Eran Tal
I am an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at McGill University and Canada Research Chair in Data Ethics. I specialize in philosophy of science, philosophy of measurement, and the ethics of big data and artificial intelligence.
Until 2016 I was a Marie Curie Research Fellow at the University of Cambridge, and before that an Alexander von Humboldt Research Fellow at Bielefeld University in Germany.
Email: eran.tal@mcgill.ca (see my full contact details)
Here you can find my CV, find out about my current research projects or read my recent papers.
News
I've been appointed Canada Research Chair in Data Ethics. Over the next few years I will be developing a framework for the ethical collection and use of scientific and medical data, with a focus on big data and machine learning. See my research page for additional details.
An updated version of my entry "Measurement in Science" is now published in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
I will deliver a keynote lecture at the Philosophy of Scientific Experimentation 6 (PSX6) international conference at Saint Louis University in September 2021.
I am collaborating with a group of health outcomes researchers led by Nancy Mayo in developing a new measure of health-related quality of life for older people. Our project has recently been awarded $1.1M from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR).
My joint project with Skye Barbic (UBC), "Psychiatric Illness in Canadian Youth: Mobilizing Measurement to Improve Clinical Care" has been granted funding by the Healthy Brains for Healthy Lives initiative. See our project website for more details.
My paper "Individuating Quantities" is out in Philosophical Studies.
I delivered two keynote lectures in 2018: at Measurement at the Crossroads (Paris, 27-29 June) and at the annual conference of the Health Care Access for Linguistic Minorities Network (Montréal, 6-7 September).
Two recently published papers: “Naturalness and Convention in the International System of Units” in Measurement, and “Calibration: Modelling the Measurement Process” in Studies in History and Philosophy of Science.
"The Making of Measurement", a special issue of Studies in History and Philosophy of Science featuring selected papers from the eponymous conference Daniel Mitchell, Hasok Chang and I organized, is now published. Read our Editors' Introduction.
I have been co-awarded the 2016 Sir Karl Popper Prize by The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science for my article "Making Time: A Study in the Epistemology of Measurement" (free access).
I'm a founding member of the Montreal Philosophy of Science Network, dedicated to research collaboration across the city's four universities. Among our recent speakers are Peter Galison, Elliott Sober, Margaret Morrison, Leah McClimans, Bernhard Nickel, Philip Kitcher, Mike Thicke, Helen Longino, and Melissa Jacquart.