Philosophical Inquiry in a Rapidly Changing World
International Conference | Citizen Philosophy | November 15-18, 2018 | University of Graz, Austria
The aim of the conference is to reflect on and analyze today’s increasingly complex realities. The global world poses a great challenge to philosophy to rethink the interrelations between science and technology on the one hand and social and democratic principles on the other.
Two central dimensions form the focus of the conference: First, the recognition of changes in, and potentiality of, life-determining limits (human and environmental) in relation to science and technology. Is a new scientific culture emerging? What new and innovative approaches have emerged in recent years using an interdisciplinary approach (utilizing multi-perspectivity, inter-, multi- and trans-disciplinarity)?
The second dimension of the conference covers the rapid changes of social processes in pluralistic democracies. Numerous questions need to be clarified: How do we deal with heterogeneity? What opportunities and challenges arise from migration movements? What opportunities to civic society are offered by demographic change and what problems are we confronted with? How might we now understand relationships between the individual and the collective? Do democratic principles ensure human rights for all?
The conference will focus on these two dimensions and the possible relationships between them. Can the attempt to bring these two dimensions closer together substantially increase the possibility for scientific-technological and social freedoms? What role can philosophy play in supporting society through these processes of change? Over the last twenty years philosophy has increasingly gone public; into schools, educational institutions, museums, cafes and public spaces. Is the role of “Philosophy for Children and Youth” changing in light of this emerging complexity? Addressing all these dimensions requires philosophical sensitivity, theoretical and practical.
An important aim of this conference is to initiate an exchange of different approaches that will extend our knowledge base, both in explicating philosophical and educational concepts and inform initiatives in education policy.
Some of the topics that fall under the mandate of this conference include:
– The relationship between democracy and human rights
– Freedom and self-determination
– Justice in a globalized world
– The meaning of inter-, multi- and trans-disciplinarity
– The role of community of inquiry
– The impact of digitalization on Philosophy and Philosophizing
– Universal Responsibility and the Environment
– Rethinking Philosophy in response to scientific-technical progress
– Relationships between communication and life forms
– Changes in philosophical perspectives and educational processes.