On Friday, 21 May, Baptiste Le Bihan (University of Geneva) will give a talk entitled “Quantum Gravity and Mereology: Not So Simple” (abstract below). The meeting will take place online on Zoom (17:00-19:00 CEST). If you have not registered yet, you can do so by sending a message to antonio.vassallo@pw.edu.pl. The Colloquium is organized by the Philosophy of Physics Group at the International Center for Formal Ontology (Faculty of Administration and Social Sciences, Warsaw University of Technology). ABSTRACT A number of philosophers have argued in favour of extended simples on the grounds that…continue reading →

On Friday, 7 May, Tim Maudlin (New York University) will give a talk entitled “S=kln(B(W)): Boltzmann entropy, the Second Law, and the Architecture of Hell” (abstract below). The meeting will take place online on Zoom (17:00-19:00 CEST). If you have not registered yet, you can do so by sending a message to antonio.vassallo@pw.edu.pl. The Colloquium is organized by the Philosophy of Physics Group at the International Center for Formal Ontology (Faculty of Administration and Social Sciences, Warsaw University of Technology). ABSTRACT The concept of entropy was introduced in the setting of classical thermodynamics,…continue reading →

On Friday, 23 April, Marco Giovanelli (University of Turin) will give a talk entitled “Special Relativity as a Theory of Principles. Reflections On Einstein’s Distinction between Constructive and Principle Theories” (abstract below). The meeting will take place online on Zoom (16:00-18:00 CEST). If you have not registered yet, you can do so by sending a message to antonio.vassallo@pw.edu.pl. The Colloquium is organized by the Philosophy of Physics Group at the International Center for Formal Ontology (Faculty of Administration and Social Sciences, Warsaw University of Technology). ABSTRACT In a 1919 article for the Times…continue reading →

The paper Epistemic and poietic intentional processes by Jozef Lubacz was published in Synthese. The paper is available in open access. Abstract "We examine the intentional processes that correspond to conceptualizations of activities performed by subjects with the intention of achieving an objective. Taking as its basis a general framework of intentional processes, two types of such process are considered: epistemic ones, aimed at acquiring knowledge about something, and poietic ones, aimed at bringing about something. The “something” is understood as anything that the processes can pertain to: a physical, mental or abstract…continue reading →

The paper entitled “Newcomb’s problem isn’t a choice dilemma“, written by Zhanglyu Li & Frank Zenker, has been published in Synthese (open access). Abstract "Newcomb’s problem involves a decision-maker faced with a choice and a predictor forecasting this choice. The agents’ interaction seems to generate a choice dilemma once the decision-maker seeks to apply two basic principles of rational choice theory (RCT): maximize expected utility (MEU); adopt the dominant strategy (ADS). We review unsuccessful attempts at pacifying the dilemma by excluding Newcomb’s problem as an RCT-application, by restricting MEU and ADS, and by…continue reading →