PNP Colloquia: 4:15, Wilson Hall, Rm. 214

FALL 2209

Sept 17  

Mitchell S. Green
"Evolutionary Biology Meets the Philsoophy of Language: How Flies Shed light on Speech Act Theory"

Oct. 1  

Mohan Matthen, Professor of Philosophy, University of Toronto
"Cognitive Feelings"

Oct. 15   Kristin Andrews, York University (Canada)
"Seeking Folk Psychological Explanations"
Oct. 29   Susan Schneider, Asst. Professor, University of Pennsylvania
"The Nature of Symbols in the Language of Thought"
Nov. 5   Alison Gopnik
"The statistical social learner: Using causal inference to learn about action sequences and personality traits."
Nov. 12   Joshua Greene, Harvard
"Of Trolleys and Cheaters: Automatic and Controlled Processes in Moral Judgment"

 

 

Spring 2009

Feb. 26

 

 Dan Steel, Michigan State
Across the Boundaries: What can Animal Models Tell us about Humans?

Abstract: Inferences from animal models to humans--sometimes referred to as extrapolations--are common in a variety of areas of the life sciences, including neuroscience and toxicology among others. Yet several authors
have argued that no such inferences can be justified and that, at best, animal models can serve only as a source of hypotheses that must be directly tested by studies involving humans. One argument for this conclusion is that causally relevant differences between the animal model and human target are inevitable, while extrapolation is justified only when no such relevant differences are present. Another argument is that establishing the relevant similarity of the model would require detailed knowledge of the target mechanisms, in which case extrapolation would be redundant.


In this talk, I present the central ideas of an account of extrapolation, which is laid out in greater detail in my book Across the Boundaries: Extrapolation in Biology and Social Science 2008 Oxford), that is intended to answer these objections.

The material from the talk is mostly found in Chapter 5 of his book.
March 6   Laurie Santos, Yale University
preliminary title: "The evolution of irrationality: insights from non-human primates"
     

Fall 2008

Sept. 18

 

Michael Strevens, NYU
"What is Empirical Testing?"
Abstract: Science is epistemically special, or so I will assume: it is better able to produce knowledge about the workings of the world than other knowledge- directed pursuits. Further, its superior epistemic powers are due to its being in some sense especially empirical: in particular, science puts great weight on a form of inductive reasoning that I call empirical confirmation. My aim in this paper is to investigate the nature of science's "empiricism", and to provide a preliminary explanation of the connection between empirical confirmation and epistemic efficacy. I will try to convince you that the place to find an account of empirical confirmation is the dusty, long-neglected instantialist account of scientific inference offered by mid-century logical empiricists. Some revision of instantialism will be required. As for what is advantageous in empirical confirmation, I propose that it is an unusual degree of independence from background belief.


His well-organized web page is http://www.strevens.org/
Oct. 9   Bernhard Hommel, Leiden Institute for Brain and Cognition
"Integrating features and functions"
ABSTRACT: The distributed organization of the human brain calls for mechanisms that integrate and bind the features of perceived and to-be-produced events (action plans). I will discuss several examples of how feature binding can be empirically studied (e.g., in the integration of visual features, the integration of parameters in action planning, or in sensorimotor binding) and present a brief sketch of the main findings and the state of the art in this research domain. I will focus on recent work from our lab suggesting systematic relationships between particular neurotransmitter systems and cognitive control operations. In particular, we claim that cholinergic pathways are functional in integrating visual information, whereas dopaminergic pathways are driving visuomotor integration. Moreover, whereas the integration and maintenance of visuomotor links mainly rely on dopaminergic D1 receptors, inhibitory processes depend on functioning dopaminergic D2 receptors. A highly speculative integrative multiple-pathway model of control is suggested.

Oct. 30th

 

Bill Ramsey, University of Nevada, Las Vegas
"From Mindless Representation to Representational Minds"

Nov. 13

 

Brandon Towl, Washington Univ.
"Laws and Constrained Kinds: A Lesson from Motor Neuroscience"

Abstract: In this talk I explore the question of whether or not there are laws in psychology.  Jaegwon Kim has argued (1993, 1998) that there are no laws in psychology that contain reference to multiply realized kinds, because statements about such kinds fail to be projectible.  After reviewing Kim's argument for this claim, I show how his conclusion hinges on a hidden assumption: that a kind can only feature in a projectible statement if it is defined by an internal physical property.  This assumption, however, is false: constrained kinds can feature in projectible statements, and yet they are not defined by any set of internal physical properties.  I suggest that many mental terms actually refer to constrained kinds, and give an example from motor neuroscience of a constrained kind that is multiply realizable and "projectible": the intention to move voluntarily in a specific direction.

 

 

Past
(Spring 2008)

Jan. 17th

 

Rick Grush, UCSD
"What am I? An exploration of some relationships between the mind and the brain"

March 6th

 

Paul Teller, UC, Davis
Title: TBA

March 27

 

Lindley Dardin, (Univ. of Maryland) Clark Way-Harrison visiting Professor
"Strategies for Discovering Mechanisms"

March 28

 

Brian Cantwell-Smith, University of Toronto
Solving the Halting Problem
(and Other Skullduggery in the Philosophy of Computing)

April 10

 

Cory Wright, PNP Post-Doc, Washington University
Title: TBA

April 24

 

David Kaplan , PNP Post-Doc, Washington University
Title: TBA

 

(Fall 2007)

Oct. 11

 

Christoph Jäger, Univ. of Aberdean, UK
"Higher-Order Emotions"

Oct. 25

 

David Hilbert, University of Illinois, Chicago
“Color blindness and the nature of basic sensory qualities.”

Nov. 8

 

Edouard Machery, University of Pittsburgh
“Neo-Empiricism: A Methodological Critique”

Dec. 6

 

Lawrence Shapiro, University of Wisconsin-Madison
"The Science Behind Multiple Realizability"