Philosophy

Rebecca Newberger Goldstein on Mattering

We are the kind of creature that cares whether or not we matter and how. What follows from this? Rebecca Newberger Goldstein, author of Mattering , discuses this with David Edmonds…

Biography Edgar Morin

Photis, Schurmans and Enrique Manuel, Luengo Gonzales (2026) Biography Edgar Morin. [Preprint]

A Topological Learning-Theoretic Justification for Bounded Rational Analysis as a Methodological Strategy in Cognitive Science

Fleig-Goldstein, Brendan (2026) A Topological Learning-Theoretic Justification for Bounded Rational Analysis as a Methodological Strategy in Cognitive Science. In: UNSPECIFIED.

A Fourfold Classification of Scientific Principles

Fasol, Samuele (2026) A Fourfold Classification of Scientific Principles. In: UNSPECIFIED.

Practice-Constituted Realism

Marques, Bernardo (2026) Practice-Constituted Realism. In: UNSPECIFIED.

Formative Constructs as Tailored Aggregates

Larroulet Philippi, Cristian (2026) Formative Constructs as Tailored Aggregates. In: UNSPECIFIED.

A Conceptuality-Interpretation Perspective on Reality. Quantum Mechanics, Relativity, and Meaning

Sassoli de Bianchi, Massimiliano and Sozzo, Sandro (2026) A Conceptuality-Interpretation Perspective on Reality. Quantum Mechanics, Relativity, and Meaning. [Preprint]

Non-causal Explanatons of Social and Biological Networks

Daniel, Kostić and Christopher, Pincock (2026) Non-causal Explanatons of Social and Biological Networks. [Preprint]

When Dependence Disappears: Faithfulness and Effective Independence in Nonlinear Dynamical Systems

Fang, Wei (2027) When Dependence Disappears: Faithfulness and Effective Independence in Nonlinear Dynamical Systems. In: UNSPECIFIED.

(How) Can We Attribute Mental Disorders to Animals?

Hoffman, Kate Nicole (2026) (How) Can We Attribute Mental Disorders to Animals? [Preprint]

Counterfactual Cosmology: Incompatibility Between the Noetic Account and Cosmology

Sunil, Neha (2026) Counterfactual Cosmology: Incompatibility Between the Noetic Account and Cosmology. In: UNSPECIFIED.

Virginia Held (1929-2026)

Virginia Held, professor emerita of philosophy at the City University of New York and an influential figure in ethics and social and political philosophy, has died. Professor Held …

AI in the Philosophy Job Market (guest post) (updated)

A few weeks ago, I was contacted by a reporter working on a story about the extent to which AI, as a topic of research and an area of specialization demanded by employers, was beco…

A new blog

Readers may have noticed that I haven't been very active here for a while. That isn't because I haven't felt the "blogging urge", but because I felt that the things I want to blog …

Online Philosophy Resources Weekly Update

This is the weekly report on new and revised entries at online philosophy resources, new reviews of philosophy books, new podcast episodes, recently published open access philosoph…

Murphy from Georgetown to Notre Dame

Mark Murphy, currently professor and chair of philosophy at Georgetown University, will be moving to the University of Notre Dame. Professor Murphy is known for his work in moral p…

Russia’s Political Persecution of a Philosopher: Further Details (guest post)

Earlier this week, it was reported that Russian Philosopher Svetlana Mesyats was placed under house arrest and the offices and homes of several other employees of the Institute of …

Does Your Department Have an AI Policy? Here’s Edinburgh’s

Has your department instituted an AI policy? If so, whom does it govern, and what does it say? What should such a policy say? Has your department considered an AI policy but held o…

Russian Government Investigating Institute of Philosophy

Russian Philosopher Svetlana Mesyats is under house arrest and the offices and homes of several other employees of the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences we…

Virtual Dissertation Writing Groups

New virtual writing groups for people working on dissertations in philosophy are forming now. Joshua Smart (St. Bonaventure University), once again, is organizing them. He writes i…

Mini-Heap

Recent links… “A lot of kid stuff involves situations where the risk of something bad happening is very low, but if it does happen, then it’s really terrible.” How should a parent …

Online Philosophy Resources Weekly Update

This is the weekly report on new and revised entries at online philosophy resources, new reviews of philosophy books, new podcast episodes, recently published open access philosoph…

Monima Chadha on Responsibility Without Selves

Buddhist philosophy rejects the idea of the self. How then can there be any moral responsibility? Monima Chadha, Professor of Indian Philosophy at Oxford University, explains. This…

Carissa Veliz on Prophecy

Predictions aren't quite what they seem to be, according to Carissa Véliz, author of the book Prophecy. They often are intended to persuade you of the inevitability of a certain ou…

Quantum Mechanics of the Inverse Cube Force Law

In the last episode of my column in Notices of the American Mathematical Society, we looked at a particle moving in an attractive central force whose strength is proportional to th…

Chike Jeffers on Douglass and Du Bois

Frederick Douglass and W.E.B Du Bois were two prominent African-Americans who made a significant impact on the civil rights movement in the US. Douglass is particularly associated …

Geometry and the Exceptional Jordan Algebra

Slides for a talk on features of the octonionic projective plane.

Alexander Guerrero on Lottocracy

Democracy isn't working so well, so why not use a lottery system to choose representatives instead? Alexander Guerrero discusses his version of this old idea in this episode of the…

The Agent That Doesn't Know Itself

A large language model has very little self-awareness. But it is easy to give it some rudimentary but useful forms of self-awareness using the "plumbing" language.

A Typed Language for Agent Coordination

A category-theoretic approach to "agent frameworks": that is, frameworks for coordinating "agents" that are large language models.

Tarun Khaitan on Decolonising Institutions

Narendra Modi has spoken of "decolonising" India including its post-colonial constitution Are philosophical criticisms of this constitution well-founded? Tarun Khaitan of the Londo…

The Univalence Principle

Making precise the idea that equivalent structures are indistinguishable.

Categorifying Riemann's Functional Equation

David Jaz Myers has some thoughts about Riemann's functional equation for the zeta function.

Janet Radcliffe Richards on What is Philosophy?

Philosophers argue endlessly about what philosophy is. Janet Radcliffe Richards suggests that a simple way to approach this question is to examine what we think about inconsistenci…

Coxeter and Dynkin Diagrams

Dynkin diagrams have always fascinated me. They are magically potent language --- you can do so much with them!...

Chike Jeffers on Africana Philosophy

David Edmonds talks to Chike Jeffers of Dalhousie University about Africana Philosophy. This episode was supported by the Ideas Workshop, part of the Open Society Foundations.

Octonions and the Standard Model (Part 13)

There are two ways to stick SU(2) × SU(3) in Spin(10). One is good for physics; the other, alas, is easily obtained using the octonions.

Angie Hobbs on Plato on Power

log|x| + C revisited

A complex-analytic perspective on the indefinite integral of 1/x.

Samuel Scheffler on Grief and Time

Grief is affected by the passage of time in a way that some attitudes and emotions aren't. Samuel Scheffler explores why this might be so in this episode of the Philosophy Bites po…