Philosophy 2014 Teachers' Conference

Professor Angie Hobbs is Professor of the Public Understanding of Philosophy at the University of Sheffield. She created the UK's first Senior Fellow in the Public Understanding of Philosophy in 2009 and is the Honorary Patron of The Philosophy Foundation.

Professor Robert Stern discusses how in the Philosophy of Religion module, the A level syllabus presents the Euthyphro dilemma as arising out of difficulties of understanding compatibility of God’s characteristics: omniscient, omnipotent and supremely good ‘Issues with claiming that God has these attributes, either singly or in combination, including: - the paradox of the stone - the Euthyphro dilemma’ In latter case, the problem is how to combine God’s omnipotence with his supreme goodness. The Euthyphro dilemma is one of the standard problems for theistic ethics, and often used as a knock-down argument against any ethics that appeals to God But is it as big a problem as it appears? It is recommended that you download the accompanying PDF (found separately in this collection) in order to reference whilst watching this video. Robert Stern came to Sheffield in 1989, having been a graduate and Research Fellow at St John's College, Cambridge. He has been a Professor since 2000, and was Head of Department from 2004 to 2008.

Slippery slope reasoning is typically taken as a fallacy. But what goes wrong? Is it always bad reasoning? How should we respond to a slippery slope argument and/or guard against it leading us astray? This talk focuses on semantic slippery slopes & examples of the Sorites Paradox. It is recommended that you download the accompanying PDF (found separately in this collection) in order to reference whilst watching this video. Rosanna came to Sheffield in October 1999 after three years as a Research Fellow at Jesus College, Cambridge. Her Theories of Vagueness, was published by Cambridge University Press in 2000. This book investigates the vagueness of natural language, asking such questions as what the logic and semantics of vague language are, and with what methodology we should construct and assess theories of vagueness. She defends a supervaluationist theory of vagueness.

Professor Jenny Saul is Head of Department. Her primary interests are in Philosophy of Language and in Feminism. This talk discusses the phenomena of Implicit biases and stereotype threat, in particular how they affect teaching and some interesting philosophical issues arising from them. It is recommended that you download the accompanying PDF (found separately in this collection) in order to reference whilst watching this video. Implicit Biases: those that we will be concerned with here are unconscious biases that affect the way we perceive, evaluate, or interact with people from groups that are stigmatised in our society. Stereotype Threat: people’s awareness of their group membership may (often unconsciously) have a negative impact on their performance.

Accompanying presentation for Robert's presentation at the conference

Accompanying presentation for Rosanna's presentation at the conference

Accompanying presentation for Jenny Saul's presentation at the conference.