Decentralising Philosophy?

Journée d'étude de la Société philosophique de Louvain 

9 April, 2026

Decentralising Philosophy?

9h15 - Introduction, by Pierre Destrée (UCLouvain)

9h30 - Monika Kirloskar-Steinbach (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam):             

Keynote: How could one decenter academic philosophy?

Discussants: Wakil Belhaddad (UCLouvain/ENS Lyon) & Marco Ambrosi (UCLouvain)

11h00 - Round table (moderator: Christophe Vielle, UCLouvain)

- The idea of 'Western Philosophy': A Critique (co-authored with Josh Platzky Miller, CUP, forthcoming), by Léa Cantor (King’s College London)

- Io e mondo nella filosofia Indiana. Due tradizioni di pensiero oltre il canone occidentale (Carocci 2025), by Alfredo Tomasetta (IUSS Pavia)

- Self-Cultivation in Chinese and Greco-Roman Philosophy. Nourishing the Heart/Mind and Playing Roles (Bloomsbury, 2025), by David Machek (UCLouvain)

Discussants: Chiara Lalli, Florian Marion, Arnaud Van Dam (UCLouvain)

13h00 – 14h30 - LUNCH 

Moderator: David Machek 

14h30 - Amber Carpenter (Berlin, Einstein Institute/Oxford): ‘Perfect Knowledge and Ethical Transformation in Classical Indian Buddhist Philosophy’

Discussant: Grégoire Langouet (UCLouvain)

15h30 - David Chai (Chinese University of Hong Kong) : ‘Practicing Daoist Ethics in an (Increasingly) Unethical World’ 

Discussant: Raphaël Van Daele (ULB)

16h30 - Bernard Stevens (UCLouvain): ‘Why, in philosophy, should we take an interest in Asia in general and in the Kyôto School in particular?’

Discussant: Joffrey Grenier (ULB)