CfA: Scientific Knowledge Under Pluralism
Pluralism – about scientific methods, modeling,
theorizing, explanation, and perspective – has drawn significant recent
attention. This conference aims to consider not the fact of pluralism in
scientific practice, but the consequences of
pluralism for scientific knowledge. Pluralists often contend that
scientific knowledge is irreducibly plural: that pluralism is not merely
characteristic of the developing state of knowledge in some domain, but
that pluralistic knowledge is, in principle,
all there is; that the contrasting ideal of ultimately combining
perspectives and unifying knowledge is somehow confused. But what
picture of knowledge does this offer instead? Is it compatible with
realist hopes of describing a mind-independent world, or
must it be understood in a pragmatic, or neo-Kantian, or constructivist
way? Some pluralist allusions to incommensurable approaches, theories,
and models suggest the latter. On this view, can pluralism avoid
collapsing into relativism about scientific knowledge?
The aim of the conference is to target and clarify the epistemological
implications of pluralism.
Abstract submission deadline: November 20, 2016
Please submit a short abstract of 250-300 words.
Abstracts will be refereed blind and results communicated to authors by mid-January 2017.
Abstract submission is electronic. Please go to:
If you do not have an EasyChair account you must
create one on entering the site. After logging in, click the ‘New
Submission’ link and add your abstract. You can revise your submission
any number of times before the deadline.
Registration, travel, accommodation, further information will be posted on the conference website: www.pitt.edu/~pittcntr
Further inquiries may be addressed to Haixin Dang (had27@pitt.edu).
Program Committee:
Agnes Bolinska, University of Pittsburgh
Anjan Chakravartty, University of Notre Dame
Mazviita Chirimuuta, University of Pittsburgh
Sandra Mitchell, University of Pittsburgh