Calendar

This conference will discuss the role of digital spaces such as social media in being a public philosopher or theologian. The conference will choose papers that explore different digital platforms, how these platforms can aid in being a public philosopher or theologian, as well as the specific challenges these spaces pose. Sessions will explore how digital spaces have become arenas for philosophers and theologians to discuss ideas with other scholars and with the public, and how the discussion of concepts in this format affects the delivery and reception of the ideas. We will solicit papers that specifically discuss how digital spaces can positively facilitate the goals of public philosophy. Internet spaces are an important tool for the contemporary public philosopher and the full implications of their usage has not yet been fully explored.

Main speakers: Barry Lam, Vassar College

Contact Information

http://connect.molloy.edu/s/869/alumni/index.aspx?sid=869&pgid=2173&gid=1&cid=3727&ecid=3727&post_id=0

“Artificial Intelligence: Implications for Ethics and Religion” is an exciting one-day conference to be held on January 30, 2020, at Union Theological Seminary (UTS) in New York, in conjunction with the Jewish Theological Seminary of America (JTS), the Riverside Church and the Greater Good Initiative.

New technologies are transforming our world every day, and the pace of change is only accelerating.  In coming years, human beings will create machines capable of out-thinking us and potentially taking on such uniquely-human traits as empathy, ethical reasoning, perhaps even consciousness.  This will have profound implications for virtually every human activity, as well as the meaning we impart to life and creation themselves.  This conference will provide an introduction for non-specialists to Artificial Intelligence (AI):

What is it?  What can it do and be used for?  And what will be its implications for choice and free will; economics and worklife; surveillance economies and surveillance states; the changing nature of facts and truth; and the comparative intelligence and capabilities of humans and machines in the future? 

Leading practitioners, ethicists and theologians will provide cross-disciplinary and cross-denominational perspectives on such challenges as technology addiction, inherent biases and resulting inequalities, the ethics of creating destructive technologies and of turning decision-making over to machines from self-driving cars to “autonomous weapons” systems in warfare, and how we should treat the suffering of “feeling” machines.  The conference ultimately will address how we think about our place in the universe and what this means for both religious thought and theological institutions themselves.

UTS is the oldest independent seminary in the United States and has long been known as a bastion of progressive Christian scholarship.  JTS is one of the academic and spiritual centers of Conservative Judaism and a major center for academic scholarship in Jewish studies. The Riverside Church is an interdenominational, interracial, international, open, welcoming, and affirming church and congregation that has served as a focal point of global and national activism for peace and social justice since its inception and continues to serve God through word and public witness. The annual Greater Good Gathering, the following week at Columbia University’s School of International & Public Affairs, focuses on how technology is changing society, politics and the economy – part of a growing nationwide effort to advance conversations promoting the “greater good.”

Schedule

Introduction to AI: 9:00 – 10:30 a.m.

Mark C. Taylor (Moderator)
Chair, Department of Religion, Columbia University. A leading figure in debates about post-modernism, Taylor has written on topics ranging from philosophy, religion, literature, art and architecture to education, media, science, technology and economics.

Daniel Araya
Consultant and advisor to companies within tech industry, focusing on innovation, public policy, and business strategy, chairs annual conference on Technology, Knowledge, and Society for Commonground Publishing.

Michael Kearns
Professor in the Computer and Information Science Department at the University of Pennsylvania, where he holds the National Center Chair, as well as the departments of Economics,  Statistics, and Operations, Information and Decisions (OID) in the Wharton School; Founding Director of the Warren Center for Network and Data Sciences; faculty founder and former director of Penn Engineering’s Networked and Social Systems Engineering (NETS) Program, external faculty member of the Santa Fe Institute; author, The Ethical Algorithm. 

Vikram Modgil
Founder of Pi Square AI – a decision design company specializing in AI based systems & algorithms, IoT, Augmented Reality & Robotic Process Automation; founder of The Good AI org to drive awareness and consciousness towards transparency in AI.

Ethical Implications: 10:30 a.m. – 12:00 p.m.

Serene Jones (Moderator)
A highly respected scholar and public intellectual, the Rev. Dr. Serene Jones is the 16th President of the historic Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York. The first woman to head the 182-year-old institution, Jones occupies the Johnston Family Chair for Religion and Democracy. She is a Past President of the American Academy of Religion, which annually hosts the world’s largest gathering of scholars of religion. She is the author of several books including Trauma and Grace and, most recently, her memoir Call It Grace: Finding Meaning in a Fractured World. Jones, a popular public speaker, is sought by media to comment on major issues impacting society because of her deep grounding in theology, politics, women’s studies, economics, race studies, history, and ethics.

Thomas Arnold
Researcher at Tufts University Human-Robot Interaction Laboratory (HRILab) working on AI ethics and human-robot interaction while drawing upon background in philosophy of religion and theology. Lecturer, Tufts University Department of Computer Science; PhD. ABD Committee on the Study of Religion, Harvard University; Co-author, “Ethics for Psychologists: A Casebook Approach,” (Sage, 2011); Member, IEEE Global Initiative for Ethical Considerations in Artificial Intelligence and Autonomous Systems.

Brian Green
Director of technology ethics at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics, Santa Clara Univ. His work is focused on the ethics of technology, including such topics as AI and ethics, the ethics of technological manipulation of humans, the ethics of mitigation of and adaptation towards risky emerging technologies, and various aspects of the impact of technology and engineering on human life and society, including the relationship of technology and religion (particularly the Catholic Church). Green teaches AI ethics in the Graduate School of Engineering and formerly taught several other engineering ethics courses. He is co-author of the Ethics in Technology Practice corporate technology ethics resources.

Michael J. Quinn
Dean of the College of Science and Engineering at Seattle University. In the early 2000s his focus shifted to computer ethics, and in 2004 he published a textbook, Ethics for the Information Age, that explores moral problems related to modern uses of information technology, such as privacy, intellectual property rights, computer security, software reliability, and the relationship between automation and unemployment. The book, now in its eighth edition, has been adopted by more than 125 colleges and universities in the United States and many more internationally.

Wendell Wallach
Consultant, ethicist, and scholar at Yale University’s Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics, where he has chaired the Center’s working research group on Technology and Ethics. Senior advisor to The Hastings Center, fellow at the Center for Law, Science & Innovation at the Sandra Day O’Connor School of Law (Arizona State University), fellow at the Institute for Ethics & Emerging Technology. Author, A Dangerous Master: How to keep technology from slipping beyond our control and Moral Machines: Teaching Robots Right From Wrong.

Ethical/religious implications: 12:30 – 2:00 p.m.

John Thatamanil (Moderator)
Associate Professor of Theology & World Religions, John eaches a wide variety of courses in the areas of comparative theology, theologies of religious diversity, Hindu-Christian dialogue, the theology of Paul Tillich, theory of religion, and process theology. He is committed to the work of comparative theology—theology that learns from and with a variety of traditions. Professor Thatamanil’s first book is an exercise in constructive comparative theology. The Immanent Divine: God, Creation, and the Human Predicament. An East-West Conversation provides the foundation for a nondualist Christian theology worked out through a conversation between Paul Tillich and Sankara, the master teacher of the Hindu tradition of Advaita Vedanta.

Levi Checketts
Adjunct professor at Holy Names University, PhD in ethics with focus on theological and technological issues.

Mark Goldfeder
Orthodox Rabbi, fellow at Emory University’s Center for the Study of Law and Religion, working on a book with Yeshiva University on robots in the law tentatively titled “Almost Human.”

Ted Peters
Distinguished Research Professor of Systematic Theology and Ethics, Graduate TheologicalUniversity; His systematic theology, God – The World’s Future, now in its 3rd edition, has been used as a text book in numerous seminaries around the world. For more than a decade he edited Dialog, A Journal of Theology. Along with Robert John Russell he is the co-founder and co-editor of the journal, Theology and Science, at the GTU’s Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences. Ordained pastor in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

Jason Thacker
Associate Research Fellow and Creative Director at The Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention. He is also the author of The Age of AI: Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Humanity. He writes and speaks on various topics including human dignity, ethics, technology, and artificial intelligence. His writing has been featured at Christianity Today, The Gospel Coalition, Providence Journal, Light Magazine, and many more.

religious and theological implications: 2:00 – 3:30 p.m.

Arnold M. Eisen (Moderator)
Chancellor of the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York. Since taking office in 2007, Chancellor Eisen has transformed the education of religious, pedagogical, professional, and lay leaders for North American Jewry, with a focus on graduating highly skilled, innovative leaders who bring Judaism alive in ways that speak authentically to Jews at a time of rapid and far-reaching change.

Vincent Bacote
Associate Professor of Theology and Director of the Center for Applied Christian Ethics at Wheaton College in Wheaton, Illinois.  Professor Bacote‘s areas of teaching and research include theology and culture, theological anthropology, and faith and work.  His numerous published works include The Political Disciple: A Theology of Public Life and Erasing Race: Racial Identity and Theological Anthropology – Black Scholars in White Space. Professor Bacote is a graduate of the Citadel, holds a master’s degrees in divinity from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, and a master’s degree in philosophy and PhD in theological and religious studies from Drew University.

Robert Geraci
Professor of Religious Studies at Manhattan College and author of Apocalyptic AI: Visions of Heaven in Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, and Robotics (Oxford University Press, 2010), Virtually Sacred: Myth and Meaning in World of Warcraft and Second Life (Oxford University Press, 2014), and Temples of Modernity: Nationalism, Hinduism, and Transhumanism in South Indian Science (Lexington 2018).

Noreen Herzfeld
Reuter Professor of Science and Religion at St. John’s University and The College of St. Benedict where she teaches Computer Ethics and Doing Ministry in a Technological Age.  She is the author of In Our Image:  Artificial Intelligence and the Human Spirit; Technology and Religion:  Remaining Human in a Co-Created Age;  andThe Limits of Perfection; and editor of Religion and the New Technologies.

Hannah Reichel
Associate Professor of Reformed Theology Princeton Theological Seminary. She holds degrees in divinity and economics. Interests and work includes poststructuralist theory, scriptural hermeneutics, political theology, surveillance studies, feminist and queer theologies.

The Long Island Philosophical Society is seeking submissions for its Spring 2020 conference which will be held Saturday, April 18th 2020 on the attractive campus of Molloy College, located in Rockville Centre, NY. 

The Long Island Philosophical Society has been a dynamic forum for the exchange of ideas since 1964.  LIPS is an internationally recognized organization that is a valuable philosophical resource for the Greater New York area. Its conferences have drawn scholars from over 30 states and from the international community, including Brazil, Canada, Ukraine, Israel, and Egypt.

Papers can be on any topic of philosophical interest. Presentations are limited to 25-30 minutes, to be followed by a 10-15 minute discussion period. Both professional philosophers (full-time, part-time, unaffiliated) and graduate students are welcome to submit.  Paper submissions are also welcome from those in different disciplines who have an interest in philosophical issues.

The submission deadline is Friday, March 13, 2020. 

Please submit papers, including contact information and affiliation (if any) to Dr. Glenn Statile at StatileG@stjohns.eduor Dr. Leslie Aarons at  laarons@lipsociety.org.

Since its inception, phenomenology has been understood as a method of philosophizing or philosophical attitude rather than a system of philosophy. Husserl encouraged his students to apply this method to all types of philosophical questions and across all fields of research. As a result, phenomenological analysis was used by a wide range of disciplines, from philosophy and psychology to literature, history, sociology, mathematics, cosmology, and religious studies. The phenomenological method itself has been refined according to the insights achieved as a result of its interdisciplinary nature. However, the core tenets of this method and characterization of this attitude have long been a point of debate among phenomenologists.

This conference will explore the nature of the phenomenological method, its interdisciplinary applications, and how research in parallel fields informed the work of the early phenomenologists.

As always, we encourage submissions dealing with the thought of the full spectrum of early phenomenologists (including Edmund Husserl, Franz Brentano, Carl Stumpf, Theodor Lipps, Alexander Pfänder, Max Scheler, Moritz Geiger, Hedwig Conrad-Martius, Eugen Fink, Roman Ingarden, Edith Stein, Dietrich Von Hildebrand, Adolf Reinach, Martin Heidegger, Maximilian Beck, Jean Hering, et al.) as well as figures who were in conversation with the early phenomenological movement.

Abstracts should be 400-600 words, and include a short bibliography. Abstracts must be prepared for blind review and sent to Charlene Elsby (elsbyc@pfw.edu)

EXTENDED Deadline for submissions is 26 January 2020.

Decisions will be sent out no later than 7 February 2020.

Click here to download this call

https://philevents.org/event/show/79866

THE MAX SCHELER SOCIETY OF NORTH AMERICA

IN CONJUNCTION WITH THE

NORTH AMERICA SOCIETY FOR EARLY PHENOMENOLOGY

Theme:
Phenomenology as Attitude and/or Method
St. John’s University — New York, NY
(Queens and/or Manhattan campus)
April 22-24, 2020

The Max Scheler Society of North America (MSSNA) invites members of the international community of scholars to participate in their biannual meeting. The 2020 meeting will take place in conjunction with the North American Society for Early Phenomenology (NASEP), with sessions from each society running concurrently. Each society is having an independent call for papers. Papers and abstracts submitted for the MSSNA should be sent to the contact information below. All submissions for NASEP should be directed to the attention of Dr. Rodney Parker (rodney.k.b.parker@gmail.com).

Broadly construed, the general theme of the meeting is the distinctiveness of Scheler’s phenomenological approach. We are seeking papers that explore the development of Scheler’s understanding of phenomenology and how this development enabled Scheler to test the limits of phenomenology in examining such experiences as religious experiences, aging and death, other “minds” and persons, reality, and the emotions. The MSSNA is particularly interested in papers examining Max Scheler’s contribution to recent investigations related to the continued development of phenomenology.

Participants will have approximately 35 minutes to present their work.  Though completed papers are preferred, abstracts of at least 500 words in length will also be considered.

Deadline for submission is January 15, 2020.

All submissions should be sent electronically to Dr. Zachary Davis (davisz@stjohns.edu). Because all submissions will be reviewed blindly by the selection committee, submissions should have a separate cover sheet with name and contact information.

Notification of acceptance will be sent out by January 31.

Conference Begins 8:00 am
Breakfast/Registration: 8:00 am – 9:00 am (Kellenberg Hall – Reception Room)
Morning Sessions – (9:00 am – Noon) (Kellenberg Hall = K)

Session 1: (Philosophy and the Catholic Novel)
Chairperson: Glenn Statile (St. John’s University)
Room = K006
1. Father Robert Lauder (Saint John’s University) – “[Maritain, Marcel, Haught]: Philosophical
Resources for Analyzing the Catholic Novels of Graham Greene”
2. Brother Owen Sadlier O.S.F. (Cathedral Seminary; Saint Francis College – emeritus) –
“Philosophical Reflections on Diary of a Country Priest”
3. Glenn Statile (Saint John’s University) – “Brideshead Revisited: Aesthetic, Theological, and
Philosophical Reflections”

Session 2: (Ancient Philosophy)
Chairperson: Chryssoula Gitsoulis (Baruch College – CUNY)
Room = K015
1. Chryssoula Gitsoulis (Baruch College – CUNY) – “The Individual vs the State”: A Study of
Socrates and Antigone”
2. Eric Wickey (Saint Peter’s College) – “A Change of Mind”
3. Mark Zelcer (Queensborough Community College) – “Socrates and the Demos”
4. Alan Kim (Stony Brook University) – “Animal Farm”

Session 3: (Epistemology, Logic, and the Nature of Philosophy)
Chairperson: Christopher French (SUNY Farmingdale)
Room = K020
1. Joseph Biehl (Saint John’s University) – “Selling Truth Short”
2. Jason Costanzo (Conception Seminary College) – “The Fourth Observer: Philosophy and its
Epistemic Paths”
3. Partha Das (Saint John’s University) – “On Double Negation”

Session 4: (Modern Philosophy, Descartes, Hume)
Chairperson: Robert Delfino (Saint John’s University)
Room – K021
1. Sophie Berman (Saint Francis College) – “Descartes on the Infinite Freedom of the Finite
Mind”
2. Rocco Astore (Saint John’s University) – “Devotion Begins in Freedom: An Analysis of the
Relation Between True Love and Freedom in Descartes’s Principles of Philosophy and Passions
of the Soul”
3. Robert Devall (Independent Scholar) – “Hume, the Ideal Critic, and the Problem of Taste”

Session 5: (Political Philosophy, Cities, Confucius, Dasein, Boredom)
Chairperson: Margaret Cuonzo (LIU Brooklyn)
Room – K202
1. Margaret Cuonzo (LIU Brooklyn) – “A Somewhat Paradoxical Argument for the Rights of
Cities”
2. Peter Li (Saint John’s University) – “Political Confucianism and Global Justice”
3. Brandon Kaiser (Boston College) – “Of Dasein and Discourse: Examining the Everydayness
of the Political”
4) Henry Curcio (Western Michigan University) – “Boredom”

Session 6: (Cancer and Brain Death)
Chairperson: John DeCarlo (Hofstra University)
Room = K211
1. Paul Rezkalla (Hillsdale College) – “Elizabeth Anscombe on Brain Death”
2. John DeCarlo (Hofstra University) – “Consciousness and Cancer: An Interdisciplinary
Dialogue”
3. Seth Goldwasser (University of Pittsburgh) – “Finding Normality in Abnormality: On the
Ascription of Normal Functions to Parts of Cancers”

Session 7: (Healing and the Pandemic)
Chairperson: Jennifer Scuro (Molloy College)
Room – K211A
1. Jennifer Scuro (Molloy College) – “Re–narrating Care Work in the Wake of a Pandemic”
2. Keith Bannerman (Stony Brook University) – “An Ancient Approach to the Pandemic
Problem”
3. Cara Cummings (Johns Hopkins University) – “Healing Akrasia and Vice”

Session 8: (Mental Illness, Humor, Unconscious Morality, Moral Nihilism)
Chairperson: Lewis Williams (Oxford University)
Room – K204
1. Heather Rivera (LSU, Shreveport) – “America’s Cruel Treatment of the Mentally Ill and
Criminally Insane”
2. Maksim Vak (Saint John’s University) – “To Genealogy of Jokes or on the Dialectic of
Ressentiment”
3. Sabina Schrynemakers (Independent Scholar) – “Unconscious Moral Choices”
4. Lewis Williams (Oxford University) – “Rehabilitating Moral Nihilism”

Session 9: (Ethics 1)
Chairperson: David Kaspar (Saint John’s University)
Room = K319
1. Clayton Shoppa (Saint Francis College) – “Second–Guessing the Good: Discernment and
Moral Realism”
2. Charles Duke (University of South Florida) – “Purposive Evil?: Experience, Virtue, and the
Prospects of Human Flourishing”
3. Joe Shin (University of Michigan) – “Must Blame: Self vs Others”
4. Rob Lovering (CUNY College of Staten Island) – “A Case for Legalizing Recreational Drug
Use”

Session 10: (The Sublime and Plasticity)
Chairperson: Leslie Aarons (CUNY Laguardia Community College)
Room – K319A
1. Addison Hinton (Stony Brook University) – “The Function of the Sublime in Spirit’s Pursuit
of the Ethical”
2. Wenshu Zheng (Stony Brook University) – “Subjectivity and Alterity: Reconciling Derrida’s
Mourning and the Sublime”
3. Michael Barr (Stony Brook University) – “The Goal of Plasticity: Affects, Signifiers and the
Infinite Judgement from Hegel to Johnston”

Afternoon Sessions – (2:30 pm –5:00 pm) (Kellenberg Hall)

Session 11: (Science and Modern Philosophy)
Chairperson: Glenn Statile (St. John’s University)
Room = K006
1. Yual Chiek (Saint John’s University) – “Leibniz on the Contingency of the Laws of Motion:
The Transference Thesis”
2. Joel Alvarez (University of South Florida) – “Interpreting Leibniz Counterpart Theory or
Transworld Identity”
3. Glenn Statile (Saint John’s University) – “Analogy and the Integrity of Science”

Session 12: (Darwinism, Evolutionary Psychology, and Autopoiesis)
Chairperson: Lowell Kleiman (SUNY Suffolk Community College)
Room = K015
1. Christopher Petersen (Florida State University) – “Is Evolutionary Psychology Impossible in
Principle? A Reply to S.E. Smith’s Matching Problem Argument”
2. Jacob Koval (Florida State University) – “In Defense of Distortion: A Reply to Shafer–Landau
and Vanova”

3. Matthew Menchaca (CUNY Graduate Center) – “Enactive Autopoiesis and the Future of
Dynamic Affective Science”

Session 13: (Aesthetics and Philosophy of Literature)
Chairperson = Margaret Cuonzo (LIU Brooklyn)
Room = K020
1. Brother Owen Sadlier O.S.F. (Cathedral Seminary; Saint Francis College – Emeritus) –
“The Anatomy of an Artificial Body: Aesthetic Reflections on Hobbes’ Leviathan”
2. Alexia Papigiotis (CUNY Graduate Center) – “Rooting for the Devil: Relatability Approach
for Sympathy for Immoral Characters”
3. Joseph Jordan (Holy Apostles College and Seminary) – “A Boethian Response to
Machiavelli, Marx, and Jordan Peterson”

Session 14: (Indian Philosophy, Rhetoric, Borges)
Chairperson: John F. DeCarlo (Hofstra University)
Room = K021
1. Basilio Monteiro (Saint John’s University) – “Sadharanikaran: Exploring Indian
Communicative Philosophy”
2. Meaghan Dunn (Saint John’s University) – “ Philosophy and Rhetoric: A Curious
Ontological Coupling that Once Was? Or Still Is?”
3. Bartholomew Slaninka (University of Massachusetts, Boston) – “Borges’ “The Aleph” and
Problems in Representing Totality”

Session 15: (Ethics 2)
Chairperson: Lewis Williams (Oxford University)
Room = K202
1. Paul Gyllenhammer (Saint John’s University) – “Mill and Sartre on Oppression,
Individuality, and Virtue”
2. Daniel Doviak (Muhlenberg College) – “Moral Pluralism and the Problem Weight of
Determination for Conflicting Duties”
3. Miriam Ambrosino (Stony Brook University) – “Scheler’s Notion of (Inter) Personal Agency
Founded in Loving”
4. John Park (California State University, Sacramento) – “The Mental and Physical Health
Argument Against Hate Speech”

Session 16 : (Holism, Metaphysics, Heidegger)
Chairperson: Henry Curcio (Western Michigan University)
Room = K211
1. Partha Das (Saint John’s University) – “Holism: A Comparative Study”

2. Jake Khawaja (Rutgers University) – “Actualism, Presentism, and Ontological Commitment”
3. Weian Ding (Loyola Marymount University) – “Become the Becoming: A Heideggerian
Lesson from the Embers and the Stars”

Session 17: (Silence, Ethics, Education, Philanthropy)
Chairperson: Christine Salboudis (Saint John’s University)
Room – K211A
1. Christine Salboudis (Saint John’s University) – “On Silence”
2. Alina Anjum Ahmed (University of Georgia) – “DeCentering Power: Arguing for a
Mandatory Undergraduate Course that Teaches Anti–Oppressive Allyship”
3. Lorenzo Francesco Manuali (Stanford University) – “The Normative Importance of Donor
Self–Legitimation in Philanthropy”
4. Josue Miguel Pineiro (University of Georgia) – “Audiential Injustice and Epistemic
Exclusion”

Session 18: (Theism, Aquinas, Rahner. Ecclesiastes, Scotus)
Chairperson: Seth Goldwasser (University of Pittsburgh)
Room – K204
1. David Kovacs (Loyola Marymount University) – “Toward a New Approach to Theism”
2. Kevin McShane (Saint John’s University) – “Aquinas and Rahner”
3. Vincent Alexis Peluce (CUNY Graduate Center) – “Nothing New Under the Sun:
Ecclesiastian Optimism”
4. Jay Park (Independent Scholar) – “Will and Necessity: Reading Scotus Between Ontological
Priority and Ontological Order”

Session 19: (Ethics, Boethius, Human Dignity)
Chairperson: Alec Koppers (Western Michigan University)
Room – K319
1. Stephen Morris (CUNY College of Staten Island) – “On the Moral Status of Historic Figures
and the Removal of Public Monuments”
2. Matthew Konig (SUNY Suffolk County Community College) – “The Nature of Moral Facts”
3. Arich Hluch (Ohio State University) – “Human Dignity, Autonomy, and Altruism: Reframing
the Debate on Organ Markets”

Session 20: Room – K319A: This room is reserved as a discussion lounge for conference participants