A few moments after birth we begin to use our lungs for the first time. From then on, we must continue breathing for as long as we are alive. And although this mostly happens unconsciously, in a society plagued by anxiety, climate change, environmental racism, and illness, there are more and more instances that “teach us about the privilege that is breathing.”

Europe isn’t doing very well. Its economies are stagnating, its population is aging, and its politics is increasingly being pulled by forces that in the 20th century nearly tore the continent apart. Is this just a rough patch in Europe’s history, triggered by contingent events, or are we witnessing the beginning of what Oswald Spengler, an early 20th century prophet of western cultural decline, coined “The Decline of the West”?

Machine learning algorithms are transforming the ethics and politics of contemporary society. Algorithms can be conceptualized as ethico-political entities entangled with the data attributes of people, that give incomplete accounts of themselves, learn through relations with human practices, and exist in ways that exceed their source code.

In this event, Kathleen Higgins and Kate Warlow-Corcoran will reflect on the ways aesthetics aids people experiencing loss. Some practices related to bereavement, such as funerals, are scripted, but many others are recursive, improvisational, mundane—telling stories, listening to music, and reflecting on art or literature.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is everywhere, yet it causes damage to society in ways that can’t be fixed. Instead of helping to address our current crises, AI causes divisions that limit people’s life chances, and even suggests fascistic solutions to social problems.

Romanticism is often reduced to nostalgic pastoralism and solitary contemplation of the sublime. But a radical strand of Romantic writers and thinkers offered sweeping political, ecological, and religious critiques of capitalism, racism, settler colonialism, and environmental destruction.

This event will focus on the historical marginalisation of women and women's writing in philosophy and science. Three experts in women's writing in philosophy and science - both past and present - will discuss how and why women were marginalised and excluded from these disciplines, challenges and obstacles faced by those taking on the task of recovering women's work, and the vital importance of developing historical narratives centering on women.