Avital Pilpel
avital.pilpel@avitalpilpel.com
Haifa, Israel
Haifa, Israel
My Philosophical Interests, Writing, and Experience
(Please scroll down for CV & other documents)
(Please scroll down for CV & other documents)
Credo
'What is "pragmatic" about pragmatism is the recognition of a common structure to practical deliberation and cognitive inquiry in spite of the diversity of aims and values" -- Prof. Isaac Levi, The Fixation of Belief and Its Undoing, p. 78.
Today most philosophers of science believe that no important insights can be had by looking for such a "common structure to inquiry" (RBCT, as I called it). The collapse of the positivist-empiricist project, rise of the "weak program" and "strong program", and numerous other issues all seem to point in that direction.
I claim RBCT does play an important role, and inquirers (from physicists to economists and psychiatrists) take its epistemic desiderata -- to seek information and avoid error -- seriously. E.g., when some error is discovered in a previous experiment forces to give up some previously-held views, or when a shocking discovery makes it unclear what experiments must be performed next, researchers often obey RBCT's recommendations in preference to their "normal" way of research.
To say researchers are often implicitly committed to taking RBCT seriously is not to say RBCT is the (nonexistent) "real" scientific method, or that it obeying it demarcates "real" science from pseudoscience. But if we take epistemology and scientific inquiry seriously, in all its complexity, we must consider all the epistemic concerns real-life scientists do (or should) take seriously in their work, including RBCT.
Full CV, Publications, Teachings, and Referees
For full English CV go here . My CV is also available in Hebrew. Last update: June 2010.
For a detailed publications, presentation, and teachings list, as well as list of referees, click here. Last update: June 2010.
Selected Education
Ph.D., Columbia University, 2005, Philosophy
B.Sc., Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1995, Mathematics / "Amirim" Program in the Humanities
Selected Employment History
Lecturer, Beit Berl Academic College, Kfar Saba, Israel
Visiting Professor, Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya, Israel
Visiting Professor, University of Haifa, Haifa, Haifa, Israel
Visiting Professor, New Jersey City University, Jersey City, NJ, USA
Instructor, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA
Selected Fellowships & Scholarships
"Vatat" post-doctorate fellowship, University of Haifa
Full scholarship, Columbia University
Selected Publications
My Ph.D. thesis is now available in book form from amazon.
Book review: Ending the Mendel-Fisher Controversy (Franklin et al.), Isis, Vol. 100, No. 1 (March 2009)
What is Wrong with Rational Suicide, Philosophia 2010 (in production) (with L. Amsel)
Epistemology and Risk Management, Risk & Regulation Magazine, No. 13 (summer 2007) (with N. Taleb)
Statistics is not Enough: Revisiting Ronald A. Fisher’s Critique (1936) of Mendel’s Experimental Results (1866), Studies in the History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, Vol. 38, No. 3 (September 2007)
Cosmos and Coincidence: Why Anthropic Cosmological Coincidences are not Evidence of Supernatural Design—A New Criticism of the Fine-Tuning Argument, Skeptic, Vol. 13, No. 3 (2007)
Selected Teaching
Graduate Level
Philosophy of Biology for Ph.D. students in Biology, University of Haifa; fall 2008, 2009
Philosophy of Medicine, seminar in M.A. program in philosophy of science, University of Haifa; summer 2010 (planned)
Senior Level
History of Propaganda, senior seminar, Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya; yearly 2010, yearly 2011 (planned)
Undergraduate Level
History of Communications, Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya; fall 2008, spring 2010, spring 2011 (planned)
Game Theory, Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya; summer 2007, summer 2008, fall 2008, summer 2010 (planned)
Philosophy of Military Intelligence, University of Haifa; fall 2007, fall 2008, spring 2010
Civilizations I, New Jersey City University; fall 2004, fall 2005, spring 2005
Theory and Practice of Science, Columbia University, spring 2001, fall 2002
Formal Logic, Columbia University, Spring 1999
Selected Referees
Prof. Nassim Nicholas Taleb
Dr. Lawrence Amsel
Dr. Meir Hemo
Professional Associations
Canadian Philosophical Association
American Philosophical Association
Israeli Philosophical Association (in Hebrew)
Israeli Society for History & Philosophy of Science
'What is "pragmatic" about pragmatism is the recognition of a common structure to practical deliberation and cognitive inquiry in spite of the diversity of aims and values" -- Prof. Isaac Levi, The Fixation of Belief and Its Undoing, p. 78.
Today most philosophers of science believe that no important insights can be had by looking for such a "common structure to inquiry" (RBCT, as I called it). The collapse of the positivist-empiricist project, rise of the "weak program" and "strong program", and numerous other issues all seem to point in that direction.
I claim RBCT does play an important role, and inquirers (from physicists to economists and psychiatrists) take its epistemic desiderata -- to seek information and avoid error -- seriously. E.g., when some error is discovered in a previous experiment forces to give up some previously-held views, or when a shocking discovery makes it unclear what experiments must be performed next, researchers often obey RBCT's recommendations in preference to their "normal" way of research.
To say researchers are often implicitly committed to taking RBCT seriously is not to say RBCT is the (nonexistent) "real" scientific method, or that it obeying it demarcates "real" science from pseudoscience. But if we take epistemology and scientific inquiry seriously, in all its complexity, we must consider all the epistemic concerns real-life scientists do (or should) take seriously in their work, including RBCT.
Full CV, Publications, Teachings, and Referees
For full English CV go here . My CV is also available in Hebrew. Last update: June 2010.
For a detailed publications, presentation, and teachings list, as well as list of referees, click here. Last update: June 2010.
Selected Education
Ph.D., Columbia University, 2005, Philosophy
B.Sc., Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1995, Mathematics / "Amirim" Program in the Humanities
Selected Employment History
Lecturer, Beit Berl Academic College, Kfar Saba, Israel
Visiting Professor, Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya, Israel
Visiting Professor, University of Haifa, Haifa, Haifa, Israel
Visiting Professor, New Jersey City University, Jersey City, NJ, USA
Instructor, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA
Selected Fellowships & Scholarships
"Vatat" post-doctorate fellowship, University of Haifa
Full scholarship, Columbia University
Selected Publications
My Ph.D. thesis is now available in book form from amazon.
Book review: Ending the Mendel-Fisher Controversy (Franklin et al.), Isis, Vol. 100, No. 1 (March 2009)
What is Wrong with Rational Suicide, Philosophia 2010 (in production) (with L. Amsel)
Epistemology and Risk Management, Risk & Regulation Magazine, No. 13 (summer 2007) (with N. Taleb)
Statistics is not Enough: Revisiting Ronald A. Fisher’s Critique (1936) of Mendel’s Experimental Results (1866), Studies in the History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, Vol. 38, No. 3 (September 2007)
Cosmos and Coincidence: Why Anthropic Cosmological Coincidences are not Evidence of Supernatural Design—A New Criticism of the Fine-Tuning Argument, Skeptic, Vol. 13, No. 3 (2007)
Selected Teaching
Graduate Level
Philosophy of Biology for Ph.D. students in Biology, University of Haifa; fall 2008, 2009
Philosophy of Medicine, seminar in M.A. program in philosophy of science, University of Haifa; summer 2010 (planned)
Senior Level
History of Propaganda, senior seminar, Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya; yearly 2010, yearly 2011 (planned)
Undergraduate Level
History of Communications, Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya; fall 2008, spring 2010, spring 2011 (planned)
Game Theory, Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya; summer 2007, summer 2008, fall 2008, summer 2010 (planned)
Philosophy of Military Intelligence, University of Haifa; fall 2007, fall 2008, spring 2010
Civilizations I, New Jersey City University; fall 2004, fall 2005, spring 2005
Theory and Practice of Science, Columbia University, spring 2001, fall 2002
Formal Logic, Columbia University, Spring 1999
Selected Referees
Prof. Nassim Nicholas Taleb
Dr. Lawrence Amsel
Dr. Meir Hemo
Professional Associations
Canadian Philosophical Association
American Philosophical Association
Israeli Philosophical Association (in Hebrew)
Israeli Society for History & Philosophy of Science
Content copyright . Avital Pilpel. All rights reserved.
This page has been last updated on June 30, 2010.
This page has been last updated on June 30, 2010.
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