The 14th Annual Philosophy of Physics conference, Conceptions of Empirical Success, was held in Honor of Bill Harper’s retirement in 2010, and was organized by Wayne Myrvold. It features speakers on topics to which Harper made important contributions — in particular, historical approaches to questions of empirical success and decision theory.
This Rotman Lecture concerns John Locke’s practical and theoretical interest in measurement. Locke’s fascination with the measurement of weight, distance, time and monetary value is evident throughout his notebooks, journal and correspondence. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that it features in his philosophical reflections as early as Drafts A and B of the Essay concerning Human Understanding (1671) [...]
Rotman Institute Members Charles Weijer (Western University) and Stathis Psillos (National and Kapodistrian University of Athens) were listed among the top 91 most cited living philosophers in an article on Leiter Reports which compiled information from public Google Scholar pages. Weijer was number 54 on the list, with 4,375 citations, and Psillos was 84th, with [...]
Follow up to last-week's post on the EPR paper, a guest post by Roger Colbeck on its significance for cryptography.80 years ago, Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen put to paper an argument that the use of the wave function for describing the state of a physical system is incomplete [7]. Looking back, it is remarkable to [...]
Wayne C. Myrvold80 years ago, in the May 15, 1935 issue of Physical Review, a remarkable paper was published, whose impact on our thinking about the world has been substantial, in ways that would, perhaps, have astonished the authors. The paper was concerned with a very abstract point about the nature of physical reality. But [...]
Reposted from Je fais, donc je suis. Marks of the form [^2] should be read as footnotes. I spent last week in Washington, DC, interviewing with about 10 different federal government offices as a finalist for a AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellowship. As you’ll see from those slides, AAAS policy fellows are primarily natural scientists and engineers; [...]
Helen Longino, Stanford UniversityApril 17, 2015 Location: Western University, Chu International Centre, 2N05 International and Graduate Affairs BuildingStart Time: 3:30 pm ESTEnd Time: 5:00 pm EST Download a Poster AbstractThis lecture will explore the difference between studying human behavior as an individual characteristic versus studying it as a group property.Dr. Longino will also be giving this [...]
Helen Longino, Stanford UniversityApril 16, 2015 - April 16, 2015 Location: Western University, 1200 Spencer Engineering BuildingStart Time: 5:00 pm ESTEnd Time: 6:30 pm EST Download a PosterAbstractThis lecture will explore how the same phenomenon assumes different forms from different research perspectives and consequences of this for our understanding of scientific knowledge.
Author Meets Critics: Daniel Steel (Philosophy, Michigan State), Philosophy and the Precautionary PrincipleFriday, April 24, Stevenson Hall 1145, 2:30-5pmSponsored by the Department of Philosophy and the Rotman Institute of Philosophy Professor Steel will give an accessible overview of his recent book, followed by critical commentaries by Rotman Institute members Jessey Wright, Amy Wuest, and Daniel Hicks. [...]
Two years ago, this blog featured a series of posts about how the history and philosophy of science (HPS) can contribute to science education:Broadening the goals of science education, by Reuven Brandt,Improving scientific literacy through improved critical thinking skills, by Melissa Jacquart, How to include HPS in science education standards?, by myself, andWhat must be done [...]
