Annual Lecture Series (in-person)
Lunchtime Talks (in-person)
Conferences (in-person)
Online-Only Events
Title: How to build a mind without working memory: a computational approach to cognitive architecture Abstract: I want to argue that there’s something deeply wrong with the dominant thread running through models of the mind and its constituent parts and functions, from Aristotle’s emphasis on sensation and the faculty of phantasia, through Ibn Sina’s anatomically […]
Title: The Pragmatism of C.S. Peirce and R.B. Brandom as a Frame for Modeling Entrepreneurship Abstract: The science of entrepreneurship has a surprisingly long history, dating from Richard Cantillon’s Essai sur la nature du commerce en général (c. 1730). However, the vast majority of the published theoretical work treats entrepreneurship as the explanans for economic […]
Prediction and Punishment: Cross-Disciplinary Workshop on Carceral AI Co-Sponsored by The Center for Philosophy of Science at the University of Pittsburgh and the Center for Ethics and Policy at Carnegie Mellon University, Embedded EthiCS at Harvard University, with the generous financial support of Gayle Rogers (Mellon Professor and Chair, Department of English), Ronald Brand (Nordenberg […]
Title: Perception and Preference in Poetry: Biases Toward AI-Generated Poems Abstract: AI-generated art and text have become increasingly common, and increasingly sophisticated. This talk presents findings showing that AI-generated poems have become indistinguishable from the poetry of human poets. In fact, we find that participants are more likely to believe that AI-generated poems are human-authored when actually […]
Title: Hodgkin and Huxley’s Use of Singular Compositional Abduction Abstract: One of the most significant achievements of Twentieth-Century physiology was Alan Hodgkin and Andrew Huxley’s development of theory of the action potential. Despite the scientific prominence of this theory and the amount of philosophical attention that has been devoted to the Hodgkin-Huxley model, there has […]
Title: Problems and Possibilities: A Theory of Scientific Understanding Abstract: In this talk I will discuss joint work with Soazig Le Bihan on a novel theory of scientific understanding. Extant theories of scientific understanding fail to be suitably comprehensive. Either they fail to countenance relevant kinds of scientific understanding, e.g.~non-explanatory understanding or practical understanding, […]
Title: Myth-Busting or Meaning-Making? Public Science Communications and the Infodemic Abstract: A growth area of public-facing science communications during the COVID years has been the counter-offence against misinformation, that is, fighting the “infodemic.” Since the start of the pandemic, legions of well-intended healthcare practitioners, scientists, and concerned citizens have taken to social media platforms to […]
Nicholas Shea (Institute of Philosophy, University of London) and John Krakauer (The Johns Hopkins Hospital Department of Neurology) will participate as our debaters. Abstracts: Nicholas Shea John Krakauer This will be an online only event and will be available live streamed on Zoom & YouTube: https://pitt.zoom.us/j/91614621442 https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrRp47ZMXD7NXO3a9Gyh2sg.