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Barbara Osimani (LMU Munich): “Exact replication or varied evidence? Reliability, robustness and the reproducibility problem”
The “Reproducibility Project: Psychology” by the Open Science Collaboration caused some stir among psychologists, methodologists as well as scientists, since less than half of the replicated studies succeeded in reproducing the results of the original ones. The APA has attributed this result to hidden moderators that rendered the replications ineffective. Also publication bias and low power have been identified as possible sources for such mismatch. While some analysts have provided formal confirmation for the plausibility of such explanations (Etz and Vandekerkhove, 2016), others have further insisted on the problem of noisy data and suggested that “to resolve the replication crisis in science we may need to consider each individual study in the context of an implicit meta-analysis” (Andrew Gelman).
I investigate these positions through the lenses of Bayesian epistemology, and in particular of recent results on the Variety of Evidence Thesis.
Find out more »Davide Grossi (Liverpool): “Mutual Persuasion”
Two agents are faced with a choice between two options. They are uncertain about which option is the right one and are endowed with a personal bias, each in favor of a different option. They first acquire independent information by observing a private signal with known quality. They then need to reveal their private signal to the other agent, but may decide to manipulate some of the evidence the signal provides, in order to persuade the other agent in the direction of their own bias. In this talk Davide Grossi presents a Bayesian model capturing this form of persuasion, analyses the strategies available to the agents and characterises the possible outcomes of the interaction.
Find out more »Emergence and the Limit: A Workshop in Philosophy of Physics
Recent literature on emergence in physics and on foundational issues in statistical mechanics has stressed the importance or lack thereof of the thermodynamic limit. In this workshop we will consider various case studies portraying either emergent behaviour or other important issues in statistical mechanics and assess the indispensable vs. dispensable nature of of the thermodynamic limit (or other similar limits such as the continuum limit). Our goal is is make some headway in identifying the role that such limits may or may not play in understanding emergence, reversibility, etc.
Find out more »Peter Sozou (CPNSS): “Computational Scientific Discovery”
Is there a role for computers in the formulation of scientific concepts? Scientific discovery can take various forms: direct observational discovery, finding empirical rules, and discovery of theories. I will begin by considering the roots of scientific discovery and the basic nature of (human) discovery processes. I will then survey methods and associated applications in computational scientific discovery, covering: massive systematic search within a defined space; rule-based reasoning systems; classification, machine vision and related techniques; data mining; finding networks; evolutionary computation; and automation of scientific experiments. I conclude with a discussion of the future of computational scientific discovery.
Find out more »Michael Hunter (University of California, Davis): “Germ-line or Somatic mutations? The pitfalls and concerns for deleting and replacing the concept of race in human genetics”
Abstract: Across the recent history of Population Genetics, there have been a number of calls by historians of science, philosophers of science, social scientists and biologists themselves for dealing with the concept of "race" in Population Biology. Most recently, in the article written by Yudell et al. (2016), the authors advocate that scientific journals and professional societies should encourage use…
Find out more »History of Postwar Social Science Workshop
Programme 10:10–11:00 Alice White (University of Kent): "Consultants and coal in postwar Britain: The Tavistock Institute and mining methods" 11:00–11:30 Tea/coffee break 11:30–12:20 Laura Stark (Vanderbilt University): "Knowing without showing the minds of others: A reassessment of postwar methods in the social sciences" 12:30–14:00 Lunch break 14:10–15:00 Marcia Holmes (Birkbeck, University of London): "Criteria for conflicts: ‘Human engineering’ air traffic…
Find out more »Monstrosity (the Forum)
Why is art preoccupied with monsters? What can we learn about a society from the kinds of monsters it imagines? Today, when traditional ideas of the human cannot account for advances in biology and technology, can monstrous figures help us to better understand our changing sense of ourselves?
Find out more »Jossi Berkovitz (Toronto): “De Finetti’s Instrumentalist Philosophy of Probability”
Abstract: TBC #LSEChoiceGroup
Find out more »Marta Halina (Cambridge HPS): “The role of values in animal cognition research” (BSPS Lecture)
Abstract TBC
Find out more »Michael Stuart (CPNSS) – TBA
Abstract TBA. Michael T. Stuart is a postdoctoral fellow at the London School of Economics, interested in the epistemological nature and function of the imagination in science.
Find out more »Donald MacKenzie (Edinburgh): “A Material Sociology of Markets: the Case of ‘Futures Lag’ in High-Frequency Trading” (Auguste Comte Memorial Lecture)
This talk (about automated trading) will develop the case for an integrated "material sociology" view of markets, as both social institutions and technical systems.
Find out more »Karim Thébault (Bristol): “Cosmic Singularity Resolution via Quantum Evolution” (BSPS Lecture)
Abstract TBC
Find out more »Eleanor Knox (KCL): TBA
Abstract: TBA Dr Eleanor Knox is a Lecturer in Philosophy at King's College London. #SigmaClub
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