CFP: Reductionist and Anti-reductionist Perspectives on Normativity

Keynote Speakers:

Terence Cuneo (University of Vermont)

Claudine Verheggen (York University)

Our 7th annual conference will be focused on reductionist and anti-reductionist perspectives on normativity. We will accept submissions on epistemology, ethics, metaethics, philosophy of action, philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, and political philosophy.

Papers that address any of the following questions are especially encouraged:

Is the mental reducible to the physical? Can mental states cause actions and events? Is meaning reducible to a natural phenomenon? If yes, to which kind of natural phenomenon is meaning reducible? Are normative terms (such as ‘good’, ‘ought’, etc.) reducible to non-normative terms? Do irreducible normative properties exist? If they exist, are they natural or non-natural? If normative properties are natural properties, can they still be sui generis properties? Are normative reasons reducible to attitudes, such as beliefs or desires about what we ought to do and about what we ought to believe?

Authors should submit extended abstracts (800-1000 words) to [email protected]. The documents should be prepared for blind review. Speakers will be given 25 minutes to deliver their presentations. Papers will have commentators, selected from amongst the graduate students of York University.

The deadline for submissions is January 10, 2015.

Notifications of acceptance will be sent by February 20, 2015.

Please contact us at [email protected] for any additional inquiries