CFP: Explanation and Understanding

Key note speakers:

·       Michael Strevens (NYU)
·       Henk de Regt (VU Amsterdam)
·       Kareem Khalifa (Middlebury College)
·       Richard Dawid (Stockholm)

In both science and philosophy, good theories provide good explanations. Views on explanation diverge strongly. Explanation has been held to be brought about by subsumption under laws of nature, by unification, or by description of causes. Regardless, explanation is generally agreed to be an epistemic concern. Not so understanding. It was long ignored or thought to simply follow from explanation. More recently, some have defended understanding as a more independent phenomenon worthy of investigation. This workshop will discuss some of the latest developments in the debate and possible ways of advancing it.

The event is hosted by the Centre for Science Studies, Department of Mathematics, Aarhus University, and funded by the Danish Network in Philosophy of Science (PI: Hanne Andersen) and by the DFF Sapere Aude projects “Modal Epistemology: six investigations” (PI: Asbjoern Steglich-Petersen), and “Intuitions in Science and Philosophy” (PI: Samuel Schindler).

There are four slots available for contributed papers. Limited funding for travel and accommodation is available. Graduate students will be given preference.

Abstracts of no more than 300 words are to be submitted to https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=explund2016. Deadline for submissions is March 1st.

For questions please contact the organiser at [email protected].