry McKenzie (UC San Diego)
James Norton (Tasmania)
Daniel Stoljar (ANU)
Timothy Williamson (Oxford)
Ylwa Sjölin Wirling (Gothenburg)

The Philosophical Progress Lab Workshop (May 30th – May 31st, 2023, University of Iceland, Reykjavík).

An international workshop on philosophical progress will be held at the University of Iceland on May 30th and May 31st. This event is organized in relation to the research project Understanding Philosophical Progress, which is generously supported by the Icelandic Research Fund. The purpose of the event is to bring together scholars who are working on cutting-edge research on philosophical progress, in order to foster discussion and collaboration on new ideas.

Participants

Daniel Stoljar (ANU)
Helen Beebee (Leeds)
Ylwa Sjölin Wirling (Gothenburg)
Samuel Baron (ACU Melbourne)
Finnur Dellsén (Iceland)
Insa Lawler (UNCG)
James Norton (Tasmania)
Tina Firing (Iceland)
Victor Karl Magnússon (MCMP)

Conference: “Understanding Progress and Progress in Understanding” (June 28th – June 30th, 2022, University of Iceland, Reykjavík).

https://philevents.org/event/show/91782

Description
An international conference on “Understanding Progress and Progress in Understanding” will be held at the University of Iceland over three days this summer, from June 28th to June 30th, 2022. This in-person event is hosted by the project “Understanding Progress, in Science and Beyond”, which is generously funded by the Icelandic Research Fund (Rannís). We are delighted to welcome philosophers from all over the world to Iceland where they will present their latest research on understanding and progress, in the sciences and philosophy.

The UPPU 2022 conference is organized by: Finnur Dellsén (Iceland), Insa Lawler (UNCG), James Norton (Iceland), and Victor Magnússon (MCMP). Please direct questions and queries to vkmagnusson@gmail.com.

Participants

Catherine Elgin (Harvard)
Michael Strevens (NYU)
Milena Ivanova (Cambridge)
William D’Alessandro (MCMP)
Ellen Lehet (Utah Valley)
Yafeng Shan (Kent)
Richard David-Rus (Romanian Academy)
Linda Holland (VU Amsterdam)
Radin Dardashti (Wuppertal)
Samuel Baron (ACU Melbourne)

Zoom Workshop “Philosophical Progress” (Tuesday, August 10th, 2021, 10:00 GMT).

https://philevents.org/event/show/91782

Description
This is the fifth event in a series of online workshops affiliated with the international research project “Understanding Progress, in Science and Beyond”, which is hosted at the University of Iceland. The theme of this fifth workshop is philosophical progress and consists in a talk which will be given by Daniel Stoljar (ANU) followed by a discussion section. Stoljar will offer a critique of Helen Beebee’s account of equilibirism, according to which the goal of philosophy is to place one’s commitments in a coherent system opposed to simply pursuing the truth.

The event is open to all who are interested in listening in and/or participating in the Q&A sessions. The talk begins at 10:15 but the Zoom chat will open 15 minutes beforehand. To access the Zoom event, use the following details:

https://eu01web.zoom.us/j/61003990967

Meeting ID: 610 0399 0967

Participants
Daniel Stoljar (ANU)

Zoom Workshop “Progress & Scientific Progress” (Tuesday, October 20th, 2020, 14:00 GMT).

https://philevents.org/event/show/84702

Description
This is the fourth event in a series of virtual workshops associated with the “Understanding Progress, in Science and Beyond” research project. The focus on in first workshop will be on understanding scientific progress. Angela Potochnik (Cincinnati) will give a talk on the relationship between truth and understanding. In particular, she will motivate a non-factive epistemic standard for understanding and discuss its implications for scientific progress. Michael Stuart (Geneva) will give a talk on pragmatic understanding and explain how it relates to other types of understanding, like explanatory and objectual understanding.

The event is open to all who are interested in listening in and/or participating in the Q&A sessions. The first talk begins at 14:00 GMT but the Zoom chat will open 30 minutes beforehand. To access the Zoom event, use the following details:

https://eu01web.zoom.us/j/9709748349

Meeting ID: 970 974 8349

Participants
Angela Potochnik (Cincinnati)
Michael Stuart (Geneva)

Zoom Workshop “Progress, in Science and Beyond” (Tuesday, October 6th, 2020, 14:00 GMT).

https://philevents.org/event/show/83590

Description
This is the third event in a series of virtual workshops associated with the “Understanding Progress, in Science and Beyond” research project. The focus on in this workshop will be on scientific progress. Ilkka Niiniluoto (Helsinki) will give a talk on abductive and inductive optisim regarding scientific progress. Milena Ivanova (Cambridge) will give a talk on aesthetic values in the evolution of scientific experimentation.

https://eu01web.zoom.us/j/9709748349

Meeting ID: 970 974 8349

Participants
Ilkka Niiniluoto (Helsinki)
Milena Ivanova (Cambridge)

Zoom Workshop “Understanding & Progress, in Science and Beyond” (Tuesday, August 4th, 2020, 14:00 GMT).

https://philevents.org/event/show/83590

Description
This is the second event in a series of virtual workshops associated with the “Understanding Progress, in Science and Beyond” research project. The focus in this workshop will be on scientific progress and the epistemic notion of understanding. Catherine Elgin will give a talk on how how thinkers might “borrow” considerations which are less than adequately justified in order to “leverage” them in their epistemic investigations. Yafeng Shan will discuss the new functional account of progress in science. Finnur Dellsén will argue that the concept of scientific progress should not require epistemic justification.

Participants
Catherine Elgin (Harvard)
Yafeng Shan (Kent)
Finnur Dellsén (Iceland)

Zoom Workshop “Understanding, in Science and Beyond” (Tuesday, July 28th, 2020, 14:00 GMT).

https://philevents.org/event/show/83590

Description
This is the first event in a series of virtual workshops associated with the “Understanding Progress, in Science and Beyond” research project. The focus on in this first workshop will be on the epistemic notion of understanding (in science and in general). Michael Strevens will give an account of what it means to “grasp” a correct explanation of a phenomenon in terms of recognitional ability. María Martínez-Ordaz will assess how (and whether) scientists can achieve legitimate understanding of defective theories. Federica Malfatti will explore the relationship between truth and understanding and suggest that understanding is “diachronically factive”.

https://eu01web.zoom.us/j/69176913639?pwd=MTYvNnBYd0tKMDZuVVhVZ0gvc1Zadz09

Meeting ID: 691 7691 3639

Passcode: [The passcode is the first ten letters in the event’s name, lowercased]

Participants
Michael Strevens (NYU)
María Martínez-Ordaz (Rio)
Federica Malfatti (Innsbruck)

Panel “Understanding and Progress” at the 2nd SURe Workshop (March 12-14, 2020, Emory University, Atlanta, GA)

https://sure-workshop.weebly.com/current-workshop.html

Description
Science makes progress, at least sometimes. But what constitutes the progress of science? One idea is that scientific understanding is key to scientific progress. This symposium will explore different aspects of scientific progress and scientific understanding so as to develop this idea and evaluate its plausibility. Possible topics include the role of scientific goals and questions for explicating progress, the epistemic value of progress, and the gradability of progress.

Participants
Sorin Bangu (Bergen)
Finnur Dellsen (Iceland)
Catherine Elgin (Harvard)
Insa Lawler (UNC-Greensboro)
Jared Millson (Agnes Scott)
Casey McCoy (Stockholm)