Digest Week 3 Trinity Term 2024
TT24, Week 3 (5 May - 11 May)
If you have entries for the weekly Digest, please send information to admin@philosophy.ox.ac.uk by midday, Wednesday the week before the event.
Notices - other Philosophy events, including those taking place elsewhere in the university and beyond
Oxford Student Conference on Spinoza
Tuesday 7 May, 9:00am – 5.30pm
The second annual Oxford Student Conference on Spinoza is a conference to honour and explore the myriad ways in which Spinoza has contributed to, and continues to contribute to, the history of philosophy. This event is in collaboration with the Oxford University Philosophy Society.
The event will feature talks from world-renowned Spinoza scholars and a programme of presentations from philosophy students from around the world.
Open to all - registration not required | Gosztony Room, Pembroke College
Website: https://www.pmb.ox.ac.uk/event/second-oxford-student-conference-spinoza
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Touch and the Brain
Tuesday 7th May 2024, 5:00-7:15pm
Jacqueline du Pre Music Building, St Hilda's College
The St Hilda's Brain and Mind Series continues this term with Touch and the Brain.
Guest speakers will be Professor Michael Martin (University of Oxford) for philosophy, Professor Patrick Haggard (University College London) for psychology, and Professor Ulf Baumgärtner (Medical School Hamburg) for neuroscience.
Please join us on Tuesday 7th May 2024 - 5.00 until 7.15 pm in the Jacqueline du Pre Music Building, St Hilda's College.
Touch and the Brain is a free, live and in-person event where all are welcome.
Book Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/brain-and-mind-workshop-touch-and-the-brain-tickets-852614070637
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Joseph Butler Society
Tuesday 7 May, 8:30 pm
Timothy O'Connor, Indiana University Bloomington 'Loving God and Free Will'
Oriel College, Large SCR
Further details here: http://josephbutlersociety.weebly.com/
Senior Seminars in Indian Philosophy
Week 3: Friday 4.30pm
Library of the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies, 15 Magdalen Street, Oxford OX1 3AE
Kassandra Dugi: Do Mādhyamikas Believe in Free Will? Śāntideva on Intention, Agency and Causation
My talk will focus on BCA 6.22-32 and argue that rather than providing a potential Madhyamaka response to the question of whether we have free will, as is commonly assumed, these verses much more radically seek to challenge our notions about the nature and causes of action altogether, thus rendering any discussion about the existence of free will fundamentally untenable.
Shruthi Matthews: Vasubandhu’s Metaphors
This talk places figurative language in Vasubandhu’s Viṃśikā under the lens of conceptual metaphor theory. I argue that figurative expressions here are more than just examples. Rather, the imagery of dreams and hells are ‘new metaphors’, where Vasubandhu reconfigures old imagery to create new similarities. Through counter-intuitive comparisons, he shifts the locus of experienced reality from the external object to the mind. Attentiveness to the modes of metaphor at play in the text point us, then, to Vasubandhu’s own innovations in argument and doctrine.
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Oxford Philological Society
Friday 10 May 5pm
Dr Stefan Sienkiewicz (Oxford): ‘Without Good Cause: A Reappraisal of Aenesidemus’ Eight Modes Against Causal Explanation’
The talk will take place in Talbot Hall at Lady Margaret Hall, and is followed by refreshments (wine and soft drinks). All are welcome!