Category Archives: Upcoming events

First Two Meetings of International Philosophy of Medicine Reading Group

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This group – let’s call it Philmed-RG – will have a couple of pilot meetings in July, before settling into a series of meetings in the period September-December, after the Northern summer break is over. (Read more about the group here.)

We have over 130 expressions of interest from all over the world, so we are looking to split the meetings into two, at different sides of the clock. Therefore we propose the following first two meetings and readings.

  1. Fagerberg, H. (2023). What We Argue about when We Argue about Disease. Philosophy of Medicine, 4(1). https://doi.org/10.5195/pom.2023.172
    • Thursday 11 July at 5pm BST
    • Friday 12 July at 9am BST
  2. Stoellger, D. (2023). Why It (Also) Matters What Infectious Disease Epidemiologists Call “Disease”. Philosophy of Medicine, 4(1). https://doi.org/10.5195/pom.2023.149
    • Thursday 25 July at 5pm BST
    • Friday 26 July at 9am BST

The zoom link will be circulated to the reading group email list. You may request to join the list and group here: https://groups.google.com/g/philmed-rg/

We look forward to seeing you at one of these meetings!

The Philmed-RG Organising Committee (Alex Broadbent, Elisabetta Lalumera, Sarah Wieten)

International PhilMed Reading Group

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In various conversations, some of us have thought it might be nice to have a reading group on philosophy of medicine, with international reach. As well as creating a nice place for regular conversations, this might support people who feel a bit isolated where they are, to connect more with the international philosophy of medicine community. And of course it encourages those of us who suffer from “readers block” to read on a regular basis!

We haven’t yet decided what to read, or exactly how often to meet. So we might do a sort of pilot, and continue if it feels good, or drop it otherwise. As a rough guide, we’re imagining having maybe 8 or 10 meetings at intervals of 2 or 3 weeks, each lasting about 90 mins. These might run Sept-Dec (perhaps with some earlier meetings in June/July for those who are free). Then we review, and decide whether to line another series of meetings up for the following year. However, everything is open.

If you would like to be part of this experiment, please would you drop us a line at cpemph@durham.ac.uk? No commitment.

African Centre for Epistemology and Philosophy of Science (ACEPS): launch announced

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The African Centre for Epistemology and Philosophy of Science (ACEPS) is housed in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Johannesburg. ACEPS fosters intra-African and global conversation in the areas of Epistemology and Philosophy of Science by bringing African insights, questions and values into meaningful conversation with other philosophical traditions. ACEPS was founded in 2016 by co-directors Professor Alex Broadbent and Professor Veli Mitova, and Dr Mongane Wally Serote, Dr Ben Smart, Chad Harris and Zinhle Mncube. ACEPS’s groundbreaking philosophical work is organised around three umbrella projects:

• Indigenous Knowledge Systems;
• Health and Medicine in Africa; and
• Rationality and Power.

Kindly diarise the following date for the Centre’s launch:
• Date: Friday, 19 May 2017
• Time: 15:00-17:30
• Venue: Humanities Common Room, C-Ring 319, Auckland Park Campus, University of Johannesburg

The launch will take the format of a public forum where panelists will exchange their opinion and ideas on the following topic: “Why an African Centre for Epistemology and Philosophy of Science?” A formal invitation will be sent out soon with all the details.

Anyone interested in attending from further afield is welcome to contact me. There will be a larger conference event organised in due course, with more lead time.

Website: https://www.uj.ac.za/faculties/humanities/aceps/Pages/default.aspx

Workshop, Helsinki: What do diseases and financial crises have in common?

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AID Forum: “Epidemiology: an approach with multidisciplinary applicability”

(Unfamiliar with AID forum? For the very idea and the programme of Agora for Interdisciplinary Debate, see www.helsinki.fi/tint/aid.htm)

DISCUSSED BY:

Mervi Toivanen (economics, Bank of Finland)

Jaakko Kaprio (genetic epidemiology, U of Helsinki)

Alex Broadbent (philosophy of science, U of Johannesburg)

Moderated by Academy professor Uskali Mäki

Session jointly organised by TINT (www.helsinki.fi/tint) and the Finnish Epidemiological Society (www.finepi.org)

TIME AND PLACE:

Monday 9 February, 16:15-18

University Main Building, 3rd Floor, Room 5

http://www.helsinki.fi/teknos/opetustilat/keskusta/f33/ls5.htm

TOPIC: What do diseases and financial crises have in common?

Epidemiology has traditionally been used to model the spreading of diseases in populations at risk. By applying parameters related to agents’ responses to infection and network of contacts it helps to study how diseases occur, why they spread and how one could prevent epidemic outbreaks. For decades, epidemiology has studied also non-communicable diseases, such as cancer, cardiovascular disease, addictions and accidents. Descriptive epidemiology focuses on providing accurate information on the occurrence (incidence, prevalence and survival) of the condition. Etiological epidemiology seeks to identify the determinants be they infectious agents, environmental or social exposures, or genetic variants. A central goal is to identify determinants amenable to intervention, and hence prevention of disease.

There is thus a need to consider both reverse causation and confounding as possible alternative explanations to a causal one. Novel designs are providing new tools to address these issues. But epidemiology also provides an approach that has broad applicability to a number of domains covered by multiple disciplines. For example, it is widely and successfully used to explain the propagation of computer viruses, macroeconomic expectations and rumours in a population over time.

As a consequence, epidemiological concepts such as “super-spreader” have found their way also to economic literature that deals with financial stability issues. There is an obvious analogy between the prevention of diseases and the design of economic policies against the threat of financial crises. The purpose of this session is to discuss the applicability of epidemiology across various domains and the possibilities to mutually benefit from common concepts and methods.

QUESTIONS:

1. Why is epidemiology so broadly applicable?

2. What similarities and differences prevail between these various disciplinary applications?

3. What can they learn from one another, and could the cooperation within disciplines be enhanced?

4. How could the endorsement of concepts and ideas across disciplines be improved?

5. Can epidemiology help to resolve causality?

READINGS:

Alex Broadent, Philosophy of Epidemiology (Palgrave Macmillan 2013)

http://www.palgrave.com/page/detail/?sf1=id_product&st1=535877

Alex Broadbent’s blog on the philosophy of epidemiology:

https://philosepi.wordpress.com/

Rothman KJ, Greenland S, Lash TL. Modern Epidemiology 3rd edition.

Lippincott, Philadelphia 2008

D’Onofrio BM, Lahey BB, Turkheimer E, Lichtenstein P. Critical need for family-based, quasi-experimental designs in integrating genetic and social science research. Am J Public Health. 2013 Oct;103 Suppl 1:S46-55. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2013.301252.

Taylor, AE, Davies, NM, Ware, JJ, Vanderweele, T, Smith, GD & Munafò, MR 2014, ‘Mendelian randomization in health research: Using appropriate genetic variants and avoiding biased estimates’. Economics and Human Biology, vol 13., pp. 99-106

Engholm G, Ferlay J, Christensen N, Kejs AMT, Johannesen TB, Khan S, Milter MC, Ólafsdóttir E, Petersen T, Pukkala E, Stenz F, Storm HH. NORDCAN: Cancer Incidence, Mortality, Prevalence and Survival in the Nordic Countries, Version 7.0 (17.12.2014). Association of the Nordic Cancer Registries. Danish Cancer Society. Available from http://www.ancr.nu.

Andrew G. Haldane, Rethinking of financial networks; Speech by Mr Haldane, Executive Director, Financial Stability, Bank of England, at the Financial Student Association, Amsterdam, 28 April 2009: http://www.bis.org/review/r090505e.pdf

Antonios Garas et al., Worldwide spreading of economic crisis: http://iopscience.iop.org/1367-2630/12/11/113043/pdf/1367-2630_12_11_113043.pdf

Christopher D. Carroll, The epidemiology of macroeconomic expectations: http://www.econ2.jhu.edu/people/ccarroll/epidemiologySFI.pdf