Evan Westra
@evanwestra.bsky.social
Philosopher writing about theory of mind, moral psychology, character judgment, social norms. I bore undergraduates for a living. All opinions are my own. #philosophy #philsky
he/him
https://sites.google.com/site/ewestraphilosophy/
he/him
https://sites.google.com/site/ewestraphilosophy/
Pinned
Evan Westra
@evanwestra.bsky.social
· Jul 24
I've had a thread of office whiteboard philosopher portraits going for a while on the other site. Figure I'll start a fresh one here. This is Susan Hurley.
I'm thinking of starting a philosophy journal with a 100% rejection rate. It will be the most prestigious journal of all time.
Not sure how I feel about Ergo not allowing major revisions decisions for papers tbh
November 10, 2025 at 4:45 PM
I'm thinking of starting a philosophy journal with a 100% rejection rate. It will be the most prestigious journal of all time.
Reposted by Evan Westra
@dryan149.bsky.social and I have published a paper on how we should all be a little less like Holden Caufield (i.e. obsessed with the idea of authenticity) and a bit more like María Lugones (i.e. celebrating our multiple facets)
🚨New Paper!🚨
Do you love authenticity? @ledaberio.bsky.social and I argue that maybe you shouldn't!
We think that everything would be better if we all just got over the idea of true selves and were cooler with the fact that we all contain multitudes.
link.springer.com/article/10.1...
Do you love authenticity? @ledaberio.bsky.social and I argue that maybe you shouldn't!
We think that everything would be better if we all just got over the idea of true selves and were cooler with the fact that we all contain multitudes.
link.springer.com/article/10.1...
Challenges to Narrating a Multitudinous Self: Towards a Better Ethics of Code-switching - Topoi
We motivate and lay out the broad contours of a research program, namely that of developing a systematic ethics of code-switching. Such an ethics will articulate the values and norms that should gover...
link.springer.com
November 10, 2025 at 4:23 PM
@dryan149.bsky.social and I have published a paper on how we should all be a little less like Holden Caufield (i.e. obsessed with the idea of authenticity) and a bit more like María Lugones (i.e. celebrating our multiple facets)
Reposted by Evan Westra
🚨New Paper!🚨
Do you love authenticity? @ledaberio.bsky.social and I argue that maybe you shouldn't!
We think that everything would be better if we all just got over the idea of true selves and were cooler with the fact that we all contain multitudes.
link.springer.com/article/10.1...
Do you love authenticity? @ledaberio.bsky.social and I argue that maybe you shouldn't!
We think that everything would be better if we all just got over the idea of true selves and were cooler with the fact that we all contain multitudes.
link.springer.com/article/10.1...
Challenges to Narrating a Multitudinous Self: Towards a Better Ethics of Code-switching - Topoi
We motivate and lay out the broad contours of a research program, namely that of developing a systematic ethics of code-switching. Such an ethics will articulate the values and norms that should gover...
link.springer.com
November 7, 2025 at 6:55 PM
🚨New Paper!🚨
Do you love authenticity? @ledaberio.bsky.social and I argue that maybe you shouldn't!
We think that everything would be better if we all just got over the idea of true selves and were cooler with the fact that we all contain multitudes.
link.springer.com/article/10.1...
Do you love authenticity? @ledaberio.bsky.social and I argue that maybe you shouldn't!
We think that everything would be better if we all just got over the idea of true selves and were cooler with the fact that we all contain multitudes.
link.springer.com/article/10.1...
Reposted by Evan Westra
Good news everyone: #Duke Summer Seminars in Neuroscience and Philosophy (SSNAP) are back!! We are now accepting applications for SSNAP 2026, which will take place from May 26 to June 6, 2026. #neuroscience #philosophy #brain Please spread the word! ssnap.submittable.com/submit
SSNAP Applications Manager
SSNAP Applications Manager Powered By Submittable - Accept and Curate Digital Content
ssnap.submittable.com
November 7, 2025 at 11:58 AM
Good news everyone: #Duke Summer Seminars in Neuroscience and Philosophy (SSNAP) are back!! We are now accepting applications for SSNAP 2026, which will take place from May 26 to June 6, 2026. #neuroscience #philosophy #brain Please spread the word! ssnap.submittable.com/submit
Reposted by Evan Westra
Discover how greater gender parity and the growth of female leadership across Latin America created the conditions for a successful social movement, in this illuminating case study from Somebody Should Do Something
www.amba-bga.com/insights/voi...
www.amba-bga.com/insights/voi...
Voices of change: Leadership’s role in the rise of social movements
Many sparks fail to start fires where conditions seem right, while others flare up into fires where nobody would have expected. Few movements in recent history provide as good an example of this as t…
www.amba-bga.com
November 6, 2025 at 5:06 PM
Discover how greater gender parity and the growth of female leadership across Latin America created the conditions for a successful social movement, in this illuminating case study from Somebody Should Do Something
www.amba-bga.com/insights/voi...
www.amba-bga.com/insights/voi...
Reposted by Evan Westra
We *know* shockingly little about prehistory—we *speculate* about it, in ways that tend to reaffirm our own assumptions and biases, and then these speculations become sage wisdom about human nature, but only to the exact extent that they assert that women evolved to make sandwiches.
THIS IS WHY WE ALL HATE EVOPSYCH. Can we please fucking discredit this pseudo-naturalist bullshit at last?
November 6, 2025 at 3:57 PM
We *know* shockingly little about prehistory—we *speculate* about it, in ways that tend to reaffirm our own assumptions and biases, and then these speculations become sage wisdom about human nature, but only to the exact extent that they assert that women evolved to make sandwiches.
Reposted by Evan Westra
🧠 New paper alert! Can people infer others’ values not from what they choose, but simply from what comes to mind? Across four studies, we show they can—drawing on an intuitive theory of how options are generated.
doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106238
👇
doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106238
👇
Redirecting
doi.org
November 5, 2025 at 7:31 PM
🧠 New paper alert! Can people infer others’ values not from what they choose, but simply from what comes to mind? Across four studies, we show they can—drawing on an intuitive theory of how options are generated.
doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106238
👇
doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106238
👇
Reposted by Evan Westra
Looks great!! Love to see more scholarship on the Fodorian question of ‘How many games in town are there?’!
November 5, 2025 at 12:16 AM
Looks great!! Love to see more scholarship on the Fodorian question of ‘How many games in town are there?’!
Reposted by Evan Westra
Is this something YOU ever ask yourself?
"Man, Brett Karlan (aka Old Jerry Fodor) claims to love Fodor, but has never published anything defending anything remotely Fodorian. What's up with that?"
This was a puzzle that long perplexed the scholars... until now!
philpapers.org/rec/KARAET-4
"Man, Brett Karlan (aka Old Jerry Fodor) claims to love Fodor, but has never published anything defending anything remotely Fodorian. What's up with that?"
This was a puzzle that long perplexed the scholars... until now!
philpapers.org/rec/KARAET-4
Brett Karlan, AI empiricism: the only game in town? - PhilPapers
I offer an epistemic argument against the dominance of empiricism and empiricist-inspired methods in contemporary machine learning (ML) research. I first establish, as many ML researchers and philosop...
philpapers.org
November 4, 2025 at 11:35 PM
Is this something YOU ever ask yourself?
"Man, Brett Karlan (aka Old Jerry Fodor) claims to love Fodor, but has never published anything defending anything remotely Fodorian. What's up with that?"
This was a puzzle that long perplexed the scholars... until now!
philpapers.org/rec/KARAET-4
"Man, Brett Karlan (aka Old Jerry Fodor) claims to love Fodor, but has never published anything defending anything remotely Fodorian. What's up with that?"
This was a puzzle that long perplexed the scholars... until now!
philpapers.org/rec/KARAET-4
Reposted by Evan Westra
Highlights from Maria Waggoner's talk 'Socially Extended Moral Understanding and Outcome Homogenization in GenAI' at the CAIC Brown Bag on Friday
November 2, 2025 at 6:56 PM
Highlights from Maria Waggoner's talk 'Socially Extended Moral Understanding and Outcome Homogenization in GenAI' at the CAIC Brown Bag on Friday
Reposted by Evan Westra
It's one [philosophy] battle after another 🎃 Happy Halloween from the CAIC Brown Bag Series!
October 31, 2025 at 5:27 PM
It's one [philosophy] battle after another 🎃 Happy Halloween from the CAIC Brown Bag Series!
Reposted by Evan Westra
The CFP for the Association Association is live. See the poster for details:
October 30, 2025 at 2:43 AM
The CFP for the Association Association is live. See the poster for details:
Reposted by Evan Westra
My new paper has just been published online in @journalphp.bsky.social!
Popperian animals and instrumental reasoning: Philosophical Psychology: Vol 0, No 0 - Get Access www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1...
Popperian animals and instrumental reasoning: Philosophical Psychology: Vol 0, No 0 - Get Access www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1...
Popperian animals and instrumental reasoning: Philosophical Psychology: Vol 0, No 0 - Get Access
Browse all journals
www.tandfonline.com
October 30, 2025 at 12:46 PM
My new paper has just been published online in @journalphp.bsky.social!
Popperian animals and instrumental reasoning: Philosophical Psychology: Vol 0, No 0 - Get Access www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1...
Popperian animals and instrumental reasoning: Philosophical Psychology: Vol 0, No 0 - Get Access www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1...
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings. I am grateful to the reviewers for their insightful feedback.
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings. Please like and subscribe if you like my content!
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings. I am currently on extended leave, and will not have access to emails until next month.
October 30, 2025 at 12:14 AM
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings. I am grateful to the reviewers for their insightful feedback.
Reposted by Evan Westra
Reposted by Evan Westra
Consider proposing a commentary to the American Journal of Bioethics on the forthcoming paper Megan Delehanty and I wrote on the harms of AI psychotherapy chatbots!
October 27, 2025 at 6:51 PM
Consider proposing a commentary to the American Journal of Bioethics on the forthcoming paper Megan Delehanty and I wrote on the harms of AI psychotherapy chatbots!
Reposted by Evan Westra
There is increased enthusiasm about the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies in psychotherapy. Notably, AI psychotherapy chatbots are increasing in popularity, especially since the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) gave one of these apps breakthrough device designation.
October 27, 2025 at 6:54 PM
There is increased enthusiasm about the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies in psychotherapy. Notably, AI psychotherapy chatbots are increasing in popularity, especially since the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) gave one of these apps breakthrough device designation.
Reposted by Evan Westra
Just published:
Devin Sanchez Curry, (2025) “On IQ and other Sciencey Descriptions of Minds”, Philosophers' Imprint 25: 28. doi: doi.org/10.3998/phim...
Devin Sanchez Curry, (2025) “On IQ and other Sciencey Descriptions of Minds”, Philosophers' Imprint 25: 28. doi: doi.org/10.3998/phim...
On IQ and other Sciencey Descriptions of Minds
Philosophers of mind (from eliminative materialists to psychofunctionalists to interpretivists) generally assume that a normative ideal delimits which mental phenomena exist (though they disagree abou...
doi.org
October 27, 2025 at 6:23 PM
Just published:
Devin Sanchez Curry, (2025) “On IQ and other Sciencey Descriptions of Minds”, Philosophers' Imprint 25: 28. doi: doi.org/10.3998/phim...
Devin Sanchez Curry, (2025) “On IQ and other Sciencey Descriptions of Minds”, Philosophers' Imprint 25: 28. doi: doi.org/10.3998/phim...
Reposted by Evan Westra
favorite thing I've written
Just published:
Devin Sanchez Curry, (2025) “On IQ and other Sciencey Descriptions of Minds”, Philosophers' Imprint 25: 28. doi: doi.org/10.3998/phim...
Devin Sanchez Curry, (2025) “On IQ and other Sciencey Descriptions of Minds”, Philosophers' Imprint 25: 28. doi: doi.org/10.3998/phim...
On IQ and other Sciencey Descriptions of Minds
Philosophers of mind (from eliminative materialists to psychofunctionalists to interpretivists) generally assume that a normative ideal delimits which mental phenomena exist (though they disagree abou...
doi.org
October 27, 2025 at 6:33 PM
favorite thing I've written
Reposted by Evan Westra
There’s a deep difference between sentences like:
(1) Jane caused the glass to break.
vs.
(2) Jane broke the glass.
A surge of experimental philosophy research has led to some surprising discoveries about sentences like (2)
[Thread]
(1) Jane caused the glass to break.
vs.
(2) Jane broke the glass.
A surge of experimental philosophy research has led to some surprising discoveries about sentences like (2)
[Thread]
October 27, 2025 at 1:49 PM
There’s a deep difference between sentences like:
(1) Jane caused the glass to break.
vs.
(2) Jane broke the glass.
A surge of experimental philosophy research has led to some surprising discoveries about sentences like (2)
[Thread]
(1) Jane caused the glass to break.
vs.
(2) Jane broke the glass.
A surge of experimental philosophy research has led to some surprising discoveries about sentences like (2)
[Thread]
Swans will be swans!
Describe a character in Greek mythology the way someone trying to defend a politician would. I’ll start.
Oedipus: Like you’ve never had sex with someone and regretted it later
Oedipus: Like you’ve never had sex with someone and regretted it later
October 25, 2025 at 11:26 AM
Swans will be swans!
Reposted by Evan Westra
i'm always saying this
Ariana Grande will appear on the ‘Shut Up Evan’ podcast tomorrow at 10 AM ET.
October 23, 2025 at 9:54 PM
i'm always saying this
Reposted by Evan Westra
This Saturday, @okaydaniellle.bsky.social will be giving a talk during @ispsm.bsky.social's annual conference. The talk is part of a symposium on realism in neuroscience. Check out the ISPSM profile for a link to watch online 🧠
October 19, 2025 at 10:10 PM
This Saturday, @okaydaniellle.bsky.social will be giving a talk during @ispsm.bsky.social's annual conference. The talk is part of a symposium on realism in neuroscience. Check out the ISPSM profile for a link to watch online 🧠
Reposted by Evan Westra
As a Purdue grad, this is what I want to see!
October 18, 2025 at 11:21 PM
As a Purdue grad, this is what I want to see!
Reposted by Evan Westra
this rocks. when indiana edu killed the student newspaper, Purdue stepped up, printed the forbidden issue, drove it to Bloomington and stocked the boxes.
October 18, 2025 at 6:27 PM
this rocks. when indiana edu killed the student newspaper, Purdue stepped up, printed the forbidden issue, drove it to Bloomington and stocked the boxes.