New Orleans Workshop on Agency and Responsibility (N.O. W.A.R.)

Thanks to the generous support of Tulane University's Murphy Institute, I'm very pleased to announce that the first New Orleans Workshop on Agency and Responsibility (NO WAR) will take place November 3-5, 2011 (yes, that's 2011, not 2010).  I'm announcing this now so as to get it on your radar and whet your appetite.  It will be run on the same model as the Madison metaethics workshop and the recently-instituted Tucson normative ethics workshop.  The keynote speakers will be Sarah Buss (Michigan) and Gary Watson (USC).  For more on the motivation for the workshop and its structure, see below the fold.

While the Madison and Tucson workshops are terrific events, they provide a somewhat uneasy fit for those of us who do work primarily in agency and responsibility, i.e., it's just not clear under which general rubric--normative ethics or metaethics--work on agency and responsibility falls (if any).  The idea behind NO WAR is to address this gap and build a community of folks who are interested in these issues.  So I really hope those of you who do that sort of work or who maybe are just interested in discussing it will consider attending or submitting abstracts.

Which brings me to the format.  As I said, it will be modeled on the Mad-Meta formula: people will submit abstracts several months in advance, from which the program contributors will be selected.  Presentations will be roughly 45 minutes, followed by 45 minutes of discussion.  We'll have a keynote on Thursday evening, and then have presentations all day on Friday and Saturday (ending with a keynote).

Of course, this is also New Orleans in November: the weather's awesome, the food is fantastic, and the beer never stops flowing.  So even if you're not that interested in agency and responsibility, you might well consider coming.

Seriously, I am hoping that we get folks interested in a variety of areas of agency and responsibility, including (not just moral, but) criminal responsibility, neuroethics, (not just moral, but) empirical and social psychology, and more.

I will send out a call for abstracts at the end of the year. 

Comments

[Jamie Dreier]

Wow, Shafer-Landau spawn. Workshop proliferation.
You'd think N.O. W.A.R. would be worried about non-proliferation.
Oh, and if they worked on non-proliferation, the prolifers would protest, which would make good sense because obviously the workshop will be pro-choice.

Tremendous potential here. I feel I've only scratched the surface.

[Jussi Suikkanen]

W.A.R, it ain't nothing
But a heartbreaker
W.A.R, friend only to the undertaker
Ooooh, W.A.R
It's an enemy to all mankind
The point of war blows my mind
W.A.R has caused unrest
Within the younger generation
Induction then destruction
Who wants to die
Aaaaah, war-huh
Good God y'all
What is it good for
Absolutely nothing
Say it, say it, say it
W.A.R., huh
What is it good for
Absolutely nothing
Listen to me

Anyway, hope this will be as great of a workshop as the other two. Maybe even slightly different crowd too.

[David Sobel]

I like people letting their goofy flag fly here at Pea Soup. Fly high, goofy flag, fly high!

I love all these annual conferences popping up!

[Tamler Sommers]

This is the best idea anyone has ever had.

[David Shoemaker]

I take it that that includes ideas outside of philosophy, like the combustion engine or the internet. I humbly accept the accolade.

I can hear Jussi's insistent warble from here.

Keep scratching, Jamie. Here were some of the losing titles and acronyms: "New Orleans Responsibility and Agency Workshop" (N.O. R.A.W.--perhaps a protest against certain San Francisco-ish food trends); "New Orleans: Responsibility, Agency, and Determinism" (N.O.R.A.D.--an homage to the aerospace defense industry?); Philosophy In Agency: New Orleans (P.I.A.N.O); and "Ontological Hermeneutics: New Orleans" (O.H. N.O.: would've required a change in topics, but perhaps the acronymic value would've been worth it).