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| 4
December (Friday) 4:15 PM
ONLINE |
| Jean Eid
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Logic and
Theory of Science MA
Program, Eötvös
University, Budapest
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On The
Constitutive Role Of
Mathematics In Physical
Theories - Poincaré’s
Conventionalist Thesis
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Poincaré conventionalist
thesis appears in many accounts in
philosophy of science. He
presented a famous example of a
2-D disc, taken to be the typical
illustration of conventionalism,
specifically that we have no
empirical way of distinguishing
between a Euclidean and a
Bolyai--Lobachevsky geometry of
the 2-D disc as described. I will
argue that Poincaré’s
conventionalist thesis has major
flaws. My main conclusion will be
that the mere question “what is
the geometry of space?” is
meaningless until we operationally
define distance, and once we do
that, the question will have a
definite empirical answer, leaving
no room left for any kind of
conventionalism.
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| 11
December (Friday) 4:15
PM ONLINE |
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Marc
Artiga |
Department
of Philosophy,
University of Valencia
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Structural
Representations in Cognitive
Science
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Many philosophers have
recently put forward the notion
of ‘Structural Representation’
as a key concept that might
capture a set of distinctive and
paradigmatically
representational mental states.
Cognitive maps provide the
clearest example: they are
cognitive mechanisms that bear
some sort of structural
correspondence with the
environment and which organism
exploit to navigate
successfully. The main goal of
this paper is to clarify this
notion and assess whether it can
play the explanatory role that
many attribute to it. First, I
will argue that the notion of
Structural Representation can be
understood (and has actually
been understood) in different
ways. Secondly, and more
importantly, I will defend that
that none of the possible
interpretations of this concept
captures a kind of mental state
that is distinctive and
paradigmatically
representational in virtue of
exploiting a structural
correspondence.
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