Următoarea conferință online din cadrul seminarului de cercetare al Departamentului de Filosofie Teoretică în parteneriat cu CELFIS din semestrul I al anului 2022/2023 va fi susținută de dr. Ilmari Hirvonen și Pekka Syrjänen (Universitatea din Helsinki). Mai multe detalii despre vorbitori sunt disponibile la https://philpeople.org/profiles/ilmari-hirvonen şi, respectiv, https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Pekka-Syrjanen Prezentarea lor este intitulată ‘Just-So Stories Lack Modal Depth’. Iată un rezumat:

‘A common feature of pre-scientific, non-scientific, unscientific, and pseudoscientific explanations – including conspiracy theories – is that they invoke just-so stories. We argue that the problem with just-so stories is that they lack modal depth: they merely describe what is actual or already observed without explicating what is otherwise possible, impossible, contingent, or necessary. A theory’s lack of modal depth is detectable from its inability to imply counterfactual claims. In other words, a modally shallow theory has difficulties answering such questions as “How things would have been if a variable had been different?” or “How would things be if some variable was held constant while another one was changing?” Without modal depth, a theory cannot make genuine predictions. Without genuine predictions, the parts of a theory that conjure unobserved entities or processes are difficult—or perhaps even impossible—to evaluate and, therefore, for the time being, scientifically unjustified. In some cases, explanations invoking just-so stories nevertheless have modal depth. However, their counterfactual claims are either false or inscrutable. We illustrate our claims with examples of conspiracy theories (QAnon, Moon landing hoax) and pseudohistory (ancient aliens, historical miracles).’

Conferința se va desfășura ȋn limba engleză joi, 19 ianuarie, orele 18.00-20.00. Detaliile de conectare via Zoom vor fi distribuite celor ce își indică dorința de participare scriind la adresa andrei.marasoiu@filosofie.unibuc.ro Puteți consulta şi anunțul de pe pagina Facebook a seminarului: https://www.facebook.com/Seminarul-Departamentului-de-Filosofie-Teoretica-UniBuc-285279685738329 sau de pe PhilEvents: https://philevents.org/event/show/105249