UH Philosophy

06/08/2026

16/07/2026

Teaching staff past and present.

25/08/2025

If anyone fancies coming to the seaside for some emergentism...

This workshop will explore the relationship between the emergent properties of conscious subjects and the material structures and interactions from...

09/05/2025

New video https://youtu.be/JOmNEXFGooM

27/03/2025

At Edinburgh Futures Institute

27/02/2025

Today! Thursday 27 Feb 4.30–5.30
Kantian Ethics: Summary and Critique
ask [email protected] for the Zoom link

14/12/2024

New paper by Sam Coleman, trying to argue that there are unconscious qualia:

Conscious mental qualities, aka phenomenal qualities, are seemingly a leading factor in much of our behaviour. Pains make us recoil from painful stimuli, itches make us scratch, feelings of anger s...

04/12/2024

Department of Psychology, Sport and Geography Research Seminar: Thursday, 5 December

Time: 4:00 pm – 5:30 pm

Speaker: Sam Coleman, University of Hertfordshire

Title: Some cases of unconscious sensations and of intersubjectively shared sensations

When it comes to sensations and their properties, or what philosophers call qualia, for example the itchiness of an itch, the taste of ketchup, the blueness of seeing the sky, it is standard for cognitive scientists to understand these properties as essentially subjective, in at least two senses. First, it is held that they cannot exist unconsciously - there cannot literally be, e.g., unconscious itchiness. Second, they cannot be shared - one subject cannot literally experience the ketchup taste another enjoys. By means of some theoretical arguments as well as examination of some real-life cases, I argue that in fact qualia are not subjective in these ways. They can exist unconsciously, and they can be shared between subjects. This bears on the project to understand how sensations relate to brain and neural processes, since one source of the so-called 'hard problem' of consciousness is the claim that sensations are subjective and thus cannot be explained by objective brain and neural processes.
======================

Both staff and students attending the talk are very welcome to join us for drinks and nibbles after the talk (in 2H256, Psychology Staff Room) for a chat with the speaker.

28/11/2024

Our student Mustafa Khuramy is organising an undergraduate philosophy conference. Spread the word, or submit something yourself!
--
The University of Hertfordshire invites submissions for our upcoming Undergraduate Philosophy Conference! This is a fantastic opportunity for undergraduate students from any university to present their philosophical work in a formal academic setting. We warmly encourage professors to share this opportunity with their students who may be interested in gaining experience presenting their research.
Submission Guidelines:
• Open to all undergraduate students from any university.
• Papers may be on any philosophical topic and be approximately 2,000 to 3,000 words in length.
• Selected students will be invited to give a 20-30 minute presentation of their paper, followed by a 10 minute Q&A session.
• Students are also permitted to submit an abstract (of any length) of high quality, provided they are able to ensure they will have the paper ready before 7th March.
Conference Details (Hybrid, in person & zoom):
• Keynote Speaker: Dr Sam Coleman, University of Hertfordshire
• Date: 2nd April 2025.
Submission Deadline: 28th February 2025, 5 PM.
Please send your submissions to: [email protected]
Include your full name and university in the submission. Accepted students will be notified by 7th March 2025.
For any further inquiries, feel free to reach out by contacting the submission email address above