Past Seminars 2024
Thursday 24 October
HPS PhD Candidates Confirmation Seminars
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​Carl Sciglitano
From Glass to Pixels: The Shaping of Astronomical Practices in the Transition to Digital Photography
Many people who talk about the transition from analogue to digital photography label it a "Revolution" and remark on how quickly it all happened. However, it took 30 years for the digital camera to be embedded in most observatories, and even today, some astronomers still use glass photographic plates as part of their research. So what really did change? A lot has been written about the digital technology itself, but very little is understood about how it affected the people using it. My research looks at this transition from a material perspective, exploring the ways the new technology shaped astronomer's daily work, the practical experience of their jobs, their routines, and their epistemology.
Carl Joseph Sciglitano is a current PhD student in the School of Historical and Philosophical Studies at the University of Melbourne. After completing his Master's degree in Science (Astronomy) at Swinburne University in 2018, Carl became interested in the relationship between scientists and technology. He completed his Advanced Diploma in Arts (HPS) in 2023.
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Aseera Shamin
Powering Equitable Futures: A Cross-National Study into the Intersections of Environmental Justice, Citizen Science and Just Transitions
While the need to transition to renewable energy sources is widely accepted to be crucial in the face of the global climate crisis, it is equally important to ensure such a transition takes place in an equitable and just manner. My work extends on the research trajectory established by Benjamin Sovacool, highlighting the necessity of transformative and intersectional research that pluralises energy justice both methodologically, through the use of human-centered methods of data collection, and conceptually, by including more intersectional understandings of justice. Existing frameworks of energy justice demonstrate Western-centric notions of ethics, embedded with patriarchal, colonial, and racial legacies. I propose a conceptual framework to rethink the various constituents of energy justice from local community perspectives. Through this, justice is reconfigured from an analytical tool to a set of criteria that can actively shape decision-making. This approach would foster a more inclusive and equitable understanding of renewable energy’s societal impacts through a democratic negotiation of rights and risks. Distinct case studies from Victoria, Australia, and Tamilnadu, India will be examined to illustrate the complexities in characterising the concept of energy justice as a whole. How intersectional issues - such as indigenous, feminist, and postcolonial perspectives - affect the siting of utility-scale wind, solar, and biomass projects is the subject of focus. Ultimately, this research aims to complicate present energy justice frameworks, ensuring that diverse voices are prioritised in the transition toward sustainable energy systems.
Aseera Shamin is a first-year PhD researcher in History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Melbourne and is part of the Melbourne Climate Futures Academy. Aseera's thesis aims to disentangle the relationship between energy justice, power, and social dynamics in renewable energy production in localised contexts by considering both upstream and downstream siting of clean energy projects. She holds a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) in Global Studies, minoring in Political Science and Sociology from the National University of Singapore, and a Master of Environment (Climate Change) from the University of Melbourne.
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Thomas Spiteri
Knowing the Mind Through Its Ailments: A History and Philosophy of Cases in the Psy-Sciences
The use of cases as a scientific approach for generating knowledge has been re-evaluated by historians and philosophers of science since John Forrester's (1993) suggestion that it was overlooked in Hacking's scientific "styles project" (2002). Following this, some philosophers have sought to articulate the epistemic value of the case method (see Morgan, 2010; 2020). However, the broader scholarship in the history and philosophy of science has largely neglected to provide examples or analyse how the case method has contributed to psychological knowledge.
This research positions the case method as a vital "style" of scientific inquiry within the history of psychology’s knowledge base. It is motivated by discussions surrounding the replication crisis, particularly Feest’s (2019) claim that the inability to replicate certain psychological findings should be expected, given the complexity of the mind and the intricate relationship researchers have with it. Such characterisations reveal the limitations of psychology's preferred quantitative methods, suggesting that alternative approaches, like the case method, warrant a more thorough reconsideration as legitimate means for discovery, concept generation, understanding and explanation.
Focusing on the case method's contributions to memory studies, this research will examine Freud and Breuer's (1895) interdisciplinary impact through their conceptualisation of “repression.” They utilised the case method not only as a “site of evidence” for their phenomenon but also as a broader framework for understanding the nature of the psyche and their discipline. This talk will look into the dynamics of the case and its components, addressing what constitutes a case—specifically, the data related to the object and the underlying assumptions necessary for knowledge to emerge. By doing so, it aims to help clarify the epistemic functions of cases, exploring the kind of epistemic power they possess and the rationale behind this methodological preference in contrast to qualitative methods.
Thomas Spiteri is a PhD candidate in the History and Philosophy of Science program. His research interests are in the history and philosophy of the human sciences. His thesis explores the ways in which knowledge about the mind is generated from case studies in the "psy" disciplines – i.e., psychiatry, psychology and psychoanalysis – and is interested in the preconditions that allow for certain epistemic activities and claims to be made possible.
Thursday 17 October
Errors & Misconduct in Biomedical Research
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Elizabeh Bik
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​Even after peer-review and publication, science papers could still contain images or other data of concern. If not addressed post-publication, papers containing incorrect or even falsified data could lead to wasted time and money spent by other researchers trying to reproduce those results. Several high-profile science misconduct cases have been described, but many more cases remain undetected.
Elisabeth Bik is an image forensics detective who left her paid job in industry to search for and report biomedical articles that contain errors or data of concern. She has done a systematic scan of 20,000 papers in 40 journals and found that about 4% of these contained inappropriately duplicated images. In her talk, she will present her work and show several types of inappropriately duplicated images and other examples of errors or research misconduct. In addition, she will show how to report scientific papers of concern, and how journals and institutions handle such allegations. Finally, she will address the growing problems of 'paper mills', for-profit networks that produce and sell large amounts of low-quality or fake papers
Wednesday 9 October
Toxic Legacies in Broken Hill
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Lilian Pearce (La Trobe)
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Lead has been mined in Broken Hill since 1884, and the health risks to miners and their families have been understood for almost as long. A series of reports beginning in 1893 and a Royal Commission in 1914 outlined the prevalence and paths to prevention of lead poisoning, though subsequent behaviour change was limited. Today, lead exposure still forms a ‘public health problem of global dimensions’, impacting human and non-human life. This paper presents a history of the ways in which lead has been mobilised, responded to, and permitted in Broken Hill. It articulates the experiences of those living in relationship with enduring environmental toxicity and explores the ways in which the mining industry has repeatedly abdicated responsibility, and governments have normalised risk. Settler-colonial ideas of progress and profit work to permit ongoing violence, violence which is distributed unevenly across lines of race, class, age and gender. This work contributes to urgently needed research on health and justice in mining communities, to care for those impacted, and to inform more equitable transitions.
Dr Lilian Pearce is an award-winning environmental humanities scholar working across fields of environmental history, human geography and political ecology. She is a lecturer in environmental humanities at La Trobe University’s Centre for the Study of the Inland. Her interdisciplinary place-based research focuses on two key areas: Environmental histories of contaminated sites, and Environmental policy to support healthy Country and communities. She holds a Bachelor of Science with honours (UTAS) and a PhD in environmental history (ANU).
Wednesday 2 October
Playing with paper dolls: the evolution of cancer cytogenetics as a clinical laboratory science
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Lynda Campbell (HPS Melbourne)
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n 1972, Janet Rowley, mother of four boys and part-time researcher at the University of Chicago, was sitting one evening at her dining room table cutting out chromosomes from photographs taken of leukaemia cells. She arranged the chromosomes in pairs and noticed that two of them seemed to have exchanged parts of their long arms, forming a translocation. She had to admonish her boys not to upset the table; they referred to her occupation as their mother “… playing with paper dolls.” Rowley had identified a critical step in the development of leukaemia. And she had done it from home on her dining room table.
Cancer cytogenetics, the study of chromosomes within cancer cells, can be traced back to 1960. It developed in parallel with molecular biology and yet it was never seen as worthy of much interest. Molecular biologists, in particular, regarded it as lesser. Cytogeneticists were labelled merely “stamp-collectors.” And with every new molecular biological technical advance, came the assumption that cytogenetics would be superseded. It was an observational science in the era of experimentation and so regarded as old-fashioned and “unscientific.” It was also practiced for the most part by women.
I will explore the evolution of the techniques, taxonomy and discoveries that created the discipline of cancer cytogenetics and the roles played by women in that evolution.
Lynda Campbell is a graduate student in the School of Historical and Philosophical Studies at the University of Melbourne. She graduated from the University of Melbourne MB BS in 1977 and after training as a haematologist headed the Victorian Cancer Cytogenetics Service at St Vincent’s Hospital Melbourne until her retirement in 2015. She obtained a Diploma of the History of Medicine from the Worshipful Society of Apothecaries of London in 2016.
Wednesday 11 Sept
Microbial Determinism
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Zeb Jamrozik (Oxford/ Monash)
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Microbial determinism is the view that infectious diseases and/or or epidemics are primarily (or wholly) caused–or “determined”--by microbes. This is analogous to genetic determinism, the view that human characteristics (phenotypes) are primarily (or wholly) caused–or “determined”– by genes (genotypes). In this paper I argue that, like genetic determinism, microbial determinism is false, ubiquitous, and ethically problematic. Microbial determinism is false because infectious diseases and epidemics are always caused by interactions between host factors (e.g., the properties of human beings infected by microbes), social factors, environmental factors, and microbial factors. Among other things, this can be illustrated by the fact that similar microbes are associated with widely divergent outcomes in different individuals, populations, or seasons. Yet deterministic language about microbes is ubiquitous, such as when people speak of a “deadly” virus although most people infected with the virus survive. Microbial determinism can therefore lead to unjustified privileging of (the causal power of) the properties of microbes over the properties of the hosts, societies, and environments in which infections occur. In this paper, I explore microbial determinism by identifying central doctrines of germ theory that contribute to deterministic concepts of infectious disease and considering alternative views. I then discuss practical implications and identify areas for additional scientific and philosophical work on the interactions between microbes and other factors associated with infectious diseases.
Euzebiusz (Zeb) Jamrozik trained in medicine, epidemiology, and philosophy. His research primarily focuses on philosophical and ethical issues related to infectious diseases. Current appointments include a fellowship at the Ethox Centre, University of Oxford, as well as honorary appointments at University of Melbourne and Monash University. He is co-editor-in-chief of Monash Bioethics Review.