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The Armchair on Trial
A Graduate Conference on Philosophical Methodology
Topic
This year’s graduate conference is devoted to debates around philosophical methodology. It is centered around the question of whether philosophy is best done from the philosophical armchair or whether it can and should be done using empirical methods. The conference is focused on the extent to which the emergence of naturalistic approaches and of experimental philosophy (“X-Phi”) pose a problem to ‘traditional’ armchair methods (e.g. consulting intuitions, conceptual analysis, reflective equilibrium, conceptual engineering). We are interested both in work that focuses on individual methods or on the relations between them (e.g. their compatibility).
We aim to bring together early career and advanced researchers in order to discuss questions such as:
- Are professional philosophers epistemically better positioned for answering philosophical questions than lay people
- What is the role of intuition in philosophy?
- What is the role of a priori knowledge in philosophy?
- What is the role of X-Phi in philosophy?
- What is the role of conceptual analysis in philosophy?
- What is the role of conceptual engineering in philosophy?
- What is the role of linguistic and conceptual competence in philosophy?
- What is the role of formal methods in philosophy?
- Is philosophy importantly distinct from other sciences?
- What should responses to the challenges raised by X-Phi be?
- Are armchair philosophy and X-Phi reconcilable?
Dates
July 9-11, 2026
Keynotes
Hilary Kornblith (University of Massachusetts at Amherst)
Jennifer Nagel (University of Toronto)
Christian Nimtz (University of Bielefeld)
Venue
TBA
The conference will be held in a hybrid format at the University of Vienna. Anyone who wants is welcome to join in person. Details TBA.
Funding
TBA.