St John's Philosophical Society

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St John's Philosophical Society

Promoting the study and popularisation of philosophy at Cambridge University.

04/11/2024

We're back for 2024/5!

For our first exciting event of the academic year, we have a student interview and Q&A with visiting fellow Prof Paul Hoyningen-Huene, distinguished philosopher of science and professor at Leibniz Universität Hannover.

Gerard Kornacki, current philosophy mPhil student at St John's and previous president of the St John's Philosophical Society, will interview Professor Hoyningen-Huene on his research and life in philosophy of science and there will be time at the end for questions from the crowd.

We look forward to seeing many new freshers joining in with the society!

Event: Interview with Prof Paul Hoyningen-Huene
Location: Boys Smith Room, Fisher Building
Time: 11th November, 6:00pm-7:30pm

24/11/2023

We're celebrating Valentine's Day early...

Title: The Nature of Love

Abstract:
It is perhaps not all too surprising that when we seek to understand love, our first instinct is seldom to turn to biology or psychology textbooks. Instead, we often seek solace in art, music, or literature. We drown ourselves in aphorisms that opaquely express our experience. The question “What is love?” has thus historically been a goldmine for the poet, writer, lyricist etc. From Shakespeare’s “Love is a star” to Johnny Cash’s “Love is a burning thing”, metaphor seems to be the only solace in our human yearning to understand this mystifying emotion. Yet, metaphor is, by definition, imprecise. Still, as one of my favourite characters has once said “… love is what we stay alive for.” One might even go as far as saying “it is what defines humanity”. We thus have good reason to get precise on love—it is central to our ways of living. The nature, or ontology, of love is thus of interest to the philosopher. How are we to understand love? Perhaps we can’t even understand it, it may be fundamentally elusive! Perhaps it can be simply reduced to chemical goings-on in the brain. Such questions are catalysts for philosophical debate and dispute. In this discussion event, I present a brief overview of the philosophical landscape regarding the nature of love and invite a dialogue concerning the aforementioned questions (and more!) among those present.

14/11/2023

Click the link in our bio to order your own exclusive SJPS hoodies, t-shirts, hats, coats and more!

Stash drop ends 21st Nov so be quick!

03/11/2023

Introducing our first social...

For some chill drinks and philosophical discussions, join us at our first "Drink and Debate" event!

11th November at 7pm in the John's bar.

15/10/2023

Get ready for our first event of the year!

Title: Algorithmic Bias and the Hard Proxy Problem

Abstract: This discussion aims to confront the Proxy Problem: often machine learning programs utilize seemingly innocuous features as proxies for socially-sensitive attributes such as race, gender or class, posing various challenges for the creation of ethical algorithms. I argue that to address this problem, we must first settle a prior question of what it means for an algorithm that only has access to seemingly neutral features to be using those features as “proxies” for, and so to be making decisions on the basis of, protected-class features. Borrowing resources from statistics, philosophy of mind, and law, we’ll explore together multiple, competing answers to this question. On my preferred approach, the answer depends on whether discrimination against those protected classes explains the algorithm’s selection of individuals. This approach rules out standard theories of proxy discrimination in law and computer science that rely on overly intellectual views of agent intentions or on overly deflationary views that reduce proxy use to statistical correlation.

The event will be a discussion style event led by Gabrielle Johnson.

The format will be as follows. A topic will be initially laid out by Gabrielle, followed by a subsequent discussion regarding the points raised. Here is the title and abstract of the topic that will be discussed.

Everyone is welcome to voice their opinions and ideas or just listen to the discussion if they prefer.

04/10/2023

Welcome to St John's Philosophical Society!

We are the newest Philosophy Society in Cambridge and will soon be offering speaker events, discussions, socials, exclusive stash and more!

Stay tuned for details about our first Michaelmas event 👀

Address

St John's College
Cambridge
CB21TP

Website

https://www.joh.cam.ac.uk/philosophical-society

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