There are a number of interesting events in Anna Marmodoro’s ERC funded project at Oxford this spring. This one features John Heil, who has an interesting new book coming out soon…

Powerful Qualities: A Workshop with John Heil

Organised by the Power Structuralism in Ancient Ontologies project

26 – 27 April 2012

Rainolds Room
Corpus Christi College
Oxford

This two day workshop will explore the metaphysics of powers by engaging with the recent work of John Heil on this topic. Heil’s theory of powerful qualities will be investigated with particular attention to understanding how it compares with Power Structuralism, and what is distinctive in each theory. The workshop will include talks by John Heil, Anna Marmodoro and Alexander Kelly, and will also allow ample time for discussion of any issue from John Heil’s work.

Schedule

Thursday 26 April 2012

2 – 3:30pm: John Heil, TBC

3:30 – 4pm: coffee break

4 – 5:30pm: Alexander Kelly, ‘What makes a quality powerful?’

Friday 27 April 2012

11am – 1pm: Anna Marmodoro, ‘Structural powers in Aristotle’s metaphysics’

lunch break

2 – 4pm: Q&A session with John Heil about his own work and that of C.B. Martin

—

Registration is free but it would be helpful if you could email powers@philosophy.ox.ac.uk if you plan to attend.

This workshop in London at the Institute of Philosophy looks extremely interesting. It’s a gathering of some of the leading philosophy journal editors as well as OUP, CUP, and Wiley-Blackwell philosophy commissioning editors. I’ve recently worked with Hilary Gaskin of CUP, so I have some insight into the publishing process. I’ve also followed the discussion about open-access publishing quite keenly (although I doubt that this issue will be a major theme of the workshop), and it seems to me that there are certainly some improvements to be made in the journal editing practices. I’d be very interested in hearing what sort of ideas are bounced around at this workshop, so if anyone is attending, do report back!

INSTITUTE OF PHILOSOPHY ONE-DAY INTERNATIONAL WORKSHOP
The Editor’s Cut

Friday 13 Jan 2012, G22/26, Senate House, 9.45 (for 10.15) – 18.30

The Editor’s Cut – A view of philosophical research from journal editors

This international workshop brings together philosophers and publishers to survey and discuss recent trends and promising lines of philosophical research, aided by the current perspective of today’s editors.

9.45 Registration and Coffee

Morning Session: Chaired by Barry C. Smith (Institute of Philosophy)

10.15 Welcome and Introduction to the workshop

10.30 Thomas Baldwin (Mind)

11.00 Akeel Bilgrami (Journal of Philosophy)

11.30 Coffee break

12.00 Matti Eklund (Philosophical Review)

12.30 Luciano Floridi (Philosophy & Technology)

1.00 – 2.00 Lunch (own arrangements)

Afternoon Session: Chaired by Armen T. Marsoobian (Metaphilosophy)

14.00 Steven French (BJPS) & Michela Massimi (BJPS)

14.30 Vincent F Hendricks (Synthese)

15.00 Tim Mulgan (Philosophical Quarterly)

15.30 Robert Stern (European Journal of Philosophy)

16.00 Tea break

16.30 Panel discussion:

Chaired by Luciano Floridi (Philosophy & Technology)

David Bourget (Philpapers.org)

Thom Brooks (Ass of Philosophy Journal Editors and Journal of Moral Philosophy)

Liam Cooper (Wiley-Blackwell)

Hilary Gaskin (Philosophy editor, CUP)

Peter Momtchiloff (Philosophy editor, OUP)

5.30 Wine reception

6.30 Close

Co-organised by Armen Marsoobian (Metaphilosophy), Luciano Floridi (UNESCO Chair in Information and Computer Ethics) and Barry C Smith (Institute of Philosophy). With the generous support of Metaphilosophy and Wiley-Blackwell.

Registration essential. Please visit:
http://philosophy.sas.ac.uk/d/f/EditorsCut130112prog.pdf

In just a week’s time I’m heading to Tampere to a Metametaphysics workshop organized by Jani Hakkarainen. I’m afraid that it’s in Finnish, so the announcement below will only be informative if you know the language, but let me summarize the topics: Jani will first introduce the topic, then I’ll give a talk on ‘Quantification and Ontological Realism’ (this is closely related to the abstract I posted recently, namely ‘Why Quantification Cannot Carve at the Joints‘). Heikki J. Koskinen will continue with a talk ‘On Ontological Judgements (and their Justification)’, with Markku Keinänen following on ‘The Problem of Universals as an Ontological Problem’. Finally, Arto Repo will give a talk entitled ‘Is Composition a Metaphysical Problem?’.

This all sounds quite interesting and I’m looking forward to the workshop. My own talk will probably be quite sketchy as I’ve got too much going on at the moment and I haven’t had much time to think about this, but this should be a good opportunity to organize my thoughts! Incidentally, I think that this may be the first professional talk ever that I’ve given in Finnish…

Online announcement: http://filosofia.fi/node/6009

Metametafysiikka
Työpaja
ke 14.12.2011
Pinni B2077
Tampereen yliopisto

10.15-11.00 Jani Hakkarainen: Avaus – mistä on kysymys?
11.00-12.00 Tuomas Tahko (Helsinki): Kvantifikaatio ja ontologinen realismi
12.00-13.15 lounas
13.15-14.15 Heikki J. Koskinen (Tampere): Ontologisista arvostelmista (ja niiden oikeutuksesta)
14.15-14.30 tauko
14.30-15.30 Markku Keinänen (Turku): Universaalien ongelma ontologisena ongelmana
15.30-16.00 kahvitauko
16.00-17.00 Arto Repo (Turku): Onko kompositio metafyysinen ongelma?
17.00-19.00 viinivastaanotto (kahvihuone)

Tervetuloa!

Työpajan järjestää SA:n tutkijatohtoriprojekti Brittiläinen empirismi ja trooppinominalismi.

Lisätietoja: FT Jani Hakkarainen, 040 190 4125, jani.hakkarainen[at]uta.fi

Daniel Hill is putting together this workshop on Kit Fine’s theory of neutral relations at the University of Liverpool. This is an aspect of Kit’s work that I haven’t looked into very closely, but as all of his work, it’s certainly worth a very close look indeed. Make sure to attend this one if you’re in the area!

One-day workshop on Kit Fine’s Theory of Neutral Relations, 0930 — 1500, Department of Philosophy, 7 Abercromby Square, LIVERPOOL, L69 7WY (http://www.liv.ac.uk/philosophy/events/index.htm).

We intuitively think that there is a fundamental order or direction to the instantiation of relations. So when (e.g.) Don Jose loves Carmen, the relationship of love holds in a direction: from Don Jose to Carmen. Sometimes we think that the relationship of love holds in two directions: from Abelard to Eloise, and also from Eloise to Abelard. But in 2000 Kit Fine issued a highly important challenge to this traditional way of thinking about relations in his article `Neutral Relations’, Philosophical Review 109 (1):1-33, suggesting that at the fundamental level there is no order or direction to the instantiation of relations. This workshop aims to put two replies to that paper to Kit Fine, and Prof. Fine will respond.

Speakers:
Prof. Kit Fine (NYU)
Dr Fraser MacBride (Cambridge)
Prof. Richard M. Gaskin (Liverpool)
Dr Daniel J. Hill (Liverpool)

Programme:
0930 `Fine on Neutral Relations’ (Dr MacBride)
1100 Coffee
1130 `Are There Neutral Relations?’ (Prof. Gaskin and Dr Hill)
1300 Lunch (own arrangements)
1400 `Response to the Workshop’ (Prof. Fine)
1500 Close

Location:
Seminar Room 3, Ground Floor, Department of Philosophy, 7 Abercromby Square, LIVERPOOL, L69 7WY (building reference 143 on the campus map)

Bookings: Attendance is free, but if you plan to attend, please do let the organizer, Dr Daniel J. Hill, know by e-mail to djhill@liverpool.ac.uk, or post to:
Dr Daniel J. Hill, Department of Philosophy, 7 Abercromby Square, LIVERPOOL, L69 7WY

Directions at http://www.liv.ac.uk/philosophy/contact/location.htm and http://www.liv.ac.uk/maps/visiting/.
Nearest Train Station: Liverpool Lime St.
Parking: Limited visitor parking available; cf. map at http://www.liv.ac.uk/files/docs/maps/liverpool-university-campus-map.pdf.
General Inquiries: to Daniel Hill at djhill@liverpool.ac.uk.

That’s an impressive list of speakers! I’d love to go, but I’ve got too much travelling planned as it is. I just wish that they would’ve asked me to comment! If you’re going, do report back, as I’m curious to hear about this meeting.

Oxford, September 23-25, 2011

Papers by Dean Zimmerman, Kit Fine, Nathan Salmon, Tim Maudlin, George Bealer, Tim Williamson
Comments by Ofra Magidor, Robbie Williams, Tim Button, Joseph Melia, Jeffrey Russell

Papers will be circulated in advance rather than being presented at the workshop. Registration is
free, but the number of available places is limited. If you would like to attend, please email
oxford.metaphysics@gmail.com.

Thanks to support by Taylor & Francis, there is some subsidised accommodation available for
postgraduate students attending the event. To apply for this, please send a CV and a brief statement
of how the workshop relates to your studies to the email address given above.