Event Dates: 11-15 March 2013
Event Location: Lisbon, Portugal
Event URL: http://evolutionschool.fc.ul.pt

We are happy to inform you that registration is now open for the 1st International Winter School on Evolution.  Courses are open to international Master, PhD and Post-doctoral students in the exact, life, human and sociocultural evolutionary sciences.
 
ABOUT THE COURSES
 
From Monday to Friday, parallel sessions are organized whereby visiting staff provide a 10-hour course (2 hours a day) on critical aspects of biological and sociocultural evolution. The courses are centered around the following modules.
 
MODULE 1: MACROEVOLUTON AND THE MAJOR EVOLUTIONARY TRANSITIONS
Courses are taught by: Bruce Lieberman, Folmer Bokma, Eörs Szathmáry.
 
MODULE 2: LANGUAGE EVOLUTION
Courses are taught by William Croft, Mónica Tamariz, Daniel Dor.
 
MODULE 3: SYMBIOGENESIS, LATERAL GENE TRANSFER AND VIROLUTION
Courses are taught by Douglas Zook, William Martin, Michael Arnold.
 
All courses are taught at a level accessible to Master, PhD and post-doctoral students in the exact, life, human and sociocultural evolutionary sciences. Students of evolutionary biology, microbiology, paleontology, evolutionary linguistics, evolutionary anthropology, and philosophy of biology will especially benefit from these courses.
 
Students will be provided a mandatory reading list which will form the basis of lectures and discussions. There are neither examinations nor paper assignments.
 
REGISTRATION FEE
 
350 euro for the whole week, regardless the number of courses you choose.
 
HOW TO ENROLL
 
You can enroll for a specific module (therefore following a 30-hour course on the subject) or you may choose three courses of your specific interest.
Places are limited, we therefore advise you to enroll as quickly as possible.
 
ABOUT THE WINTER SCHOOL
 
The School is organized by the Applied Evolutionary Epistemology Lab of the Centre for Philosophy of Science of the Faculty of Science of the University of Lisbon, in collaboration with Ciência Viva and with the support of the John Templeton Foundation.
 
DOWNLOAD OUR POSTER
 
http://evolutionschool.fc.ul.pt/winter/docs/winter.pdf  
 
SUBSCRIBE TO THE WINTER SCHOOL MAILINGLIST
 
http://eepurl.com/n2ELH  
 
FURTHER INFORMATION
 
http://evolutionschool.fc.ul.pt, http://appeel.fc.ul.pt   

Call deadline: 30 December 2012
Event Dates: 28-30 May 2013
Event Location: Leuven, Belgium
Event URL: http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.science.philosophy.region.europe/846

The Institute of Philosophy of the University of Leuven is pleased to announce a call for abstracts for its conference on: 

Cultural evolution, philosophy and the emotions



About the conference:
The past decades have witnessed a proliferation of evolutionary theories on culture and cultural capacities. In general, evolutionary theories of culture have been rather well received in the philosophical literature. However, a number of important philosophical issues concerning this theory remain largely unsettled. This focused conference aims to address some of these issues by examining how gene-culture co-evolutionary theories can explain human emotions – a topic that has been of special importance for more narrow evolutionary approaches, such as evolutionary psychology. 

Below are some of the kinds of questions that we hope will be discussed in the course of the conference. The list is not exhaustive, but should be read as a list of suggestions: 

1. What role do emotions play in cultural evolution? 
2. Which human emotions are socially transmitted? 
3. Which aspects of emotions are socially transmitted? 
4. Can gene-culture co-evolutionary theory offer a plausible account of culture-bound syndromes? 
5. How can cultural evolutionary theories contribute to a more profound evolutionary understanding of basic emotions? 
6. Why have emotions been neglected by cultural evolutionists? 
7. Do some cultural variants spread because they solve emotional problems? 
8. Is emotional contagion a key factor for human cooperation? 
9. Has shame/disgust/fear been culturally exapted to solve modern adaptive problems? 
10. Can gene-culture co-evolutionary theories bring us any closer to a unified theory of the emotions? 

Invited speakers:
Peter J. Richerson (UC Davis), Daniel Kelly (Purdue University), Grant Ramsey (University of Notre Dame), Lesley Newson (UC Davis), Tim Lewens (Cambridge University), Stefan Linquist (University of Guelph), Stefano Ghirlanda (CUNY), and Murray Smith (University of Kent). 

Information for submissions:
Send an abstract of c. 500 words to andreas.deblock@... before December 31, 2012. You will be notified of acceptance before January 22, 2013. Please note that this will be a pre-read conference, so there is also a final paper submission deadline on April 25, 2013. The final paper should not be longer than 7000 words. We are able, on certain conditions, to offset the costs of travel for a limited number of graduate students. Please check with the organizers if you are interested. 

Publication:
We intend to publish most of the papers presented at the conference in an edited volume or a special issue. We will aim high when looking for a publisher. Please note, however, that all papers will have to go through the usual process of peer review, and that the publication of your paper cannot be guaranteed. 

Organization:
Organizers are Andreas De Block, Pieter R. Adriaens and Helen De Cruz. The meeting is part of a research project about the historical and evolutionary roots of homophobia (‘Homophobia and cultural evolution: A Philosophical approach’), and is sponsored by the Research Foundation Flanders (FWO-Vlaanderen), the Human Evolution and Behavior Network (HEBEN), and the Institute of Philosophy (HIW, University of Leuven).

Call deadline: 1 February 2013
Event Dates: 17-19 May 2013
Event Location: Lisbon, Portugal
Event URL: http://evolutionarypatterns.fc.ul.pt/sub/cfa/cfa.html

We call for bioinformaticians, evolutionary biologists, microbiologists, paleontologists, geologists, physicists, mathematicians, anthropologists, archeologists, linguists, sociologists, economists, and philosophers and historians of science to provide talks on the following topics:

1. Conceptualization, quantification and modeling of horizontal and vertical transmission in biological and sociocultural sciences
   • Bioinformatic approaches in biology, paleontology, anthropology, archeology, linguistics, sociology, and economics. These approaches can include: phylogenetics, phylogenomics, complex network based models, mathematical and statistical (computer) simulations, imaging techniques, (multi-)agent models, Complex Adaptive Systems approaches, …
   • Tree versus network diagrams
   • Mechanisms of horizontal and/or vertical transmission
   • Parallels and differences between biological and sociocultural trait transmission and inter-individual interactions
2. Conceptualization, quantification and modeling of micro- and macroevolution in biological and sociocultural sciences
   • Mechanisms of biological and/or sociocultural micro- and macroevolution
   •  Modes of biological and/or sociocultural micro- and macroevolution
   • Tempos of biological and/or sociocultural micro- and macroevolution
   •  (Meta-)Patterns of evolution
   • Parallels and differences between biological and sociocultural micro- and macroevolution
3. Hierarchy theory and the units, levels and mechanisms of evolution
   • Units of biological and/or sociocultural evolution
   • Levels of biological and/or sociocultural evolution, multilevel selection theories
   • Mechanisms of biological and sociocultural evolution
   • (Nested) Hierarchy theory
   • Emergence
   • Upward and downward causation
4. How the universal application of evolutionary theories enables new possibilities for inter- and transdisciplinary research and the unification of the sciences
   • The need for an Extended Synthesis
   • Universal Darwinism, Universal Selectionism
   • The universality of symbiogenesis, reticulate evolution, hybridization, drift, patterns of punctuated equilibria, the ratchet effect, the Baldwin effect, …
   • (Applied) Evolutionary Epistemology
   • Unification of the sciences through shared research frameworks, methodologies, modeling techniques
   • Philosophical analyses and historical accounts on attempts to unify the biological and the sociocultural sciences based upon evolutionary theory

We encourage submissions of (1) concrete models and simulations, (2) theoretical, reflexive talks, and (3) historical accounts on any of the above mentioned topics.

Please see the conference website for submission details.