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October 6, 2003
Press Contact: Allegra Young (512) 471-7330
World-Renowned Philosopher of Science To Be Visiting Professor This Spring
Larry Laudan to teach seminar on philosophical issues in evidence law
AUSTIN, Texas¡ªOne of the world¡¯s most eminent philosophers of science, Larry Laudan, will be a Visiting Professor at The University of Texas School of Law this spring, teaching a seminar on ¡°The Epistemology of Proof in the Law.¡± Professor Laudan, who is renowned for his philosophical work on the nature of evidence and proof in the natural sciences, has in recent years turned his attention to how proof works in the law. The seminar will examine how a variety of evidentiary rules and standards (beyond a reasonable doubt, probable cause, confession rules, exclusionary rules, etc.) fare epistemically, that is, in terms of their ability to promote the truth.
Professor Laudan presented some of his work on these topics to a workshop last spring for Law & Philosophy Program (LPP) faculty and students. His paper on ¡°Beyond a Reasonable Doubt¡± will soon be published in the Cambridge University Press journal Legal Theory, edited by LPP Director and UT Law Professor Brian Leiter.
¡°You can count on one hand the number of philosophers of science alive today whose work has been as influential and important as Laudan¡¯s,¡± notes Professor Leiter. ¡°It¡¯s a great boon for legal scholarship that he has turned his attention systematically to issues about evidence and proof, and a great opportunity for our students to learn about these topics from a scholar of unsurpassed authority to speak about them.¡±
Professor Laudan, who is currently a faculty member at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, was the founding chair of the History and Philosophy of Science Department at the University of Pittsburgh, which, thirty years later, is still the international leader in that field. His many seminal books include Progress and Its Problems (University of California Press and Routledge, 1977); Science and Hypothesis (D. Reidel, 1981); Science and Values (University of California Press, 1984); Science and Relativism (University of Chicago Press, 1990); and Beyond Positivism and Relativism (Westview Press, 1996). His books have been translated in to Chinese, French, Italian, Japanese, Russian, and Spanish.
Professor Laudan has also taught at University College London, Cambridge University, and the Universities of Hawaii, Illinois, Melbourne, Minnesota, and Rochester, and has been a member of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. He is Past President of the Pacific Division of the American Philosophical Association.
UT¡¯s Law & Philosophy Program is recognized as one of the three or four strongest programs of its kind in the nation. While moral and political philosophy have long been sources of insight for legal scholarship and study, UT¡¯s Program has led the way in also integrating developments in metaphysics, epistemology, and philosophy of language in to contemporary legal theory. ¡°This is the first time,¡± notes Professor Leiter, ¡°that a philosopher of distinction outside moral and political philosophy will be teaching in a U.S. law school. It is a development we expect other schools will soon emulate.¡±
For more information on the Law & Philosophy Program at Texas, see
http://www.utexas.edu/law/academics/curriculum/philosophy/.