Colloquium 2025-26
Schedule 2025-26
Fall 2025
October 20
Amanda Greene (UC Santa Barbara)
Democratic Legitimacy for SkepticsToday democracy is thought to be the most legitimate form of government the world has ever seen. But why does democracy matter at all for political legitimacy? As I understand this question, an adequate answer has not yet been given. Some accounts rely on standards of legitimacy that implicitly regard democracy as a necessary or even constitutive element. These defenses of the value of democracy tend to rely on idealized or romantic views about what democracy is and how it functions. This paper provides a challenge and an alternative to that family of approaches. It does so by showing how democracy makes a special contribution to political legitimacy, even though there is no legitimacy-based imperative to democratize. I argue that democracy contributes to legitimacy because it makes the exercise of power responsive to people’s views. I show that this realistic view has several advantages: it allows us to answer democratic skeptics with a legitimacy-based argument for democracy, it is more compatible with empirical research on political behavior, and it accepts the contingent relationship between democracy and other political values.
November 3
Kenny Easwaran (UC Irvine)
Neural Nets as a Model of "Knowing How"
Gilbert Ryle argued that there was an important distinction between "knowing how" and "knowing that". Stanley and Williamson, "Knowing How" (2001), argued that syntax and semantics require the meaning of "knowing how" to be a sub-type of "knowing that". I will not contest their claim about the formal semantics of English. However, I claim that in doing epistemology, it is useful to consider what concepts exist that are usefully like the concepts we apply to humans, that can be applied more broadly to subjects like animals, groups, and artificial intelligences. I will argue that neural nets are a class of systems that have been used for several decades, for which there is a useful concept of "knowing how" that can be applied. But until the rise of Large Language Models in the past few years, neural nets have not been the subject of a useful concept of "knowing that", and even now it is unclear. I claim that this conception of "knowing that" as a special and refined type of "knowing how" is also a useful way to think of humans, in line with the distinction that cognitive scientist Daniel Kahneman draws between "System 1" and "System 2" thinking.
Winter 2026
January 26
Adina Roskies (UC Santa Barbara)
Inference in Neuroimaging and the Problem of Cognitive Ontology
Neuroimaging studies attempt to assign function to brain regions. The neuroscientific practice of assigning functions to active brain areas involves two general patterns of inference, so-called “forward inference” and “reverse inference”. In this talk, I will evaluate these inferential patterns. Neuroscientists and philosophers of science have recognized and discussed the logical problems attending reverse inference, but have viewed forward inference as straightforward. Here I argue that reverse inference is overly maligned, whereas forward inference is even more problematic than previously recognized. Both forms of inference are closely tied to the problem of cognitive ontology. I situate this problem in contemporary views of philosophy of neuroscience, and suggest avenues to address these problems.
February 23
Anastasia Berg (UC Irvine)
Coming to an End: Why Care About the Survival of Humanity?
What objective reasons, if any, do we have to care about the survival of humanity? I will critically explore some previously proposed answers—the Arguments from Additional Lives, from Final Value and from Value Dependence—before suggesting an alternative account. According to it, a concern with the existence of human beings in the future is intrinsically implied by the engagement in a particular kind of activities, namely, ones with infinite ends of unconditional worth. The account thereby ties our capacity to appreciate the goodness of a human future to the actuality of our recognition of goodness in human existence in the present.
Spring 2026
April 13
Sara Bernstein (UC Santa Cruz)
Reasons and Pronouns
Abstract: This talk suggests that the concepts of gendering and misgendering encompass a broader range of phenomenon than traditionally thought. Whereas the distinction between gendering and misgendering is often thought to revolve around correctness and incorrectness, I argue that gendering and misgendering are located in a broader schema of normative properties. A fully fleshed out theory of gendering and misgendering must include an account of the reasons involved in attributing a gender to an individual. After examining some relevant reasons through examples, I articulate a distinction between Bad Gendering, Misgendering, and Defective Gendering. With a fuller schema in hand, I draw some lessons for social metaphysics.
April 17
Gil Hersch (Virginia Tech)
Procedural Allocative Fairness
Abstract: Fairness matters in allocation when there isn't enough of the good to go around. Who gets into the Titanic lifeboats? Who gets the full ride at the flagship state university? Who gets the first available doses of the vaccine? Questions of fairness in allocation are some of the most common and urgent moral problems we face as a society. There are a variety of different procedures for allocating goods that might seem fair at different times: based on some morally relevant criteria, such as need, deservingness, or merit (Fumagalli 2022); relying on the price mechanism of markets (Brennan & Jaworski 2015); using lotteries (Broome 1990, Stone 2011); and implementing first-come-first-serve queues (John & Millum 2020). While there is no one allocative procedure that works across all cases, there is much more similarity between cases in different contexts than might first meet the eye. I argue that we can make a lot of progress in developing a philosophical account of procedural allocative fairness once we recognize that there are some underlying principles that cut across contexts.
May 11
Arthur Ripstein (University of Toronto)
Two Forms of Relational Normativity
Abstract: Darwall begins his book The Second Person Standpoint with two examples: the first involves you telling me to get off your toe; the second a drill sergeant ordering a platoon to fall in. Darwall treats both as instances of the same phenomenon; I contend that they are normatively and conceptually distinct. Both forms are non-derivatively relational. Attending to the differences between them shows why the existence of relational duties does not depend on questions of ease, difficulty, or degree. It also reveals that features often taken to be definitive of relational morality, particularly moral motivation and reactive attitudes, play no direct part in it.
Colloquium 2023-24
Schedule 2023-24
Fall 2023
October 23
Rosa Cao (Stanford)
“Can Swampmodels Have Inner Representations?” - abstract
November 13
Kareem Khalifa (UCLA)
"Inquiry, Risk, and Impartiality: Lessons from the Kerner Commision." - abstract
November 27
Hanti Lin (UC Davis)
"Context-Sensitivity and Ockham's Many Razors." - abstract
Spring 2024
April 8
Dale Jamieson (NYU)
"Am I Responsible for Climate Change?" - abstract
May 6
Margaret Gilbert (UC Irvine)
"Notes Toward a General Epistemology." - abstract
May 20
Lisa Raphals (UC Riverside)
Note! Canceled event.
Colloquium 2022-23
Schedule 2022-23
Fall 2022
September 30
Elizabeth Schechter (Indiana University)
"The Evidence in Self-Deception" - abstract
November 18
Carlotta Pavese (Cornell University)
Canceled
December 2
C. Thi Nguyen (University of Utah)
Canceled
Winter 2023
Spring 2023
April 14
Lauren Ross (UC Irvine)
"Causal Varieties in Science" - abstract
May 19
Ray Briggs (Stanford University)
"Counterpossible Triviality, Potentiality, and Actuality" - abstract
June 2
John Carriero (UCLA)
“Ontological Demotion and Spinoza” - abstract
Colloquium 2021-22
Schedule 2021-22
Fall 2021
October 15
Rachel Singpurwalla (University of Maryland, College Park)
"Civic Friendship in Plato's Republic" - abstract
November 5
Rachel Zuckert (Northwestern University)
"Thomas Reid’s Disjunctive Realist Aesthetics" - abstract
November 19
Sam Cumming (UCLA)
"Indefinites, reference, and truth conditions" - abstract
Winter 2022
January
February
March 4
Spring 2022
April 15
Ryan Preston-Roedder (Occidental College)
"Love and Social Justice" - abstract
May 6
Zoë Johnson King (USC)
"Working on Yourself" - abstract
May 27
Michael LeBuffe (University of Otago)
"The Identity of Indiscernibles and Human Essence in Spinoza's Ethics" - abstract
Colloquium 2020-21
Schedule 2020-21
Fall 2020
October 23
Sharon Street (New York University)
"On Recognizing Oneself in Mirrors and in Others"
November 20
Peter Railton (University of Michigan, Ann Arbor)
"What Normativity Could be" - abstract
December 4
Jeanette Kennett (Macquarie University)
"Truthfulness and Sense-making: Two Modes of Respect for Agency" (co-authored with Steve Matthews) - abstract
Winter 2021
January 22
Kenny Easwaran (Texas A&M University)
"A New Method of Value Aggregation" - abstract
February 19
Miriam Schoenfield (University of Texas at Austin)
“Can Bayesianism Accommodate Higher Order Defeat?” - abstract
March 12
Umrao Sethi (Brandeis University)
"Sensible Individuation and Over-Determination" - abstract
Spring 2021
April 30
Donald Ainslie (University of Toronto)
"The Passions of David Hume" - abstract
May 21
Andrew Chignell (Princeton University)
“Hope, Despair, and the Primacy of the Practical” - abstract
June 4
Jeff McMahan (University of Oxford)
"Conflicting Intuitions About Causing People to Exist" - abstract
Colloquium 2019-20
Schedule 2019-20
Fall 2019
October 4
Evan Thompson (University of British Columbia)
"What’s in a Concept? Conceptualizing the Nonconceptual in Buddhist Philosophy and Cognitive Science" - abstract
Note! This colloquium starts at 4:30pm and ends at 6:30pm.
October 25
John MacFarlane (UC Berkeley)
"Seeing Through the Clouds" - abstract
November 8
Rima Basu (Claremont McKenna College)
"Indecent Philosophy: Mapping The Moral Terrain of Philosophical Inquiry" - abstract
November 15
Susan R. Wolf (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill)
"Criticizing Blame" - abstract
November 22
Sam Elgin (UC San Diego)
"Physicalism and the Identity of Identity Theories" - abstract
Winter 2020
January 31
Lisa Shabel (Ohio State University)
"Kant's 'Schematism'" - abstract
February 21
Pamela Hieronymi (UC Los Angeles)
"Fairness, Sanctions, and Condemnation" - abstract
March 6
Julia Staffel (University of Colorado, Boulder)
"Eyeballing the Evidence" - abstract
Spring 2020
May 8
CANCELED EVENT!
Julia Annas (University of Arizona)
May 29
CANCELED EVENT!
Sharon Street (New York University)
June 5
CANCELED EVENT!
Henry T. (Hank) Greely (Stanford Law School)
Colloquium 2018-19
Schedule 2018-19
Fall 2018
October 12
Barry Loewer (Rutgers University)
"What Breathes Fire into the Equations?" - abstract
October 19
Wes Holliday (UC Berkeley)
"Another Problem in Possible World Semantics" - abstract
November 9
Angela Smith (Washington and Lee University)
"Deep Responsibility" - abstract
November 16
Allen Buchanan (Duke University & King's College)
"The Evolution of Moral Progress" - abstract
Winter 2019
January 11
Elliott Sober (University of Wisconsin)
"When Is the Simpler Theory Better?" - abstract
January 18
Alison Gopnik (UC Berkeley)
"Life History and Learning: Childhood As a Solution to Explore-Exploit Tensions" - abstract
Note! Professor Gopnik's talk takes place in the Price Center, East Forum 4th Floor.
February 22
Voula Tsouna (UC Santa Barbara)
"Is Virtue a Form of Techne? The Case of Plato's Charmides" - abstract
Spring 2019
April 5
Ralph Wedgwood (University of Southern California)
"Measuring Beliefs' Incorrectness" - abstract
April 12
Joseph Carens (University of Toronto)
"On the Relationship between Normative Claims and Empirical Realities in Immigration" - abstract
May 3
José Luis Bermudéz (Texas A&M University)
"Framing Decisions: Rationality and Intensionality" - abstract
May 10
Eric Schwitzgebel (UC Riverside)
"Is There Something It's Like to Be a Garden Snail?" - abstract
May 17
Barbara Herman (UC Los Angeles) - abstract
"Challenges of Beneficence: Revising the Terms"
May 24
Seana Shiffrin (UC Los Angeles)
"Learning from Lawyers about Deception" - abstract
Note! Professor Shiffrin's talk takes place at the Faculty Club, Atkinson Pavilion.
May 31
Houston Smit (University of Arizona)
"The Representation <I Think> and Its Origin in Pure Apperception" - abstract
Colloquium 2017-18
Schedule 2017-18
Fall 2017
September 29
Shamik Dasgupta (UC Berkeley)
"Realism and the Absence of Value" - abstract
October 13 CANCELLED!
Evan Thompson (University of British Columbia)
October 27
Cailin O'Connor (UC Irvine)
"How to Beat Science and Influence People" - abstract
November 17
R. A. Briggs (Stanford University)
"Real-Life Newcomb Problems?" - abstract
December 1, 2:30-4:00PM
Special Event: Discussion Seminar
Andrew Light
University Professor of Philosophy, Public Policy, and Atmospheric Sciences at George Mason University, and Distinguished Senior Fellow in the Climate Program at the World Resources Institute, in Washington, D.C.
"From Public Scholarship to Political Practice" - abstract
Note! No reception.
Winter 2018
January 12
Tommie Shelby (Harvard University)
"Prison Abolition? The Uses and Abuses of Incarceration" - abstract
February 2
Jenann Ismael (University of Arizona)
"The Link Between Time, Totality, and Determinism" - abstract
March 12
Note! This event takes place on a Monday 2-4pm followed by a reception.
Frances Kamm (Harvard University)
"Direction and Distribution in Life: Lessons from 'Benjamin Button'" - abstract
Spring 2018
April 6
Mark Schroeder (University of Southern California)
"Persons as Things" - abstract
April 20
Hannah Ginsborg (UC Berkeley)
"Skepticism and Quietism about Meaning and Normativity"
April 27
David Danks (Carnegie Mellon University)
"Handling Complexity" - abstract
May 25
Elizabeth Harman (Princeton University)
“Is Subjective Moral Truth Explanatorily Prior to Objective Moral Truth?” - abstract
June 1
Suzanne Obdrzalek (Claremont McKenna College)
"Platonic Dualism Revisited" - abstract
Colloquium 2016-17
Schedule 2016-17
Fall 2016
September 30
Richard Bett (Johns Hopkins University)
"Living as a Sceptic"
October 14
Sandra Harding (UCLA)
"Another Logic of Scientific Inquiry? Engaging with Latin American Perspectives" - abstract
October 28
Philip Pettit (Princeton University and Australian National University)
"Three Fallacies about Doing Good" - abstract
November 17
Gail Fine (Cornell University and Oxford University)
"Plato on the Grades of Perception: Theaetetus 184-6 and the Phaedo" - abstract
Note! This event takes place on a Thursday.
Winter 2017
February 10
Robert Gooding-Williams (Columbia University)
"Delany's Two Principles, the Argument for Emigration, and Revolutionary Black Nationalism" - abstract
Spring 2017
April 7
Evan Thompson (University of British Columbia)
Cancelled!
May 5
Jeremy Waldron (NYU)
"What Do Philosophers Have Against Human Dignity?" - abstract
May 19
Michael Wedin (UC Davis)
Cancelled!
May 26
Sally Haslanger (MIT)
"Culture and Critique" - abstract
June 2
Adrienne Martin (Claremont McKenna College)
"What Kind of a Debt is a Debt of Gratitude?" - abstract
Colloquium 2015-16
Fall Quarter 2015
October 23
Katie Elliott (UCLA)
"The Applicability Problem for Chance Explanation" - abstract
November 13
Dorothea Frede (University of Hamburg)
"Equal but Not Equal: Plato and Aristotle on Women as Citizens" - abstract
November 20
Gwen Bradford (Rice University)
"The Badness of Pain" - abstract
Winter Quarter 2016
February 26
James Kreines (Claremont-McKenna College)
"Hegel, Dialectic, and Metaphysical Grounding" - abstract
Spring Quarter 2016
April 8
Ralph Bader (Merton College, Oxford)
"Liberty, Threats, and Ineligibility" - abstract
April 15
Alyssa Ney (UC Davis)
"Are the Questions of Metaphysics More Fundamental Than Those of Science?" - abstract
April 22
Peter Railton (University of Michigan)
"Intuition and Intuitions in Ethics" - abstract
April 29
Manuel Vargas (University of San Francisco) CANCELLED!
May 20
Sally Haslanger (MIT)
"Social Practices and Ideology" - abstract
May 27
Nellie Wieland (CSU, Long Beach)
"Quotation in the Wild" - abstract
Colloquium 2014-15
Fall Quarter 2014
October 10
Connie Rosati (University of Arizona)
"Welfare and Rational Fit" - abstract
Note! This event takes place on a FRIDAY 4-6PM.
October 13
Michael McKenna (University of Arizona)
"Facing the Luck Problem for Compatibilists" - abstract
October 27
Calvin Normore (UC Los Angeles)
"What is in the Picture? Descartes and Some Scholastics on Thought and Representation" - abstract
December 8
James Weatherall (UC Irvine)
"Theoretical Structure and Theoretical Equivalence" - abstract
Winter Quarter 2015
March 9
Alan Thomas (Tilburg University)
"Rawls, Piketty and the 'New Inequality'" - abstract
March 18
Gerhard Schurz (University of Duesseldorf)
"Inductive Scepticism and the Optimality of Meta-Induction" - abstract
Note! This event takes place on a WEDNESDAY 2-4PM.
Spring Quarter 2015
March 30
Don Rutherford (UC San Diego)
"Spinoza's Ethics: Perfectionism and Naturalism?" - abstract
April 6
Juha Saatsi (University of Leeds)
"Between Realism and Anti-realism? Theory-progressivism about Fundamental Physics" - abstract
April 13
Paolo Mancosu (UC Berkeley)
"In Good Company? On Hume's Principle and the Assignment of Numbers to Infinite Concepts" - abstract
April 24
Charles Mills (Northwestern University) (Henry Allison Chair Invited Lecture)
Note! This event takes place on a FRIDAY, 4-6PM.
CANCELLED!
May 8
Charles Mills (Northwestern University) (Henry Allison Chair Invited Lecture)
"Black Radical Kantianism" - abstract
Note! This event takes place on a FRIDAY, 4-6PM
May 15
Daniel Hausman (University of Wisconsin-Madison)
"Equality of Opportunity, Cultural Differences, and Familial Intimacy" - abstract
Note! This event takes place on a FRIDAY, 4-6PM
June 8
Seana Shiffrin (UC Los Angeles)
"The Moral Neglect of Negligence"
Colloquium 2013-14
Fall Quarter 2013
October 18
Pierre Destree (University of Louvain)
"Aristotle on the Value of Art" - abstract
October 25
Tomasz Bigaj (University of Warsaw)
"On Essences and Haecceities in Modern Physics" - abstract
November 15
Kenneth Taylor (Stanford University)
"Toward a Metaphysically Modest Semantics" - abstract
Winter Quarter 2014
February 14
Leif Wenar (King's College London)
"Unity-Based Moral and Political Theory" - abstract
February 28
Jeremy Howick (University of Oxford)
"What Counts as a Placebo Is Relative to a Target Disorder and Therapautic Theory: Defending a Modified Version of Grünbaum's Scheme" - abstract
March 7
Nancy Cartwright (UCSD)
"There Are Mechanisms - And Then There Are Mechanisms"
March 10
Holger Lyre (Otto-von-Guericke-University Magdeburg)
"The Socially Extended Mind" - abstract
Note! This event takes place on a Monday 2:00pm-4:00pm.
March 14
David Wiens (UCSD)
"An Internal Problem for Ideal Theory" - abstract
Spring Quarter 2014
April 4
Seth Yalcin (UC Berkeley)
"The Modality of Quantification" - abstract
This event is cosponsored with the Linguistics Department at UCSD.
April 8
Roberto Fumagalli (University of Bayreuth)
"On the Neural Enrichment of Economic Models: Recasting the Challenge" - abstract
Note! This event takes place on a Tuesday 2:00pm-4:00pm.
April 11
Tamar Schapiro (Stanford University)
"What are Theories of Desire Theories of?" - abstract
May 2
Gary Watson (USC)
"A Moral Predicament in the Criminal Law" - abstract
May 9
Krista Lawlor (Stanford University)
"What is Known and the Limits of Deductive Inference" - abstract
May 16
Roberta Millstein (UC Davis)
"Re-examining the Darwinian Basis for Aldo Leopold's Land Ethic" - abstract
This event has been CANCELLED.
May 30
Anjan Chakravartty (Notre Dame)
"Voluntary Commitments and the Epistemology of Science" - abstract
Colloquium 2012-13
Fall Quarter 2012
- October 5
- Ned Hall (Harvard University)
"Physical and Metaphysical Modality" - abstract - October 12
- Quayshawn Spencer (University of San Francisco)
"How to Be a Biological Racial Realist" - abstract - October 26
- Jason Stanley (Rutgers University, cosponsored with Linguistics)
"Knowing wh-to" - abstract - November 9
- Terry Irwin (University of Oxford)
"Is Aristotle a Virtue Theorist?" - abstract - November 16
- Josh Ober (Stanford University)
"Relevant Expertise Aggregation: An Aristotelian Middle Way for Epistemic Democracy" - abstractNote! The event on November 16 has been moved to the Michel de Certeau Room, Literature Bldg., 1st floor, 2:00pm to 4:00pm.
Winter Quarter 2013
- January 4
- Neil Sinhababu (National University of Singapore) - abstract
"Ethical Reductionism" - March 18
- GunnarBjörnsson (University of Gothenburg) - abstract
"Having Your Strings Pulled: An Error Theory for Manipulation Arguments"
Note! This event takes place on Monday, March 18, 2:00-4:00pm, H&SS 8025
Spring Quarter 2013
- April 19
- Oliver Pooley (University of Oxford)
"Relativity, the Open Future, and the Passage of Time" - abstract - April 26
- Gary Watson (USC) - CANCELLED
- May 3
- Gideon Yaffe (USC)
"In Defense of Criminal Possession" - abstract - May 10
- Barbara Herman (UCLA)
"Love and Morality" - abstract - May 17
- Robin Jeshion (USC)
"Dehumanizing Slurs" - abstract - May 24
- Ruth Chang (Rutgers University)
"Do We Have Normative Powers?" - abstract
Colloquium 2011-12
Fall Quarter 2011
- October 14
- Peter Graham (UC Riverside)
- "Perceptual Entitlement and Natural Norms" - abstract
- October 21
- Sven Bernecker (UC Irvine)
- "On the Relation between Truth and Knowledge" - abstract
- November 18
- Jessica Wilson (University of Toronto, Canada)
- "Indeterminacy in the World" - abstract
- December 2
- Richard Kraut (Northwestern University)
- "An Aesthetic Reading of Aristotle's Ethics" - abstract
Winter Quarter 2012
- March 2
- Sandy Mitchell (University of Pittsburgh)
- "Representation Pluralism: the Case of Protein Folding" - abstract
- March 9
- Bonnie Kent (UC Irvine)
- "Aquinas, Scotus, and the Fragmentation of Virtuous Character" - abstract
Spring Quarter 2012
- April 20
- Patricia Easton (Claremont Graduate University)
- "More than an Occasion for a Cause: Louis de la Forge on Real Mind-body Interaction" - abstract
- April 27
- Jean Roberts (University of Washington)
- "Was Socrates a Teacher of Rhetoric?" - abstract
- May 4
- Igal Kvart (Hebrew University & Rutgers)
- "Rational Assertabiity, the Steering Role of Knowledge, and Pragmatic Encroachment" - abstract
- May 11
- Mark Wilson (University of Pittsburgh)
- "Is There Life in Possible Worlds?" - abstract
- May 25
- Michael Huemer (University of Colorado)
- "The Duty to Disregard the Law" - abstract
- June 1
- Amy Kind (Claremont McKenna College)
- "How Imagination Gives Rise to Knowledge" - abstract
Colloquium 2010-11
In honor of UC San Diego's 50th anniversary, our year-long colloquium series is themed "UCSD Philosophy: Then and Now" which will showcase the research of current departmental faculty and former departmental affiliates.
Fall Quarter 2010
- October 8
- Clinton Tolley (UC San Diego)
- "Kant on the Content and Object of an Intuition"
- October 29
- Michael Weisberg (University of Pennsylvania)
- "Getting Serious About Similarity" - abstract
- November 5
- Saul Smilansky (Haifa University, Israel)
- "Hard Determinism and Punishment: A Practical Reductio" - abstract
- November 12
- Lawrence Shapiro (University of Wisconsin)
- "Mental Manipulations and the Problem of Causal Exclusion" - abstract
Spring Quarter 2011
- April 8
- Samuel Rickless (UC San Diego)
- "Berkeley's Master Argument" - abstract
- April 15
- Wayne Martin (University of Essex)
- "Ubi Inletabilitas Ibi Virtus: Melancholy, Virtue and Self-Consciousness" - abstract
- April 16 (agenda)
- Symposium in honor of UC San Diego's 50th Anniversary
-
Event to showcase research of current departmental faculty and former departmental affiliates to present their current work and discuss the department's traditions. Speaker line-up includes Henry Allison, Paul Churchland and Avrum Stroll, Philosophy Professor Emeriti - UC San Diego; and Wayne Martin, Professor of Philosophy - University of Essex, England.
- May 13
- Chris Hitchcock (California Institute of Technology)
- "‘Cause’ in ‘Causal’ Decision Theory?" - abstract
- May 27
- Kyle Stanford (UC Irvine)
- "The Difference Between Ice Cream and Nazis: Evolution and the Emergence of Moral Objectivity" - abstract
- June 3
- Jeff King (Rutgers University)
- "'Descriptive Readings' of Indexicals and Demonstratives" - abstract
Colloquium 2009-10
Fall 2009
- October 16
- Michael Friedman (Stanford University)
- "Scientific Rationality after Kuhn"
- October 23
- Robert Pippin (University of Chicago)
- "What is Conceptual Activity? On the McDowell-Dreyfus (Hegel-Heidegger) Debate"
- November 20
- Christian Wuthrich (University of California, San Diego)
- "Space and Time Do Not Exist, Fundamentally"
- December 4
- Rick Grush (University of California, San Diego)
- "The Psychological Basis of Demonstratives"
Winter 2010
- January 22
- John Fischer (University of California, Riverside)
- February 12
- Maudemarie Clark (University of California, Riverside)
- March 5
- John Perry (Stanford University)
- March 15
- Frank Arntzenius (Oxford University)
- "Physics and the Existence of Mathematical Objects"
Spring 2010
- April 9
- Jonathan Cohen and Craig Callender (University of California, San Diego)
- "Special Sciences, Conspiracy, and the Better Best System Account of Lawhood"
- April 23
- Adrienne Mayor (Stanford University)
- "The Poison King: Mithradates, Rome's Deadliest Enemy"
- May 7
- Niko Kolodny (University of California, Berkeley)
- May 21
- Rachana Kamtekar (University of Arizona)
- "Politics in Socrates' 'Defense of Justice'"
- May 22-23
- West Coast Plato Workshop - Third Annual Conference
- Topic: Plato's Phaedrus
- June 4
- Derk Pereboom (Cornell University)
- "Nonreuctive Physicalism and Mental Compositional Properties"