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4 November
(Wednesday) 5:00
PM
Room 226
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Emese
Mogyoródi
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Department
of Philosophy, University of Szeged
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Revelation
and
Reason:
Mysticism
and
Metaphysics
in
Parmenides'
Philosophy
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| Parmenides
of Elea (5th c. B.C.E.) is
one of the founders of Western science and philosophy. His
contributions to the development of metaphysical reasoning and
natural science are pivotal. One of the most debated issues of
interpreting his philosophy, however, is raised by the fact that he
presents his tenets in the form of divine revelation from a goddess.
In most interpretations the significance of this motif is explained
away as a rhetorical or didactic device external to the philosophy.
Others argue, however, that the motif is to be taken “literally”,
that is to say, we must assume that Parmenides had some such
experience and concluded that human knowledge is impossible without
supernatural aid. This paper addresses the issue of the compatibility
of the motif of revelation with Parmenides’
argumentative rigour and argues that a genuine revelatory experience
lying behind his poem is not a rhetorical device serving as an
introduction into his philosophy, but constitutes the experiential
ground on which his metaphysical and cosmological tenets rest.
However, this does not diminish the pivotal role of Parmenides as one
of the founders of Western science and philosophy, on the contrary,
it attests to the economy, consistency and cogency of his thought. |
11 November
(Wednesday)
5:00
PM
Room 226
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Balázs Gyenis *
Zalán Gyenis
(speaker) **
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* History and
Philosophy of Science,
University of Pittsburgh
** Mathematics, CEU,
Budapest
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A Hume-i természettörvényekről***
(On Humeian laws of
nature)
*** In spite
of the English abstract, the language of presentation will be Hungarian
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Our
aim is to discuss the feasibility of Humeian accounts of laws of
nature, according to which laws merely supervene on more fundamental
non-nomic facts. We are going to focus on the following question
(which, as I shall argue, these accounts need to successfully address):
is it true that it is possible to obtain a law-based description of the
fundamental non-nomic facts whatever the distribution of these facts
might turn out to be?
We are going to present several results -- both positive and negative
-- which address the various natural ways how this question can be
precisely formulated, complete with a discussion of the notion of a
"law-based description". Some of these results might strike as
surprising.
We're going to develop some formalism but the talk is not math-heavy
and the intended philosophical points are accessible even on the basis
of a crude understanding of the technical details.
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18 November
(Wednesday)
5:00
PM
Room 226
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Tamás Füzessy
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Department of
Logic, Eötvös University,
Budapest
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Egy ismeretelméleti
probléma vizsgálata formális eszközökkel
(Formal
analysis of an epistemological problem)
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Előadásom
tárgya az empirikus aluldetermináció közismert ismeretelméleti
koncepciója, vagyis az a tézis, hogy a tudományos elméleteinket
aluldeterminálják a megfigyelhető események. Kitérünk az empirikus
aluldeterminációval kapcsolatos legfontosabb kortárs problémára:
miközben a természettudományos kutatás széles körben alapvető
tudomány-metodológiai elvként hivatkozik rá, igazából rendkívül nehéz a
fent megfogalmazott formális feltételeknek tételesen megfelelő, és a
téma kutatói, illetve a természettudományok aktív művelői által is
elfogadott valódi alternatív elméleteket találni.
Az elemzés fő tartalma annak vizsgálata, hogy a formális logika, a
modellelmélet (halmazelmélet) modern eszközeivel, hogyan lehet precízen
megfogalmazni a tudományos elméletekkel kapcsolatos követelményeket,
ekvivalenciájuk illetve különbségük formális szabályrendszerét. Az így
létrehozott formális apparátussal egy teoretikus példa-elméleten
keresztül megmutatjuk a formális elméletleírások, illetve az
elmélet-ekvivalencia vizsgálatok módszertanát.
A módszer felhasználásával megvizsgáljuk az empirikus aluldetermináció
néhány klasszikusnak számító példáját, hogy megállapítsuk: vajon
tényleg példái-e ennek az ismeretelméleti problémának.
Végül (ha marad idő), fel fogom vetni a formális elméletvizsgálat
eszközeinek bizonyos metafizikai (ontológiai) eszmékre való
alkalmazhatóságát is.
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25 November
(Wednesday) 5:00
PM
Room 226
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Adrien
Barton
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Department of
Philosophy, CEU,
Budapest
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Rationality and observations in an
Everettian universe
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In
order to solve quantum paradoxes, the contemporary Everett
interpretation of quantum mechanics postulates a structure of the
universe as a collection of splitting worlds. Still, it has sometimes
been argued that this surprising description of reality should not lead
to any difference in rationality or observational predictions, as
compared with a unique, non-Everettian universe. In my talk, I will
present a version of the contemporary Everett interpretation of quantum
mechanics, in the continuation of Hilary Greaves’ approach. I will
present and discuss thought experiments (quantum Sleeping Beauty,
quantum suicide) which will show how rational decisions, epistemic
evaluations and observational predictions can differ in Everettian and
non-Everettian universes. This will bring up the question of scientific
realism as a central issue.
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