News

Call for Papers for the second issue: January 10th, 2018. Semioculus has opened its eyes. . .

Three visiting philosophers will give a talk at the conference "Variation in language, literature, folklore, and music" taking place on December 7th-8th.

The lecture will take place 29.11.2017 at 14.15 Jakobi 2-336 Abstract in English: SEMIOTIC RESEARCH IN HUNGARY (2017 TARTU)

November 29th at 18:00 in Üheteistkümnes (Gildi 3-11) the Philosophical Film Club will gather to watch "Lovelace" (2013) and discuss porn from a feminist perspective. We will watch Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman's "Lovelace" with Amanda Seyfried playing Linda (Lovelace) Marchiano. The film depicts how Marchiano came to appear in “Deep Throat.”

Juhani Yli-Vakkuri will take up the position of Professor in Philosophy of Language from January 2018. He defended his PhD at Oxford University in 2013 and is currently an Alexander von Humboldt Research Fellow in Philosophy at Bielefeld University. Juhani has conducted research on internalism and externalism about mental content and on the interaction between epistemic and objective modalities. In Tartu, he will focus on the logic and semantics of sentences containing modal words (‘must’, ‘might’, ‘can’, etc).

Next Friday, 24.11 at 12.15-14.00 in room 306 we will have a guest lecturer Zviad Sulaberidze from Georgia. He works as a head of Robotics and Engineering Lab and Computer Science and Mathematics School in Free University of Tbilisi. He creates platforms that involve computer, electrical and mechanical engineering, and opportunities for students to apply their theoretical knowledge in practical projects.

Program available now: https://sisu.ut.ee/akksugiskool/about?lang=en

Urban environments are inhabited not only by humans but by a number of species, including our pets, plants introduced by humans, commensals taking advantage of human resources, and also native species of the given area. Different species are related by manifold of relations: food chains, behavioural co-adaptations, interspecies communication, use of shared environments, and also cultural representations in case of human culture.

Meelis Luht, former management board member of Eesti Meedia Group, will start work as the Director of Administration of the University of Tartu on 21 August. Rector Volli Kalm said the new director of administration has been in charge of several different areas of activity in his career and is a top leader with international work experience. We can see his capability as well as his desire and ambition to actively contribute to the implementation of the university’s development goals.

The Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics, born in the early 1960s as a joint initiative of intellectuals from Tartu and Moscow, was led by Juri Lotman on the Tartu side and Vyacheslav Vsevolodovich Ivanov (21 August 1919 – 7 October 2017) on the Moscow side. Ivanov was a polymath whose many-sided interests met in the field of semiotics. His studies encompassed early history of Indo-European languages and cultures, Hittite culture and language, machine translation, literary scholarship, mathematical linguistics, cultural anthropology, etc.

Associate Professor Kristjan Laasik (University of Shandong) is visiting the Department of Philosophy. He will deliver a guest lecture on October 5th. Thursday, October 5th at 16.15 guest lecture in the Departmental Colloquium in room 337 titled „Phenomenal Intentionality: Husserlian Reflections“. In their recent paper, Andrew Bailey and Bradley Richards criticize Terence Horgan's and John Tienson's arguments in support of phenomenal intentionality. I use Husserlian ideas to counter Bailey and Richards' criticisms.

On October 9th-10th Tim Crane will deliver the Frege Lectures 2017 on the topic of "Thoughts, thinking, and thinkers." More information on the lectures

Dear semiotician! We invite you to come and visit Viljandi together on Friday, 29 September. The schedule is not very precise yet, but here's a rough sketch: Start at 9.30 in the morning of 29th in front of our department, Jakobi 2. 10.30-13.00 taking a look around UT Viljandi Culture Academy. 13.30 Lunch at Heimtali 14.30 Visiting a museum at Heimtali 15.30 Hike at bog Riisaraba 18.00 Back to Tartu

Professor Toni Rønnow-Rasmussen (University of Lund) will give two lectures at the Department of Philosophy on September 27th and 28th. Wednesday 27th September at 14:15 in room Jakobi 2-336 "R. M. Hare's utilitarianism" Thursday 28th September at 14:15-... Informal meeting with students Thursday 28th September at 16:15 in room Jakobi 2-336 "Value Dualism and Good-for Unitarianism" Abstract

All lectures will take place in Jakobi 2-336 26.09.2017 starting at 10.15 Peeter Müürsepp will give venia legendi lecture National and Foreign in the Development of Estonian Thought 27.09.2017 starting at 18.15 Jaan Undusk will give venia legendi lecture On the Possibility of Studying Intellectual History on Estonian Grounds

You can find the program from the conference page.

On 4 September 2017, Viljandi Culture Academy opens the Centre for Arts in Tartu, in which more than 35 arts courses are offered for all students, teaching staff members and employees of the University of Tartu, enabling them to acquire new knowledge and skills and fully develop their creativity.

More information at homepage http://tsss.ut.ee/

Call for abstracts for an interdiciplinary conferece Emotions: Rationality, Morality and Social Understanding is now open, deadline 30th of June 2017. For more information visit the conference webpage of download the call here.

A master’s thesis defended in the University of Tartu’s Department of Philosophy claims that top athletes, who more and more often attract media interest even outside the sports sphere, should also behave more morally than the so-called average person outside the training and competition period.