Evolution, cognition and developmental biology

Isabella Sarto-Jackson was part of a symposium with the title "Pushing the Boundaries: Neuroscience, Cognition, and Life" at the University of California, USA, speaking about "Epistemogenesis: Knowledge accumulation in biological systems". Luis Alejandro Villanueva presented on “Music as a relative stabilization of cognitive traits for social interaction” at the 4th Lisbon International Conference on Philosophy of Science in Portugal. He also shared his expertise on “Acoustic Affordances and Sociomaterial Niches” at the Philosophy and Mathematics of Situated Agency Conference at the University of Oulu, Finland and at the Multidisciplinary Avant Symposium, University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland. In June, Corey Bunce presented a talk at the 'Philosophy and Biology Shop Talks' (PaBST) meeting in North Carolina, USA on “Narrative as a form of sense-making in developmental biology research”. He also spoke at the 'International Society for the History, Philosophy and Social Studies of Biology' (ISHPSSB) conference in Toronto, Canada on “Narrative organization and autofictional elements in research articles in developmental biology”. Corey Bunce, Joyshree Chanam and Hari Sridhar attended a workshop together on “Methods in Philosophy of Science” at the University of Vienna, co-organised by KLI alumna Sophie Veigl.

Philosophy and Environmental history

Laura Menatti spoke about the relationship between health and environment in her talk “Pathogenic and salutogenic accounts of the environment in medicine. An interdisciplinary analysis at the crossroads of humanities and medical sciences” at the ‘Unruly Microbes – Epidemics, Infections, and Ecologies of Change in Historical Perspective’ Congress at Durham University. Joyshree Chanam is part of the ‘Oral History of Climate Change’ project, a collaboration between Newcastle University, the Centre for Public History, India, and the Archives at the National Centre for Biological Sciences, India. As part of this project, she went to Imphal, India, this summer to conduct oral history interviews on local and global events, and food and environmental changes, for example the vanishing of various indigenous rice varieties and fish species. Also researching environmental history is KLI alumna Jonathan Palmblad. At the European Society for Environmental History conference in Bern, Switzerland he presented "From Hills to Sea: The Regional Survey and the Usefulness of Environmental History." Hari Sridhar gave a talk about his work to students at Azim Premji University in Bangalore, India titled "Interrogating and Interpreting the Making of Ecological Knowledge and its Intersection with Conservation Practice".

Transdisciplinary sustainability science

Anna-Katharina Brenner presented on “Settlement patterns and their social drivers in Vienna over the past 34 years: Implications for sustainability transformations” at the ‘Deutscher Kongress für Geographie 2023’, in Frankfurt, Germany. Brenner also gave a talk on “How experiments with superblocks in Vienna shape climate and health outcomes and interact with the urban planning regime” at the 8th NEST conference ‘Re-imagining transitions: beyond established methods and concepts’ in Dresden, Germany. She was attending the NEST conference alongside fellow transdisciplinary sustainability researcher Marina Knickel presenting on "Researchers' perspectives on the impact of Living Labs for sustainability transitions in rural areas". Knickel also spoke at the ‘14th annual International Sustainability Transitions’ conference organized by the Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development in Utrecht, Netherlands about "A decade of Living Labs for sustainability transitions in European rural areas: Researchers' reflections on the Living Lab approach". Furthermore, she attended the Summer School on Justice in Transformative Research in Dresden, Germany organised by Leibniz Institute of Ecological Urban and Regional Development (IOER)  in cooperation with the Leibniz Research Network “Knowledge for Sustainable Development", where Guido Caniglia gave a talk on "Justice is in the details: beyond aspirations and towards commitment in transdisciplinary and transformative research”. At the Transformations Conference 2023 in Prague, Czech Republic, Guido Caniglia, Marina Knickel and Rebecca Freeth lead the Workshop "Navigating transformative change through practical wisdom: From personal to teams and organisations". At the First in-person meeting of the ‘Transatlantic Research Lab on Complex Societal Challenges’ at the Unversity of Continuing Education Krems, Guido Caniglia gave a talk on: "Social justice in a world of poli-crises".