January 2014 Lunchtime Abstracts & Details

::: Aristotle’s Precept on Precision: How Natural Science Once Looked
Nicholas Rescher
U. Pittsburgh, Dept. of Philosophy
Tuesday, January 14, 2014
12:05 pm, 817R Cathedral of Learning

Abstract: Aristotle viewed the nature and structure of natural science in close alignment with his metaphysical position. The paper considers how this works, and how its upshot compares with the present situation both in similarity and difference.


::: Disembodiment and Schizophrenia
Lucia Foglia
Visiting Fellow, McGill U.
Friday, January 17, 2014
12:05 pm, 817R Cathedral of Learning

Abstract: Schizophrenia manifests in a variety of symptoms such as disturbances of thought, perception and action. What unifies these symptoms, however, is their manifesting a disembodiment. My aim is twofold: the first is describing signs and symptoms of schizophrenia as a disorder of disembodiment. The second is showing that phenomenological concepts of embodiment advance understanding of schizophrenia and are on the right track to become a key paradigm in psychopathology.


::: Reformulating Quantum Theory: is special relativity an example to follow?
Leah Henderson
Visiting Fellow, Carnegie Mellon U.
Tuesday, January 21, 2014
12:05 pm, 817R Cathedral of Learning

Abstract: There is a research programme in the foundations of quantum mechanics to reaxiomatise the theory in terms of simple, physically motivated postulates, which might, for example, be of an information-theoretic nature. In this area, Einstein’s postulates for special relativity are often held up as an exemplar of what is wanted. In this talk, I will analyse some different ways in which the case of special relativity might be regarded as an example to emulate in the quantum domain.


::: Relativism, Translation, and the Metaphysics of Realism
Aristidis Arageorgis
Visiting Fellow, National Technical U. of Athens
Friday, January 24, 2014
12:05 pm, 817R Cathedral of Learning

Abstract: Thoroughgoing relativists typically dismiss the realist conviction that competing theories describe just one definite and mind-independent world-structure on the grounds that such theories fail to be relatively translatable even though equally correct. I argue that this relativist line of reasoning is shaky by deriving a formal result about relativistic inquiry. According to the formal result, two scientists, who share some background knowledge but follow different appropriately reliable methods, will converge to relatively formally translatable competing theories, even if meaning, truth, logic and evidence are allowed to vary in time depending on each scientist’s conjectures, actions, or conceptual choices.