Bolsas de Investigação para Doutoramento (BID), no Centro de Filosofia da Universidade de Lisboa, da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa, ao abrigo do Regulamento de Bolsas de Investigação da FCT (RBI) e do Estatuto do Bolseiro de Investigação (EBI). As bolsas serão financiadas pela Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT), ao abrigo do Protocolo de Colaboração para Financiamento do Plano Plurianual de Bolsas de Investigação para Estudantes de Doutoramento, celebrado entre a FCT e a Unidade de I&D Centro de Filosofia da Universidade de Lisboa (CFUL), UIDP/00310/2020.

Referência: CFUL_01_2022_BID_Programatico_Janeiro

• ACTA N.º 1
• AVISO DE ABERTURA
• EURAXESS NOTICE (Offer ID: 726307)

Prazo de candidaturas: 07/01/2025 a 21/01/2025

The LanCog Research Group, University of Lisbon, welcomes expressions of interest from suitably qualified candidates interested in applying for fix-term (up to 6 years) research positions funded by the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT) in the following conditions:

The FCT is the Portuguese national funding agency for academic research and development. In 2022, the FCT will fund the hiring of 400 researchers, holders of PhDs at various stages of career, to carry out their activity in research centres throughout Portugal. The selected researchers are hired by the host institution through a framework-contract between the host and the FCT, which guarantees the funding. In the previous edition, 21 positions have gone for philosophers, and LanCog has a very strong record of supporting successful candidates.

The FCT will accept applications between 3 February and 3 March 2025 (17:00 Lisbon time). Candidates will apply online directly to the FCT, but their application must be supported by a host institution.

The application, written in English, must include the following:

- A research plan, including a description of the main activities to be undertaken, the expected results, as well as an indication of how the research project fits with (at least one of) the goals set out in the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development;

- A brief description of previous academic and scientific experience, highlighting the main activities and results obtained in the last 5 years;

- Curriculum vitae;

- Motivation letter, identifying up to two main contributions of the candidate in the last 5 years and the expected main contributions for the next years;

- A brief description of the conditions provided by the host institution and of how the proposed research plan fits into the overall strategy of the research centre.

Applications will be assessed by an international panel, according to the following criteria:

- The candidate’s scientific experience, with emphasis on the last 5 years (60%);

- The proposed research plan (40%).

Each applicant can submit only one application for one of the following types of positions:

Junior researcher: PhD holders with up to 5 years of post-doctoral experience in the scientific area of application – 2.134,73€ gross wage (c. 1.400-1.500€ net wage for 14 months/year, depending on several specific factors related to the family composition and income);

Assistant researcher: PhD holders with more than 5 and up to 12 years of post-doctoral research, with relevant experience in the scientific area of application and limited scientific independence* – 3.201,39€ gross wage (c. 1.800-1.950€ net wage 14 months/year, depending on several specific factors related to the family composition and income);

Principal researcher: PhD holders with more than 12 years of post-doctoral research, with relevant experience in the scientific area of application and demonstrating scientific independence* for the last 3 years – 3.611,83€ gross wage (c. 2.100-2300€ net wage 14 months/year, depending on several specific factors related to the family composition and income);

Coordinating researcher: PhD holders with more than 12 years of post-doctoral research, holders of an academic title of ‘Agregado’ (or ‘Habilitation’) awarded in Portugal, with relevant experience and demonstrating scientific independence and recognized leadership in the scientific area of application – 4.678,96€ gross wage (c. 2.350-2500€ net wage 14 months/year, depending on several specific factors related to the family composition and income).

*Research independence is demonstrated through scientific competence, originality and international recognition, by experience in doctoral or post-doctoral supervision, or by the competitive research funds attracted at national or international level.

It is the applicant’s responsibility to choose the contract level best suited to their career stage.

It is mandatory to upload the doctoral diploma. In order to comply with the Portuguese legislation concerning the recognition of foreign qualifications, all the doctoral degrees granted by foreign higher education institutions should be duly recognized**. Applicants are advised to visit the website of the Direção-Geral do Ensino Superior (DGES) for further information:https://www.dges.gov.pt/en/pagina/degree-and-diploma-recognition. If possible, the recognition certificate (or proof that one has been requested) should be uploaded together with the diploma. Applications will be considered even if the recognition certificate is not available. However, the recognition must be obtained before signing the contract.

** Cf. Decree-Law No. 66/2018, of 16 August; Portaria No. 33/2019, of 25 January; Portaria No. 43/2020, of 14 February.

More information about the call, including a link to the application portal, is available here.

Interested candidates are invited to contact Dr. Domingos Faria (at [email protected]), with a brief description of their intended research and current CV no later than 2 February.

The Centre of Philosophy of the University of Lisbon (CFUL) has launched a call for applications to 2 PhD fellowships (up to 4 years) at the School of Arts and Humanities of the University of Lisbon.

CFUL is interested in hosting high-quality doctoral students in a wide range of areas in History of Philosophy, Analytic Philosophy and Practical Philosophy.

Please email to [email protected]

Application deadline: January 21st, 23:00 Lisbon Time.

More information:

For more information about CFUL, the PhD program in Philosophy at the U of Lisbon and this call, please visit https://www.lancog.com/ or write to [email protected]

Unconscious Mental Imagery Requires Unconscious Mental Qualities
Sam Coleman (University of Hertfordshire)

17 December 2021, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – GMT) | Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract: It is widely agreed that conscious mental imagery features phenomenology, or conscious mental qualities, as I will say. Moreover, conscious imagery is accorded an important role in various sorts of action guidance. Unconscious mental imagery is also widely posited, and is held to share an important neurophysiological basis with conscious imagery (especially in the visual case I focus on). And unconscious imagery is accorded a very similar role in action guidance. But it is almost universally denied that unconscious imagery features mental qualities. I argue that unless we ascribe unconscious mental qualities to unconscious imagery, the behavioural contribution of conscious mental imagery is threatened, indeed, that conscious imagery is rendered epiphenomenal.

The room has a limited number of seats. Pre-registration is required at <[email protected]> until a day before the event. Note that this is an in-person event and everyone should wear a mask.

Tamara Caraus

Praxis-CFUL, University of Lisbon

Husserl, Foucault, and the ‘functionaries of humanity’

7 December 2021, 17h00 (Lisbon Time — GMT+0)

Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia)* | School of Arts and Humanities – University of Lisbon

Abstract

In The Crisis of European Science and Transcendental Phenomenology, Husserl declares philosophers the ‘functionaries of the mankind’, asking ‘How can we avoid it?.’ In The Courage of the Truth, Foucault declares the Ancient Cynic ‘a functionary of humanity in general’. This paper examines how and why these two different philosophers make similar declarations despite the general mistrust in functionary. The similarities between Husserl’s and Foucault’s arguments point to a double resistance which is part of the process of becoming a ‘functionary of humanity’: resistance against the very stance of a functionary, with its hierarchy and constitutive vicariousness, and resistance against the current meanings of humanity. This resistance makes possible a ‘life in truth’ and opens the potential imprisoned in the current understandings of humanity. Thus, Husserl’s and Foucault’s use of expression ‘functionary of humanity’ allows mapping a ‘function’ that could justify the invocation of this peculiar functionary: to keep humanity open, which enters into a challenging dialogue with the recent accounts on post-humanism.

* The event will also be available via Zoom for those unable to attend in person. Pre-registration required at: praxis.cful [at] gmail.com until a day before the event. Those registered will receive the Zoom link by e-mail the same day of the Seminar.

‘Actually, Scratch That’: A Tour into the Illocutionary Fabric of Retraction
Laura Caponetto (Vita-Salute San Raffaele University, Milan)

03 December 2021, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – GMT) | Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract: Just as we can do things with words, so too we can use words to take back what we did in speaking. Political history is filled with such ‘u-turns’. Consider, for example, Nigel Farage’s ‘unresignation’ in May 2015, or Al Gore’s decision to ‘unconcede’ to George W. Bush in 2000. Retraction maneuvers are common currency and play a significant role in our discursive practices, as well as in our social and political lives. Still, very little attention has been paid among speech act theorists to how retraction works. By expanding upon previous work (Caponetto 2020) and engaging with recent contributions to the topic (e.g. Kukla & Steinberg 2021), I set out to unpack the illocutionary fabric of retraction – i.e. the illocutionary category it belongs to, its felicity conditions, the normative changes it effects. I construe retraction as a higher-order speech act whose definitional function is to cancel the deontic update enacted by some previous, lower-order speech act. After identifying its general (definitional) felicity conditions, I pause on the special felicity conditions for retracting specific illocutionary types. I conclude by saying something on “I-never-said-that!” kind of moves and how they differ from retractions.

The room has a limited number of seats. Pre-registration is required at <[email protected]> until a day before the event. Note that this is an in-person event and everyone should wear a mask.

Falko Schmieder

Leibniz Center for Literary and Cultural Research – Berlin

Questions and Theses on the Historicity and Actuality of Ideology Critique

30 November 2021, 17h00 (Lisbon Time — GMT+0)

Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia)* | School of Arts and Humanities – University of Lisbon

Abstract

The concept of ideology, and with it the approach of ideology critique, seem to be out of date; other guiding concepts such as discourse, narrative, or hegemony have relegated them to sideshows. At the same time, basic assumptions such as the end of history or the post-ideological age, both powerful factors in the depotency and delegitimization of ideology critique, have lost their plausibility today and have themselves become recognizable as ideologems. New forms of authoritarian populism and religious fundamentalism, as well as the intensification of the contradictions of neoliberalized capitalist society, therefore in recent times have led to new attempts to reappropriate and refound the critique of ideology. The lecture pleads for not limiting oneself to systematic reconstructions of a supposed core of ideology critique or the presentation of different types of ideology (critique). Rather, the reappropriation of ideology critique must also address the reasons for its historical decline, as well as the new phenomena that lead to tensions with classical approaches to ideology critique and by which the historicity of the object of ideology critique can be grasped. In a second step, reflections, theses and questions on the concept of ideology under the conditions of ‘reflexive’ modernity will be presented. They refer both to new manifestations and to theories related to them, such as that of the formation of cynicism as a form of enlightened false consciousness or that of the ironic self and the commodification of irony. The lecture demonstrates the indispensability of ideology critique for a critical theory and at the same time points to the necessity of reflecting on the limits of ideology-critical enlightenment.

* The event will also be available via Zoom for those unable to attend in person. Pre-registration required at: praxis.cful [at] gmail.com until a day before the event. Those registered will receive the Zoom link by e-mail the same day of the Seminar.

Awareness of Universals
Alex Grzankowski (Birkbeck, University of London)

26 November 2021, 16:00 (Lisbon Time – GMT) | Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia)

Abstract: A number of intentionalists (many of whom are also physicalists) about consciousness hold that when one hallucinates, one is aware of an uninstantiated universal. According to some commentators, this is an odd view, if not an absurd one. In this talk, I’ll spell out how intentionalists ought to think about this claim and explain the ways in which it is in keeping with a story about other intentional states (such as propositional desire) that relate their subjects to abstracta. A kind of confusion, I speculate, has been driven by failing to attend to a familiar ambiguity found in intensional transitive verb constructions.

The room has a limited number of seats. Pre-registration is required at <[email protected]> until a day before the event. Note that this is an in-person event and everyone should wear a mask.

Christine Reeh-Peters

Konrad Wolf Film University of Babelsberg

Film and the Critique on Philosophical Anthropocentrism

23 November 2021, 17h00 (Lisbon Time — GMT+0)

Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia)* | School of Arts and Humanities – University of Lisbon

Abstract

The lecture is based on the onto-epistemological hypothesis of regarding film as a form of artificial intelligence, core of my current research project. Such a hypothesis draws upon the philosophy of art of Gilles Deleuze, who famously evinces in his books on cinema that “the essence of cinema” would have “thought as its higher purpose”. However, understanding film as the thinking ability of a technical apparatus was first formulated by pioneer filmmaker and thinker Jean Epstein at a time when the cinematograph was both a recording and a projection machine and thus plausibly compared to a “robot brain”. By this token, I am focusing on questions that have been present since the very origins of film-philosophy, and shed new light on them through the speculative-materialist turn in contemporary philosophy and its critique on philosophical anthropocentrism. I will particularly enquire into the nature of the posthuman, the non-human, and the concomitant questioning of human supremacy referring to philosophers like Karen Barad or Rosi Braidotti. Surprisingly enough, the theories of Epstein not only confirm these recent nondualist principles of thought but also show how they can be extended through an idea of film thinking beyond the human frame.

* The event will also be available via Zoom for those unable to attend in person. Pre-registration required at: praxis.cful [at] gmail.com until a day before the event. Those registered will receive the Zoom link by e-mail the same day of the Seminar.