October 2019 Lunchtime Abstracts & Details

On Dynamical Laws as Guides to What is Fundamental
Vera Matarese, Center Visiting Fellow
Czech Academy of Sciences
Tuesday, October 1, 2019
12:05 pm, 1117 Cathedral of Learning

Abstract:  Are we entitled to read off our fundamental ontology from our dynamical laws? Normally two different replies can be found in the literature. North (2013), for instance, answers in the affirmative. According to her, dynamical laws relate what is fundamental to what is fundamental and we should posit, in the fundamental world, whatever makes the dynamical laws true. Her view is even committed to term-objectivism, according to which equivalent but different mathematical formulas depict different fundamental structures of the physical world (North 2009). In contrast, Esfeld (2018) answers in the negative by claiming that dynamical laws do not wear their ontology on their sleeves and their predicates are only nomological parameters, devoid of any ontological significance.  In my talk I will concede that—as illustrated in Shaffer & Hicks (2107)—dynamical laws do not always use joint-carving predicates. However, I will argue that they should still be regarded as guides to what is fundamental and I shall show possible ways in which they may actually guide us. Finally, I will discuss a thesis proposed by Curiel (Ms.), which does seriously challenge my view: that it is the kinematics, and not the dynamics, that plays a role in revealing the fundamental structure of the physical world.

The Aspectuality of Perceptual Experience: Learning / Knowing How to See
Arnon Cahen, Center Visiting Fellow
Bar-Ilan U. in Israel
Tuesday, October 8, 2019
12:05 pm, 1117 Cathedral of Learning

Abstract:  In this talk, I will be concerned with the aspectuality of conscious perceptual experience. Aspectuality is a property of perceptual experience that can colloquially be expressed by noting that (conscious) perception is not merely of something or other, of tables and chairs, animals and faces, but it presents to us what it is of as being some way or other – where this has both phenomenological and functional (cognitive and epistemic) consequences. That perceptual experience is aspectual will not be my main concern here (though I will provide some support for this claim, by way of illustrating and clarifying the phenomenon). Rather, my concern is more specifically with what might account for its aspectuality, and how certain challenges from the philosophy of science, philosophy of mind, and epistemology, might shape such an account. In particular, I will argue against the plausibility of certain traditional accounts that ground aspectuality in a perceiver’s background theories, conceptual endowment, or via the phenomenon of cognitive penetration. I will then briefly develop an alternative account, and highlight some of its implications and merits with respect to the cluster of challenges afflicting the traditional accounts and with respect to what the study of (conscious) perception should involve.

On Robustness in Cosmological Simulations
Marie Gueguen, Center Postdoctoral Fellow
U. of Western Ontario, Rotman Institute
Tuesday, October 15, 2019
12:05 pm, 1117 Cathedral of Learning

Abstract:  While the Cold Dark Matter model is well supported by evidence on large scales, it does not fare well on small scales, where simulations do not reproduce the observed abundance and demographics of dark matter halos. Since these properties are the prime discriminators between different dark matter models, predicting them accurately is crucial for determining the nature of dark matter. At such a scale though, only numerical approaches to determining them are possible; and understanding in which case a simulation can succeed in (dis)confirming a model is still a challenge. In other disciplines, such as biology, this question has been addressed through robustness analysis. In this talk, I will argue that robustness is not a sufficient criterion for determining when a simulation is reliable and that alternatives to robustness should be pursued. I motivate the use of crucial simulations, meant to put the numerical or physical origin of a prediction under a crucial test. 

What is Health? Allostasis and the Evolution of Human Design
(some conclusions)
Peter Sterling, Professor of Neuroscience
U. of Pennsylvania, School of Medicine
Friday, October 18, 2019
12:05 pm, 1117 Cathedral of Learning

Abstract:  Many claim that the conditions of human life began improving with the Enlightenment (1700-1800 CE), and now we are better off by every measure––food, health, lifespan, and so on.  But recently U.S. death rates have been rising from suicide, alcohol, and drugs. These “deaths of despair” are exceeded tenfold by rising deaths from type 2 diabetes, hypertension, and cardiovascular disease––caused by overwhelmingly rich “foods of despair.” Also rising in parallel are deaths from mass shootings, which should be viewed as “murders of despair.” Meanwhile, atmospheric CO2 rises steeply, threatening the health of our planet. All have a single cause: compulsive consumption­: eat, drink, snort, and shop––till-we-drop. What gives?

Our ancestors, migrating from Africa across deserts, mountains, and oceans, faced continual challenge. They were rewarded for each morsel of food, encountered episodically, by a satisfying pulse of dopamine. Risks of scarcity were reduced by sharing­––which rewarded both givers and receivers. Today we obtain food and comfort with neither effort, nor surprise, nor need to share. “Jobs”, learned in minutes or days, offer neither challenge nor surprise, and so are unrewarding. Lacking intermittent pulses of dopamine, we grow uncomfortable and seek relief from substances that act powerfully to release dopamine in great, addicting surges.

Standard medicine promotes drugs to treat addiction by blocking the reward circuit. But strategies to prevent satisfaction cannot work.  Standard economics promotes “growth” for more “jobs”. But growth is incompatible with reducing CO2, and “jobs” are what now drive us to despair. To restore bodily and planetary health, we need healthy minds. We must re-expand opportunities for small satisfactions via challenging activities that require life-long learning and thereby rescue the reward system from its pathological regime.

New Tools Drive New Concepts into Neuroscience
Luis Favela, Center Visiting Fellow
U. of Central Florida
Tuesday, October 22, 2019
12:05 pm, 1117 Cathedral of Learning

Abstract:  Increases in the spatial and temporal resolution of data obtained from neuronal activity are largely enabled by technological innovations, for example, single neurons integrating inputs from thousands of other neurons and then distributing energy back to the network. Revealing this neuronal avalanche behavior required technology able to capture particular spatial and temporal distributions, specifically, multielectrode arrays. Accordingly, such experimental work can be viewed as a tool-driven advance in our understanding of neurophysiology. However, such experimental work is also a concept-driven advance as well, in that such phenomena are more accurately explained and understood by concepts and theories not typically employed in contemporary neuroscience. Neuronal avalanches demonstrate features commonly found in complex systems, for example, criticality, emergence, nonlinearity, and self-organization. Though some try to fit such features into more traditional frameworks, others realize the necessity of importing new concepts and theories into neuroscience.

Interpersonal Comparisons of What?
Jean Baccelli, Center Postdoctoral Fellow
Munich Center for Mathematical Philosophy
Tuesday, October 29, 2019
12:05 pm, 1117 Cathedral of Learning

Abstract:  A fundamental question of social choice theory is whether collective decision-making requires interpersonal comparisons of welfare. Arrow's and Sen's pioneering contributions to this field have long been interpreted as confirming that such is the case. It is now held that a more nuanced answer is in order. Social choice theorists highlight the possibilities illustrated by, e.g., the Borda count or Nash's bargaining solution, that do not seem to assume any interpersonal comparability. I will examine whether these two famous examples do, as claimed, eschew interpersonal comparisons. I will show that, in different ways, they do not. I will discuss the implications for social choice theory and the philosophy of economics.