About

Welcome to the home of Grounding and Metaphysical Explanation.

On this website you will find details of all our Work-in-Progress and Workshop events.

Aims

Grounding and Metaphysical Explanation is a group for philosophers interested in issues of grounding and metaphysical explanation. It is run by Will Moorfoot and James Ross, of the University of Southampton. Will works on contingentist formulations of ground physicalism. James works on the relationship between grounding and causation.

The Work-in-Progress arm of Grounding and Metaphysical Explanation was set up in September 2022. The aim was—and still is—to host speakers presenting their unfinished papers. Six 1.5-hour sessions take place fortnightly across each semester. Typically, a 45-minute presentation is followed by questions and discussion.

The first Grounding and Metaphysical Explanation Workshop was held at the University of Southampton in June 2023 with the aim of bringing together experts on grounding and metaphysical explanation from around the world. Keep your eyes peeled for the announcement of our 2024 Workshop.

Joining

You can register to join the group here.

The group is particularly aimed at academics and postgraduate researchers. However, please do still contact us if you are interested in joining and do not meet these criteria (our contact details are below).

Presenting

If you are interested in presenting, either at one of the Work-in-Progress sessions or at the Workshop, please send an abstract of no more than 500 words to James and Will at GandMEphilosophy@gmail.com. And keep an eye out for calls for abstracts.

Themes

We are happy to interpret the theme of grounding and metaphysical explanation broadly. However, we particularly welcome work in the following areas:

• Pure work on the metaphysics or logic of grounding and metaphysical explanation.
• Applications of grounding and metaphysical explanation to areas such as ethics, philosophy of mind, wider issues in metaphysics, philosophy of science, social ontology, and philosophy of mathematics.
• More historically-minded approaches.

Contact