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Event: Workshop: Evidence and Expertise

Posted on September 21, 2015 by Julie Zahle
Event date October 29, 2015 - October 30, 2015
Submission deadline October 02, 2015
Registration deadline October 26, 2015
Location Helsinki
Host(s) University of Helsinki
Event website/information https://evidencecausationargumentation.wordpress.com/events/workshop-evidence-and-expertise/
Workshop: Thursday-Friday October 29-30, 2015
 
Title: Evidence and Expertise 
The workshop is the first in a series of meetings within the project The Trinity of Policy-Making: Evidence, Causation and Argumentation – https://evidencecausationargumentation.wordpress.com
Speakers
Casey Helgeson (London School of Economics)
Barbara Osimani (Munich Center for Mathematical Philosophy, LMU)
Eleonora Montuschi (Ca’ Foscari University of Venice and London School of Economics)
Judith Favereau (TINT, Helsinki)
Cléo Chassonnery-Zaïgouche (Centre d’études interdisciplinaires Walras Pareto, University of Lausanne)
Julian Reiss (Durham University)
Carlo Martini (TINT, University of Helsinki)
Rani Lill Anjum (Norwegian University of Life Sciences)
Frank Zenker (Lund University and University of Konstanz)
Stephen Mumford (University of Nottingham)
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Call for Papers. There are two or three spots available for contributed papers. Please send an abstract of no more than 400 words to evidenceandexpertise@gmail.com by October 2, 2015. Notification of acceptance/rejection will be given by October 6, 2015. Accepted speakers will be given free accommodation in Helsinki for the days of the workshop and up to €400 as contribution for travel expenses.
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Description of the Workshop
Evidence plays a very important role in science; but, with the development of evidence-based decision-making, nowadays also in public decisions and policy-making. The trend is towards using evidence-based methods to assess policy-making in sectors like health, education, or the economy. Choices on school programs can be made on the basis of evidence from randomized control trials (RCTs), as well as choices on how to invest in development programs in third-world countries. Researchers use many methods for gathering evidence, from formal ones like models, controlled experiments, or simulations, to less formal ones like historical analysis, or case studies. In the majority of cases expert judgment is one of the most significant components of the process of gathering and amalgamating evidence.
Experts, those who are considered the most competent and knowledgeable in their fields of expertise, enter the evidence process at all levels; from the choice of methods, to the gathering of the evidence itself, to the combinations of evidence coming from different sources. Often times experts are themselves sources of evidence, though experience and personal knowledge, as in the case of economists at the several monetary policy committees around the world, in the use of the Delphi method for the health sector, or in the teams of scientists working on the IPCC reports on climate change.
Philosophers of science, methodologists, and epistemologists have long discussed the concept of evidence; this workshop will focus on whether the current concepts and accounts of evidence are adequate for capturing the subjective, reason-based and argumentative component of evidence-based science and policy-making.
Registration: please send an email to evidenceandexpertise@gmail.com by October 26, 2015.
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