Spring 2019
2/15: Andrew Lee, Philosophy, New York University
2/22: William Robinson, Philosophy, Iowa State University
3/1: Wesley Sauret, Philosophy, University of Bayreuth
3/8: Jean-Paul Noel, Center for Neural Science, New York University
3/15: Santiago Echeverri, Philosophy, New York University
3/22: TBA
3/29: TBA
4/5: No Cognitive Science talk: CUNY Graduate-Student Conference https://2019cunyphilosophyconference.weebly.com/
4/12: TBA
4/19, 4/26: No talks; Spring Break
5/3: TBA
Additional information at:
http://bit.ly/cscitalks or e-mail David Rosenthal <davidrosenthal1@gmail.com>
Physicists and philosophers question the validity of one of the most observed and seemingly obvious appearance in our world: that time flows. Many in the physics and philosophy communities contend that the flow of time is not a fundamental feature of the world, nor even a fact of the world, but is an illusion. As a case in point, we will consider Brian Greene’s view of time in his PBS exposition “The Elegant Universe” holding that time may not flow, the past may not be gone, the future may already exist, and that now is not special. Most people, as observers of time’s passage, might agree with the Greek philosopher Heraclitus who expressed the idea that all is change and that change occurs with the flow of time. I will explore some of the motivation and reasons given for these positions and contrast the arguments made for each viewpoint.
The schedule: a short presentation on topic of 3-D Printing, and then Stuart’s presentation for about 1 hr. plus time for questions. It is necessary to register beforehand to be admitted.
CV: Stuart Kurtz graduated from MIT with an SB in Chemical Engineering and from Princeton with an MS degree in Polymer Engineering and an MA and PhD. in Chemical Engineering. He taught at RPI and in Brazil as Professor Titular in Materials Engineering. This was followed by a research career in industry accumulating around 30 patents and publishing at least a few good papers. He now focuses on Philosophy of Science and Physics and climbing mountains because they are there. He has spoken to the Lyceum Society many times; most recently in January, 2018 he spoke on the topic: Lessons from Science Lysenko, Velikovsky and the Demarcation Problem; In February, 2018 he spoke on Geoengineering for Climate Change Mitigation. In December, 2018 he reviewed the Nobel Prize in Physics for that year.
Spring 2019
2/15: Andrew Lee, Philosophy, New York University
2/22: William Robinson, Philosophy, Iowa State University
3/1: Wesley Sauret, Philosophy, University of Bayreuth
3/8: Jean-Paul Noel, Center for Neural Science, New York University
3/15: Santiago Echeverri, Philosophy, New York University
3/22: TBA
3/29: TBA
4/5: No Cognitive Science talk: CUNY Graduate-Student Conference https://2019cunyphilosophyconference.weebly.com/
4/12: TBA
4/19, 4/26: No talks; Spring Break
5/3: TBA
Additional information at:
http://bit.ly/cscitalks or e-mail David Rosenthal <davidrosenthal1@gmail.com>
The philosophical traditions of India offer contemporary researchers an unparalleled and mostly untapped resource for fresh thinking about attention, its relations to mind and world. From Nyāya manas-theory to the extensive Buddhist theories about attention’s relationship with consciousness, and from precise taxonomies of the varieties of attention to discussions about the norms governing attention, epistemic, moral, and practical, the wealth and sophistication of Indian analysis is astounding. Our workshop will look at the ways in which Indian, including Buddhist, philosophical theory can enrich contemporary discussion, and there will be presentations by a world-class panel of speakers.
We hope too that this workshop will serve as a catalyst to Indian philosophical studies in the New York area. The workshop is open to everyone, free and without registration, and the program is here.
April 25, 2019|DAY 1
8:45 am – 9:00 am
Coffee & Welcome (Jonardon Ganeri NYU)
9:00 am – 10:45 am
Panel 1. Attending to Oneself
Chair: Nic Bommarito (Buffalo)
9:00 am – 9:50 am
Sharon Street (NYU, via video conferencing)
“On Recognizing Oneself in Others: A Meditation-Based Response to Mackie’s Argument from Queerness”
9:55 am – 10:45 am
Muhammad Faruque (Fordham)
“Attending to Oneself: Muḥammad Iqbāl and his Indian Contemporaries”
10:45 am – 11:00 am
Morning Break
11:00 am – 12:45 pm
Panel 2. Attention and Affect
Chair: Joerg Tuske (Salisbury)
11:00 am – 11:50am
Evan Thompson (British Columbia)
“Affect Biased Attention and Concept Formation”
11:55 am – 12:45 pm
Sonam Kachru (Virginia)
“Attention and Affect: A View from Indian Buddhist Philosophy”
12:45 pm – 2:00 pm
Lunch Break
2:00 pm – 3:45 pm
Panel 3. Decision and Exclusion
Chair: Emily McRae (New Mexico)
2:00 pm – 2:50 pm
Arindam Chakrabarti (Stonybrook)
“Deciding to Attend and the Problem of Disjunctive Attention”
2:55 pm – 3:45 pm
Catherine Prueitt (George Mason)
“At the Limits of Pain: Attention, Exclusion, and Self-Knowledge in Pratyabhijñā Śaivism.”
3:45 pm – 4:00 pm
Afternoon Break
4:00 pm – 5:45 pm
Panel 4. The Ethics of Attention
Chair: Eyal Aviv (George Washington)
4:00 pm – 4:50 pm
Curie Virag (Edinburgh)
“Attention as Cognitive Resonance”
4:55 pm – 5:45 pm
Shalini Sinha (Reading)
“The Ethics of Attention in Śāntideva and Simone Weil”
April 26, 2019|DAY 2
10:15 am – 10:30 am
Coffee
10:30 am – 12:15 pm
Panel 5. Self-Awareness and Attention
Chair: Payal Doctor (LaGuardia)
10:30 am – 11:20 am
Amit Chaturvedi (Hong Kong)
“Phenomenal Priority and Reflexive Self-Awareness: Watzl meets Yogācāra”
11:25 am – 12:15 pm
Nilanjan Das (University College London)
“Śrīharṣa on Self-knowledge and the Inner Sense”
12:15 pm – 1:30 pm
Lunch Break
1:30 pm – 3:15 pm
Panel 6. Mindfulness and Justification
Chair: Bryce Huebner (Georgetown)
1:30 pm – 2:20 pm
Georges Dreyfus (Williams)
“But What is Mindfulness? A Phenomenological Approach”
2:25 pm – 3:15 pm
Anand Vaidya (San Jose)
“Attention and Justification”
3:15 pm – 3:30 pm
Afternoon Break
3:30 pm – 5:15 pm
Panel 7. The Wandering Self
Chair: Adriana Renero (NYU)
3:30 pm – 4:20 pm
Carolyn Jennings (UC Merced)
“From Attention to Self”
4:25 pm – 5:15 pm
Zac Irving (Virginia)
“Harnessing the Wandering Mind”
Spring 2019
2/15: Andrew Lee, Philosophy, New York University
2/22: William Robinson, Philosophy, Iowa State University
3/1: Wesley Sauret, Philosophy, University of Bayreuth
3/8: Jean-Paul Noel, Center for Neural Science, New York University
3/15: Santiago Echeverri, Philosophy, New York University
3/22: TBA
3/29: TBA
4/5: No Cognitive Science talk: CUNY Graduate-Student Conference https://2019cunyphilosophyconference.weebly.com/
4/12: TBA
4/19, 4/26: No talks; Spring Break
5/3: TBA
Additional information at:
http://bit.ly/cscitalks or e-mail David Rosenthal <davidrosenthal1@gmail.com>
Various programmes and results in the philosophy/foundations of spacetime theories illustrate themes from reductionism and functionalism in general philosophy of science. I will focus on some programmes and results about how the physics of matter contributes to determining, or even determines, or even explains, chrono-geometry. I hope to say something about most of the following examples: in the philosophical literature, Robb (1914), and Mundy (1983); and in the physics literature: Barbour and Bertotti (1982); Hojman, Kuchar and Teitelboim (1976); Dull, Schuller et al. (2012, 2018); and Gomes & Shyam (2016).
Presented by Metro Area Philosophers of Science
===============================================================
Armin Schulz (University of Kansas)
Details: 4:30-6:30pm Wednesday Oct 9; 3rd floor seminar room, 5 Washington Place (NYU).
Title: TBD.
Abstract: TBD.
===============================================================
Christopher Weaver (University of Illinois)
Details: 4:30-6:30pm Wednesday Nov 13; 3rd floor seminar room, 5 Washington Place (NYU).
Title: TBD.
Abstract: TBD.
September 20: Matthias Michel
Philosophy and Laboratoire Sciences, Université Paris-Sorbonne and NYU
“Consciousness and the Prefrontal Cortex”
October 4: Ryan McElhaney
Cognitive Science and Philosophy, CUNY Graduate Center
“Explanation and Consciousness”
October 18: Sascha Benjamin Fink
Philosophy-Neurosciences-Cognition, University of Magdeburg and NYU
“Varieties of Phenomenal Structuralism”
November 1: Jesse Atencio
Cognitive Science and Philosophy, CUNY Graduate Center
Title TBA
November 15: Frank Pupa
Philosophy, Nassau Community College
“Getting Between: Predicativism, Domain Restriction, and Binding”
December 6: Susana Martinez-Conde
Neurology and Integrative Neuroscience, Downstate Medical Center
Title TBA
https://philosophy.commons.gc.cuny.edu/cognitive-speaker-series-fall-2019/
September 20: Matthias Michel
Philosophy and Laboratoire Sciences, Université Paris-Sorbonne and NYU
“Consciousness and the Prefrontal Cortex”
October 4: Ryan McElhaney
Cognitive Science and Philosophy, CUNY Graduate Center
“Explanation and Consciousness”
October 18: Sascha Benjamin Fink
Philosophy-Neurosciences-Cognition, University of Magdeburg and NYU
“Varieties of Phenomenal Structuralism”
November 1: Jesse Atencio
Cognitive Science and Philosophy, CUNY Graduate Center
Title TBA
November 15: Frank Pupa
Philosophy, Nassau Community College
“Getting Between: Predicativism, Domain Restriction, and Binding”
December 6: Susana Martinez-Conde
Neurology and Integrative Neuroscience, Downstate Medical Center
Title TBA
https://philosophy.commons.gc.cuny.edu/cognitive-speaker-series-fall-2019/
The philosophical and psychological literature on well-being tend to focus on the prudential value of positive emotions such as pleasure, joy, or gratitude. But how do the negative emotions such as grief fit into our understanding of well-being? It is often assumed that negative emotions are intrinsically bad far us and that we should work toward eliminating them, especially from the perspective of our own well-being.
In this presentation I want to question this assumption by drawing on the ideas of Zhuangzi (a prominent early Daoist thinker from the 4th Century BCE) to argue that negative emotions are not intrinsically bad for us, and that their prudential value or disvalue is context dependent. Zhuangzi’s outlook, with his focus on the flexibility of perspectives and living according to our natural, spontaneous inclinations, gives us reason to reconsider the role of negative emotions in our lives and how we might think about them in a more constructive way.
With responses from: CHRISTOPHER GOWANS (Fordham University)
The Fall dates for the Comparative Philosophy seminar:
September 20 – Justin Tiwald (San Francisco State University)
October 11 – Richard Kim (Loyola University, Chicago
November 8 – Sungmoon Kim (City University of Hong Kong)
December 6 – Paul R. Goldin (University of Pennsylvania)
More details (such as titles, abstracts, and respondents) to follow. Looking forward to seeing you soon.
Hagop Sarkissian
Associate Professor & Chair, Department of Philosophy, The City University of New York, Baruch College
Associate Professor, Department of Philosophy, CUNY Graduate Center
Co-Director, Columbia Society for Comparative Philosophy
https://www.cbs.columbia.edu/cscp/
September 20: Matthias Michel
Philosophy and Laboratoire Sciences, Université Paris-Sorbonne and NYU
“Consciousness and the Prefrontal Cortex”
October 4: Ryan McElhaney
Cognitive Science and Philosophy, CUNY Graduate Center
“Explanation and Consciousness”
October 18: Sascha Benjamin Fink
Philosophy-Neurosciences-Cognition, University of Magdeburg and NYU
“Varieties of Phenomenal Structuralism”
November 1: Jesse Atencio
Cognitive Science and Philosophy, CUNY Graduate Center
Title TBA
November 15: Frank Pupa
Philosophy, Nassau Community College
“Getting Between: Predicativism, Domain Restriction, and Binding”
December 6: Susana Martinez-Conde
Neurology and Integrative Neuroscience, Downstate Medical Center
Title TBA
https://philosophy.commons.gc.cuny.edu/cognitive-speaker-series-fall-2019/