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News

New Publication – Adam Koberinski

Posted on March 8, 2023 by center_admin

Congratulations to our Postdoc Adam Koberinski!

His paper “Contemporary Philosophical Perspectives on the Cosmological Constant,” based on his lunchtime talk last fall has been published in a special issue of the journal Universe, dedicated to the Cosmological Constant.

The link to the paper (open access) is below.

Universe | Free Full-Text | Contemporary Philosophical Perspectives on the Cosmological Constant (mdpi.com)

Below is a link to his talk discussing the topic on our YouTube channel:

LTT: Adam Koberinski – Philosophy of the Cosmological Constant – YouTube

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Catching Up With Naftali Weinberger

Posted on January 11, 2022 by center_admin

Featured Former Fellow talks resume on January 25 when our speaker will be Naftali Weinberger (Postdoc 2018-19.) What’s he been up to since then? Find out.

naftali weinbergerWhere are you now?  At the Munich Center for Mathematical Philosophy

What are you working on?  Right now I have two primary projects: One on causation in dynamical systems and another on causally modeling discrimination. I’m also involved in several collaborations with people I know primarily through my time at the Center

Favorite memory of The Center?   This is a hard one! One of the first things that jumped to mind though was the time Bill and Barbara Wimsatt had the fellows over for pizza. They lived in a high amenity apartment complex in Lawrenceville where everyone was either a 28-year-old hipster or a Wimsatt, and it seems like they were basically co-opted by the building’s other residents as honorary grandparents. For some reason I found it very amusing to eat pizza with the other fellows in the lobby while watching an endless parade of millenials and their dogs. 

What you you say is your greatest non-professional achievement since leaving the Center? Learning German. I even on occasion have gotten Germans to laugh (with me, I think). 

What’s the best book/movie/tv you’ve enjoyed lately? I really enjoyed Jordan Peele’s “Us”. I also think lots of Center members would enjoy Bill Bryson’s recent book on the history of the human body. Much of it will be familiar, but it has lots of great HPS anecdotes and is written with so much infectious enthusiasm that it’s a joy to read. 

Join us for Naftali’s talk, “Signal Manipulation & the Causal Analysis of Racial Discrimination” online only on Jan. 25.
Register here

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Catching Up With Erik Curiel

Posted on November 18, 2021 by center_admin

erik curielOur last Featured Former Fellows talk of the fall is happening right after Thanksgiving break! These online-only talks occur throughout the year and reunite our Center community with past Fellows from around the globe.

The next Featured Former Fellow will be Erik Curiel on Tuesday, Nov. 30. Erik was a postdoc Fellow at the Center in 2008-09 under then-Center Director John D. Norton. We sat down with Erik ahead of his talk to catch up with him.

Register for Erik’s talk

 

1. Where are you now?

I am assistant professor at the Munich Center for Mathematical Philosophy (LMU Munich) and Senior Research Fellow at the Black Hole Initiative (Harvard).  Between 2016-2019, I split my time eight months inMunich and four months at Harvard; starting this year, I’ll be spending ten months in Munich, two months at Harvard.  Munich is home.

2.  What are you working on?

I am working on a number of different projects at the moment: writing a book on foundational problems in black hole thermodynamics and semi-classical gravity; writing a series of papers developing a novel account of the structure and semantics of physical theories, including an analysis of the way that theory and experiment make contact with each other; trying to figure out a new way to attack the Measurement Problem; and vigorously championing Pragmatism à la Peirce, Carnap and Stein in contraposition to standard forms of realism and instrumentalism

3. What is your favorite memory of The Center?

My favorite memory of the Center, hmm, that’s hard.  I think it’s a 3-way tie.  One is pleasantly sozzled karaoke with all the fellows at Bootleggers (with Knickerbocker beers for $1!), followed by heroically dressed hot-dogs and ridiculously large servings of fries at The O.  The second is a collective memory, all the weekly fellows’ reading-group meetings.  We had a superlative group of fellows my year, collegial and fun as all hell.  (It was the Year of the Italian Women.)  The third is dropping into John Norton’s office whenever the mood struck me to run some new idea by John and having him invariably analyze and reconstruct it on the spot to present it back to me in marvelously simpler, clearer, and more illuminating form.

4. Greatest non-professional achievement since leaving the Center

My greatest non-professional achievement—continually learning to be an ever more psychologically well adjusted and healthier person as I grow older.

5. Best book/movie/tv you’ve seen this year?

I’ll take “this year” to mean going back to May 2020, not the 2021 calendar year.  Best book:  “The Guermantes Way” (Volume 3 of “À la Recherche du Temps Perdu,” now working on volume 4); best movie: “Céline et Julie Vont en Bateau” (for the 4th or 5th time, but it’s still the best); best tv show: “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” (again, for the 4th or 5th time, but still the best!).

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James Weatherall Returns for ALS and Science Revealed

Posted on November 17, 2021 by center_admin

Former Center Fellow James Owen Weatherall (author of the popular book Void: The Strange Physics of Nothing), will return to Pittsburgh in December for two events.

On December 2, he will be the guest speaker at “Nothingness: So Much to Talk About!” (Part of the Science Revealed public lecture series in partnership with with the Kenneth P. Dietrich School of Arts & Sciences). This will be an online talk and registration is required.  For further details and to register, visit the Science Revealed webpage.

Then on Friday, December 3, Jim will give the Adolf Grünbaum Memorial Lecture of the Center’s Annual Lecture Series.  His subject will be, “The Philosophy Behind Dark Matter.”  The talk will be accessible both in person and online; for more details please see the full event listing.

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Congratulations Darrell

Posted on October 22, 2021 by center_admin

Darrell RowbottomOur Visiting Fellow Darrell Rowbottom (Lingnan University, Hong Kong) has just had a paper accepted for publication.

The paper, entitled “Why Might an Instrumentalist Endorse Bohmian Mechanics?” was written during Darrell’s time at the Center and will be published in Quantum Mechanics and Fundamentality: Naturalizing Quantum Theory between Scientific Realism and Ontological Indeterminacy, V. Allori (ed.), (Dordrecht: Springer) (Forthcoming)

 

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Catching Up With Yann Benétreau-Dupin

Posted on October 19, 2021 by center_admin

yann benetreau-dupin

Our Featured Former Fellows Lunchtime Talk series continues next week on Oct.26 when we’ll be joined by Yann Benétreau-Dupin.  Yann was a Postdoc Fellow at the Center during the 2016-17 year.  What’s he up to these days? Find out below, and of course
join us for Yann’s talk.

 

 

1. Where are you now?

I now work as a Senior Editor for PLOS ONE, the large, multidisciplinary, open-access journal of the Public Library of Science (PLOS). As of this writing, I am working from home just a few miles away from my office—still almost empty because of the pandemic—in San Francisco.

I am also a visiting researcher at San Francisco State University, where I previously worked as a Visiting Assistant Professor right after I left the Center.

2.  What are you working on?

At PLOS ONE, I oversee the peer-review process for some of the many thousand submissions we receive each year: I select submissions that are ready for peer-review, help ensure that our articles meet our publication criteria for rigor, ethics, and data availability. In short, I tackle the reproducibility crisis one paper at a time.

As one of two dozen staff editors, I help define the editorial policies of a multidisciplinary journal that welcomes all rigorous science, regardless of how novel or impactful the findings are. I work more specifically in the behavioral and social sciences team, along with psychologists, an economist, and a neuroscientist.

For instance, I recently led the development of registered reports as a new article type at the journal, a format whereby papers are reviewed both before and after the empirical part of the work so as to improve transparency in reporting and minimize publication bias (you can find more details about it here).

Occasionally, I have to follow specific submissions very closely, particularly when they deal with sensitive topics that could easily be misinterpreted in the media (see for instance this article on police deadly use of force for which we commissioned a formal comment to help contextualize the results).

With colleagues at SFSU (Isabelle Peschard and Chris Wessels), I am working on a book on the philosophy of risk. It should come to a bookstore or classroom near you next year or so, perhaps? This project grew out of an undergraduate class that works well to introduce students, non-majors in particular, to issues in epistemology, philosophy of science, but also ethics.

3. Favorite memory of The Center?

It’s difficult to pick just one favorite memory from my time at the Center, between the city of Pittsburgh itself, the vibrant philosophy community both at Pitt and CMU, an office window with Gothic arches, the incredible talk series, or a formal epistemology workshop on ignorance I was fortunate enough to organize with John Norton and Lee Elkin.

My favorite memory of the Center is probably the Fellows’ reading group weekly sessions where we talked in depth, in a collegial but lively way, about our research in progress, in turn.

4. Greatest non-professional achievement since leaving the Center?

I have become an amateur developmental psychologist (see photo).

5. Best book/movie/tv you’ve seen this year?

After more than a year trapped at home I feel like I have to answer Groundhog Day, no? Other than that, I found Michael Sandel’s Tyranny of Merit thought-provoking and unsettling (and somewhat uncomfortable), in a good way.

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Catching Up With Peter Vickers

Posted on September 22, 2021 by center_admin

peter vickers 2021Next week we’ll be kicking off our new Lunchtime Talk series Featured Former Fellows! These online-only talks will occur throughout the year and reunite our Center community with past Fellows from around the globe.

Our first Featured Former Fellow will be Peter Vickers on Tuesday, Sept. 28. Peter was a postdoc Fellow at the Center in 2010-11 under then-Center Director John D. Norton. We sat down with Peter ahead of his talk to catch up with him.

1. Where are you now?

University of Durham, UK

2.  What are you working on?

Just in the very final stages of completing a monograph entitled “Identifying Future-Proof Science.”

3.  What is your favorite memory of The Center?

So many!

If I had to pick one: Probably February 2011, being grilled on my 5000 words by John Norton and the 2010-11 Fellows in the Center reading group. An experience I’ll never forget!

4. What would you say is your greatest non-professional achievement since leaving the Center?

Raising two kids, now aged 7 and 9. I also ran a 50 mile ultramarathon in the mountains of Wales, but that’s nothing compared with raising kids!

5. Best book/movie/tv you’ve read/seen this year?

TV: My Octopus Teacher
Fiction Book: “Normal People” (Sally Rooney)
Non-fiction book: “Other Minds” (Peter Godfrey-Smith)

Click here for details and to register for Peter’s talk.

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Welcome 2021 Fellows

Posted on August 3, 2021 by center_admin

The Center is pleased to announce our Fall 2021 Visiting Fellows. We are very excited and hopeful that this will be the first group of Fellows to return to in-person work at the Center since Spring 2020. Please join us in welcoming them to Pittsburgh!

Senior Visiting Fellow:
Heather Douglas, Michigan State University

Anthony Beavers, University of Evansville
Hyunduek Cheon, Seoul National University
Brian McLoone, Higher School of Economics
Matthew Parker, University of Western Ontario
Darrell Rowbottom, Lingnan University

PostDoc Fellows:
Ravit Dotan, UC Berkeley
Aydin Mohseni, UC Irvine

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Ryan Nefdt’s New Book

Posted on May 11, 2021 by center_admin

Ryan Nefdt (Univ. of Cape Town), a Spring 2021 Visiting Fellow, has edited and contributed a chapter to a newly-published work on philosophy of language.

The Philosophy and Science of Language, part of the “Interdisciplinary Perspectives” series, is available now from Springer.

This volume brings together a diverse range of scholars to address important philosophical and interdisciplinary questions in the study of language. Linguistics throughout history has been a conduit to the study of the mind, brain, societal structure, literature and history itself. The epistemic and methodological transfer between the sciences and humanities in regards to linguistics has often been documented, but the underlying philosophical issues have not always been adequately addressed.

The volume also features new work by Center Resident Fellow Kate Stanton (Univ. of Pittsburgh, Philosophy.)  See Springer’s website for more details and to order.

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Hannah Rubin Wins NSF Grant

Posted on April 28, 2021 by center_admin

Hannah Rubin (Spring 2021 Visiting Fellow) has been awarded a five-year grant from the National Science Foundation.

The grant begins this summer and the topic is: “Race, Gender, and the Science of Science.”  An excerpt from her abstract is below.  Congratulations, Hannah!

 

hannah rubinThe “science of science” has recently exploded in popularity as researchers turn scientific methods of investigation around to investigate the practice of science itself. While some attention has been paid to issues of marginalization and representation, these concerns have generally not been brought to bear on other questions within the science of science regarding how to enhance scientific progress. The research component of this project fills the resulting gaps in our understanding. The project demonstrates when attempts to improve science not only further entrench (or even amplify) current injustices, but backfire, ultimately impeding scientific progress. Moreover, it examines how ideas spread throughout diverse communities, both providing insight into how current inequities hinder scientific progress and illuminating questions surrounding belief spread and polarization. Finally, it uncovers hidden, unsuspected roadblocks for marginalized groups and suggests potential remedies, promoting diversity in scientific fields. This research component is intertwined with teaching and outreach components, with initiatives including the development of courses discussing diverse methods used to investigate scientific practice (e.g., from philosophy, history, sociology, science of science), a national workshop for members of underrepresented/marginalized groups intending to pursue research in the science of science, and innovative K-12 STEM programming which demonstrates the importance of diversity in action.

This project employs tools from evolutionary game theory and network science to provide a picture of how aspects of social identity, e.g. race and gender, matter both to scientific progress and to how researchers scientifically investigate the institution of science. 

 

 

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2021- 22 Fellows Announced!

Posted on March 17, 2021 by center_admin

The Center is pleased to announce our list of the Fellows who will be joining us for the 2021-22 academic year.  We’re especially happy to have some past visitors back with us in new roles.  Many more details will follow, but for now, here is the complete list:

Senior Visiting Fellow
Heather Douglas, Michigan State University

Fall Visiting Fellows
Brian McLoone, Higher School Economics (Moscow)
Anthony Beavers, University of Evansville
Matthew Parker, University of Western Ontario
Darrell Rowbottom, Lingnan University
Hyundeuk Cheon, Seoul National University

Spring Visiting Fellows
Leonardo Bich, University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU)
Laura Menatti Passages UMR 5319 CNRS (Bordeaux)
Eugen Fisher, University of East Anglia
Ruth Kastner, University of Maryland
Serife Tekin, UT at San Antonio

Postdocs
Ravit Dotan, UC Berkeley
Aydin Mohseni, UC Irvine

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Podcast With Riet Van Bork

Posted on March 12, 2021 by center_admin

One of this year’s post-doc Fellows, Riet Van Bork, sat down with two University of Amsterdam undergraduates for a podcast interview on how the current pandemic times influence different research areas, and other things.  Enjoy!

 

Podcast: Let’s Mingle #1 – The Rainbow

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New Fellows’ Publications

Posted on February 23, 2021 by center_admin

Congrats to our Visiting Fellows Hannah Rubin and Chris Weaver for their recent publications!

You can find Hannah Rubin’s new publication “Reintroducing Kin Selection to the Human Behavioral Sciences” in the Jan. 2021 issue of Philosophy of Science and Prof. Christopher Weaver’s paper “In Praise of Clausius Entropy: Reassessing the Foundations of Boltzmannian Statistical Mechanics” will be forthcoming in Foundations of Physics.

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Andrew Buskell’s 5-Minute Fellows

Posted on March 4, 2020 by center_admin

Andrew Buskell joins us to talk about models of cultural evolution, the evolution of human cognition, and decision-making at the population level.
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Sam Fletcher’s 5-Minute Fellows

Posted on February 25, 2020 by center_admin

Samuel Fletcher, a spring Visiting Fellow from the University of Minnesota, shares his lifelong interest in physics and how it has shaped his work on the examination of statistics and modeling.

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Jean Baccelli’s 5-Minute Fellows

Posted on February 18, 2020 by center_admin

Meet Jean Baccelli, one of our 2019-20 Post-Doc Fellows. Jean works in decision theory and philosophy of economics, but at the Center he’s particularly focused on topics in the foundations of social choice theory, such as interpersonal comparisons of welfare.  For more 5-Minute Fellows, visit our YouTube channel.

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Incoming Fellows

Posted on October 16, 2019 by center_admin

Announcing our incoming Fellows for the Spring 2020 term.  We’re looking forward to meeting them in January.

Andrew Buskell, University of Cambridge

Samuel Fletcher, University of Minnesota

Christian Feldbacher-Escamilla, Düsseldorf Center for Logic and Philosophy of Science

Paola Hernandez-Chavez, Cognitive Sciences Research Center

Sander Verhaegh, Tilburg University

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