UCHV Seminars and Workshops

The University Center for Human Values sponsors a limited number of seminars and workshops throughout the academic year which seek to incite thought and discussion about ethical issues in both private and public life.


Upcoming Events

The Princeton Faculty Symposium on Altruism
Fri, Sep 29, 2023, 4:00 pm6:00 pm

Peter Singer: “The Possibility & Necessity of Altruism”

Elizabeth Harman: “When to Be a Hero”

Chair: Jacob Nebel

Location
Betts Auditorium
Sponsor
Department of Philosophy
Free and Open to the Public
Harmania: A Conference in Honor of Gilbert Harman
Sat, Sep 30, 2023, 9:00 amSun, Oct 1, 2023, 2:00 pm
Location
Maeder Hall Auditorium, Room 002
Sponsors
  • Department of Philosophy
  • University Center for Human Values
Open to Princeton University ID Holders and Other Academic Affiliates
Martin Loughlin (London School of Economics & Political Science): "The Case Against Constitutionalism"
Wed, Oct 4, 2023, 4:30 pm6:00 pm

“Constitutionalism Under Stress”,
a Joint Project of Princeton University and Humboldt University
zu Berlin presents: “The Case Against Constitutionalism”

This lecture will reprise claims made Martin Loughlin's book: Against Constitutionalism (Harvard University Press,…

Location
Laura Wooten Hall, Room 301 (Kerstetter Room)
Speaker
Sponsors
  • The Bouton Law Lectures Fund, Department of Politics
  • University Center for Human Values, Program in Law and Normative Thinking
Open to Princeton University ID Holders
Artificial Intelligence, Conscious Machines, and Animals: Broadening AI Ethics
Fri, Oct 6, 2023, 9:00 amSat, Oct 7, 2023, 6:00 pm

Artificial intelligence (AI) is already having a huge impact on our lives and will continue to do so in the future. While most discussions of AI’s impact are about impacts on humans, this conference aims at investigating and evaluating AI’s impacts on two classes of nonhuman beings, nonhuman animals and potentially sentient or conscious AI. The…

Location
Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment, Maeder Hall Auditorium, 86 Olden Street
Free and Open to the Public (registration required)
Artificial Intelligence, Conscious Machines and Nonhuman Animals: A Discussion on Broadening AI Ethics
Fri, Oct 6, 2023, 4:30 pm6:00 pm

Most discussions of AI’s impact, and of the ethical questions raised, are about impacts on humans. This discussion will investigate and evaluate AI’s impacts on two classes of nonhuman beings: potentially sentient or conscious AI, and nonhuman animals. Drawing on existing impacts on animals, the event will seek to broaden AI ethics beyond…

Location
Friend Center, Room 101
Free and Open to the Public (registration required)
Science and Social Justice Salon
Wed, Oct 11, 2023, 4:30 pm6:00 pm

Are you a STEM graduate student, post-doc, or faculty member interested in thinking more concretely about the social, political and ethical dimensions of your research? Maybe the climate crisis or the Covid-19 pandemic have left you wishing for new ways of thinking about how values and politics impact science? Perhaps you’ve wondered about how…

Location
Louis A. Simpson, Weickart Atrium
Sponsor
Future Values@UCHV
Open to Princeton University ID Holders
Stephen Vladeck (The University of Texas at Austin): “The Shadow Docket: What’s Really Wrong With —and How to Fix—the Supreme Court”
Tue, Oct 24, 2023, 5:00 pm6:30 pm
Program in Law and Normative Thinking

ABSTRACT: From abortion to affirmative action, gun control to greenhouse gas emissions, and redistricting to religious liberty, the Supreme Court has come to play a central role in virtually every major contemporary public policy debate. And in the last six years, in particular, the…

Location
Arthur Lewis Auditorium, Robertson Hall
Sponsors
  • Law@Princeton
  • University Center for Human Values
  • Department of Politics
Free and Open to the Public
Book talk with Philip Pettit & Fintan O'Toole at Labyrinth Books: "The State"
Wed, Nov 15, 2023, 6:00 pm7:30 pm

The future of our species depends on the state. Can states resist corporate capture, religious zealotry, and nationalist mania? Can they find a way to work together so that the earth heals and its peoples prosper? Two eminent writers and thinkers -- one a philosopher, one a journalist -- consider these questions and their answers.

Location
Labyrinth Books, 122 Nassau Street, Princeton, NJ
Sponsors
  • Labyrinth Books
  • Princeton University Humanities Council
  • University Center for Human Values
Free and Open to the Public
Book talk with Melissa Lane and Benjamin Morison at Labyrinth Books: “Of Rule and Office: Plato’s Ideas of the Political”
Wed, Nov 29, 2023, 6:00 pm7:00 pm

Plato famously defends the rule of knowledge. Knowledge, for him, is of the good. But what is rule? In her new study, which she will present and discuss with her colleague in Classics, Melissa Lane shows Plato to have been deeply concerned with the roles and relationships between rulers and ruled.

Lane reveals how political office and…

Location
Labyrinth Books, 122 Nassau Street, Princeton, NJ
Sponsor
Princeton University’s Humanities Council and Politics, Philosophy, and Classics Departments
Free and Open to the Public
Center for the Study of Democratic Politics Colloquium: Jeff Spinner-Halev and Elizabeth Theiss-Morse
Thu, Nov 30, 2023, 12:00 pm1:30 pm

 

Audience: Faculty, fellows, and graduate students only

Location
Robertson Hall, Bowl 001
Speakers
Sponsors
  • Center for the Study of Democratic Politics (CSDP)
  • University Center for Human Values (UCHV)
Other
Dave Edmonds Interview Talk with Tom Kelly
Fri, Mar 29, 2024, 4:00 pm6:00 pm
Location
TBA
Sponsors
  • Department of Philosophy
  • University Center for Human Values
Peter Singer Farewell Conference
Mon, May 13, 2024, 9:00 amTue, May 14, 2024, 5:00 pm
Location
TBA