Dr. Susanne Mantel

 

susanne.mantel(at)uni-saarland.de  
Geb. A2 3, Room 0.06,
Tel. +49 (0)681 302-4224

Contact person (Vertrauensperson) for studets and staff:
Feel free to contact me confidentially in case of sexual harrassment, discrimination or other forms of trouble with people or atmosphere at the philosophical institute. I will try to help resolve conflicts.

Member of the Scientists for Future Saarland  

 Biography 

 

  • 2001-2007: studies at the Eberhard-Karls Universität Tübingen, Germany
  • 2007: Magister Artium in Philosophy (major subject), German Literature (minor subject) and Psychology (minor subject)
  • 2008: teacher's degree (Staatsexamensabschluss) in German Language and Philosophy/Ethics
  • 2008: start of the dissertation project about acting for a normative reason at the Universität Tübingen, supervised until 2010 by Prof. Dr. Sabine A. Döring
  • 2010-2014: continuation of the dissertation project about acting for a normative reason at the Universität des Saarlandes at the Lehrstuhl für Praktische Philosophie, Prof. Ulla Wessels und Prof. Christoph Fehige
  • 2010: studies as "Visiting Scholar" at the UC Berkeley, USA, with Prof. Niko Kolodny and Prof. Jay Wallace
  • 2011-2012: assistant with the Lehrstuhl für Philosophie des Geistes und Kulturphilosophie (Prof. Heinz-Dieter Heckmann) 
  • July 2014: defense of the dissertation "Acting for a normative reason: A competence account
  • Currently assistant with the Lehrstuhl für Praktische Philosophie (Prof. Ulla Wessels and Prof. Christoph Fehige)
  • Organizer of the interdisciplinary ZiF Cooperation Group "Normative Challenges of the European Asylum System" , May 2021-October 2023, together with Svenja Ahlhaus, Matthias Hoesch, and Petra Sussner
  • Substitute professor at the university of Gießen October 2021 to October 2022

 

Interests 

I am mainly interested in action theory, rationality, normativity, and political philosophy. Currently I am working on questions about (a) migration ethics, (b) normative practical reasons, and (c) the (alleged) normativity of epistemic reasons.

 

Scholarships and awards

  • "Lauener Prize for Up and Coming Philosophers", awarded in September 2016 by the Lauener Foundation for Analytical Philosophy in Bern
  • "Wolfgang-Stegmüller-Preis", awarded in September 2015 by the German Society for Analytic Philosophy (GAP) for the dissertation "Acting for a Normative Reason: A Competence Account"
  • "Dr. Eduard Martin-Preis" awarded in October 2015 by the Philosophical Faculty I of Saarland University for the dissertation "Acting for a Normative Reason: A Competence Account"
  • Dissertation scholarship "Dissertationsstipendium nach dem Landesgraduiertenförderungsgesetz" by the Landesstiftung Baden-Württemberg 2008-2010
  • Student scholarship by the Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes 2002-2007

 

Books

  • Determined by Reasons: A Competence Account of Acting for a Normative Reason, Routledge, 2018


    This book offers a new account of what it is to act for a normative reason, namely a dispositional account which allows for more and less reflective ways of acting for normative reasons. It refutes the widely held 'identity view' that acting for a normative reason requires the normative reason to be identical with a motivating reasons and it proposes a new understanding of how normative reasons explain those actions that are performed for them. Determined by Reasons engages with current debates from a wide range of different philosophical areas, including action theory, metaethics, moral psychology, epistemology, and ontology.
    Reviews of "Determined by Reasons":
    - J.J. Cunningham (forthcoming in Philosophical Quarterly).
    - Clayton Littlejohn (forthcoming in Mind).
    - Claire Field 2019, Ethics 129 (3), 484-489.
    - Rüdiger Bittner 2018, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews.
    - Maike Albertzart 2018, Zeitschrift für philosophische Forschung 72 (3), 416-420.
    - Benjamin Kiesewetter 2018, Zeitschrift für philosophische Forschung 72 (3), 421-428.

 

Articles

  • From responsibility to reason-giving explainable artificial intelligence (with Kevin Baum, Eva Schmidt and Timo Speith) forthcoming in Philosophy & Technology.
  • Stability, protection, and refugees: Does refugee protection require admission? fIn: Migration, Stability and Solidarity, Corinna Mieth und Wolfram Cremer (ed.), Nomos (2021), 85–108.
  • On how to explain rational motivation: Where internalism and externalism meet. In: Reason, Justification, and Contractualism. Themes from Scanlon, Markus Stepanians and Michael Frauchiger (ed.), De Gruyter (2021), 59-81.
  • Do epistemic reasons bear on the ought simpliciter?, Philosophical Issues 29 (1), 2019, 214-227. 

    Are epistemic reasons normative in the same sense as, for instance, moral reasons? In this paper I examine and defend the claim that epistemic reasons are normative only relative to an epistemic standard. Unlike moral reasons they are not substantially normative, because they fail to make an independent contribution to obligations or permissions simpliciter. After presenting what I take to be the main argument for this view, I illustrate that the argument has often been defended by examples which controversially presuppose strong epistemic obligations or pragmatic reasons for belief. Opponents of the argument often deny the existence of obligations and reasons of these kinds. I therefore examine whether the argument can withstand that line of critique by employing new examples
  • Not duties, but needs: Rethinking refugeehood, Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy 15(2), 2019, 91-120.

    There is a lively debate about how to define refugeehood, for instance about the question whether an individual fleeing hunger is a refugee. This paper argues against the two most prominent characterizations of refugeehood. Both characterize the refugee by reference to a duty - either to the duty to admit (e.g., Lister) or to the less concrete duty to protect (e.g., Shacknove). However, both are inadequate from the perspective of commonsense as well as for moral and political purposes, I argue, since both imply that, when two individuals are fleeing threats of the same kind, only one of them may be a refugee. This result is due to the fact that duties partly depend on the capacities and decisions of duty bearers, as well as on the needs of third parties. Much more plausibly, a refugee is defined simply as a person whose basic needs and rights are threatened and who migrates with the aim to find protection. Although this definition coheres with commonsense, it has so far been neglected in the philosophical and political debate.
  • Because there is a reason to do it: How normative reasons explain actions, Analytic Philosophy 59 (2), 2018, 208-233.

    When an agent acts for a certain normative reason, this reason is relevant to what that person does and plays a vital role in explaining why the person performs the action. This, at least, is what intuition and ordinary language suggest, and has been defended, e.g., by Williams and Dancy. However, this view is hard to vindicate from a systematic perspective. Normative reasons for actions are usually facts about the world, not about the agent's mind. Although people often explain actions colloquially by reference to facts about the world, it is contested how best to analyze such explanations. The three main accounts of world explanations, namely, the reductive, the causal, and the non-factive account, all fail to accommodate the explanatory role of normative reasons. Therefore, the present essay aims to provide a new and dispositional account of how normative reasons explain those actions that are performed for them, which is inspired by explanations in virtue epistemology.
  • Dispositionen: Segen oder Fluch für die kausale Theorie der epistemischen Stützungsbeziehung? Zeitschrift für philosophische Forschung 71 (I), 2017, 37-49.

    Wir stützen viele unserer Überzeugungen auf andere mentale Zustände. Doch worin besteht eine Stützungsbeziehung (engl. basing relation)?
    Kausale Theorien nennen folgende kausale Bedingung dafür, dass die Überzeugung Ü auf den mentalen Zustand M gestützt ist.
         (KB) M hat Ü verursacht oder M verursacht, dass Ü aufrechterhalten wird.
    Das Problem abweichender Kausalketten zeigt jedoch, dass KB nicht hinreichend für die Stützungsbeziehung ist. In letzter Zeit wurde mehrfach vorgeschlagen, dass das Problem durch eine dispositionale Zusatzbedingung gelöst werden könne, die zusammen mit KB hinreichende Bedingungen angibt. Sie lautet grob folgendermaßen:
         (DB) Ü ist die Manifestation einer mentalen Disposition des Subjekts, auf M-artige Zustände hin Ü-artige Zustände auszubilden oder aufrechtzuerhalten.
    Ich werde untersuchen, ob die kausale Theorie durch DB gestärkt werden kann, oder ob sie von ihr vielmehr geschwächt wird.
    Zwar schließt DB abweichende Kausalketten erfolgreich aus, doch lässt sich unter Bezugnahme auf DB letztlich KB in Zweifel ziehen und für eine rein dispositionale Theorie argumentieren, die auf KB verzichtet. Daher stellt der Versuch, die kausale Theorie durch eine dispositionale Zusatzbedingung zu retten, unbeabsichtigter Weise den kausalen Ansatz als solchen in Frage. Daraus folgt, dass eine rein dispositionale Theorie vorzuziehen ist.
  • Three cheers for dispositions: A dispositional approach to acting for a normative reason, Erkenntnis 82 (3), 2016, DOI: 10.1007/s10670-016-9832-8 .

    Agents sometimes act for normative reasons - for reasons that objectively favor their actions. Jill, for instance, calls a doctor for the normative reason that Kate is injured. In this article I explore a dispositional approach to acting for a normative reason. I argue for the need of epistemic, motivational, and executional dispositional elements of a theory of acting for a normative reason. Dispositions play a mediating role between, on the one hand, the normative reason and its normative force, and the action on the other hand. Thereby, they help to deal with problem cases such as cases of deviant causal chains and improper instrumental motivation. 
  • How to be psychologistic about motivating but not about normative reasons, Grazer Philosophische Studien: Internationale Zeitschrift für Analytische Philosophie 93, 2016, 80-105, DOI: 10.1163/18756735-09301005.

    Because normative reasons are non-psychological, and motivate us when we act for them, some have concluded that motivating reasons have to be non-psychological, too. This thought has served as part of an argument against the Causal-Psychological Account of Action, because the account states that motivating reasons are psychological. Recently, many authors recognized that there are two different notions of motivating reasons which are commonly being confused in this dispute. This paper's aim is to point out more carefully the argument against the Causal-Psychological Account and the dilemma faced by that argument. This will hopefully show that and why motivating reasons - in the sense in which they figure in the Causal-Psychological Account - can be psychological even if agents act for non-psychological normative reasons.
  • Worldly reasons: An ontological inquiry into motivating considerations and normative reasons, Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 98 (S1), 2015, DOI: 10.1111/papq.12094.

    In this paper I advocate a worldly account of normative reasons according to which there is an ontological gap between these and the premises of practical thought, i.e., motivating considerations. While motivating considerations are individuated fine-grainedly, normative reasons should be classified as coarse-grained entities, e.g., as states of affairs, in order to explain certain necessary truths about them and to make sense of how we count and weigh them. As I briefly sketch, acting for normative reasons is possible nonetheless if the connection between normative reasons and motivating considerations is a competence-based correspondence.
  • No reason for identity: on the relation between motivating and normative reasons, Philosophical Explorations 17 (1), 2014, DOI:10.1080/13869795.2013.815261.

    This essay is concerned with the relation between motivating and normative reasons. According to a common and influential thesis, a normative reason is identical with a motivating reason when an agent acts for that normative reason. I will call this thesis the 'Identity Thesis'. Many philosophers treat the Identity Thesis as a commonplace or a truism. Accordingly, the Identity Thesis has been used to rule out certain ontological views about reasons. I distinguish a deliberative and an explanatory version of the Identity Thesis and argue that there are no convincing arguments to accept either version. Furthermore, I point out an alternative to the Identity Thesis. The relation between motivating and normative reasons can be thought of as one of representation, not identity.
  • Acting for reasons, apt action, and knowledge, Synthese 190 (17), 2013, DOI: 10.1007/s11229-012-0230-8.

    I argue for the view that there are important similarities between knowledge and acting for a normative reason. I interpret acting for a normative reason in terms of Sosa's notion of an apt performance. Actions that are done for a normative reason are normatively apt actions. They are in accordance with a normative reason because of a competence to act in accordance with normative reasons. I argue that, if Sosa's account of knowledge as apt belief is correct, this means that acting for a normative reason is in many respects similar to knowledge. In order to strengthen Sosa's account of knowledge, I propose to supplement it with an appeal to sub-competences. This clarifies how this account can deal with certain Gettier cases, and it helps to understand how exactly acting for a normative reason is similar to apt belief.
  • Handeln aus normativen Gründen - ein praktisches Pendant zu Wissen. http://epub.ub.uni-muenchen.de/12541/.

    In this short article I discuss why it is important to understand the phenomenon of acting for a normative reason and whether it could be helpful to compare it to theoretical phenomena such as knowledge. One question is whether there might be cases of acting only in accordance with a normative reason which are of a similar structure as Gettier cases.
  • Warum nach Wahrheit suchen? Grazer Philosophische Studien: Internationale Zeitschrift für Analytische Philosophie, 78, 2009. 292-301.
    (This essay was rewarded with the third prize of the essay competition of the Gesellschaft für Analytische Philosophie "GAP".)

    The article explores two attempts to establish the value of true beliefs and the disvalue of false beliefs. It shows how an argument form the constitutive aim of beliefs fails both to establish the conditional and unconditional value (the value of existing beliefs being true versus of acquiring new true beliefs). The second attempt establishes both sorts of value for some beliefs, and it acknowledges that this value comes in degrees and is relative to persons, but this value is practical value, and it exists only for persons possessing desires as well as freedom of action.
  • Motivierende Gründe und praktische Überlegung, Zeitschrift für philosophische Forschung 63 (2), 2009. 260-284.

    The essay explores arguments against the view that motivating reasons are psychological entities (Psychologism). The two main arguments concern the content of an agent's practical deliberation and actions which are performed for a normative reason. They presuppose a very close connection between motivating reasons and what, from the agent's perspective, appears to be a normative reason. Psychologism can be defended by rejecting this connection if the primary function of motivating reasons is to explain actions. The explanation of actions in terms of what, from the agent's perspective, appears to be a normative reason is far more problematic than the explanation of actions in terms of psychological entities.

 

Papers in anthologies, reviews, etc.

  • Gründe und Evidenz. Handbook "Erkenntnistheorie", Martin Grajner (ed.), Metzler (2019), 212–217.
  • Ralph Wedgwood, The Value of Rationality. The Journal of Moral Philosophy 17 (2020), 110–113.
  • The Reasons of Objective Consequentialism and Collective Action Problems. In: Utility, Progress, and Technology, Michael Schefczyk und Christoph Schmidt-Petri (ed.), KIT Scientific Publishing (2021), 167–182. 
  • Précis "Determined by Reasons: A Competence Account of Acting for a Normative Reason",Zeitschrift für philosophische Forschung 72 (2018), 410–415.
  • Aufnehmen ohne die Einreise zu erlauben? In: Ursula Bitzegeio, Frank Decker, Sandra Fischer (ed.), Flucht Transit Asyl: Interdisziplinäre Perspektiven auf ein europäisches Versprechen, J.H.W. Dietz, 2018. 164-178.
  • Repliken. Zeitschrift für philosophische Forschung 72, 2018. 429-434.
  • Globale Bewegungsfreiheit als moralischer Default? Kommentar zu Andreas Cassee: Globale Bewegungsfreiheit. Zeitschrift für philosophische Literatur 5, 2017. 9-20.
  • Star, Daniel. Knowing Better: Virtue, Deliberation, and Normative Ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015. Pp. xvii1147. $60.00 (cloth), Ethics 127 (II) 2017. 507-511.
  • Thomas Hurka: The Best Things in Life. A Guide to What Really Matters, 200 S., OUP, Oxford 2011, Zeitschrift für philosophische Forschung, 66 (2), 2012. 351-354.
  • Kieran Setiya: Reasons without Rationalism, 131 S., Princeton University Press, Princeton 2007, Zeitschrift für philosophische Forschung, 64, 2010. 433-437.

Talks 

 

  • Klimawandel als ethische Herausforderung. Kamingespräch with fridays for future, May 2019, Saarbrücken.
  • Reasons are the things that matter. Normativity conference. January 2019, Tromsö.
  • Zum Verhältnis moralischer und politischer Gründe. October 2018, Konstanz.
  • Refugeehood and duties of admission. Congress gap 10, September 2018, Köln.
  • Reasons, Rationality, and Evidence. Rationality: Epistemic & Practical Perspectives, July 2018, Bochum.
  • The reasons of objective consequentialism and collective action problems. ISUS, July 2018, Karlsruhe.
  • Facts, reasons, and rationality. Derek Parfit's Philosophical Legacy, July 2018, Karlsruhe.
  • Levels of reasonableness and responding for reasons. Rationality and Reasonableness, April 2018, Köln.
  • Die Kompetenztheorie und die Vielfalt des Handelns aus normativen Gründen. Institutsvortrag, May 2018, Mannheim.
  • Brauchen wir Regeln? Aber welche? Kinderuni, November 2017, Saarbrücken.
  • Neue Fluchtwege öffnen, alte Fluchtwege schließen? Talk for a public discussion about migration with politicians "Politik trifft Philosophie: Migration und Grenzen", September 2017, Saarbrücken.
  • Was macht das Gute gut? Philosophieren mit Astrid Lindgren. Für Bücherwürmer ab 7 Jahren. Kindervortrag zum Tag der offenen Tür der Universität des Saarlandes, June 2017, Saarbrücken.
  • Flüchtlingsaufnahme als globale Hilfspflicht. Vortrag zum Tag der offenen Tür der Universität des Saarlandes, June 2017, Saarbrücken.
  • Because there is a reason to do it. At the "Humboldt-Southampton Normativity Conference", June 2017, Southampton.
  • The admission analogy. At the conference "Humanitarian Ethics and Action", June 2017, Birmingham.
  • Flüchtlingsaufnahme als globale Hilfspflicht. Gastvorlesung im Rahmen der Paul-Fritsche-Stiftung Wissenschaftliches Forum, June 2017, Homburg.
  • Globale Bewegungsfreiheit als moralischer Default? Symposium zu Andreas Cassee "Globale Bewegungsfreiheit", March 2017, Berlin.
  • The influence of normative beliefs: Where internalism and externalism meet. At the workshop "Reasoning, Reflection, and Normativity: the 4th meeting of the European Normativity Network", November 2016, Oslo.
  • On how to explain rational motivation. At the conference "Rational Capacities", November 2016, Luxembourg.
  • Flüchtlingsaufnahme als gobale Hilfspflicht. At the interdisciplinary conference "Flucht, Transit, und Asyl - Interdisziplinäre Perspektiven auf ein europäisches Versprechen", September 2016, Bonn.
  • Aufnehmen, ohne die Einreise zu erlauben? At the "IV. Tagung für Praktische Philosophie", September 2016, Salzburg.
  • On how to explain rational motivation. At the "7th International Lauener Symposium on Analytical Philosophy on Themes from Thomas M. Scanlon", September 2016, Bern.
  • How normative reasons explain action. At a meeting for the DFG network "Practical Thought and Good Action" with the title "Action and Ability", July 2016, Leipzig.
  • Reasons, normativity, and epistemic standards. At the "Workshop Metaethik", May 2016, Frankfurt a.M.
  • How normative reasons explain. At the "research unit for epistemology, metaphysics, and philosophy of cognition", February 2016, Aarhus.
  • What is the normativity of attitudes? At the conference "The Normativity of Attitudes", December 2015, Saarbrücken.
  • Dispositionen: Segen oder Fluch für die kausale Theorie der epistemischen Stützungsbeziehung? At the conference of the Gesellschaft für Analytische Philosophie (GAP 9), September 2015, Osnabrück.
  • Justice and migration. At the conference "Dialogue of civilizations: Rhethoric and justice in Europe. How Human Rights transformed a continent", July 2015, Heidelberg.
  • Dispositionen in Erkenntnis- und Handlungstheorie. At the workshop "Fähigkeiten: vom Können, Tun und Wissen", July 2015, FU Berlin.
  • The practical, the theoretical, and the legal: Similarities concerning reasons, defeaters, and reasoning. Commentary to Prof. Jonathan Dancy's talk "Reasoning in and outside the law" at the conference "Defeasibility in the Law" of the excellence cluster "Die Herausbildung normativer Ordnungen", March 2015, Frankfurt a.M.
  • Die Kompetenztheorie des Handelns aus normativen Gründen. Book symposium about my dissertation "Acting for a normative reason: A competence account", with commentaries by Dr. Benjamin Kiesewetter and Prof. Ralf Stöcker, March 2015, Berlin.
  • Dispositionen und abweichende Kausalketten. At the doctoral colloquium of Prof. Holger Steinfath, February 2015, Göttingen.
  • On acting for a normative reason. At the conference "Normativity and Meaning", May 2014, Saarbrücken.
  • Aus guten Gründen: Handlungserklärungen und normative Gründe. At the Institutskolloquium of the Humbldt Universität zu Berlin, January 2014, Berlin.
  • Epistemic and normative reasons (together with Christian Wendelborn). At the conference "Reasons: Action, Belief, Perception", October 2013, Saarbrücken.
  • How to be psychologistic about motivating but not about normative reasons. Beitrag zum dritten "Scientific Retreat" der Arbeitsgruppe um Dr. Attila Tanyi (Zukunftskolleg Konstanz), September 2013, Insel Reichenau.
  • On the identity of motivating and normative reasons. At the conference of the British Society for Ethical Theory (BSET), July 2013, London.
  • On why (not) to identify normative reasons with motivating reasons. Beitrag zum zweiten "Scientific Retreat" der Arbeitsgruppe um Dr. Attila Tanyi (Zukunftskolleg Konstanz), October 2012, Insel Reichenau.
  • On why (not) to identify normative reasons with motivating reasons. At the eighth conference of the Gesellschaft für Analytische Philosophie (GAP), September 2012, Konstanz.
  • The nature of motivating reasons. At the workshop "Action explanation and causality" of the DFG-Netzwerk "Practical Thought and Good Action", August 2012, Magdeburg.
  • Epistemic normativity: Ought I to believe the truth? At the seventh "Cologne Summer School in Philosophy" entitled "The normativity of epistemic rationality" with Prof. Ralph Wedgwood, July 2012, Köln.
  • On 'Forms of Agency. Kommentar zu dem Vortrag "Forms of Agency" von Prof. Douglas Lavin auf der Konferenz "Varieties of action explanation", March 2012, München.
  • Acting for a normative reason and deviant causal chains. At the "Doktorandenkolloquium", February 2012, Berlin.
  • Virtue Epistemology, the Gettier problem, and acting for reasons. Beitrag zum ersten "Scientific Retreat" der Arbeitsgruppe um Dr. Attila Tanyi (Zukunftskolleg Konstanz), September 2011, Insel Reichenau.
  • Handeln aus normativen Gründen - ein praktisches Pendant zu Wissen. At the Konferenz der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Philosophie (DGPhil), September 2011, München.
  • Was sollen wir tun? Bastelanleitung für eine Ethik. Tag der offenen Tür der Universität des Saarlandes, June 2011, Saarbrücken.
  • The source of agential authority. At the Tübinger Studierendenkonferenz with M. Bratman, June 2011, Tübingen, Germany.Available at www.uni-tuebingen.de.
  • Acting for normative reasons. At the GAP-Doktorandenworkshop Meta-Ethik und normative Ethik, November 2010, Essen, Germany.
  • The assessment of actions - introducing a third dimension. At the Tübinger Studierendenkonferenz with T.M. Scanlon, May 2010, Tübingen, Germany. Available at www.uni-tuebingen.de.
  • What Transparency tells us about practical rationality and reasons. At the seventh confereartnce of the Gesellschaft für Analytische Philosophie (GAP), September 2009, Bremen, Germany.
  • Scheinbare Gründe und Rationalität: Warum etwas dafür zu sprechen scheint, rational zu sein. At the "Doktorandenkolloquium zur Praktischen Philosophie", June 2009, Saarbrücken.
  • Could rationality be responding to reasons? At the Tübinger Studierendenkonferenz with M. Smith, May 2009, Tübingen, Germany. Available at http://www.uni-tuebingen.de/?id=13911.
  • Motivating reasons and rationalization of actions. At the European Congress for Analytic Philosophy (ECAP 6), August 2008, Krakau, Poland.

 

Teaching

Winter term 2018/19:
Master seminar Reasons and Reasoning in Moral and Political Philosophy

Summer term 2018:
Lecture Introduction to Practical Philosophy

Winter term 2017/18:
Master seminar Ethics of Migration

Summer term 2017:
Seminar Ethik der Globalisierung

Winter term 2016/17:
Seminar Gerechtigkeit in Zeiten des Klimawandels

Winter term 2015/16:
Seminar Philosophisches Argumentieren in der Flüchtlingsdebatte

Winter term 2015/16:
Seminar Schlussfolgern, rechtfertigen, wissen: rationale Inferenz

Summer term 2015:
Seminar Einführung in die Politische Philosophie mit Texten von der frühen Neuzeit bis heute

Winter term 2014/15:
Seminar Aristoteles' Nikomachische Ethik und neuere Texte zur Tugendethik

Summer term 2014:
Seminar Ausgewählte Themen der Politischen Philosophie: Globalisierung und Migration

Winter term 2012/13:
Seminar Soll ich oder soll ich nicht? Werte, Normen und Regeln (with Oliver Petersen)

Summer term 2012:
Seminar Deontologie und Konsequentialismus

Winter term 2011/12:
Seminar Werte und das gute Leben

Summer term 2011 (from 2011 on at the Universität des Saarlandes):
Seminar Handlung, Motivation und Gründe

Summer term 2010 (at the Universität Tübingen):
Seminar Einführung in die Handlungstheorie

 

Information about current seminars is accessible to students of the Universität des Saarlandes via Moodle.

 

Conference Organization

November 2018: "Norms and Reasons" in Zürich (organized together with Frank Hofmann und Eva Schmidt). Our speakers were Corine Besson, Hanjo Glock, Frank Hofmann, Antti Kauppinen, Benjamin Kiesewetter, Susanne Mantel, Erasmus Mayr, Anne Meylan, Conor McHugh, Christian Piller, Douglas Portmore, Eva Schmidt, Daniel Whiting.

6. bis 8. Juli 2017: "Jonathan Dancy on Reasons and Reasoning: The Third SaarLux Joint Conference on Reasons and Rationality" in Saarbrücken (organized together with Frank Hofmann and Eva Schmidt) Raum 407 im Informatik-Gebäude E1.1. Contact: eva.schmidt(at)mx.uni-saarland.de.

November 2016: "Rational Capacities" in Esch-sur-Alzette (organized together with Prof. Frank Hofmann und Dr. Eva Schmidt). Our speakers were Alex Gregory, Rebekka Gersbach, Frank Hofmann, Chris Kelp, David Löwenstein, Susanne Mantel, Thomas Pink, Daniel Star, Barbara Vetter

December 2015: workshop "The Normativity of Attitudes" in Saarbrücken (organized together with Frank Hofmann and Eva Schmidt). Our speakers were Maria Alvarez, Anna-Maria Eder, Frank Hofmann, John Hyman, Susanne Mantel, Ram Neta, Jonas Olson, Eva Schmidt, John Skorupski, and Kurt Sylvan.

May 2014: workshop "Normativity and Meaning" in Saarbrücken (organized together with Stephan Padel). Our main speaker was Michael Ridge.

October 2013: conference "Reasons: Action, Belief, Perception" in Saarbrücken (organized together with Eva Schmidt). Our main speakers were Terence Cuneo, Gerhard Ernst, Jennifer Hornsby, and Asbjorn Steglich-Petersen. Further information about the conference can be found on the conference website.

2009-2011: organization of student conferences (together with other students and supported by Prof. Dr. Sabine A. Döring) in Tübingen: 2009 with Prof. Micheal Smith, 2010 with Prof. T. M. Scanlon and 2011 with Prof. Michael E. Bratman (for more information, talks, and pictures, see http://www.uni-tuebingen.de/?id=13911)

Der Header ist ein Ausschnitt von Hermann Waibels Bild "Lichtfarbe" von 1987. Wir danken Herrn Waibel für die freundliche Erlaubnis, sein Bild zu nutzen.