Skip to main content

How should social and ethical values influence the practice of climate science?

Date
Date
Wednesday 9 October 2019, 12:00 - 13:00
Location
Roger Stevens LT 22 (10M.22)

***CANCELLED***

According to the “value-free ideal”, the internal workings of science should be kept free from the influence of social, ethical, political and personal values (also known as “contextual values”). Today, many philosophers of science reject this view; they argue that it is sometimes appropriate for contextual values to influence choices among methodologies, the collection and characterization of evidence, decisions about whether to accept or reject hypotheses, and more. This talk will survey some of these arguments and consider their implications and applications in the case of climate science.

In this SRI seminar, Wendy Parker from the Department of Philosophy at Durham University will discuss not only how contextual values already influence climate science in various ways, but also where there is scope for even more influence.