OPC 2: The Sequel

As some of you may already know, last May we held the first Online Philosophy Conference (OPC)--which included over thirty papers and sixty invited participants and received 40,000 visits from the global philosophical community.  Well, we are now pleased to announce the sequel--OPC2--which will be hosted on this new blog.  This year's tentative program is as follows:

Week One--May 14th through 20th (2007):   

1. Juan Comesaña (University of Wisconsin--Madison), "Knowledge and Subjunctive Conditionals," w/ commentary by John Greco (St. Louis University).

2. John Martin Fischer (University of California--Riverside), "The Direct Argument," w/ commentary by Randolph Clarke (Florida State University) and David Widerker (Bar-Ilan Univesity).

3. Caspar Hare (MIT),"Morphing and Aggregation," w/ commentary by Peter Graham (UMass--Amherst).
   
4. Shaun Nichols (University of Arizona) “The Rise of Compatibilism: A Case Study in the Quantitative History of Philosophy," w/ commentary by Eric Schwitzgebel (University of California--Riverside), and Kelby Mason (Rutgers University--New Brunswick).
   
5. **Ernest Sosa (Rutgers University--New Brunswick) "Epistemic Normativity" w/ commentary by Ram Neta (University of North Carolina--Chapel Hill), and Duncan Pritchard (University of Stirling).   

6. Meredith Williams (Johns Hopkins University), "Wittgenstein and the Paradox of Thought," w/ commentary by Hans-Johann Glock (University of Zurich), and David Stern (University of Iowa).

Week Two--May 21st through 27th (2007):   

1. Jonathan Dancy (University of Texas--Austin), "Practical Reasoning and Inference," w/ commentary by Joseph Raz (Columbia/Oxford), and Candace Vogler (University of Chicago).
   
2. Delia Graff Fara (Princeton). TBA.
   
3. **Jeff McMahan (Rutgers University--New Brunswick), "The Pacifist Challenge."

4. Derk Pereboom (Cornell), "A Compatibilist Account of the Beliefs Required for Deliberation," w/ commentary by Joseph Campbell (Washington State University), and Dana Nelkin (University of California--San Diego).
   
5. Adina Roskies (Dartmouth). TBA.
   
6. Gillian Russell (Washington University - St. Louis), "One True Logic?" w/ commentary by JC Beall (University of Connecticut), and Jonathan McKeown-Green (University of Auckland)

**=keynote address

OPC 2 will officially last two weeks this year--although you are obviously welcome to continue commenting in the threads so long as others are willing! Some of the threads last year were very active--hopefully, even more people will take part this year.  After all, that is one of the primary benefits of the online format.  It enables the participants to get a lot of constructive feedback on their work in a short amount of time, while also allowing the online audience a chance to engage in interesting philosophical discussion.  Please do your part and play along.  As for us, we have tried to do our part to ensure that this year's OPC is as interesting and engaging as possible.  For instance, we have included far fewer papers--so that each paper gets the attention it deserves--but we have also invited more philosophers to comment on each one.

Another new development is that Blackwell Publishing has kindly offered to sponsor this year's OPC.  With their assistance, we are going to be able to include two keynote addresses this year--one to kick off each week of the conference.  The first will be given by Ernest Sosa at Georgia State University.  The second will be given by Jeff McMahan at Dickinson College.  Both talks (along with the ensuing discussions) will be recorded, video-taped, and posted for people to view on the OPC 2 blog!  We are particularly excited about this new feature and we thank Blackwell for making it possible.

Finally, we are very pleased to announce that Professors McMahan and Sosa have generously offered to donate their keynote honorariums to charity.  This year the charities selected by the OPC keynote speakers are Amnesty International, Oxfam, and The American Philosophical Association.  Please follow their generous lead and donate what you can.   Perhaps treat it as an inexpensive conference registration fee!  We have provided links in the sidebar to this year's official charities.  We hope that with your assistance we can start a charitable tradition here at the OPC, and we thank both Professors McMahan and Sosa for laying the groundwork!

For now, we just want to invite you once again to participate in this year's OPC.  We hope to "see" you in the comment threads come May!  Keep in mind that the more everyone in the broader philosophical community puts into the conference, the more everyone gets out of it. So, we hope you will watch and listen to a couple of interesting philosophy talks, download and read some engaging papers, peruse the invited commentary, and contribute to the unfolding philosophical dialogue that this conference is designed to facilitate.   

As always, if you have any suggestions with respect to how to improve OPC 2 (as well as future installments of OPC), please don't hesitate to let us know.  In the meantime, if you could help us spread the word about the upcoming conference we would greatly appreciate it.

Thanks, Thomas Nadelhoffer and Eddy Nahmias

As some of you may already know, last May we held the first Online Philosophy Conference (OPC)--which included over thirty papers and sixty invited participants and received 40,000 visits from the global philosophical community.  Well, we are now pleased to announce the sequel--OPC2--which will be hosted on this new blog.  This year's tentative program is as follows:

Week One--May 14th through 20th (2007):   

1. Juan Comesaña (University of Wisconsin--Madison), "Knowledge and Subjunctive Conditionals," w/ commentary by John Greco (St. Louis University).

2. John Martin Fischer (University of California--Riverside), "The Direct Argument," w/ commentary by Randolph Clarke (Florida State University) and David Widerker (Bar-Ilan Univesity).

3. Caspar Hare (MIT),"Morphing and Aggregation," w/ commentary by Peter Graham (UMass--Amherst).
   
4. Shaun Nichols (University of Arizona) “The Rise of Compatibilism: A Case Study in the Quantitative History of Philosophy," w/ commentary by Eric Schwitzgebel (University of California--Riverside), and Kelby Mason (Rutgers University--New Brunswick).
   
5. **Ernest Sosa (Rutgers University--New Brunswick) "Epistemic Normativity" w/ commentary by Ram Neta (University of North Carolina--Chapel Hill), and Duncan Pritchard (University of Stirling).   

6. Meredith Williams (Johns Hopkins University), "Wittgenstein and the Paradox of Thought," w/ commentary by Hans-Johann Glock (University of Zurich), and David Stern (University of Iowa).

Week Two--May 21st through 27th (2007):   

1. Jonathan Dancy (University of Texas--Austin), "Practical Reasoning and Inference," w/ commentary by Joseph Raz (Columbia/Oxford), and Candace Vogler (University of Chicago).
   
2. Delia Graff Fara (Princeton). TBA.
   
3. **Jeff McMahan (Rutgers University--New Brunswick), "The Pacifist Challenge."

4. Derk Pereboom (Cornell), "A Compatibilist Account of the Beliefs Required for Deliberation," w/ commentary by Joseph Campbell (Washington State University), and Dana Nelkin (University of California--San Diego).
   
5. Adina Roskies (Dartmouth). TBA.
   
6. Gillian Russell (Washington University - St. Louis), "One True Logic?" w/ commentary by JC Beall (University of Connecticut), and Jonathan McKeown-Green (University of Auckland)

**=keynote address

OPC 2 will officially last two weeks this year--although you are obviously welcome to continue commenting in the threads so long as others are willing! Some of the threads last year were very active--hopefully, even more people will take part this year.  After all, that is one of the primary benefits of the online format.  It enables the participants to get a lot of constructive feedback on their work in a short amount of time, while also allowing the online audience a chance to engage in interesting philosophical discussion.  Please do your part and play along.  As for us, we have tried to do our part to ensure that this year's OPC is as interesting and engaging as possible.  For instance, we have included far fewer papers--so that each paper gets the attention it deserves--but we have also invited more philosophers to comment on each one.

Another new development is that Blackwell Publishing has kindly offered to sponsor this year's OPC.  With their assistance, we are going to be able to include two keynote addresses this year--one to kick off each week of the conference.  The first will be given by Ernest Sosa at Georgia State University.  The second will be given by Jeff McMahan at Dickinson College.  Both talks (along with the ensuing discussions) will be recorded, video-taped, and posted for people to view on the OPC 2 blog!  We are particularly excited about this new feature and we thank Blackwell for making it possible.

Finally, we are very pleased to announce that Professors McMahan and Sosa have generously offered to donate their keynote honorariums to charity.  This year the charities selected by the OPC keynote speakers are Amnesty International, Oxfam, and The American Philosophical Association.  Please follow their generous lead and donate what you can.   Perhaps treat it as an inexpensive conference registration fee!  We have provided links in the sidebar to this year's official charities.  We hope that with your assistance we can start a charitable tradition here at the OPC, and we thank both Professors McMahan and Sosa for laying the groundwork!

For now, we just want to invite you once again to participate in this year's OPC.  We hope to "see" you in the comment threads come May!  Keep in mind that the more everyone in the broader philosophical community puts into the conference, the more everyone gets out of it. So, we hope you will watch and listen to a couple of interesting philosophy talks, download and read some engaging papers, peruse the invited commentary, and contribute to the unfolding philosophical dialogue that this conference is designed to facilitate.   

As always, if you have any suggestions with respect to how to improve OPC 2 (as well as future installments of OPC), please don't hesitate to let us know.  In the meantime, if you could help us spread the word about the upcoming conference we would greatly appreciate it.

Thanks, Thomas Nadelhoffer and Eddy Nahmias

Comments

[Eddy Nahmias]

Just in case you didn't notice, there will be three "talks" on free will (by our own Fischer and Pereboom and Nichols) with two commentaries each. So, I hope Gardeners will be quite active in the conference!