KLI Colloquia are informal, public talks that are followed by extensive dissussions. Speakers are KLI fellows or visiting researchers who are interested in presenting their work to an interdisciplinary audience and discussing it in a wider research context. We offer three types of talks:
1. Current Research Talks. KLI fellows or visiting researchers present and discuss their most recent research with the KLI fellows and the Vienna scientific community.
2. Future Research Talks. Visiting researchers present and discuss future projects and ideas togehter with the KLI fellows and the Vienna scientific community.
3. Professional Developmental Talks. Experts about research grants and applications at the Austrian and European levels present career opportunities and strategies to late-PhD and post-doctoral researchers.
- The presentation language is English.
- If you are interested in presenting your current or future work at the KLI, please contact the Scientific Director or the Executive Manager.
Event Details
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/5881861923?omn=85945744831
Meeting ID: 588 186 1923
Topic description / abstract:
The Red Queen Hypothesis, put forward by biologist Leigh Van Valen in 1973, argues that fitness is not an achievement, but a process. Environments may always change, especially due to the influence of other organisms, and so what is fit today may not be fit tomorrow. Here, I discuss an epistemic analogue to this: that knowledge is also a process, i.e. that previously successful scientific theories or methods may stop being successful due to changes in the world that they study.
I explore and offer examples of three types of such change, with a particular focus on changes instigated by humans: i. activity which undermines previously successful scientific theories; ii. activity which reduces the reliability of scientific methods; and iii. activity which undermines the socio-ecological preconditions for science. In doing so, I draw connections between scientific activity, climate change, other anthropogenic crises, and ultimately between the original and the epistemic formulations of the Red Queen Hypothesis. I finish by exploring the implications of the Epistemic Red Queen Hypothesis, and suggesting that we should be concerned about the possible unproduction of knowledge, and the environmental impacts of scientific research.
Biographical note:
Elis Jones is a philosopher and sociologist focused on scientific practice and values in marine contexts. He is interested in using qualitative and conceptual methods to understand how values (in a broad sense) shape scientific activity, including the influence of personal, social and scientific ideals, but also the value attributed to specific entities, particularly living ones. His BA dissertation, a part of his degree in Politics, Philosophy and Economics, offered a non-anthropocentric definition of environmental damage (i.e. a way to define environmental damage which does not require the existence of humans). His MRes in Science and Technology Studies focused on human bioengineering of corals. His PhD, based at Exeter University’s Egenis Centre, focused on the value attributed to coral reefs by scientists. This work was empirical and conceptual: he interviewed coral scientists and qualitatively analysed interview data alongside scientific literature. The result was a thesis looking at key issues in coral science related to reef value: how ecological baselines (depictions of ‘normal’ or ‘healthy’ reefs) are produced; how intrinsic, instrumental and non-human forms of value interact and are incorporated into scientific activities; and how coral science itself is increasingly evaluated according to the socio-ecological conditions it produces and perpetuates. After finishing his PhD he undertook at short project embedded in a marine biogeochemistry lab (the Betrand Lab at Dalhousie University in Canada), where he explored the concepts underlying the rapidly developing field of marine biogeochemistry, which involves the study of microbes and how they move chemical elements around in the ocean. His postdoctoral work focuses on the ecological, scientific and economic value of marine ecosystems.
His work is interdisciplinary and engaged, borrowing from philosophy, sociology, science and technology studies (STS), economics, ecology, and biogeochemistry. He has worked closely with scientists and engaged with the public, by organising, attending and speaking at events with marine and social scientists, philosophers, arts and humanities scholars, the general public, and school children. More recently, he has co-organised an international workshop, research network, podcast (titled ‘Values at Sea’), and an edited journal volume to foster closer dialogues between STS, philosophy, and marine science.
