CfP: PSX 5 - scientific experimentation and policy

22-23 September 2016.

University of Belgrade

Belgrade, Serbia

Organized by the Department of Philosophy, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Belgrade, and the Center for the Studies of Bioethics, Belgrade

This conference series is intended to give a home to philosophical interests in, and concerns about, scientific experimentation. The fifth conference will focus on philosophical exploration of various aspects of the relationship between experimentation and policy. For instance, are there epistemically optimal ways of organizing a scientific laboratory? Is there a set of policies concerning division of cognitive labor that can ensure that small, large, or mega laboratories produce relevant scientific knowledge in the most efficient way? Recent philosophical studies have addressed these and similar questions and produced interesting results, often with the help of computer simulations and quantitative methods of analysis. Also in biomedical and related sciences the conduct of experiments and data they produce often raise a number of dilemmas relevant to public policy decisions. Philosophical approaches to such dilemmas may have far-reaching consequences.

Submissions of abstracts on any aspect of the relationship between policy and experiments are welcome. They should be in the form of an extended abstract (1000 words) submitted through EasyChair (https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=psx5). The deadline for submissions is 15 June, 2016.

(Accommodation will be provided for overseas participants and graduate students for three nights).

Keynote Speakers

Helena Siipi (University of Turku, Finland)

Kevin Zollman (Carnegie Mellon University, USA)

The Department of Philosophy is part of the Faculty of Philosophy, the founding school of the University of Belgrade (since 1838). Philosophy is studied and taught at this institution through three seminars: 1) Logic, Epistemology, and Philosophy of Science, 2) History of Philosophy, and 3) Ethics, Aesthetics and Philosophy of Politics. Its faculty publishes articles in some of the most prestigious philosophy and logic journals. The Department of Philosophy has been running the international conference series "Conditionals" in cooperation with the German Research Foundation (DFG), and international workshops on philosophy of physics, modal epistemology and philosophy of cognitive sciences.

The Center for the Study of Bioethics (CSB; www.csb.eu.com) is a scientific institution that was founded in Belgrade but that is global in scope. It gathers the world`s leading bioethicists, including Peter Singer, John Harris, Arthur Caplan, Nick Agar, Erik Parens, James Hughes, Anders Sandberg and others (http://www.csb.eu.com/ljudi_en.html). CSB has a lot of experience in organizing international scientific conferences, including conferences in Belgrade in collaboration with Oxford University and The Hastings Center. CSB is the seat of the European Division of the UNESCO Chair in Bioethics and the Cambridge Working Group for Bioethics Education. It organizes weekly seminars, mostly on bioethics related themes. A number of CSB members are involved in the areas of research ethics and philosophy of science.

Organizers

Slobodan Perović (Head of the Department of Philosophy, University of Belgrade: sperovic@f.bg.ac.rs)

Vojin Rakić (Director of the Center for the Study of Bioethics: vojin.rakic@csb.eu.com)

Program Committee

Allan Franklin (University of Colorado Boulder, allan.franklin@colorado.edu)

Deborah Mayo (Virginia Tech; dmayo@vt.edu)

John Norton (University of Pittsburgh; jdnorton@pitt.edu)

Wendy Parker (Ohio University; Durham University; parkerw@ohio.edu)

Slobodan Perovic (University of Belgrade; sperovic@f.bg.ac.rs)

Samuel Schindler (Aarhus University; samuel.schindler@ivs.au.dk)

Marcel Weber (University of Geneva; Marcel.Weber@unige.ch)

Previous PSX conferences: