A woman smiling in front of ppt screen that reads "Philosophy of Paleoanthropology Data, Underdetermination and Evidence about Past Human Populations Prospectus Defense Matilde Carrera BU PHILOSOPHY OF THE GEOSCIENCES RESEARCH GROUP
Congratulations to @matildecarrera.bsky.social on her superb defense today of a fantastic dissertation prospectus! She is now officially ABD! 🎉
#philsci #phigeo
Matilde Carrera has been offered to be part of a competitive summer program at Northeastern University intended for graduate students with advanced training in applied ethics, ethical theory, philosophy of science, or other areas with potential research applications to Al and big data. (AIDE Summer - the Ethics Institute -Northeastern University,_Summer 2025) • Matilde Carrera has also been selected as one of four PhD students from Boston University through a competitive, merit-based process to attend the Catalyzing Advocacy in Science and Engineering workshop. This workshop, sponsored by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), focuses on the role of science in policy making and the federal policy-making process. (CASE Workshop: Catalyzing Advocacy inScience and Engineering, April 6-9, 2025, Washington, D.C.)
Congrats to Phi-Geo grad Matilde Carrera @matildecarrera.bsky.social for being accepted to the competitive AI & Data Ethics Summer Institute at Northeastern this summer, as well as accepted to the upcoming AAAS Workshop: Catalyzing Advocacy in Science & Engineering, April 6-9 in D.C. 🙌 #philsci
Leticia smiling & giving brief overview of dissertation. Slide says Boston University | April 2025 HIDDEN NARRATIVES IN GEOSCIENTIFIC RESEARCH: TOWARD DEVELOPING MORE ETHICAL SCIENTIFIC PRACTICES Leticia A. Castillo Brache Dissertation Defense
Alisa & Leticia smiling at successful conclusion of defense with a vase flowers & zoom screen with some remote audience & committee members.
Congratulations to Dr. Castillo Brache @leticiacastillo.bsky.social on successfully defending her PhD dissertation this morning!!! Woo-hoo!!! 🙌🎓🌟 🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉
Thank you to Profs. Samia Hesni, @rachelankeny.bsky.social, & @miguelohn.bsky.social for serving on her committee 🙏
#philsci #phigeo
A man in board room with wood paneling giving a talk next to a screen with slide saying "Project Planet".
Photo of Ben next to following text: Pardee Research Seminar Series WITH: Ben Goossen Assistant Professor of International History, Pardee School of Global Studies Inventing Earth: A New History of the 1957-1958 International Geophysical Year Knowledge of planet Earth as a set of interconnected environmental systems is fundamental to present-day efforts to address global environmental challenges, including climate change. Among the most consequential projects in the history of Earth science was the 1957-1958 International Geophysical Year (IGY), a crash program to study the planet through worldwide collaboration. In the midst of the Cold War and global decolonization, tens of thousands of scientists and citizen volunteers from East and West, North and South, crossed political and ideological lines for the IGY. What they discovered shapes much of what we know about our common planetary home today. March 24, 2025 12:00 PM - 1:15 PM 121 Bay State Road Register here BU Boston University Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies
A wonderful #HistGeo talk today by global historian Ben Goosen on "Inventing Earth: A New History of the 1957-1958 International Geophysical Year" followed by a lunch with him & our #PhiGeo reaearch group. #histsci
Alisa, Leticia, Matilde & Matt standing in front of Mexico's standard of length the Castilian vara brass bar. Sign says Measuring Difference. This vara was seized during the 1847 U.S. invasion of Mexico City by an army engineer.
Gabriela Soto Laveaga | Nancy Friedemann-Sánchez | Pablo Gómez sitting on stage in conversation
Three grad students next to display with Humboldt's famous Mount Chimborazo elevation diagram.
A nice Phi-Geo group trip to @harvardmuseums.bsky.social to see exhibit Measuring Difference & hear a wonderful presentation by @chattyprofessor.bsky.social, artist Nancy Friedemann-Sánchez & #histmed Pablo Gómez, who spoke about roots of medical data about bodies in Atlantic slave trade. #philsci
In these uncertain times, this is something to look forward to.
I will present a brand new project, "When Adequacy is Inadequate: a Pragmatist Approach to Accurate Measurement Democratization," with Carlos Santana. »www.centerphilsci.pitt.edu/event/pragmatism-and-mea...
Thank you to my co-symposiasts Carlos Santana & Meghan Page for their fantastic talks, Lydia Patton for inviting us to do a session on #phigeo at #APAEastern25, & @mattbrewer.bsky.social for moderating! #philsci #philsky
Thank you so much for the invitation and the shout out JJ! Excitedly looking forward to my first AGU ⚒️🪨🌏
Leticia in front of screen "incorering Hidden Narratives in the Use of Unethical Geoscientific Research Practices"
Matt in front os screen text ""Women's Work" in Science Two Cases: The "Hobbyist" and the "Computer" Matt Brewer brewer@bu.edu PH 436/636 December 3 BOSTON UNIVERSITY BU PHILOSOPHY OF THE GEOSCIENCES
Matilde in front of chalkboard. & screen "Debunking Racial Thoughts in Population Genetics"
It was great having some of the Phi-Geo grads give short presentations of some relevant material from their research to my "Gender, Race, & Science" class today (Thank you @mattbrewer.bsky.social @matildecarrera.bsky.social & @leticiacastillo.bsky.social!!!)
1st-ever symposium on philosophy of seismology: @alisabokulich.bsky.social on Peircean abduction & inverse modelling, @terumiyake.bsky.social on 'problem of the missing model' in seismology, optics, and thermal physics; @cristianlarph.bsky.social on quantification in seismology (joint work with me).
14 people sitting around a table in restaurant
A lovely Phi-Geo & friends dinner @ #PSA24: @rachellaudan.bsky.social Aja W, @miguelohn.bsky.social @terumiyake.bsky.social @mattbrewer.bsky.social AndrewZ @leticiacastillo.bsky.social Kailyn S @federicabocchi.bsky.social @matildecarrera.bsky.social Carlos S, Katherine V @cristianlarph.bsky.social
6 people standing on Bourbon St. from left: Matt, Federica, Kailyn, Alisa, Leticia, Matilde
Some of the Boston University #PSA24 group out on Bourbon St.
BU Phi Geo logo designed as ellipsoid Earth stylized as Greek letter Phi. Text "PHILOSOPHY OF THE GEOSCIENCES RESEARCH GROUP"
The Philosophy of Geosciences Research Group at BU, Φ-Geo, is dedicated to exploring topics in the philosophy of the geosciences (historical & current Earth sciences), broadly understood. We have a big group heading to #PSA24 ⚒️ next week--check out our upcoming talks
bokulich.org/%cf%86-geo-g...
🧵 ⬇️
Some months ago @mattbrewer.bsky.social and I wrote a review for Suárez’s latest book “Inference and Representation. A Study in Modelling Science” and now it’s finally out on BJHS! www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
Ever wonder why the Cambrian explosion is called "the Cambrian explosion"? Or how it survived declining enthusiasm for the concept of "explosive evolution" to become the last explosion standing? Get the scoop on Extinct:
www.extinctblog.org/extinct/2024...
Forthcoming in C. Cleland and M. Dietrich (eds.) Anomalies in Science. Springer. Rising Tides and the Method of Residues: Anomaly-Driven Research in the Geosciences A. Bokulich, Boston University M. Carrera, Boston University M. Ohnesorge, Cambridge University 1. Introduction 1 2. The Historical Roots of the Method of Residues: Herschel, Whewell, and the Geosciences 2 2.1 Herschel's Method of Residues and the Geosciences 3 2.2 Whewell's Iterative Method of Residues and Tidal Research 6 3. The Method of Residues in Solid-Body Tide Research 9 3.1 Solid-Body Tides 10 3.2 First Predictions and Detections 11 3.3 From Residues to the Love-Shida Model to More Residues 12 4. Residue-Driven Research: How Anomalies Advance Science 18 4.1 Taxonomizing Residues. 18 4.2 The Method of Residues Refined 21 4.3 The Scope of the Method of Residues 23 5. Conclusions 26 References
💥New paper by @matildecarrera.bsky.social @miguelohn.bsky.social & me💥"Rising Tides & Method of Residues: Anomaly-Driven Research in #Geosciences" traces roots J. Herschel & Whewell's method in their paleoclimate & tidology, & MoR in discovery solid-body tide #HPS #19thC
bokulich.org/wp-content/u...
Congratulations to Phi-Geo grad @leticiacastillo.bsky.social who has been awarded the BU Institute for Global Sustainability 2024 Peter Fox-Penner Graduate Student Award (given for significant contributions to research or practice in sustainability & climate change &/or equity & justice)! 🎉 #philsci
This week, a first: an Extinct double feature! You read Matt Brewer's fascinating post on negative evidence in debates about the origin of plate tectonics. Now chase that high with a new Problematica on "arguments from absence" in the historical sciences...
www.extinctblog.org/extinct/2024...
New post! Matt Brewer (PhD candidate at BU) writes about the (geological) origin of the phrase "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence," and defends arguments from absence in the context of debates about the origin of plate tectonics. Check it out!
www.extinctblog.org/extinct/anci...
New Extinct Blog post from our Phi-Geo Research Group grad student @mattbrewer.bsky.social
⚒️ 🧪 #HPS #philsci #geoscience
Sept 27: Time Description 09:00 Breakfast and Coffee; Introduction and conference kick-off 09:30 Invited Talk by Ken Waters – Pursuing Metaphysics by Examining Successful Investigative Practices 10:30 Contributed talk by Tushar Menon – Scientific realism as a normative notion (twice over) 11:00 Coffee break 11:30 Invited talk by Holly Andersen – Measuring Modality 12:30 Lunch (TBD, WIRB 4190) 02:00 Contributed talk by Armond Duwell – Problems and Possibilities: A Pragmatic Account of Scientific Understanding 02:30 Contributed talk by Nickolas Boylan – Why Truth Matters 03:00 Contributed talk by Kabir Singh Bakshi – Scientific Progress, Zetetic Epistemology, and Lessons from Pragmatist Philosophy of Science 03:30 Coffee break 04:00 Invited talk by Alisa Bokulich – The Geodetic & Metrological Roots of C.S. Peirce’s Pragmatism 05:00 End of day 1 of the conference
Sept 28: Time Description 09:00 Breakfast and Coffee 09:30 Invited talk by Huw Price – Sidestepping the Rhinoceros – Copernicus, Pragmatism and Quantum Entanglement 10:30 Contributed talk by Patrick Fraser – Knowledge-How and the Semantics of Physical Theories 11:00 Coffee break 11:30 Contributed talk by Margrette Gress – How Standpoint Can Matter In Physics 12:00 Lunch & Poster Session (TBD, WIRB 4190) 02:30 Invited talk by Carlo Rovelli – The Two Thermodynamic Roots of Causation: A Lesson from Pragmatism 03:30 Coffee break 04:00 Contributed talk by Jason DeWitt – Causal Pragmatism without Causal Perspectivalism 04:30 Contributed talk by Shimin Zhao – Why we need the notion of probabilistic causation: a functional perspective 05:00 Invited talk by Jim Woodward – Structural Realism and the Dependency Account of Explanation 06:00 End of day 2
Sept 29: Time Description 09:00 Breakfast and Coffee 09:30 Contributed talk by John Dougherty – Pragmatism and the interpretation of physical theories 10:00 Contributed talk by Pascal Rodriguez Warnier – Resource theories and the pragmatist tradition (with a study case) 10:30 Coffee break 11:00 Invited Talk by Laura Ruetsche – That’s Entertainment: Pragmatism and the Interpretation of Physical Theory 12:00 Lunch (TBD, WIRB 4190) 02:00 End of the PPS conference
Conference program for "Pragmatism & The Philosophy of Science" Sept 27-29 @ Western (Ontario) University is up! Speakers incl @hkandersen.bsky.social, Ken Waters, @huwprice.bsky.social, Ari Duwell, @rovelli.bsky.social, Jim Woodward, Laura Ruetsche, & me. #philsci
www.rotman.uwo.ca/event/pragma...
Thanks so much!
Thank you @alisabokulich.bsky.social and @miguelohn.bsky.social for all your support thus far! Looking forward to developing the project further 😊
Congratulations to @mattbrewer.bsky.social on successfully defending his PhD dissertation prospectus "Evidence, Classification, & Explanation: Towards a Philosophy of Plate Tectonics" today--he's now ABD! 🎉(& thanks to @miguelohn.bsky.social & Rachell Powell for serving on the committee) #philsci
Tune in for the penultimate PhilPalaeo "Roadshow" talk tomorrow, with Matt Brewer of BU. (Apologies to Matilde Carrera, also at BU, whose talk I forgot to advertise last week!) The talk will take place at 11 AM EDT. Link w/i
www.extinctblog.org/palaeonews/2...
⚒️ The debate over when plate tectonics started is so philosophically interesting. How do you assess the relative reliability of very different evidence; how uniformitarianism itself is stressed when faced with the drastic changes of a planet over Deep Time.
Thanks for spreading the word! @matildecarrera.bsky.social and I have swapped days so she will present tomorrow 😊
Thank you! Looking forward to November 😊
@dollyjorgensen.bsky.social Thank you! I’ll check this out! 😊