Another year, another Utrecht HPS group photo (credit: Harold van de Kamp)

Happening this Wednesday

The recording of the UPAC colloquium speaker session on December 2nd, in which Marta Pedroni (University of Geneva) gave a talk titled "Singularity Resolution in Loop Quantum Gravity", has just been uploaded! youtu.be/noh_rdUSRh4?...

Beautifully illustrated science communication piece on black hole imaging, by Peter Galison et al. (Best viewed on a laptop/tablet.) planetaryvision.antikythera.org

Open access collected volume on the conceptual distinction between spacetime and matter to appear in the summer of 2027 with Cambridge University Press www.uu.nl/en/research/...

Prof Chris Smeenk (Western Uni, London Ontario) will be giving the 2025 Beth Lecture, presenting his upcoming book with @jamesowenweatherall.com on the aim and structure of cosmological theory. 10 Dec 2025, Academiegebouw Utrecht, 19:30-21:00, followed by reception. hpp-nl.nl/events/beth2...

Ik heb afgelopen paar jaar veel verbreding gevonden in onderwijs. Bij @utrechthps.bsky.social kon ik tussen 2022 en 2024 twee jaar werken aan onderwijs over de geschiedenis en filosofie van de Aard- en klimaatwetenschappen, waarmee mijn proefschrift een hele brede context kreeg. 1/

Beth Lecture 2025 by Prof Chris Smeenk, on closing the loop on inflation hpp-nl.nl/events/beth2...

New preprint on dark matter epistemology, by Niels Martens

Cool stuff happening tomorrow! And you can even join online

Join this proposal for an exciting collected volume with CUP. All open access fees would be covered.

HPS researchers Diana Taschetto and Stefano Furlan discuss Bohr, Wheeler, and the history of quantum mechanics at the Descartes Colloquium tomorrow (23 Sept 2025, 15h30-17h00). For more information, visit: www.uu.nl/en/events/de...

The final day of the Utrecht Philosophy of Astronomy and Cosmology Conference is upon us

What can philosophy do for astronomy and cosmology, and vice versa? Panel happening right now in Utrecht www.uu.nl/en/research/...

Ruward Mulder summarising the divide of responses to Reichenbach on universal forces

And so it begins. The Spacetime Matters conference in Utrecht www.uu.nl/en/research/...

On the 12th of September we'll be traveling up north for a dose of history and philosophy of physics: hpp-nl.nl/6th-hpp-nl-w...

Looking for some fun and short reads for over the holiday? Why not follow @shellsandpebbles.bsky.social on Bluesky, our long-running blog on interesting finds in the history of science!

Happening in Utrecht

Final call for registration: conference on the conceptual distinction between spacetime and matter Registration deadline: 10th of July www.uu.nl/en/research/...

Yet another inspiring New Directions in Foundations of Physics conference concluded. For the second time in the gorgeous Logar Valley, Slovenia

Exciting workshop coming up in South Africa, co-organised by our "Microbiome research and race in the Local South" team

Exciting days with awesome colleagues 💕🌱🐬 #PhilSci @utrechtuniversity.bsky.social @utrechthps.bsky.social

Such fun and intense two days at the Spring School "Forms of Knowledge and Values in Science and Society" @utrechtuniversity.bsky.social @utrechthps.bsky.social

The topic of this monday's Nijmegen Science Cafe will be Dark Matter, with Flavia Dias, Bas Zoutendijk & Niels Martens @eu-phil-cosmo.bsky.social www.sciencecafenijmegen.nl/actueel/2025...

Foundations of Astronomy, Astrophysics and Cosmology Conference happening in Utrecht in September

Happy and proud to announce that the 17th History of Recent Economics Conference will happen at Radboud University, 23-24 October 2025! hisreco.wordpress.com/2023/06/21/c...

We are so happy to have @luciacneco.bsky.social with us at the HPS program @utrechthps.bsky.social Today presenting "Rethinking Race in Microbiome Research: A Social Systems Approach" at the Descartes Colloquium @utrechtuniversity.bsky.social #hps #philbio 🐋🌱

Today we strike against the budget cuts to Dutch education🌱🐳 #hps

PhD position in philosophy of quantum cosmology (Amsterdam)

Should we move beyond viewing space(time) as a container, and matter as that what's inside the container? Come find out at our Spacetime Matters conference. www.uu.nl/en/research/...

For the next UPAC colloquium speaker session (04 Mar 2025, 15h30-17h00), we will be hosting Jonathan Fay (University of Bristol), who will give a talk on Historical proposals for a Machian unification of gravity and inertia. For more information, visit: www.uu.nl/en/research/...

Today in our course on the philosophy of space and time: subsystems with opposite arrows of time interacting; does a lone champagne bottle in an empty universe pop or unpop?; and Ken Wharton's tragic scifi love story on retrocausation www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6rV...

Hello! I am Elian Schure, happy to be part of the Microbiome research and race in the ‘Local South’ project! #hpbio #philbio I am especially interested in the interaction between colonialism and the life sciences 🪴 Outside of work, I run two book clubs and like picnicking in the park! 🌳

Mega conference alert! Two back-to-back conferences happening in Utrecht, 1) Spacetime Matters, and 2) the Utrecht Philosophy of Astronomy and Cosmology Conference @eu-phil-cosmo.bsky.social, straight after #EPSA Groningen www.uu.nl/en/research/... www.uu.nl/en/research/...

The next installment of the History & Philosophy of Physics in the Netherlands workshop series will be organised by our neighbours in Amsterdam hpp-nl.nl/events/5th-h...

We are excited to announce that four of the recordings of the 2024 UPAC workshop on the Philosophy of Black Holes are now live on the UPAC YouTube channel! Check them out, and stay tuned for other colloquia coming soon!

The registration lines for the Master’s Open Day at Utrecht University just opened! On Friday 7 February more than 150 programmes will give a presentation! Register in the following link: start.uu.nl/form/registr...

A new paper from Luca Forgiarini titled “Unstable Bonds: CERN’s Relations with Its Peripheral Member States, 1950s–1960s” has been published in the JEIH Journal of European Integration History. nomos-elibrary.de/10.5771/0947...

Echoing Hilbert, James Read is settling for once and for all what the 23 most important problems in philosophy of physics are #rcnp2025

Looking forward to figuring out next Monday whether dark energy is a constant of nature, a form of matter, a modification of gravity/ spacetime, or all at the same time

History and philosophy of physics is flourishing in the Netherlands 🇳🇱🤎 hpp-nl.nl

And the final "superhero" is another member of the Utrecht crew, Jos Uffink

Moving on to the second "superhero" on the schedule, our own Dennis Dieks

Let the fun begin.

Utrecht HPS group pic

New conceptual psychiatry paper by Toine Pieters and colleagues just dropped, on developing a translational research framework for Major Depressive Disorder www.frontiersin.org/journals/psy...

I have a lot of constructive criticism for my employer, but the university is on its way to doing some things well, like a (small) paid leave of absence for those who transition.

All info about history & philosophy of physics in the Netherlands (courses, events, scholars) is now conveniently available in one place: hpp-nl.nl @rcnp-nijmegen.bsky.social @isis-radboud.bsky.social @sjangtenhagen.bsky.social @eu-phil-cosmo.bsky.social @leviatan.bsky.social @rbwille.bsky.social

Say hi to our neighbours from Nijmegen who just joined Bluesky: the Radboud Centre for Natural Philosophy @rcnp-nijmegen.bsky.social