Oct
4
Thu
The Gift and Weight of Genomic Knowledge: In Search of the Good Biocitizen @ Feil Hall, Forchelli Conference Center, 22nd Floor
Oct 4 – Oct 5 all-day
This knowledge is irrevocable.” So reads an opening line in the terms-of-service agreement for 23andMe, a leading direct-to-consumer genetic testing company. This remarkable phrase attests to an increasing recognition of the role genomic knowledge plays in shaping human life. On the one hand, genomic knowledge is a gift, creating novel insights into the genetic drivers of disease and into the geographical paths of our ancestors. On the other, it is a weight, creating new obligations, new forms of social classification, and new forms of surveillance. Thus, we are faced with a fundamental question: how can we live well in the face of knowledge that can change the criteria, conditions, and lived experience of life? Or, as we formulate that question for this conference, what is a good biocitizen?
This conference aims to take a step back and ask: In what ways can genomic knowledge promote human flourishing, and in what ways might it thwart it?  What are the conditions that shape the biocitizen today, and how ought one act in light of these? Heeding not only the lessons of this history, but also our contemporary socio-political context, we wish to gain clarity on how genomics has shaped and is shaping lived experience. How, against the background of such knowledge, might we leverage genomic knowledge toward a life lived well in health for all?

DATES:

October 4 and 5, 2018

LOCATION:

Feil Hall, Forchelli Conference Center, 22nd Floor, 205 State Street Brooklyn, New York

Sponsored by The Hastings Center and Brooklyn Law School’s Center for Health, Science and Public Policy; co-sponsored by Columbia University’s Department of Medical Humanities and Ethics and Harvard Medical School’s Center for Bioethics

Access the conference flyer here.


SPEAKERS: 

Catherine Bliss (University of California, San Francisco) Alondra Nelson (Columbia University)
Catherine Clune-Taylor (Princeton University) Carolyn Neuhaus (The Hastings Center)
Eva Kittay (SUNY Stony Brook) Jenny Reardon (UC Santa Cruz)
Melinda Hall (Stetson University) Sandra Soo-Jin Lee (Stanford University)
Colin Koopman (University of Oregon) Joe Stramondo (San Diego State University)
Leslie Larkin (Northern Michigan University) Jessica Kolopenuk (University of Alberta)

CONFERENCE SCHEDULE:

Thursday, October 4, 8:15 am – 5:00 pm

REGISTRATION AND CONTINENTAL BREAKFAST: 8:15-9:00

SHORT BREAK: 10:20-10:40

  • 10:40-11:40 Lesley Larkin “On Contemporary Literature and the ‘Good Bionarrative Citizen”

LUNCH: 11:40-1:00

  • 1:00-1:50 Sandra Soo-Jin Lee “How Is Social Networking and Direct-To-Consumer Genetic Testing Shaping The Choices and Conundrums of the Biocitizen?”
  • 1:50-2:40 Melinda Hall “On The Language of Risk and the Marginalization of Bodies”

BREAK: 2:40-3:10

  • 3:10-4:00 Catherine Clune-Taylor  “What Does The History of Medicine Teach about the Advent of Genomics as “Truth” Concerning Categories of Embodiment such as Sex and Sexuality?”
  • 4:00-5:00 Joseph Stramondo “How Does Genomics Shape Categories of Disability and How Might the Virtuous Biocitizen Respond?”

Friday, October 5, 2018, 8:15 am – 5:00 pm

REGISTRATION AND CONTINENTAL BREAKFAST: 8:15-9:00

  • 9:00-9:50 Jessica Kolopenuk “How Does Colonialism and Racism Inform Genomic Knowledge and How Might Such Legacies Be Undermined?”
  • 9:50-10:40 Catherine Bliss “Given Genomics’ Potential for Reinscription of Erroneous Notions of Race, How Should One Think about Race Ethically in the Genomic Age?”

SHORT BREAK: 10:40-11:00

  • 11:00-11:50 Eva Kittay “How Much of a Gift or Weight Is Genomics from the Perspective of Care?”

LUNCH 11:50-1:00

  • 1:00-1:50 Carolyn Neuhaus “On the Rhetoric that Exaggerates the Weight and Elides the Gift”
  • 1:50-2:40 Alondra Nelson “The Politics of Genomics in the USA: the OSTP and the PMI”

SHORT BREAK: 2:40-3:00

  • 3:00-4:00 Jenny Reardon “How Should We Understand the Relationship between Genomics, Justice, and Democracy?”
  • 4:00-5:00 Roundtable Discussion

REGISTER HERE


This conference will have live on-screen captioning and will be livestreamed. Send inquiries about the conference and any accessibility-related requests to reynoldsj@thehastingscenter.org. Requests for a reasonable accommodation based on a disability to attend this event should also be made to Louise Cohen, the BLS Reasonable Accommodations Coordinator, at louise.cohen@brooklaw.edu or (718) 780-0377. 

Oct
11
Thu
Working Papers in Ethics and Moral Psychology @ Icahn School @Mount Sinai, Annenberg 12-16
Oct 11 @ 5:30 pm – 7:00 pm

Working Papers in Ethics and Moral Psychology is a speaker series conducted under the auspices of the Icahn School of Medicine Bioethics Program. It is a working group where speakers are invited to present well-developed, as yet unpublished work. The focus of the group is interdisciplinary, with an emphasis on topics in ethics, bioethics, neuroethics, and moral psychology. The meetings begin with a brief presentation by the invited speaker and the remaining time is devoted to a discussion of the paper. The speakers will make their papers available in advance of their presentation to those who sign up for the Working Papers mailing list.

Upcoming Speakers:

11 Oct: Jordan Mackenzie, NYU

8 Nov: Susana Nuccetelli, St. Cloud State

13 Dec: Michael Brownstein, John Jay

14 Mar: Kyle Ferguson, CUNY

18 Apr: Jeff Sebo, NYU

23 May: Johann Frick, Princeton

Oct
29
Mon
Evaluating Chronic Pain in Neuroscience, Ethics, and Law – Seminars in Society and Neuroscience @ Faculty House, Columbia U
Oct 29 @ 4:15 pm – 6:15 pm

Speakers:
Amanda Pustilnik, Professor of Law, University of Maryland
Tor Wager, Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience, University of Colorado Boulder

Moderators:
Federica Coppola, Presidential Scholar in Society and Neuroscience, Columbia University
Lan Li, Presidential Scholar in Society and Neuroscience, Columbia University

We will provide additional information as soon as possible.

Free and open to the public, but RSVP is required via Eventbrite. This event is part of the Seminars in Society and Neuroscience series.

Nov
8
Thu
Working Papers in Ethics and Moral Psychology @ Icahn School @Mount Sinai, Annenberg 12-16
Nov 8 @ 5:30 pm – 7:00 pm

Working Papers in Ethics and Moral Psychology is a speaker series conducted under the auspices of the Icahn School of Medicine Bioethics Program. It is a working group where speakers are invited to present well-developed, as yet unpublished work. The focus of the group is interdisciplinary, with an emphasis on topics in ethics, bioethics, neuroethics, and moral psychology. The meetings begin with a brief presentation by the invited speaker and the remaining time is devoted to a discussion of the paper. The speakers will make their papers available in advance of their presentation to those who sign up for the Working Papers mailing list.

Upcoming Speakers:

11 Oct: Jordan Mackenzie, NYU

8 Nov: Susana Nuccetelli, St. Cloud State

13 Dec: Michael Brownstein, John Jay

14 Mar: Kyle Ferguson, CUNY

18 Apr: Jeff Sebo, NYU

23 May: Johann Frick, Princeton

Nov
30
Fri
Samantha Matherne @ Columbia University, Philosophy rm 716
Nov 30 @ 4:30 pm

New York German Idealism Workshop

Our upcoming events for this fall (2018):

Robyn Marasco – September 28 (Columbia)
Francey Russell – October 26 (NSSR)
Samantha Matherne – November 30 (Columbia)
Allegra de Laurentiis – December 7 (NSSR)

Dec
7
Fri
Allegra de Laurentiis @ New School D1001
Dec 7 @ 4:30 pm

New York German Idealism Workshop

Our upcoming events for this fall (2018):

Robyn Marasco – September 28 (Columbia)
Francey Russell – October 26 (NSSR)
Samantha Matherne – November 30 (Columbia)
Allegra de Laurentiis – December 7 (NSSR)

Dec
13
Thu
Working Papers in Ethics and Moral Psychology @ Icahn School @Mount Sinai, Annenberg 12-16
Dec 13 @ 5:30 pm – 7:00 pm

Working Papers in Ethics and Moral Psychology is a speaker series conducted under the auspices of the Icahn School of Medicine Bioethics Program. It is a working group where speakers are invited to present well-developed, as yet unpublished work. The focus of the group is interdisciplinary, with an emphasis on topics in ethics, bioethics, neuroethics, and moral psychology. The meetings begin with a brief presentation by the invited speaker and the remaining time is devoted to a discussion of the paper. The speakers will make their papers available in advance of their presentation to those who sign up for the Working Papers mailing list.

Upcoming Speakers:

11 Oct: Jordan Mackenzie, NYU

8 Nov: Susana Nuccetelli, St. Cloud State

13 Dec: Michael Brownstein, John Jay

14 Mar: Kyle Ferguson, CUNY

18 Apr: Jeff Sebo, NYU

23 May: Johann Frick, Princeton

Dec
19
Wed
Rethinking Pregnancy: Two Philosophical Perspectives with Suki Finn and Jennifer Scuro @ Martin E. Segal Theater
Dec 19 @ 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm

Pregnancy is something that affects all of us: Many of us are, have been, or will be, pregnant; and each and every one of us is the result of a pregnancy. But there remain deep and important questions about pregnancy that are yet to be answered.

What is it to be pregnant?  How can we understand the complex relationship between the fetus and the mother?  What are the myths and assumptions that surround the phenomenon of pregnancy?  Should we challenge the medical and paternalistic interpretations of pregnancy?  Are our current dominant understandings of and cultural scripts about pregnancy harmful?  

Two philosophers discuss these issues regarding pregnancy through a phenomenological and metaphysical lens.

Suki Finn is a Doctor of Philosophy, working as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Philosophy Department at the University of Southampton in the UK, on the ERC funded project ‘Better Understanding the Metaphysics of Pregnancy‘. Suki is currently embarking on a Visiting Research Scholarship at New York University to continue her work on the metaphysics of pregnancy, and she also researches in the areas of metametaphysics and the philosophy of logic. Suki’s research has been published in various academic journals, books, and the popular online magazine Aeon. Her publications can be viewed on Academia or PhilPeople. Suki is also on the Executive Committee for the Society for Women in Philosophy UK, and on the Council for the Royal Institute of Philosophy.

Jennifer Scuro, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at the College of New Rochelle in New York and has been recently elected to the governing board of the Cultural Studies Association. She is the author of Addressing Ableism: Philosophical Questions via Disability Studies(Lexington Books, Oct 2017) and The Pregnancy ≠ Childbearing Project: A Phenomenology of Miscarriage, (Rowman & Littlefield International, Feb 2017) a (autobio)graphic novel and feminist phenomenological analysis of pregnant embodiment, miscarriage and the labor of grief. The original tracework art from her graphic novel on miscarriage has been exhibited in several cities with the award-winning arts organization, The ART of Infertility.

This event is co-sponsored by the Gotham Philosophical Society and the CUNY Academy for the Humanities and Sciences.  Admission is free and open to the public.

Wednesday, December 19, 2018 at 6:30pm, in the Martin E. Segal Theater

CUNY Graduate Center, 365 5th Avenue (at 34th Street) New York, New York 10016 (212) 817-7944  cunyacademy@gc.cuny.edu

Feb
8
Fri
Bioethics Colloquium: Hanna Pickard on The Puzzle of Addiction @ NYU, rm tba
Feb 8 @ 4:00 pm – 6:00 pm

The orthodox conception of drug addiction is a neurobiological disease characterised by compulsive drug use despite negative consequences. But this conception depends on three core ideas that are rarely clarified: disease, compulsion, and negative consequences. Pickard argues that it is only when the significance of negative consequences is appreciated that the puzzle of addiction comes clearly into view; and she discusses some conceptual and empirical grounds supporting scepticism about the claim that addiction can be accurately characterised as a form of compulsion, and agnosticism about the claim that addiction is a neurobiological disease. Addiction is better characterized as involving drug choices that, while on the surface puzzling, can be explained by recognizing the multiple functions that drugs serve, and by contextualizing drug choices in relation to a host of interacting and individualized factors. Alongside craving or strength of motivation to use, these factors include (1) psychiatric co-morbidity, (2) limited socio-economic opportunities, (3) temporally myopic decision-making, (4) denial and motivated irrationality, and, lastly, (5) a sense of self and social identity. She shall briefly explain the relevance of all five factors, but conclude by focussing on (5) in more detail, exploring the distinctive way that the human drive not only for social reward and belonging but also to know who one is can serve to cement addiction and impede recovery.

Hanna Pickard is Professor in Philosophy of Psychology at the University of Birmingham, UK, and a 3-year Visiting Research Scholar in the Program of Cognitive Science at Princeton University. In addition to her academic work, from 2007-17 she worked in a NHS specialist service for people with personality disorders and complex needs. Website: www.hannapickard.com.

Friday, February 8th, 2019
4:00 – 6:00 PM
Reception to follow
Location TBD; RSVPs will be notified via email

RSVP Here

German Idealism Workshop @ Columbia University, Philosophy rm 716
Feb 8 @ 4:30 pm – 6:30 pm

8 February @Columbia

Patricia Kitcher: The Fact of Reason in Kant’s Moral Psychology

Response: Jessica Tizzard

22 February @NSSR

Matters of Love: A Conference

5 April @Columbia

Beatrice Longuenesse: Residues of First Nature

19 April @NSSR

Angelica Nuzzo: Approaching Hegel’s Logic Obliquely: Melville, Moliere, Beckett

Response: David Carlson

10 May @Columbia

Amy Allen: Turning Dead Ends into Through Streets: Psychoanalysis and the Idea of Progress