Wittgenstein Lectures
The Wittgenstein Lectures were inaugurated 1987 and are funded from the central University budget. It was one of the first steps towards internationalization of teaching at the University. Traditionally we invite a renowned philosopher to hold a week of lectures and colloquia on themes central to our Philosophy & Economics programme.
All philosophy teaching stops for a week and the first lecture is usually followed by a reception. At the end of the series there is a short exam. Students of the new PO get 2 ECTS for module V1. Students of the old PO get 2 ECTS for module area V, but are only allowed to credit no more than two Wittgenstein Lectures. Sometimes we offer advanced seminar courses on the work of the Wittgenstein Lecturer.
The Wittgenstein Lectures are open to the public and all members of the University.
Summer Winter Semester 2020:
Network Epistemology: What Economics and Philosophy Tell Us About Learning in Groups
NOTE: Postponed to Winter Semester 2020/21 due to the covid-19 situation. New Dates:
November 30th-December 4th, 2020.
Prof. Dr. Kevin Zollman
Carnegie Mellon University
Abstract: Groups communicate in many different ways, and how they communicate influences how groups learn and perform. Many tragedies of group rationality are not the result of any individual failing, but rather a failure to communicate in appropriate ways. These lectures will look at how groups might communicate, how they do better and worse, and how incentives to communicate might influence them. We will explore three broad themes: (1) When might it be good for groups to communicate less rather than more? (2) When is there a conflict between what makes individuals smarter and what makes the group smarter? And (3) When might rational groups be made up of irrational individuals? To understand these issues we will use mathematical tools from both economics and philosophy, and it will discuss how our conclusions might influence economics, philosophy, and public policy. (The lectures will not presume any prior knowledge of these fields; they will be self-contained.)
2019
Blaming and Forgiving - The Work of Morality
Prof. Dr. Miranda Fricker
City University of New York Graduate Center
2018
Climate Change and Obligations for Future Generations
Prof. Dr. Joseph Heath
University of Toronto
2017
Markets and Morality
Prof. Dr. Debra Satz
Marta Sutton Weeks Professor of Ethics in Society (Stanford University)
2016
Preference, Prediction and Policy
Prof. Daniel M. Hausman
Herbert A. Simon and Hilldale Professor University of Wisconsin-Madison
2015
Left Libertarianism: Promise and Problems
Prof. Peter Vallentyne
Kline Chair in Philosophy University of Missouri-Columbia
2014
The Ethics and Economics of Climate Change
Prof. John Broome
Emeritus White’s Professor of Moral Philosophy, University of Oxford
2013
The Revolution in Just War Theory
Prof. Jeff McMahan
White’s Professor of Moral Philosophy, University of Oxford
2012
The Robust Demands of the Good
Prof. Philip Pettit
Laurance S. Rockefeller University Professor of Politics
and Human Values at Princeton University
2011
Ethics and Public Policy
Prof. Jonathan Wolff
Professor of Political Philosophy, University College London
2010
Values, Norms, Decisions
Prof. Wlodek Rabinowicz
Professor (emeritus) of Philosophy, Lund University
2009
Collective Actions and the Commons: What Have We Learned?
Prof. Elinor Ostrom
Professor (emeritus) of Political Science, Indiana University
(Nobel Prize in Economics, 2009; †2012)
2008
Philosophy Amid the Darkness of These Times
Prof. Jonathan Glover
Professor of Philosophy, King's College, University of London
2007
From Rankings to Reasons
Prof. Michael Smith
McCosh Professor of Philosophy, Princeton University
2006
The Theory of (Un)Bounded Rationality: Games, Experiments and Evolution
Prof. Werner Güth
Max Planck Institute of Economics, Jena
2005
Evolution, Learning and the Social Contract
Prof. Brian Skyrms
Distinguished Professor of Logic and Philosophy of Science and Economics at the University of California, Irvine
2004
Knowledge and Representation
Prof. Keith Lehrer
Arizona
2003
David Hume as a Contemporary Political Theorist
Prof. Russell Hardin
Stanford