May 5, 2008

UT-Austin Graduate Student Workshop on Philosophical Methodology, Aug. 12-16
By Julia Driver

I’d like to draw your attention to the following:

The UT-Austin philosophy department is pleased to announce a week-long
graduate student workshop on philosophical methodology, August 12 –
August 16.

Possible workshop subtopics include (but are not limited to)
intuition, conceptual analysis, reflective equilibrium, reduction, and
ontological commitment.

Already confirmed speakers include Julia Driver (Washington University/St. Louis), Marc Moffett (Wyoming), Roy Sorensen (Washington University/St. Louis), Ernest Sosa (Rutgers), and a number of UT faculty.

We hope to accept around 10 outside graduate student participants. If
you are interested in applying, please see our website for details:

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Posted on May 5, 2008 at 3:49 pm in Conference Announcement, Philosophical Methods, Julia Driver's Posts | 1 Comment

May 2, 2008

Why do ethicists write such long papers?
By Saul Smilansky

I’ve been looking through the recent issue of Analysis. It has 13 papers, of which one is on meta-ethics, and there’s nothing in either normative or applied ethics. This is a fairly typical showing. There are occasional papers on free will (which is a distinct topic, combining metaphysics and ethics), but very little ethics as such, and (my focus here) hardly any normative or, indeed, applied ethics. Why? And why does this matter?

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Posted on May 2, 2008 at 8:21 am in Normative Ethics, Saul Smilansky's Posts, Philosophical Methods | 14 Comments

January 31, 2008

Appiah Reading Group
By S. Matthew Liao

experimentsinethics.jpg Following the successful Kamm Reading Group, Ethics Etc will shortly be holding another reading group on Professor Kwame Anthony Appiah’s book, Experiments in Ethics. Professor Appiah is Laurance S. Rockefeller University Professor of Philosophy at the Center for Human Values at Princeton University and the current President of the American Philosophical Association. The content of his book is as follows:

1. Introduction: The Waterless Moat
2. The Case against Character
3. The Case against Intuition
4. The Varieties of Moral Experience
5. The Ends of Ethics

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Posted on January 31, 2008 at 6:11 pm in S. Matthew Liao's Posts, Appiah Reading Group, Philosophical Methods, Experimental Ethics | 5 Comments

January 3, 2008

Jason Stanley’s Bank Case Poll
By S. Matthew Liao

Professor Jason Stanley (Rutgers University) has recently won the American Philosophical Association Book Prize for his book, Knowledge and Practical Interests. In this book, Stanely also tests and develops his theories and principles by means of intuitive judgments about cases. Here is a case from the book:

[Bank Case 1:] Hannah and her wife Sarah are driving home on a Friday afternoon. They plan to stop at the bank on the way home to deposit their paychecks. Since they have an impending bill coming due, and very little in their account, it is very important that they deposit their paychecks by Saturday. But neither Hannah nor Sarah is aware of the impending bill, nor of the paucity of available funds. Looking at the lines [i.e., at the long queue at the bank], Hannah says to Sarah, ‘I know the bank will be open tomorrow, since I was there just two weeks ago on Saturday morning. So we can deposit our paychecks tomorrow morning.’ (p. 5)

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Posted on January 3, 2008 at 7:01 am in S. Matthew Liao's Posts, Epistemology, Ethics Etc Poll, Philosophical Methods | 4 Comments