Seventh Conference of the Dutch-Flemish Association for Analytic Philosophy (VAF): Scepticism

The Dutch-Flemish Association for Analytic Philosophy (VAF) organizes its 7th Conference from Wednesday afternoon 28 January uptill and including Friday morning 30 January 2015 at the Faculty of Philosophy, Erasmus University Rotterdam (EUR), The Netherlands.


Theme

The theme of the Seventh Conference of the Dutch-Flemish Association for Analytic Philosophy (VAF) will be Scepticism.



Keynote speakers

-  Bryan Frances (Fordham University, USA):
Worrisome Scepticism about Philosophy

-  Katerina Ierodiakonou (University of Athens, Greece; University of Geneva, Swiss):
The Triple Life of Thought Experiments

-  Martijn Blaauw (Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands):
Scepticism and Privacy


Topics of interest

Scepticism about:

the scientific status of economics;
realism (knowing reality as it is in and of itself);
the senses (they somehow deceive us, distort the world, or narrow our view intolerably);
going beyond the senses (empiricism, instrumentalism, pragmatism);
moral values (there aren't any);
aesthetic values (there aren't any);
knowledge (scepticism, also: fallibilism, contextualism, solipsism, pragmatism);
the impossibility of communication or understanding, or both;
politics and (the future of) humanity at large, sceptical activism;
solving problems in the philosophy of mind or in practical philosophy (e.g. free will)
by an appeal to neuroscience (neuromania);
solving problems in moral philosophy and ethics by an appeal to biology (Darwinitis);
solving problems in metaphysics by an appeal to physics;
under-determination theses in and outside philosophy of science;
resolvability, or even the meaningfulness, of metaphysical problems and disputes;
philosophy tout court, or only analytic philosophy, or only continental philosophy;
science as a whole, or certain aspects of science (method, scientistic claims);
religion (e.g. existence-claims about god or gods, or its claimed virtues);
ever obtaining gender balance in (analytic) philosophy;
how (analytic) philosophy is practised and organised today in Academe;
the aims, claims and aspirations of logic.

Organizing Committee (VAF Board members)

-  Filip Buekens (Tilburg Unversity; Catholic University of Leuven)
-  Lieven De Cock (Free University Amsterdam)
-  F.A. Muller (Erasmus University Rotterdam; Utrecht University)
-  Sabine Roeser (Delft University of Technology)
-  Katrien Schaubroeck (University of Antwerp)



Chairs (Fac. Philosophy, EUR)

Tim De Mey & F.A. Muller


Local Organizing Committee (Fac. Philosoph, EUR):

-  Tim De Mey
-  F.A. Muller
-  Ceciel Meiborg
-  Fabian van Dijk
-  Floris van der Pol
-  Gijs Leegwater
-  Geurt Sengers
-  Stefan Wintein

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