Project Description

Home / Members / Postdoctoral Fellows / Richard Vagnino

RESEARCH AREAS:

  • Philosophy of Science

  • Philosophy of Neuroscience

  • Analogical Reasoning

CONTACT:

RICHARD VAGNINO

Postdoctoral Fellow;
Department of Philosophy, Western University

I am a philosopher of science and cognitive scientist interested in how scientists reason about the phenomena they study. In particular, I am interested in analogical reasoning and analogical models in science, especially the sciences of the mind and brain.

My research focuses on the role of analogy in scientific practice and theorizing. I am especially interested in understanding the influence of analogy in science beyond argument by analogy. My research on analogical reasoning intersects with broader interests in pluralism, interdisciplinary collaboration, and modeling in neuroscience and cognitive science.

PUBLICATIONS   

Bechtel, W., & Vagnino, R. (Forthcoming). The Spark of Mechanistic Biology in the 19th Century: The Roots of Electrophysiology in The History and Philosophy of Modern Science, 1750-1900. ed. Erik Peterson and Elise Crull (London: Bloomsbury).

Vagnino, R., & Walker, C. M. (2024). Schema Drift: Relational Concept Stability Across Repeated Comparison. In Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society (Vol. 46).

Bechtel, W., & Vagnino, R. (2022). Figuring out what is happening: the discovery of two electrophysiological phenomena. History and philosophy of the life sciences, 44(2), 20.

Vagnino, R., & Olin, L. (2020). [Review of the book Isn’t That Clever: A Philosophical Account of Humor and Comedy, by S. Gimbel]. The Philosophy of Humor Yearbook, 1(1), 285-287.

Vagnino, R. (2019). Afterword. In N. Cartwright, Nature, the artful modeler: Lectures on laws, science, how nature arranges the world and how we can arrange it better (pp. 77-78). (Vol. 23). Open Court Publishing.

  

WORKS IN PROGRESS

Vagnino, R. (Under Review). The Animal Leyden Jar: Analogy and Exploratory Experimentation in the History of Electrophysiology

PRESENTATIONS           

Paper Presentations

The Animal Leyden Jar: Analogy and Exploratory Experimentation in the History of Electrophysiology Society for the Philosophy of Science in Practice, Columbia, SC   –   May, 2024

Analogical Anatomy: Scientific Disagreement and the Neuron Doctrine Int’l Society for the History, Philosophy, and Social Science of Biology   –   July, 2023

Invited Talks

A Network by Any Other Name: Analogy, Conventionalization, and Disagreement Cognate Society Session (PSA), New Orleans, LA   –   November, 2024

Leyden Jars and Magic Squares: Analogy Use in Early Electrophysiology  UMSL Philosophy Department Colloquium, St. Louis, MO   –   January, 2023

Center for Humanities Engaging Science and Society, Durham, UK   –   October, 2022

Deep South Phil & Neuroscience Workgroup (APA), Vancouver, BC   –   April, 2022

Nature the Artful Bartender Workshop for “Nature the Artful Modeler,” San Diego, CA  –  January, 2020

Conference Sessions Organized

New Roles for Analogy in Science: Experiment, Pluralism, and Interdisciplinarity Int’l Society for the History, Philosophy, and Social Science of Biology   –   July, 2023

Poster Presentations

Schema Drift: Relational Concept Stability Across Repeated Comparison Cognitive Science Society, Rotterdam, NL   –   July, 2024

Schema Drift: Relational Concept and Conceptual Change Society for Philosophy and Psychology, Ithica, NY   –   June, 2024

Summer 2024, Technology and Human Values, UCSD (Instructor)

Summer 2023, Philosophy of Cognitive Science, UCSD (Instructor)

Summer 2022, Philosophy of Science, UCSD (Instructor)

Fall 2024, Introduction to Philosophy, UCSD (TA)

Spring 2024, Data Ethics, UCSD (TA)

Winter 2024, Philosophy of Psychology, UCSD (TA)

Spring 2023, Knowledge and its Limits, UCSD (TA)

Winter 2023, The Nature of Reality, UCSD (TA)