The Department of Philosophy hosted a week-long conference on global comparative philosophy from December 4 to 7, 2023, featuring four distinguished speakers: Dr. Karin Meyers, Academic Director of the Mangalam Research Center in California; Dr. Jonardon Ganeri, Bimal K. Matilal Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at the University of Toronto; Dr. Lerato Posholi, SNSF Fellow at the Europainstitut, University of Basel; and Dr. Ralph Weber, Institute for European Global Studies, University of Basel.
As global profiteering businesses continue to aggravate the ecological crisis around the world, the need for mutual understanding and epistemic humility across cultures grows. Despite an almost century-long history of discourses on ‘cosmopolitanism’ and the ‘post-colonial rectification’ of the exoticization and homogenization of non-Western philosophical traditions, mutually instructive philosophical dialogue across cultures has only just begun.
Hawaiʻi is blessed with a profound host culture, an awe-inspiring natural environment, and strong ties to Asia and the Pacific. Drawing on these unique advantages, the conference provided a distinctive opportunity for cross-cultural collaboration and interdisciplinary research in the fullest sense of the word. The CALL Uehiro Program supported this event in collaboration with the Department of Philosophy. The four lectures delivered by the invited speakers have been published in Philosophy East and West, Volume 75, Number 1.