The Philosophers' Cocoon

A safe and supportive forum for philosophers.

Owned & Moderated by Marcus Arvan (University of Tampa)

Contact: marvan@ut.edu

Blog mission & moderation policy

IMPORTANT NOTE on how to ensure anonymity in commenting
Job-Market Reporting Thread (2025-26)
Job-Market Discussion Thread (2025-26)

recent posts

about

Particularly good philosophy conferences?

In most recent "how can we help you?" thread, a reader asks:

There is plenty of information about good philosophy journals, including Leiter's rankings. But I'm curious to know what people think about philosophy conferences.

So my question is: which philosophy conferences do you consider good? The evaluation could be based on prestige, quality of feedback, etc. They can also be either "generalist" or "specialist".

For example, I expect the Joint Session and the APA Meetings to be good "generalist" conferences, and Euro X-Phi to be a good "specialist" conference in experimental philosophy.

What do readers think?

Posted in

12 responses to “Particularly good philosophy conferences?”

  1. been to all sorts of conferences

    I don’t fully understand the generalist-specialist distinction, but in my opinion, the APA isn’t the best conference—especially if you’re focused on non-western philosophy. From what I’ve seen, people typically attend the APA for networking. However, if you’re looking for a solid Q&A session and insightful feedback from people who are really familiar with your area and can offer thoughtful comments on your paper, I’d recommend attending conferences that are specifically focused on your field.

    Reply
  2. B

    The PSA and BSPS conferences are very good, the EPSA ones are good, and the LM&PS conferences are very enjoyable though the quality of papers at the latter are uneven. These are all important conferences in philosophy of science.

    Reply
  3. Assistant Prof

    Some conferences on M&E topics (many primarily normative) with a good reputation for quality:
    Chapel Hill Normativity Workshop, FEW, MadMeta, NUSTEP, Ranch Metaphysics, ROME, Rutgers Epistemology Conference, SLACRR, …
    Probably many more that I haven’t listed.

    Reply
  4. CJ

    This may not be what the OP has in mind, but if by “good” is meant (at least partly), “looks good on a C.V.”, then I don’t consider any conferences good or bad. What conferences you have, or have not, presented at would have no impact on my assessment of a job candidate. The main reason for this is that whether you can attend conferences in impacted by things such as institutional funding and parenting / caring commitments. I’m not bothered whether or not you’ve attended conferences, although other people may well be. (As I say, this may not be what the OP has in mind, so ignore this comment if so!).

    Reply
  5. T

    The society for applied philosophy conference (which takes place annually in a different city in Europe) is fantastic, great opera, great people, great organizers.

    Reply
  6. T

    *Papers not opera

    Reply
  7. Dan Weiskopf

    I’d be far more inclined to go to conferences if more of them featured good opera.
    Anyway, the Society for Philosophy and Psychology, Southern Society for Philosophy and Psychology (an older and distinct organization), Deep South Philosophy and Neuroscience Workgroup, and the brand new Society for Philosophy and Neuroscience are all good places to talk to people in philosophy of psychology and neuroscience. PSA can be good for this as well, but it’s got all the drawbacks that huge conferences do.
    To be clear, by “good” I mean that the talks will be relatively interesting, the Q&A sessions collegial and helpful, and the attendees diverse in terms of career stage and institutional affiliation. I have no idea whether they will “look good” on a CV, and I encourage you not to care either.

    Reply
  8. Kevin Timpe

    NASSP has an excellent vibe. Papers are early stage rather than final polishing before submitting, which is great because the point of all the comments is to help the project get better. A really wonderful atmosphere and a number of friendships have developed out of it.

    Reply
  9. Niles Crane

    The APA isn’t a very good conference even if you work on mainstream, analytic philosophy. Good philosophers will be there. Some of them will be presenting good work. But the quality of the work presented is really inconsistent. Everyone is also kind of pissed off and tired of all the handshakes. Everyone thinks everyone else is missing the point as well. If you presented a paper, you think the audience missed the point of the paper. If you were in the audience, you think the speaker missed the point of the question. So the kind of networking that takes place often takes the form of mutual aggravation.
    I tend to prefer little ad hoc workshops with half a dozen to a dozen people. When you go to those you talk to the same people you see at the APA, but they’re in a better mood and you can have an extended conversation over coffee instead of trying to cram a complicated discussion into the Q&A and testing the chair’s patience.

    Reply
  10. Mike Titelbaum

    To me, it’s hard to generalize about the APA conferences because they each have a different vibe. I always find the Pacific overwhelming, with tons of people and many things I want to see at once. The Central, on the other hand, is much smaller and more intimate, and I tend to see the same group of people in multiple sessions. So if you have the opportunity, maybe try out different APAs to see if any is to your liking?

    Reply
  11. B

    Philosophers of science should also consider the SPSP conferences (Society for the Philosophy of Science in Practice). These are a good place for those who do work closer to the actual practice of science. they also bring together philosophers from North America and UK-Europe.
    About the APA conferences … I used to enjoy attending the Pacific division meetings in particular. I was working at a state university in the north east, and it was nice to get a chance to (re)connect with people on that side of the country. Further, I also appreciated the change of weather.

    Reply
  12. Hand Grenade

    The PPE Society is a really great conference for value theory!

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Discover more from The Philosophers' Cocoon

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Continue reading