Historians of philosophy face a significant methodological tension: they must generalise across historical materials in order to make a tradition intelligible to others, while simultaneously resisting allowing those generalisations to ossify into closed, static systems that misrepresent the living complexity of the traditions they study.

This workshop brings together researchers, especially those in their early careers, who are grappling with this tension directly. Drawing on different philosophical traditions, the workshop explores how historians of philosophy can remain reflexively attentive to the role of contemporary scholarship in shaping the traditions they study, and what it might mean to pursue a methodologically self-conscious, cross-cultural history of philosophy.

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Programme

Session 1

• Kevin Berryman (Monash University): Selfless Responsibility: Not-self and Moral Agency in Buddhism

• Fang Xin (Peking University): From Doctrines to Problems: Contemporary Metaphysics and the Interpretation of Buddhist Philosophy

• Commentator: Timothy O’Leary (UNSW Sydney)

Session 2

• Monica Zixuan Ding (University of Toronto): Can “Correcting the Names” Help LLMs Become Morally Diverse?

• Julius Geissler (University of Oxford): What Makes Reified Categories a Distinctive Problem for Comparative Philosophy?

• Commentator: Philippe Major (Lancaster University)

Chair and principal organiser: Xingding Liu (UNSW Sydney; BSHP Ambassador)

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Registration: https://forms.gle/PxJPveSRJJoghfRXA Zoom details will be emailed directly to registered participants prior to the event.

Please find the full programme and abstracts here.

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This workshop has been organised by Xingding Liu, one of our 2026 Ambassadors. You can find out more about Xingding Liu and the BSHP Ambassadors scheme here.