Markus Paulus: The Communicative Species Hypothesis: Human Ontogeny and Evolution as the Emergence of Communicative Structures
Markus Paulus (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München) The Communicative Species Hypothesis: Human Ontogeny and Evolution as the Emergence of Communicative Structures ABSTRACT: This talk presents the communicative species hypothesis, a framework on human development. It proposes that ontogeny can be conceived of as the development of individual communicative abilities in social contexts that are already structured by historically grown communicative routines (i.e., communicative structures). The framework stresses the dynamic nature of human ontogeny considering reciprocal effects in the interplay between existing communicative routines and developing individual abilities. I will discuss paradigmatic cases of the development of communication, imitation, Theory-of-Mind and morality, highlighting the communicative nature of each of these human competencies. Most central, the framework implies that the evolutionary success of humans lies in the fact that humans are an extraordinarily communicative species. Overall, the communicative species hypothesis emphasizes how genuine human competences emerge in and through communicative routines.
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Tuomo Tiisala: The Two Aspects of the Critique of Constitution
Tuomo Tiisala (University of Vienna) The Two Aspects of the Critique of Constitution ABSTRACT: Many philosophers have argued that concepts can be evaluated and improved. How viable this is and what it involves, depends on details in a theory of concepts. From this perspective, a view that combines an inferentialist semantics with a normative pragmatics is appealing, because it can explain why concepts, in part, are unknown to concept-users, and how concept-users can increase and exercise their rational control over the concepts they use. This is an account of rules, both implicitly enacted and explicitly represented, in discourse as a social practice. It is an important feature of this account that concepts are not immediately available for evaluation and revision, but we have to bring them under rational control by making explicit rules of inference that are implicitly in play in a discursive practice. As I have argued, it is apt to view this work as a kind of critique whose goal is make the conceptual constitution of experience, roughly, how we make sense of things, available for evaluation and improvement. Only rarely, however, has it been asked what obstacles there might be, preventing or hindering this critical […]
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Christophe Heintz: When do people trust what they are told: studies on epistemic vigilance
Christophe Heintz (Central European University) When do people trust what they are told: studies on epistemic vigilance ABSTRACT: I will describe the mechanisms that humans have for updating their beliefs in view of what is communicated. I will argue that trusting what others have communicated is a process of belief updating that can be modelled as Bayesian. I will show that this process account for our ability to make the most of what is communicated, but also for behaviours that have been interpreted as signs of gullibility. I will then specify the challenges that our society face because assessment of trustworthiness needs to be made not just for other humans, but also for social institutions. This LMS Centre talk is financially supported by the project OP JAK: Knowledge in the Age of Distrust, CZ.02.01.01/00/23_025/0008711.
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Thomas Grundmann: Expert Authority and Thinking for Oneself
Thomas Grundmann (University of Cologne) Expert Authority and Thinking for Oneself You can also watch on: https://cesnet.zoom.us/j/91813080382 ABSTRACT: In the paper, I argue that two claims, both of which have a lot going for them, cannot easily be reconciled. On the one hand, experts possess the normative status of epistemic authorities for laypeople, i.e. the latter should simply defer to expert testimony and ignore their own evidence regarding the subject matter. I defend this Preemption View of epistemic authority by introducing a novel argument from higher-order defeat. On the other hand, thinking for themselves is epistemically highly valuable or even indispensable for laypeople. It would be an epistemic catastrophe, if laypeople stopped thinking for themselves altogether. In the paper, I explore the question of how the two claims can be reconciled. I suggest that, despite the initial tension, laypeople can simultaneously follow epistemic authorities and think for themselves, as long as the latter happens in terms of acceptances. I will explain the idea of thinking for oneself with acceptances in more detail and defend it against some standard objections. This LMS Centre talk is financially supported by the project OP JAK: Knowledge in the Age of […]
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Peter Nicholas Tuck: The View Which Has No Name
Peter Nicholas Tuck The View Which Has No Name ABSTRACT: This proposed article also forms part of the aforementioned research arc in that it includes a descriptive analysis of the putative association between gradual behaviour in society, and philosophical-ethical thought in the field of animal ethics. Here I argue that the moral-philosophical view that “we should not use or harm non-human animals” has no particular name, but it ought to, and I say the reasons why. Further, I point out that this view is often given, or associated with, the name “vegan”, but that this can be misleading. Veganism can be understood as an identity, an attitude, or a practice, and can be motivated by animal ethical, environmental ethical, or health concerns. In this sense, it can be associated with labels like “catholic”, “European”, or “conservative”. These are loose terms which can be more specifically defined or motivated in a range of ways. Any particular combination of vegan definitions or motivations may or may not be ethical, and even if ethical, may or may not be anthropocentric. I conclude that we should be very cautious in associating the apparently increasing prevalence of vegan identities or products in European […]
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Jaroslav Daneš: On Internal Conflict
Jaroslav Daneš (University of Hradec Králové) On Internal Conflict ABSTRACT: A properly functioning society is a delicate balance of conflict and cooperation, dissent and consensus. A conflict as such appears to be a fundamental characteristic of politics since various agents have diverse and different interests and there are many cleavages in a society. It seems, then, that one of the most fundamental political problems may be formulated as how to manage or to handle a political conflict to make it fruitful instead of letting it be corrosive. The fifth-century Greeks used a term which covered many and various manifestations of political conflict – stasis (στάσις). In my lecture, I will ask about the causes of civil conflict in connection with various theories in the fields of ancient history, ancient political thought, and modern political science.
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Sander van der Linden: Psychological Inoculation Against Misinformation
Sander van der Linden (University of Cambridge) Psychological Inoculation Against Misinformation ONLINE TALK! Zoom link: https://cesnet.zoom.us/j/91813080382 ABSTRACT: Much like a viral contagion, misinformation can spread rapidly from one mind to another. Moreover, once lodged in memory, falsehoods are difficult to correct. Inoculation theory offers a natural basis for developing a psychological ‘vaccine’ against the spread of fake news and misinformation. Specifically, in a series of lab and field studies, I’ll show that it is possible to pre-emptively “immunize” millions of people against disinformation about a wide range of topics by pre-exposing them to severely weakened doses of the techniques that underlie its production. This process of ‘prebunking’ helps people cultivate cognitive antibodies in both simulated and real social media environments. I’ll showcase several interventions we developed and evaluated—with public health authorities and technology companies—to help citizens around the world recognize and resist unwanted attempts to influence and mislead. This LMS Centre talk is financially supported by the project OP JAK: Knowledge in the Age of Distrust, CZ.02.01.01/00/23_025/0008711.
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Keith Raymond Harris: Evidence Resistance and Control
Keith Raymond Harris (University of Vienna) Evidence Resistance and Control ABSTRACT: Evidence resistance occurs when individuals fail to update their beliefs in ways recommended by the evidence. Scholars representing a range of disciplines have offered various explanations of evidence resistance, including motivated reasoning, confirmation bias, and distrust toward sources of evidence. Even when taken together, these explanations do not fully account for evidence resistance as it manifests in the real world. I argue that a key causal factor in certain important cases of evidence resistance is suspicion about the way in which the evidence is controlled. Among other merits, this explanation explains how distrust can cause resistance to certain kinds of evidence and not others, why conspiracy theorists are especially prone to evidence resistance, and why novel technologies, especially generative artificial intelligence, promote resistance to certain kinds of evidence. The work is financially supported by the project OP JAK: Knowledge in the Age of Distrust, CZ.02.01.01/00/23_025/0008711.
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Julian Reiss: The Dilemma of Expertise
Julian Reiss (Johannes Kepler University) The Dilemma of Expertise You can also watch on: https://cesnet.zoom.us/j/91813080382 ABSTRACT: In this paper I explore the tension between the necessity of scientific input for complex political decisions that have a technical aspect (‘technical-political decisions’) and the inherent unreliability of expert judgement. While modern crises—such as climate change, pandemics, and socio-economic decline—require technical knowledge that citizens and politicians often lack, experts are frequently compromised by cognitive and motivational biases. Among the failings are: Cognitive Biases: Experts are prone to ‘confirmation bias’ and the ‘spiral of conviction’, where increased knowledge leads to greater dogmatism. Motivational Biases: Personal, financial, and political interests often colour scientific recommendations, particularly in medicine and economics. Numerical Illiteracy: Experts frequently struggle with statistical concepts, such as confusing relative and absolute risk reductions or committing the prevalence fallacy. To address these failures, I take up Jürgen Habermas’s democratic models but reject both technocratic approaches that grant experts a political monopoly, and Habermas’ own democratic approach. Instead, I advocate a decisionist model characterised by competition. By consulting multiple competing experts, the political system can better identify the spectrum of scientific discourse while incentivising experts to reduce their individual biases. This […]
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LMS Centre Program: Spring 2026
LMS Centre invites everyone to internal seminars and invited talks in the Spring semester 2026. The seminars are regularly held in the room SM4 and start at 14:05. The activity of LMS Centre is financially supported by the project OP JAK: Knowledge in the Age of Distrust, CZ.02.01.01/00/23_025/0008711.
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