Reference in Remembering

We are pleased to announce the Reference in Remembering Workshop, to be held in-person at the Université Grenoble Alpes on June 30th–July 2nd 2022. A full schedule of talks can be found below. Colleagues interested in attending should please contact me for registration information. 

Website: http://phil-mem.org/events/2022-reference.php

Organisers: James Openshaw; Kourken Michaelian; Denis Perrin. 

This workshop is funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement (no. 101032391), and also by the CNRS GDR Mémoire, the Institut de Philosophie de Grenoble, and the Centre for Philosophy of Memory.

1. STUDENT BURSARIES

We invite applications from Masters and PhD students for some limited travel and accommodation bursaries, kindly funded by the CNRS GDR Mémoire. Students interested in attending the workshop should email (1) a copy of their academic CV and (2) a brief, one-paragraph account of how the conference’s theme interacts with their research interests to James Openshaw at the email address listed on this page. The application deadline for bursaries is Friday May 20th.

2. THEME

Episodic memory enables us to consciously ‘relive’ experienced events from our past. You might remember making coffee this morning and sensorily recall what it was like to smell the coffee grounds or to see the kettle reach a boil. Success in this activity requires that there be a certain relationship between your present act of remembering and the past event in question. First, something must ‘fix’ or determine that your memory is about that particular event, rather than, say, a similar event the previous morning. Second, the memory must be suitably accurate. By analogy, success in uttering ‘This is blue’ requires, for its evaluability, that ‘This’ refers to a particular object and, for its truth, that the predicate accurately characterises the referred-to object. Though these observations are simple, what we might call the reference-fixing and accuracy conditions of episodic remembering remain obscure. The thriving work on memory in philosophy and the sciences suggests that continued progress requires more attention—and new approaches—to these particular issues. The primary aim of the workshop is to cast new light on the multi-faceted relationship between reference, singular thought, and remembering by bringing together, for the first time, researchers specialising on these topics.

3. SCHEDULE 

Day 1 – Thursday June 30th

Location: MACI Amphitheatre, Université Grenoble Alpes

09:20–09:30. Welcome.

09:30–10:40. François Recanati, ‘Pure memory’.

10:40–11:00. Coffee break.

11:00–12:10. Nikola Andonovski, ‘Engrams as mental files: A moderately optimistic proposal’.

12:10–13:30. Lunch.

13:30–14:40. Rachel Goodman (and Aidan Gray), ‘Thinking (and filing) across time’.

14:40–15:50. Michael Barkasi, ‘Remembering what your brain doesn’t’.

15:50–16:10. Coffee break. 

16:10–17:20. Sarah Robins, ‘The target of remembering’.

19:30. Dinner.

Day 2 – Friday July 1st

Location: MACI Amphitheatre, Université Grenoble Alpes

09:30–10:40. Kristina Liefke & Markus Werning, ‘Parasitic mnemonic reference’.

10:40–11:00. Coffee break.

11:00–12:10. Kourken Michaelian & James Openshaw, ‘Reconstructing reference’.

12:10–13:30. Lunch.

13:30–14:40. Imogen Dickie, ‘The role of episodic memory in present-tense demonstrative thought’.

Group activity, flexible evening plans. 

Day 3 – Saturday July 2nd

Location: CTL Amphitheatre, Université Grenoble Alpes

09:00–10:10. Christoph Hoerl, ‘Singular thought without temporal representation?’

10:10–10:30. Coffee break.

10:30–11:40. Denis Perrin (and Christopher McCarroll), ‘Veridical remembering: Accuracy and authenticity in episodic memory’.

11:40–12:50. Manuel García-Carpintero, ‘Memory-based reference, IEM and presupposition-failure’.