Alex Fisher

Current & Recent Philosophy Grad Students: APDA Is Reaching Out - Daily Nous If you're a current philosophy PhD student or received your PhD within the past decade, Academic Philosophy Data and Analysis (APDA) wants to make sure you're counted in its 2025 survey, which is runn...

Academic Philosophy and Data Analysis is collecting information about philosophy departments. If you're a current philosophy PhD student or received your PhD within the past 10 years, and you haven't heard from them, see this.

Abstract deadline tomorrow if anyone is interested in joining us in Exeter in February to talk all things Social AI!

We pour billions into saving an economically tiny steel industry whilst actively destroying one of our largest export industries. (Yes, higher education to overseas students who already massively subsidise UK students, are counted as exports).

Today is World Philosophy Day!
🧡💛🤍🩵💙

Here is why philosophers should care about the asexual and aromantic spectrum (aspec) 👇

✨#Philosophy really can change minds. ✨To mark #WorldPhilosophyDay, here's a reminder of what a difference it can make.

As our Chair, @lucyobrien.bsky.social, puts it:

“Philosophy teaches skills integral to cultivating social values and conduct. It changes people's minds.”

Global Philosophy: Global Perspectives on Technology and Close Personal Relationships (CPR) This special issue invites globally diverse perspectives on the moral, cultural, and technological dimensions of close personal relationships. In particular, we invite authors to consider variants on ...

🚨 Call for papers: Close personal relationships and AI technologies.

Great opportunity for global perspectives on the philosophical implications of Close Personal Relationships and AI-driven technologies (from Chatbots to robots). Please share! (Reach out if interested).

#AIethics / #philtech

Obviously given the history of moral panic around videogames, much attention has focused on whether there are negative effects rather than positive ones!

But the conclusion I draw is that we ultimately shouldn’t be worried about moral corruption through this process of imaginative contagion.

Yes, definitely. I’ve often found myself after playing some role-playing videogames thinking in a different, *better* way afterwards as the character would.

In the article, I argue that actually we often resist imaginatively adopting bad perspectives, and it’s easier to take on morally good ones.

Yes I think AI chatbot cases often involve this kind of contagion where the boundary between pretending it’s conscious and actually thinking it is becomes blurred.

Same is true of some conspiracy theories - you start out pretending/“just playing along” but over time this transitions to real belief.

A new issue of Philosophy and Phenomenological Research is out, featuring my article on moral concerns about the corruptive effects of imagination in games/VR.

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/toc/19331592...

You can read a short summary here:

newworkinphilosophy.substack.com/p/imaginativ...

#philtech

🦷 DIY dentistry should never be anyone’s only option.
Across the country people can’t get an NHS dentist. Children end up in hospital with tooth decay and adults live in pain. NHS dentistry needs urgent funding and reform.

It’s time for the Government to fix this gap for good.

Yes, I agree. Though this does also remind me a little of @katemanne.bsky.social’s argument in Down Girl about how we shouldn’t think of misogyny just as internal feelings of hate for women, which are impossible to verify, but in terms of actions that police and punish women.

Interesting! Look forward to reading this when out

I briefly discuss some related issues about the difficulties of obtaining empirical evidence right at the end of the book. There I was happy enough with the line that careful use of fictional and detailed nonfictional examples is enough (on the former, agreeing with @alex-fisher.bsky.social)

Wrote about what the real threat Grokipedia poses is + some suggestions for addressing it! Drawing on @brendannyhan.bsky.social's work on misinformation.

(Lots more to say about erosion of epistemic standards, models of knowledge-production, etc.!)

@alfredarcher.bsky.social

Philosophy of Football Manager - now we’re talking!

(Warning: addictive substance. I am on a long-term enforced break from FM due to its propensity to take over my life.)

Animal testing to be phased out faster as UK unveils roadmap for alternative methods New plan backs researchers to seize on new and developing opportunities to phase out animal tests with specific commitments for the coming years.

Very happy to see the UK government making a commitment to phasing out animal testing
www.gov.uk/government/n...

Virtual Workshop If you have any questions, please feel free to email us at digitalworldsworkshop@gmail.com. You can also sign up here for updates:

Here's a CFP for this year's Digital Worlds Workshop. It's a great conference for trying out new ideas and a pretty friendly group.
Digitalworldsworkshop.com/virtual-workshop
#philsky #philtech #philosophy #philosophyoftechnology

"Following the scandal of the BBC editing a clip of Donald Trump to make it look like he was inciting an insurrection in a more concise way than he actually did..."

How many monkeys died for the polio vaccine? One million. Excellent reporting and solid analysis by Ava Kofman. It’s genuinely shocking to learn just how much contemporary scientific research depends on animal suffering on a massive scale

From Virtual Rape to Meta-rape: Sexual Violence, Criminal Law and the Metaverse Abstract. As the metaverse blurs the lines between physical and virtual realms, enhanced by haptic devices providing sensory feedback, it is poised to beco

@claremcglynn.bsky.social, also involved in the new laws on image-based sexual abuse, has shown how we might criminalise these actions within existing legislation, and/or introduce a new wider offence of *intimate intrusions* that captures new forms of tech-aided misogyny.

doi.org/10.1093/ojls...

A next area that warrants new legislation is the widespread sexual harassment/assault of women in virtual worlds.

My research and work in psychology shows how these experiences can be as distressing and traumatic as real events - but no legal protections exist.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article...

This is a really good interview with Baroness Charlotte Owen, who has been spearheading in the House of Lords new legislation to criminalise creating AI-generated sexual images/videos of people.

As ever, new technologies immediately being put to use to perpetuate misogyny!

youtu.be/woMtATKrLpA?...

While we’re at it maybe also treat inheritances as taxable income spread over, say, 10 years.

As many have pointed out absurd that we tax income earned through labour more heavily than other forms of income and acquired wealth.

Panera’s moderately caffeinated lemonade was loosely associated with 2 deaths before it was taken off market.

This article alone has 4 examples of ChatGPT encouraging young people to commit suicide, and OpenAI’s own public stats estimate over a million users discuss suicide with ChatGPT each week.

To mark two weeks since the launch of the @aroaceresearch.bsky.social based at CLSR, @isobellogan.bsky.social sat down with the organiser @kristin-kaeuper.bsky.social to hear more about the network, plans for the future, and how you can get involved! 🧡💛💙

⬇️Give it a listen⬇️

University of Leicester to consult on redundancies University bosses are also planning to stop a number of courses.

UK university news just this week: 163 jobs at risk + course closures at Leicester; 300 jobs at risk at Dundee; modern language & music courses being closed at Nottingham. Every week it‘s the same.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Last week I gave a talk to the British Postgraduate Philosophy Association. What advice would you give to philosophy postgraduates in 2025?

Elon Musk is boosting the British right - and this shows how Elon Musk is boosting the British right - and this shows how

Vital piece of investigative reporting from Sky. They've uncovered the X algorithm which feeds users extremist right wing material from the moment they join the site. It is a far-right radicalisation engine, by design.

news.sky.com/story/the-x-...