Planet Philosophy

Kirk Ludwig (philosophy of mind, language & action; epistemology) at the University of Florida at Gainesville has accepted a senior offer from the Department of Philosophy at Indiana University, Bloomington, to start this fall. Brian Leiter

CENTER FOR FORMAL EPISTEMOLOGY
OPENING CELEBRATION CONFERENCE
June 26-27, 2010
Department of Philosophy
Carnegie Mellon University

Everyone interested is welcome to attend!

Confirmed speakers include:

Johan van Benthem, Amsterdam and Stanford
Paul Egre, Jean-Nicod Institute
Branden Fitelson, Rutgers
Stephan Hartmann, Tilburg
James Joyce, Michigan
Hans Kamp, Stuttgart
Hannes Leitgeb, Bristol
Rohit Parikh, CUNY
Wilfried Sieg, Carnegie Mellon
Brian Skyrms, UC Irvine
Wolfgang Spohn, Konstanz
James Woodward, Cal Tech

For details regarding the Center for formal epistemology, the opening
celebration conference, and local arrangements, please follow the
relevant links here.

We look forward to seeing you.

Kevin T. Kelly, Director
kk3n@andrew.cmu.edu
Horacio Arlo-Costa, Associate Director
hcosta@andrew.cmu.edu
Center for Formal Epistemology
Department of Philosophy
Carnegie Mellon University
5000 Forbes Avenue
Pittsburgh, PA 15213

We are pleased to announce that Jeremy Fantl has accepted our invitation to be a contributor at PEA Soup. Jeremy is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Calgary and specializes in epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, and mind. Welcome Jeremy! Dan Boisvert

...from the band Gourmet Rapport (good name!), courtesy of Richard Hanley (Delaware). Brian Leiter

The work of René Girard invites us to re-imagine a 'religious[ndash]secular' interactivity within social space in a way released from the violent dualisms of the 'sacred/profane.' Earlier Dietrich Bonhoeffer considered the same task and suggested directions for a positive theology of church-state relations, even as the inherited forms of these institutions were collapsing about him. This paper explores the Girardian scenario for church and state becoming rivalrous 'doubles'[ndash] whether it be secular utopic projects doubling religious narratives of redemption, or churches doubling the state as parallel yet purer societies [ndash] and suggests resources from Bonhoeffer by which a non-rivalrous church-state relationality - both mutually-constituting and mutually-limiting - may be configured.

Those of you who are or will be in the UK in a few weeks may be interested in this conference on psychopathy and amorality to be held in Swansea, March 26-27. David Shoemaker

The schedule for the first annual Northwestern-Notre Dame Graduate Student Conference in Epistemology, to take place at Northwestern on Friday and Saturday, April 16-17, can be found here.   Hilary Kornblith will be the keynote speaker.  Everyone is welcome to attend.

Story here. Brian Leiter

This post will be moved to the top periodically. PLEASE NOTE THE CHANGE IN THE RULES ABOUT WHO CAN POST. It's that time of year again...I am opening comments on this thread for people to post news about junior, tenure-track... Brian Leiter

Harry Brighouse (Wisconsin) comments. Brian Leiter

Philosophers' Imprint Vol 10 Issue 2, 2010-02-01 It is often argued that future-directed decisions are effective at shaping our future conduct because they give rise, at the time of action, to a decisive reason to act as originally decided. In this paper, I argue that standard accounts of decision-based reasons are unsatisfactory. For they focus either on tie-breaking scenarios or cases of self-directed distal manipulation. I argue that future-directed decisions are better understood as tools for the non-manipulative, intrapersonal division of deliberative labor over time. A future-directed decision to ϕ gives rise to a defeasible exclusionary reason to ϕ. This reason is grounded on the default authority that is normally granted to one’s prior self as an “expert” deliberator. I argue that this kind of exclusionary reason is the only one that can account for the effectiveness of future-directed decisions at shaping our diachronic agency without violating our autonomy over time.