Job: Postdoc in digital humanities/history and philosophy of science (ERC, Berlin)

The project “Network epistemology in practice (NEPI)”, funded by the European Research Council (ERC) through a Consolidator Grant to Adrian Wüthrich (Technische Universität Berlin), is seeking to appoint a postdoctoral researcher in history and philosophy of science with special expertise in computational methods and digital humanities. The project will analyze the recent and ongoing digital communication inside a major collaboration in the field of particle physics. The main objective is to understand how knowledge is generated in large scientific collaborations. The project will primarily use methods from network analysis and machine learning to identify relevant communication structures and attempt to track the flow of ideas through the communication network.

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CFP: Workshop on spacetime functionalism, Pittsburgh, 1-2 April 2023

We invite submissions for a workshop on Spacetime Functionalism held by the Center for Philosophy of Science at the University of Pittsburgh. This conference will be held in person in Pittsburgh on April 1st-2nd 2023. Submissions should be directly relevant to the conference topic. You are welcome to submit EITHER an extended abstract of up to 1000 words, OR a paper. There is no word limit on the latter, but it should be suitable for presentation in 45 minutes.

The Center will cover accommodation costs for accepted papers, but participants will need to make their own travel arrangements.

Submissions should be emailed to spacetimefunctionalism@gmail.com by 5pm EST on Friday 23rd December.

For more information, please see the workshop website at https://www.centerphilsci.pitt.edu/event/spacetime-functionalism-conference/.

CFP: Workshop on The Gravitational Constant, from the Local to the Universal, St Andrews, UK, 20-21 April 2023

The workshop is part of The Gravitational Constant, from the Local to the Universal, an interdisciplinary collaborative project between St Andrews and the Lichtenberg Group for History and Philosophy of Physics, University of Bonn (https://www.gravconstant.net/ ). The project brings perspectives from transnational history, philosophy, mathematics and physics to bear on the question of how the constant, G, was transformed from a controversial innovation in the 1880s to an unquestioned fundamental constant of nature by 1915. The aim of the workshop is to explore the wider context and foster collaborations around emerging research questions.  

New journal ‘Philosophy of Physics’ finally launched!

I am excited to report that the new open-access journal Philosophy of Physics is finally online and ready to receive submissions. The Philosophy of Physics Society, together with LSE Press who will be our publishing house, have launched the new journal today.

Thank you very much to everyone in the Governing Board and the Society who contributed to realizing our key initiative!

Special thanks go to David Wallace for having accepted to act as the journal’s founding Editor-in-Chief. Read his announcement on the LSE Press’s blog here.

Please consider submitting your best work to Philosophy of Physics. In order to do so, you should become a member of the Society. It’s free for students and unwaged people, £10 for postdocs, and £20 for others. Once you are a member, you will find instructions on how to submit a paper inside the members’ area, as explained here.

Oxford: Associate Professorship (or Professorship) of Philosophy of Physics

Associate Professor/Professorship in Philosophy of Physics link 

Faculty of Philosophy, Woodstock Road, Radcliffe Observatory Quarter; Merton College, Merton Street, Oxford.

Salary range: £50,300 – £67,541 p.a. plus substantial college allowances, including a £4,000 p.a. tutorial allowance plus either a pensionable housing allowance of £20,000 p.a. and access to a Joint Equity scheme or rent-free accommodation with residential allowances set according to the accommodation type. An additional salary payment of £2,913 per annum would be payable upon award of the title of full Professor (without change to the duties of the post).

Call for nominations for the Hanneke Janssen Memorial Prize 2022

The Jury would like to issue a call for nominations for the 2022 Hanneke Janssen Memorial Prize, which is awarded annually for the best work in History and/or  Philosophy of Modern Physics, done by a student as a requirement for a Masters Thesis. The prize carries a 2000 euro award. Nominations for this Prize need to be submitted by a supervisor of the nominee before November 7, 2022. 

We would also like to issue a special encouragement for the nomination of candidates from underrepresented groups. 

CFA: 3rd Chilean Conference on the Philosophy of Physics

We are delighted to announce the Third Chilean Conference on the Philosophy of Physics. The conference will be hosted by the Philosophy Institute at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile.

It will be held in Santiago, between December 14 and 16, 2022.

Invited speakers: Elise Crull, Wayne Myrvold

We invite scholars to submit an abstract of 500-1000 words to phil.phys.chile.2022@gmail.com, before september 20. Notification of acceptance: october 1.

For any questions, please contact Professor Pablo Acuña: ptacuna@uc.cl / phil.phys.chile.2022@gmail.com

Website of the conference: https://philphyschile.wixsite.com/2022

Call for Papers: Special issue of Entropy on information-theoretic concepts in physics

Guest editors:
Michael Cuffaro (LMU Munich)
Stephan Hartmann (LMU Munich)

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 1 May 2023

Description:

Call for Registration: The Many-Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics

Research workshop of the Israeli Science Foundation.

Hosted by QuanTAU, Quantum Science and Technology Center
Tel-Aviv University, 18-24 October 2022.

A preliminary version of the program can be found here: https://www.mwi2022tau.com/program

Registration: Registration is open and ongoing through this form. Registration fee should be paid separately (full fee \ student fee). (Please note that this price is valid until September 15th, after which the price will increase by 50%.)

Proceedings: Participants are invited to contribute an article to an open-access peer-reviewed special issue of Quantum Reports (MDPI) dedicated to the Many Worlds Interpretation and its alternatives.

CFP: Theoretical Virtues and Non-Empirical Guides in Scientific Theory-Development

Submission deadline: July 11, 2022

Aarhus, Denmark

November 23, 2022 – November 24, 2022

Go to the conference’s page

As part of Establishing the Nordic Network for Philosophy of Physics, we will host a workshop on Theoretical Virtues and Non-Empirical Guides in Scientific Theory-Development.

Theoretical virtues are desirable features of scientific theories, and may include principles such as consistency, simplicity, unification, and consilience/coherence—not all of which are directly related to empirical evidence. These principles play various roles in scientific theory development, including as heuristic, exploratory guides in scientific discovery, as indicators of pursuit-worthiness, or means of confirmation. But there are also other non-empirical features used in these roles that are not typically classified as theoretical virtues, such as analogy and thought experiment.