Current Position

• Assistant Professor, San Francisco State University

Education

• 2000-04 : Ph.D in Epistemology. Thesis title : "Reality without Representation, the enactive theory of of cognition and its epistemological legitimacy" (in French).
  Thesis advisor : Michel Bitbol.
  Distinction : Highest honors, Sorbonne Paris 1 and Ecole Polytechnique (Centre de Recherche en Epistémologie Appliquée), Paris.
• 1998-99: M.A. in History and Philosophy of Science. Thesis title: "From Connectionism to Enaction: Emergence of Knowledge" (in French).
  Distinction : High honors, Sorbonne, Paris 1.
• 1996-98: B.A. Thesis title: "Feyerabend’s relativism" (in French)
  Distinction: High honors, Sorbonne, Paris 1.

• 1992-95: Ph.D in Fluid Mechanics. Thesis title: "From the oscillator to coupled wakes" (in French)
  Thesis advisor: Patrice Le Gal.
  Distinction: Highest honors, Institut de Recherche sur les Phénomènes Hors Equilibre, University of Aix-Marseille.
• 1991-92: M.Sc. in Fluid Mechanics. Thesis title: "Stability analysis of two coupled Hopf bifurcations" (in French)
  Distinction: Honors, Institut de Mécanique de Marseille, Université d'Aix-Marseille.
• 1986-90: B.Sc. in Fluid Mechanics Institut de Mécanique de Marseille, Université d'Aix-Marseille.

Professional Activities

• 2008- : Assistant Professor in Philosophy, at San Francisco State University
• 2006-8: Research Fellow at the philosophy department of the University of Twente, Netherlands
• 2006-8: Instructor, for the Science and Technology Studies Master’s Program, University of Twente
• 1999-2004 : Teacher, in public high-school (Rectorat de Paris).
• 1992-5 : Teaching Fellowship in Fluid Mechanics, Université Aix-Marseille, (L’Ecole Supérieure de Mécanique de Marseille, Technopole de Château Gombert, Marseille).

• Local Co-organizer, Bay Area Philosophy of Science Group, 2008-
• Organizer, Workshop on the Experimental Side of Modeling, SFSU, March 2009, March 2010, September 2011.
• Senior Editor for Philosophy of Science, Philosophical Frontiers, 2008-
• Reviewing for: Synthese, International Studies in the Philosophy of Science, Metapsychology, Spontaneous Generation, Philosophia Scientiae, National Science Foundation, MIT press, Erkenntnis

Publications

• "Computer Simulation as Substitute for Experimentation?" [Paper based on material presented at Models and Simulation 4 conference, University of Toronto, May 2010.] Under review.
  
  
• "Making Sense of Modeling: Beyond Representation" [Paper based on material presented at the Society for Philosophy of Science in Practice conference, University of Minnesota, June 2009.] Forthcoming in European Journal for Philosophy of Science (2011).
  
  
• "Modeling and Experimenting" [Paper based on material presented at Models and Simulations 3, University of Virginia, March 2009]   Forthcoming in Models, Simulations, and Representation, Routledge.
  
  
• Review: E.Winsberg (2010) Science in the Age of Computer Simulation. Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews
  
  
• "Non-Passivity of Perception" , Contemporary Pragmatism 7 (2010): 149-164.
  
  
• Heat, temperature and mental concepts: A critique of a standard reductionist confusion, (with M. Bitbol),   pp. 155-174 in E. Wright (ed.) The Case for Qualia, MIT Press, 2008.
  
  
• "Identity over time: objective, subjective", (with B. van Fraassen), Philosophical Quarterly 58 (2008): 15-35.
  
  
• "The Value(s) of a Story: Theories, Models, and Cognitive Values" Principia 11 (2007): 151-169
  
  
• Participation of the Public in Science: Towards a New Kind of Scientific Practice, Human Affairs 17 (2007):138-153.
  
  
• Review: T. Martin (Ed.) Le Tout et Les Parties dans les Systemes Naturels (Review in English), International Studies in the Philosophy of Science 22 (2008), 233-236.
  
  
• Review: E. Selinger and R. Crease (eds.), The Philosophy of Expertise , Metapsychology 12 (2008), 3.
  
  
• "Y-a-t-il un fondement neurophysiologique au réalisme de la représentation ?", Cahiers de Philosophie du Langage, n°5, L’Harmattan, 2003.
  
  
• Contributions to Grand Dictionnaire de la Philosophie, dir. Michel Blay, CNRS éditions-Larousse diff, 2003.

Science
            [For Abstracts on these papers click here]

• "On the spatio-temporal structure of cylinder wakes", I. Peschard, P. Le Gal and Y. Takeda, Experiments in Fluids, 26: 188-196, (1999).
  
  
• "Coupled wakes of cylinders", I. Peschard and P. Le Gal, Phys. Rev. Letters, 77: 3122-25, (1996).
  
  
• "Collective behavior of wakes downstream a row of cylinders", P. Le Gal, I. Peschard, Y. Takeda and M.P. Chauve, Phys. Fluids, 8 (8), 2097, (1996).
  
  
• "The Ginzburg-Landau equation and the transition to turbulence in open flows", P. Le Gal, M.P. Chauve, I. Peschard and S. Jarre, Current Topics in the Physics of Fluids, Research Trends, edited by S.G. Pandalai, India, (1995).

Presentations

2010-11
• "Computer simulation and the quest for novel epistemic novelty"
  APA Eastern Division, Author Meets Critic, December 2011
• "Are Empirical Representations Causally Explained by Phenomena?"
  International Conference: Representation and Explanation in the Sciences, University of Louvain-la-Neuve (Belgium), 26-28 April 2011.
• "Experimental Reliability and Neglected Relevance of Relevance"
  Philosophy of Science Association Biennal, Montreal, 4-6 Nov. 2010.
• "Relevance For What, Relevance For Whom: Numerical Simulation and Experimental Measurement Face-to-Face"
  Models and Simulations 4 University of Toronto, 7-9 May 2010,
  Colloquium : Simulations and Networks, Marseille, 4-5 June 2010.
• "Target Systems, Phenomena and the Problem of Relevance"
  Henle Conference: Experimental and Theoretical Knowledge, Saint Louis University, 26-27 March 2010
  2008-09
• "Measurement seen through the experimenters' eyes", Summer Seminar, University of Colorado, Boulder, July 2009.
• “On the Use and Assessment of Models: Forget about Representation” Society for Philosophy of Science in Practice, University of Minnesota, June 2009
• “Data-model or artifact?"University of California Berkeley HPLMS, April 2009
• “Modeling and Experimenting” Models and Simulation 3, University of Virginia Mar 2009
• “The Temporal Dimension of Modeling” University of California Davis and University of California Santa Cruz Oct. 2008
  Before 2008
• "Enaction and Consistency: Non_Representationalism in Cognitive Science and in Philosophy of Science" Interdisciplinary Conference Cognition: Embodied, Embedded, Enactive, University of Central Florida, October 2007.
• "Ethical Values, Scientific Practice and Virtue Epistemology", First Biennial Conference of the SPSP (Society for Philosophy of Science in Practice), University of Twente, NL, August 2007.
• "Non-Passivity of Perceptual Experience" Joint Session of the Aristotelian Society and the Mind Association, Bristol UK, July 2007 and at the Federal University of Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte (Brazil), August 2007.
• "The Value(s) of a Story: Theories, Models, and Cognitive Values" Fifth Principia International Symposium, Florianopolis (Brazil), August 2007.
• Values in Science, University of Colorado Summer Seminar, Boulder CO, July 2007.
• Values in Science: Responsibility and Significance, University of California at Santa Cruz, Jan 2007; San Francisco State University, March 2007.
• Response to T. Kuipers, ‘"Truth approximation by the instrumentalist method, NFWT Workshop on Realism, Empiricism and Constructivism, Ravenstein November 2006.
• Non-Passivity of Perceptual Experience, University of Twente, October 2006.
• Ethics or Epistemology?, University of Twente, May 2006.
• Identity over time: objective, subjective, (with B. van Fraassen) Conference Identity: Ontological Perspectives, Free University of Amsterdam, May 2005.
• Cognitive Science, Philosophy of Science: on tacit but edifying connections. Séminaire Formes Symboliques, 07 June 2005, Organisé par J. Lassègue et Y.M.Vissetti. Ecole Normale Supérieure, Paris.
• McDowell facing conflict in functions of experience : ‘Second Nature’ and ‘Faculty of Spontaneity’ . Workshop : Experience and Concepts (McDowell, Wittgenstein, Kant, Hume) Organised by Sandra Laugier. University of Picardie, 27-28 June, 2005.
• About a would-be autonomy of science and location of knowledge : Wittgensteinian arguments, in Thematic Session: "Thinking the links between history and philosophy of science, after and with Thomas Kuhn", Symposium de la joint Commission de la division d’histoire des sciences et de la division de logique, méthodologie et philosophie des sciences, Union Internationale d’Histoire et de Philosophie des Sciences, Ecole Normale Supérieure, Paris, Oct. 2002.

• Coupled oscillators in fluid mechanics: wakes behind rows of cylinders, P. Le Gal, I. Peschard, J.F. Ravoux, 4th SIAM conference on applications of dynamical systems, Snowbird, USA, 19-22 May 1997.
• Collective behavior of wakes shed by row of cylinders, J.F. Ravoux, I.Peschard, P. Le Gal; Y. Takeda, First international symposium on Ultrasonic Doppler Methods for fluid mechanics an fluid engineering , Villengen, Switzerland, 9-11 Sept. 1996.
• On the structure of the cylinder wake, I. Peschard, P. Le Gal, Y. Takeda, First international symposium on Ultrasonic Doppler Methods for fluid mechanics an fluid engineering, Villengen, Switzerland, 9-11 Sept. 1996.
• Coupled wakes, P. Le Gal, I. Peschard, American physical society meeting, Irvine, 18-21 Nov. 1995
• Sillages couplés, I. Peschard, P. Le Gal, Congrès National de la S. F. P., Marseille, 4-8 Sept. 1995.
• Coupled wakes, I. Peschard, P. Le Gal, Dynamics Days, Lyon, Juillet 1995.
• Analyse par traitement d'images vidéo dans une chaîne d'oscillateurs couplés, I. Peschard, P. Le Gal, M.P. Chauve, 1ier Colloque international sur l'imagerie scientifique et le traitement d'images, AAF, Cannes, 4-6 Avril 1995.
• Interaction of two bi-dimensionnal vortex sheddings, N. Kabouya, I. Peschard, P. Fraunié, P. Le Gal, J. Dusek and A. Salem, Proceedings of the 1er Congrès de Mécanique, Rabat, 13-16 April 1993.
• Spatio temporal chaos in a chain of coupled wakes, P. Le Gal, I. Peschard, International symposium on spatio temporal structure and chaos, Athènes, 18-22 Mai 1992.