We are looking forward to the next series of our monthly online workshop devoted to discussion of work in progress in experimental philosophy. The workshop is held via Teams, the second Wednesday of each month, 16:00-18:00 UK time. Except for the opening keynote session, all sessions will have two presentations. Please email to register and receive the links (by the day before the session you hope to attend would be ideal).

Opening Keynote:

Oct 9, 16-18 UTC+1, Shaun Nichols (Cornell), The PSR and the folk metaphysics of explanation

Abstract: There just has to be an explanation. This familiar commonsense refrain resonates with the Principle of Sufficient Reason (PSR), according to which, for every fact, there must be an explanation of that fact. In this talk, I’ll report several studies which indicate that people’s judgments conform to the PSR. This holds for adults in the US and children in the US; it also seems to hold for adults in China and India. However, we have found that judgments vary by domain: people are less committed to the idea that aesthetic and moral facts must have explanations.

Nov 13, 16-18 UTC+0, Monica Ding (KCL), Non-factive Understanding: Evidence from English, Cantonese, and Mandarin

Abstract: This talk contributes to the current debate on the factivity of understanding by examining the use of ‘understand’ in English, Cantonese, and Mandarin. While ‘S understands that p’ entails that p, four non-factive constructions of ‘understand’ have been found. Further observation suggests that these constructions can be used as tests categorising cognitive verbs into four types in terms of their factivity. Following this new categorisation, ‘understand’ is the type of cognitive verb that always takes two objects: one is the target to understand that must be factive, and the other is the manner in which the target is understood, which may not be factive.

Nov 13, 16-18 UTC+0, María Alejandra Petino Zappala (German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), Germany); Phuc Nguyen (German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), Germany); Andrea Quint (German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), Germany); Nora Heinzelmann (Institut für Philosophie, FAU Erlangen), Digital interventions to boost vaccination intention: a report

Abstract: This study, performed in Germany, the United States and the United Kingdom, assesses how digital interventions in parents of unvaccinated children affect moral judgements and the intention to vaccinate their children against HPV. All parents received basic information about HPV and the vaccination. In the risk intervention, we showed a group of participants an infographic visualizing the harm-benefit trade-off of vaccination. In the trust intervention, we showed a different group the infographic plus a peer message by a mother affected by cervical cancer advocating the vaccination to protect children. We summarize our results and suggest measures to improve vaccination rates.

Dec 11, 16-18 UTC+0, Elis Jones (Konrad Lorenz Institute for Evolution and Cognition Research) , The problem of baselining: philosophy, history, and coral reef science

Abstract: Many areas of the life sciences, particularly those where human-driven changes are prevalent, have to grapple with the problem of baselining. Put briefly, this is the problem of how to decide how some system - for example, a coral reef - should normally appear and behave. This entails the acceptance of some state of the reef as the baseline (i.e. undegraded) state. Subsequent judgements about the condition of the reef are then made in contrast to the baseline. In coral reef science, this problem looms large. Reefs are rapidly shifting into new states - made up of different combinations of animals, plants and other organisms - and these need to be assessed, understood, and responded to. But there are thorny philosophical problems here, manifested in debates in both the sciences and humanities. At the extremes, some take the position that each ecosystem has a single, true baseline, based purely on evidence about its past, whilst others take the position that there are no baselines in nature, and that baselines simply reflect human preferences. In this talk, I present insights into the baselining process in coral reef science, derived from interviews I conducted with coral scientists in 2021. Using qualitative and conceptual analysis, I explore some of the ways baselines can vary in a given case. By framing this in terms of sources of variation in the baselining process - rather than the common formulation as 'shifting baseline syndrome' - I hope to avoid the problematic relationship often implicitly posited between history and baselines: that the further back in history you look, the closer you get to the true baseline state of an ecosystem. Instead I suggest a more nuanced relationship, which allows for a role for historical evidence in telling us how ecosystems ought to be, but also makes clear the importance of broader considerations about the value of system. I finish by showing that this problem also applies to contexts beyond ecology, such as physiology and oceanography.

Dec 11, 16-18 UTC+0, April H. Bailey (University of Edinburgh); Nicholas DiMaggio (University of Chicago, Booth), Of minds and men

Abstract: Prior work finds that seemingly generic and gender-inclusive concepts such as ‘person’ and ‘humanity’ elicit male bias in practice. When prompted to think of an example of a person, people are more likely to generate men than women. In the present work, we tested whether male bias might also emerge about an even more fundamental concept, that of a ‘mind.’ We found evidence that entities perceived to have more complex minds were also more likely to be gendered as male than female. We found this about human entities that varied in perceived mind as well as about non-human animal entities.

Jan 8, 16-18 UTC+0;, Ajinkya Deshmukh (The University of Manchester); Frederique Janssen-Lauret (The University of Manchester), Reincarnation and anti-essentialism: An argument against the essentiality of material origins

Abstract: We argue that Indian speakers’ discourse about reincarnation represents a counterexample to the ordinary-language evidence for the Kripkean thesis of material-origin essentialism. Advocates of the essentiality of origins contend not only that persons have the property of coming from the two particular gametes they actually came from essentially, but also that competent ordinary-language speakers find this view intuitively compelling. We adduce evidence from Indian speakers’ discourse, both ordinary-language remarks and published literature about reincarnation, to disconfirm that contention.

Jan 8, 16-18 UTC+0, Ethan Landes (Kent); Justin Sytsma (Victoria University of Wellington), LLM Simulated Data: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Abstract: Multiple recent projects have found remarkable correlations between human responses to studies and LLM simulations of those responses. While not perfect, in meta-analyses the correlation between human-based results and simulated results has been as high as r = 0.90. At the same time, most of us think that LLM responses are not themselves of interest to most work in experimental philosophy. This talk will explore how experimental philosophers can use simulated data for both good and evil and explore what roles simulated data might play in the future of xphi.

Feb 12, 16-18 UTC+0, Elzė Sigutė Mikalonytė (University of Cambridge); Jasmina Stevanov (University of Cambridge); Ryan P. Doran (University of Cambridge); Katherine A. Symons (University of Cambridge); and Simone Schnall (University of Cambridge), Transformed by Beauty: Exploring the Influence of Aesthetic Appreciation on Abstract Thinking

Abstract: TBC

Feb 12, 16-18 UTC+0, Poppy Mankowitz (University of Bristol) , Experimenting with ‘good’

Abstract: TBC

Mar 12, 16-18 UTC+0;, Kathryn Francis (University of Leeds); Maria Ioannidou (University of Bradford); Matti Wilks (University of Edinburgh), Does dietary identity influence moral anthropocentrism?

Abstract: TBC

Mar 12, 16-18 UTC+0, Jonathan Lewis (University of Manchester); James Toomey (University of Iowa); Ivar Hannikainen (University of Granada); Brian D. Earp (National University of Singapore), Normative authority, epistemic access, and the true self

Abstract: TBC