The FraMEPhys project at the University of Birmingham and the Metaphysical Explanation project at the University of Gothenburg hosted a two-day conference on Metaphysical Explanation in Science on 10-11 January 2019 at the Ikon Gallery, Birmingham.

Podcasts of selected talks are coming soon!

Thursday 10 January 2019

• 09:10 – Coffee and pastries
• 09:30 – Elanor Taylor (Johns Hopkins), “Backing without Realism”. Comments: Naomi Thompson (Southampton/Gothenburg)
• 10:45 – Coffee
• 11:00 – Juha Saatsi (Leeds), “Which explanations in science are “metaphysical” (and why)?”. Comments: Robin Stenwall (Lund)
• 12:15 – Lunch
• 13:30 – Silvia Bianchi (Pavia), “Metaphysical Grounding as a Non-foundationalist Explanation of Quantum Entanglement: on the Plausibility of Weak Structuralism and Thin Objects”. Comments: Joaquim Giannotti (Glasgow)
• 14:45 – Break
• 14:55 – Roberto Fumagalli (King’s College London), “How Thin Rational Choice Theory Explains Choices”. Comments: Adam Bales (Cambridge)
• 16:10 – Tea
• 16:30 – Michael Strevens (NYU), “Necessity in Scientific Explanation”
• 17:45 – Finish
• 18:45 – Dinner

Friday 11 January 2019

• 09:10 – Coffee and pastries
• 09:30 – Stephan Leuenberger (Glasgow), “Merely partial metaphysical explanation”. Comments: Anna-Sofia Maurin (Gothenburg)
• 10:45 – Coffee
• 11:00 – Amanda Bryant (Trent), “Toward a Scientifically Responsible Metaphysics of Ground”. Comments: Ashton Green (Notre Dame)
• 12:15 – Lunch
• 13:30 – David Kovacs (Tel Aviv), “The Problem of Meta-Causation”. Comments: Andrew Brenner (Gothenburg)
• 14:45 – Break
• 14:55 – Atoosa Kasirzadeh (Toronto), “Can Mathematics Really Make a Difference?” Comments: Samuel Kimpton-Nye (King’s College London)
• 16:10 – Tea
• 16:30 – Samuel Baron (Western Australia), “Counterfactual Scheming”. Comments: Martin Glazier (Hamburg).
• 17:45 – Finish