by Anthony Skelton Ending the pandemic will require mass vaccination for COVID-19. But will it be achieved simply by leaving vaccination to the voluntary choice of individuals? If not, is it permissible for institutions or states to mandate vaccination for COVID-19? It is not uncommon for institutions or the state to mandate public health measures [...]
This article, Three Postdoctoral Associates in Philosophy Focus on AI, is reprinted with permission from Western's Faculty of Arts & Humanities. Artificial intelligence (AI) and related technologies pose new opportunities and challenges across many domains of our lives. Philosophers are uniquely equipped to address the underlying assumptions and potential conflicts that arise from integrating these [...]
Written by Lisa Forsberg and Anthony Skelton Mandating COVID-19 vaccination for children is cross-posted from the Practical Ethics blog, of the University of Oxford. In many countries vaccine rollouts are now well underway. Vaccine programmes in Israel, the United Kingdom, Chile, United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and the United States have been particularly successful. Mass vaccination [...]
Marie Gueguen is an alumnus of the Rotman Institute, who completed her doctorate under the supervision of Chris Smeenk in 2019. She was recently awarded a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) Individual Fellowship (IF) grant by the European Commission. Her unique project will embed her in a research group working with molecular physicists and astrochemists--one of [...]
Niels Linnemann worked as a postdoctoral fellow on the New Directions in Philosophy of Cosmology grant project, with principal investigator Chris Smeenk. His fellowship came to end in January 2021, but he will continue working with Chris and other collaborators on the project. And as the situation with COVID improves & travel is permitted we [...]
Ed Baggs joined the Rotman Institute of Philosophy as a postdoctoral fellow in fall 2019. His work focuses on embodied approaches in cognitive science, including ecological psychology, dynamic systems theory, and enactivism. This virtual interview was conducted by Eric Desjardins & is part of a series of interviews of all of our current postdocs. More [...]
The Rotman Institute of Philosophy is currently inviting graduate students to apply for membership. The Institute’s mission is to catalyze and lead the production of interdisciplinary research by uniting philosophers with scientists, policy makers and the general public. Our open-concept, collaborative work space is housed in the Western Interdisciplinary Research Building, along with the Brain and Mind [...]
Adam Koberinski has worked as a Postdoctoral Fellow on the New Directions in Philosophy of Cosmology research project, under Chris Smeenk, for the past year. His research focuses on the intersection of particle physics and cosmology. Laura Cardozo conducted this virtual interview with Adam to learn more about his research and what sparked his interest [...]
By Benjamin Hill James Mackey (MA, Western expected 2020) was assigned to me for a Rotman Summer Graduate Research Assistantship. Our project was to create in Zotero an annotated bibliography of recent work (works published since 2015) on 16th century natural philosophy. As many of you know well, the 16th century saw the birth of [...]
This bi-monthly post begins with exciting news from a couple of our members. First off, we are excited to announce that Jess Du Toit received a Varnier Canada Graduate Scholarship, 2020-2023. The Vanier Scholarship recognizes students with outstanding academic achievement, research potential and leadership. In addition to this award, a few of our faculty members [...]
