[PhilPhys] Next Week's Lunch Time Talks - Margherita Harris 4/9 and Mousa Mohammadian 4/12

[Center for Phil Sci]

The Center for Philosophy of Science invites you to join us for our Lunch Time Talks.  Attend in person, Room 1117 on the 11th floor of the Cathedral of Learning at the University of Pittsburgh or visit our live stream on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrRp47ZMXD7NXO3a9Gyh2sg.

This week's talks are presented by The Center for Philosophy of Science's visiting Postdoctoral Fellow, Margherita Harris, and Visiting Fellow, Mousa Mohammadian. If you would like information about these positions for the 2025-2026 academic year, please see the bottom of this notice.

LTT: Margherita Harris
Tuesday, April 9th @ 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm EDT


This talk will also be available live streamed on:  Zoom at https://pitt.zoom.us/j/98986700518


Title: Probabilism Under Scrutiny: Grappling with the Weight of Evidence


Abstract:  Probabilism, the philosophical view that the role of probability is to capture degrees of belief, support, confirmation, or plausibility about hypotheses, has been gaining increasing traction across a diverse array of disciplines: epistemology, risk assessment, decision theory, ethics, psychology, data science, evidence law, and statistics, to name a few. Despite its growing prominence, a recurring concern arises amidst this ascendancy. This concern revolves around the idea, often attributed to John M Keynes, that probability, when fulfilling this role, fails to capture something epistemically important about the evidence, namely its “amount,” “completeness,” or “weight”.

In this talk, I will delve into discussions surrounding the concept of “the weight of evidence” within evidence law scholarship and the broader philosophy of proof. I posit that substantial philosophical insights regarding this concept can be gleaned from this particular domain of inquiry alone. The outline of my presentation is as follows: I will begin with a brief overview of legal probabilism, highlighting pertinent cases that have raised doubts regarding the ability of probabilistic interpretations of standards of proof to adequately capture the “weight of evidence”. I will then contend that proponents of legal probabilism neither have nor can have an epistemically satisfactory response to this concern. Instead, I will propose Giorgi Gardiner’s relevant alternatives framework for interpreting legal standards of proof as a promising alternative to probabilism. Finally, I will argue that this framework illuminates the ongoing debate surrounding the role of probability in inference, at the heart of the so-called “statistics wars” – wars that, as Mayo observes, “reflect disagreements on one of the deepest, oldest philosophical questions: How do humans learn about the world despite threats of error due to incomplete and variable data?”




LTT: Mousa Mohammadian

Friday, April 12th @ 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm EDT


This talk will also be available live streamed on: Zoom at https://pitt.zoom.us/j/94576817686


Title: Peirce Disappears: C.S. Peirce and Early Logical Empiricism


Abstract:  Scholars of the history of philosophy of science read and hear a lot about Duhem, Mach, Poincaré, and the members of the Vienna Circle. C.S. Peirce, however, is not generally considered a canonical figure in the history of philosophy of science. But in the early years of the logical empiricist movement in the United States, Peirce received a warm reception from prominent representatives, proponents, and sympathizers of logical empiricism including Charles Morris, Ernst Nagel, Herbert Feigl, Phillip Frank, and W.V.O. Quine. This reception was short-lived though and Peirce gradually disappeared from the mainstream philosophy of science while logical empiricism turned into a formidable movement.

In this talk, I begin by discussing examples of the early reception of Peirce’s philosophy in the works of Morris, Nagel (and his student Justus Buchler), Feigl, and Frank. I show the variety of topics (including logic, probability theory, theories of truth and meaning, and social dimensions of science) in which Peirce received a warm (though not uncritical) reception. We see that the engagements with his works are persistent from the late 1920s to the 1950s and get more refined over time. I then provide some explanations for the eventual marginalization of Peirce in mainstream philosophy of science.




Information about 2025 - 2026 Fellowships

 If you would like information about our Fellowships please visit our websites. We will be accepting applications this Fall.


Postdoctoral Fellowships: https://www.centerphilsci.pitt.edu/programs/postdoc-fellowships/program-overview/


Visting Fellows Program: https://www.centerphilsci.pitt.edu/programs/visiting-fellows/program-overview/



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