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Nat Hansen

@nathansen.bsky.social
1.9K followers 575 following 177 posts

Philosopher at the University of Reading (UK) working on new wave ordinary language philosophy, experimental semantics and pragmatics, and some aesthetics. I'm building playable simulations of historical philosophical scenes at ux-phi.com.

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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 22h
This fits with what we found in our corpus study of [know]; basically no occurrences in COCA where people say someone doesn't know something because they lack sufficient justification (or some other feature), only occurrences where the person isn't aware of something.
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
What are we arguing about? I wasn’t in Bluesky today, I was working on a cookie clicker-style game about submitting papers to journals 🍪 🍪
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Aidan McGlynn @aidanmcglynn.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
The clues were all there
The front cover of Wittgenstein's 'Philosophical Grammar', with a small portrait and the title in a light greeny-blue. The title here has been altered to read 'Philosophical Grammarly'
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Edouard Machery @edouardmachery.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
great project by @nathansen.bsky.social! Do some thought experiments in a socratic manner!
ux-phi.com
Experiments — ux-phi
Playable versions of canonical experiments in philosophy: the Socratic-questionnaire thought experiments — the trolley problem, Gettier cases, the side-effect effect, Mary the colour scientist.
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joannad-c.bsky.social @joannad-c.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
Hiring! 🧠❤️🤔If you’re a philosopher working in ethics/ x-phi/ empirically informed moral philosophy / moral psychology / applied ethics, consider applying for a 2.5 year research postdoc with me in my lab at Oxford. Deadline noon 16th Oct. Details 👉 philjobs.org/job/show/32101 Hit me up with q’s!
static.klipy.com
Shameless Fiona Gallagher
ALT: Shameless Fiona Gallagher
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
These have been getting a lot of traffic, thanks @xphilosopher.bsky.social! I added a button for people to share their chat transcripts—and one showed a capacity I didn't know they had: the user started writing in Spanish and the SQ just adapted! So I think you can try other languages with these...
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Zoe Drayson @zoedrayson.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
Attention philosophers of language who also work in theoretical linguistics: the Philosophy department and the Linguistics department at UC Davis are jointly hiring a TT Assistant Professor. Apply! recruit.ucdavis.edu/JPF07874
recruit.ucdavis.edu
Department of Philosophy/Linguistics - Philosophy of Language/Computational Linguistics
University of California, Davis is hiring. Apply now!
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
Thanks so much Josh! When were running the experiments for that paper (back in the early 2020s) we wished we could do something like this, but we didn't know how to make it work. So it's pretty fun to have these up and running now. More are in development! Which other versions should I try to make?
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Experimental Philosophy @xphilosopher.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
Philosopher @nathansen.bsky.social has created a website that uses AI to take people through a Socratic dialogue about a philosophical thought experiment I gave it a try. In my opinion, it really does help users think through these questions www.ux-phi.com/experiments
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
A new simulation is up at ux-phi: Hegel's last lectures on aesthetics: www.ux-phi.com/sim/hegel-ae... There's a new "scrollytelling"-style intro with a cameo by Schopenhauer—I found a scan of the course catalog/*Vorlesungsverzeichnis* for the 1828/9 term! nathansen.substack.com/p/berlin-182...
nathansen.substack.com
Berlin 1829: Hegel’s Last Lectures on Aesthetics
From Doric columns to the end of art
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Paul L. Franco @loadofbunk.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
The book launch today was great and I'm excited to check out Sander's book, especially the later chapters on the culture wars!
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
Back in 2022, Jumbly Grindrod, @jdporter.bsky.social, and I started writing a paper on distributional semantics and holism. How long ago that is in A.I. terms? The cutting edge model that we were talking about in our early drafts was GPT-3. nathansen.substack.com/p/lmao-in-fa...
nathansen.substack.com
LMAO. In fact, LMAFO.
Distributional Semantics, Holism, and the Instability of Meaning
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
Epiphenomenal, the sad Kantian, takes the lead!
Epiphenomenal has taken the lead at 46 semesters, with the label: "Sad Kantianism"
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
Thanks to @dailynous.com putting my little philosophy swipe game Philotypes in the heap of links, Ia lot more people have been playing it, and someone ("Knowledge Cartel") has finally unseated me as top of the leaderboard www.ux-phi.com/philotypes/
The Library of Leading Philotypes leaderboard: #1 is Knowledge Cartel, a time-travelling, lever-pulling relationist
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Robert Hawkins @rdhawkins.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Stanford Linguistics is hiring an open-rank sociolinguist (Assistant, Associate, or Full). Materials due October 16 for full consideration; start date September 2027. Please share widely!
facultypositions.stanford.edu
Sociolinguistics, Open Rank - Stanford University, California, United States
The Department of Linguistics at Stanford University seeks applicants for a junior or senior appointment at the rank of tenure-track Assistant Professor, tenured Associate Professor, or Full Professor...
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David Papineau @davidpapineau.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
We are hiring—a permanent lectureship in Ethics/Political Philosophy—deadline 15 Nov www.kcl.ac.uk/jobs/144566-...
kcl.ac.uk
Lecturer in Ethics and/or Political Philosophy | King's College London
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Kieran Healy @kjhealy.co · 30/08/2026
“From the inside, ‘sort-of following along’ really feels like you're doing something productive.” arbustoemchamas.substack.com/p/i-naively-...
arbustoemchamas.substack.com
I naively tried vibe-coding a memory tool for agents and stared into the abyss of unsolved problems in philosophy
or, cheap code does not translate into systems design prowess
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 25/08/2026
This summer I've been messing around with various game mechanics and I made a philosophy-themed swipe game: www.ux-phi.com/philotypes It's based around a simple forced choice, swipe left or right mechanic, and works best played on your phone.
Philotypes, a ux-phi game, homescreen
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Richard Jean So @richardjeanso.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
Hey I'm teaching a course "AI, Creativity & Slop" to first-year students this fall which includes readings in lit/philosophy, history + cog sci/comp sci. Does anyone have recs - essays they love in any of these areas - to help me finalize the syllabus? Would really appreciate any suggestions, thx!
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Experimental Philosophy @xphilosopher.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
Starter pack for experimental philosophy
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
I made a short, farcical simulation based on Oskar Morgenstern and Albert Einstein driving Kurt Gödel to his citizenship test in 1947. You play Einstein: www.ux-phi.com/invite/GDELG... I wrote about its design here: nathansen.substack.com/p/godels-cit...
nathansen.substack.com
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 08/08/2026
My awesome uncle Keith and his marvelous bird art in the Guardian! www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...
theguardian.com
The ornithological artist drawing 1,000 birds by hand – all for an app that wants you off your phone
The mission of the Flock app is quietly subversive: to encourage users to ditch their screens and explore the wonderful world of birding
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
2026 is not only the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, it’s also 250 years since the death of David Hume on August 25, 1776. On ux-phi, now you can play David Hume’s favorite card game, Whist, with him, Adam Smith and Adam Ferguson: www.ux-phi.com/invite/HUMEW...
A short treatise on the game of Whist. Containing the LAWS of the GAME. An 18th century rulebook for the card game Whist.
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 26/07/2026
A new way of interacting with the philosopher personas of J.L. Austin, Iris Murdoch, G.E.M. Anscombe, and R.M. Hare is now up at ux-phi: The Oxford tutorial. Try it out here: www.ux-phi.com/class/TUTORI...
A 1950s illustrated map of Oxford showing the center of town and some of the colleges.
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
I've been quoting the idea from this paper's first para, that Claude prompts like "Report outcomes faithfully” are like what Azande witch-doctors say while stirring medicine: “You medicine which I am cooking, mind you always speak the truth to me. Do not let anyone injure me with his witchcraft..."
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Experimental Philosophy @xphilosopher.bsky.social · 17/07/2026
Philosophers, we need your help We are running a study on philosophers’ intuitions about thought experiments moralsciencelab.com/intuitions/ Only takes a few minutes!
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 09/07/2026
Wait... maybe we should apply for these!?
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 09/07/2026
Umeå University is advertising two assistant professor positions in the humanities: www.umu.se/en/work-with... I was a postdoc at Umeå and it's a great place to work! @ethannowak.bsky.social would back me up on this.
umu.se
Two positions as Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Arts and Humanities
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Shen-yi Liao 廖顯禕 @liao.shen-yi.org · 06/07/2026
Why do people think there's conceptual inflation when there isn't? We suggest that it is, in part, just due to the diversity in language use. There is an assumption that drives me up the wall behind a lot of these complaints. People seem to think each word can only have this one meaning.
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 06/07/2026
Oh yeah, nice!
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 06/07/2026
@liao.shen-yi.org and my op-ed version of "Measuring Conceptual Inflation: The Case of 'Racist'" is up at New Work in Philosophy, thanks @marcusarvan.bsky.social! newworkinphilosophy.substack.com/p/measuring-...
newworkinphilosophy.substack.com
"Measuring Conceptual Inflation: the Case of ‘Racist'" - Nat Hansen (University of Reading) & Shen-yi Liao (University of Puget Sound)
Ergo, 2026
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Erik Angner @erikangner.com · 02/07/2026
Philosophy job in beautiful Lund 🇸🇪 lu.varbi.com/en/what:job/... #philjobs
lu.varbi.com
Senior Lecturer in Practical Philosophy
We are seeking a candidate for a full-time permanent position as Senior Lecturer in Practical Philosophy at the Department of Philosophy at Lund University. Workplace and academic environment The Depa
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Shen-yi Liao 廖顯禕 @liao.shen-yi.org · 30/06/2026
This is the last of the trilogy that @nathansen.bsky.social and I have on conceptual inflation critiques and the word 'racist'. All the articles are open access. Download them all via the following DOIs, nerds! 1. doi.org/10.1017/apa.... 2. doi.org/10.3998/ergo... 3. doi.org/10.7015/JEAS...
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Shen-yi Liao 廖顯禕 @liao.shen-yi.org · 30/06/2026
Me and @nathansen.bsky.social has a paper called "Conceptual Inflation" that is now officially published by the TWese open access journal EurAmerica*. We do some natural history of critiques in this vicinity (cf. "concept creep"). We disentangle things people might mean by "conceptual inflation".
euramerica-ch.ea.sinica.edu.tw
56-2-2
出刊年月/Date of Publishing 2026.06 所屬卷期/Vol. & No. 第56卷第2期 Vol. 56, No. 2 類型/Type 研究論文 Research Article
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Ben Wurgaft @benwurgaft.bsky.social · 27/06/2026
I had no idea this existed until now, and thought I had a good education: Mel Brooks' 1963 The Critic (h/t @kellylink.bsky.social ) www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pram...
youtube.com
Mel Brooks - The Critic (1963)
YouTube video by ados4k
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Ethan Landes @ethanlandes.bsky.social · 23/06/2026
This paper is amazing. Highly recommend
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 22/06/2026
This is a big chunky paper! My favorite parts are at the end, when we give our account of why people think "racist" is being conceptually inflated when we haven't found evidence that it is.
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 15/06/2026
Thanks to a suggestion from Ángel Pinillos, I gave the Big Five personality test to some of the philosopher personas that are at the heart of the ux-phi.com simulations: Thrasymachus, Socrates, G.W.F. Hegel, J.L. Austin, G.E.M. Anscombe, and Iris Murdoch.
Big Five personality cards for Thrasymachus and J.L. Austin
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Pekka Väyrynen @vayrynen.bsky.social · 08/06/2026
"High Standards" is advance access in PPR (doi.org/10.1111/phpr...). Argues against the view that 'rational' and (moral) 'good' are maximum-standard gradable adjectives and sketches an alternative view on which these adjectives have non-maximal but normatively demanding standards. 2/3
doi.org
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 22/05/2026
Marking season
A student asking a philosophy professor: When will we get our papers back?A philosophy professor saying "I've almost finished correcting them"A philosophy professor saying "I don't want to do a sloppy job. Next week. I promise"
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 17/05/2026
Last week I taught the part of Plato's Phaedrus where Socrates argues speech is superior to writing because writing can't argue back. I think Socrates is half right (Phaedrus's scroll can't argue back) so I made a version of the Phaedrus that *can* argue back: www.ux-phi.com/class/BLUESK...
Eli Cash enjoying his literary celebrity and saying "EVERYONE KNOWS WRITING CAN'T ARGUE BACK // WHAT THIS PRESUPPOSES IS...MAYBE IT CAN?"
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 07/05/2026
I'm teaching 1984 and since we already ask our students to submit their work to an automated plagiarism detector, I thought I would make one for thoughtcrime: www.nat-hansen.com/minitrue Paste your work or bio to identify how much crimethink is in it and get a certified thoughtcrime-free version.
A Ministry of Truth Document Compliance Office thoughtcrime detection and newspeak conversion service that has identified 24 thoughtcrimes in the document I posted.
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Shen-yi Liao 廖顯禕 @liao.shen-yi.org · 10/04/2026
Nerds: This is basically an amazing open ended RPG set in important scenes in philosophical history. Pedagogy nerds: This is like Reacting (to the Past) simulations but single player. And philosophy. It’s not generic LLM generated but based on lots of research into academic and popular sources.
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 10/04/2026
I made some playable philosophy simulations: -Oxford 1952 -Republic Book I -Jena 1799 -Paris 1945 www.ux-phi.com
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Mark Dingemanse @markdingemanse.net · 08/04/2026
New! Interactional foundations for critical AI literacies doi.org/10.5281/zeno... Why do Anthropic engineers talk to Claude as a witch-doctor to his potions? How is prompt engineering like spider divination? Can one reason without reasons? ft. Lovelace, Adorno, Suchman, Weizenbaum & many more ☺️
Six-panel composite figure. Caption: Interactive artifacts always rely on people’s interpretive and interactional practices. Rowwise from top left to bottom right: A. Aegeus consults the oracle at Delphi (cup from Vulci, 440-430 BCE). B. Byzantine mosaic depicting the zodiac, from the floor of the 6th century CE Beth Alpha synagogue. C. One-sided sense-making in an experimental psychotherapy session, (McHugh 1968). D. Still from a BBC documentary showing a person interacting with ELIZA via a computer terminal, late 1960s. E. Researchers interacting with the PARC copier (Suchman 2007 [1987]). F. Screenshot of large language model chat interface, 2026.
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 07/04/2026
I built a text based simulation of 1952 Oxford where you can argue with Austin, Hare, Strawson, etc. and I'm trying to convince them that they should think about making searchable bodies of ordinary language using the computers that Alan Turing is working on and they're laughing at me:
I'd ask him what would be involved in making a corpus of ordinary use, whether it's feasible. I expect he'll say it's possible, there's nothing even that computationally difficult about it, but to scale it up might take a lot of resources. What are the chances we could convince Oxford University to buy one of the machines that Turing is working on?

Austin lets out a short, sharp laugh that echoes off the stone walls. "Oxford University? Buy a computing machine? For philosophy?"

The entire room breaks into barely suppressed chuckles. Even Strawson, who had seemed sympathetic to your idea, is shaking his head with amusement.

"My dear fellow," Hampshire says, still smiling, "do you have any idea what one of those machines costs? Or how much space it takes up? The university can barely afford to heat the libraries properly."

"And imagine the conversation," Warnock adds gleefully. "Vice-Chancellor, we'd like several thousand pounds for an electronic brain to help us understand the word 'really.'"
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 31/03/2026
The next round of Zed and my work on aesthetic judgment and conversation: inspired by Susan Sontag we make the case for "seriousness" in aesthetic judgment and against vibing, communitarianism and the "omnivore monoculture". onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
onlinelibrary.wiley.com
The Very Idea of Seriousness
What norms govern aesthetic conversations? In Hansen and Adams (2024), we argue for a norm we call, following Stanley Cavell, “the hope of agreement”, along with a requirement of “seriousness”, the “...
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Dan Harris @danielwharris.bsky.social · 16/03/2026
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lindsay thomas @lindsaythomas.net · 16/02/2026
This is just another way of saying that I love mixed methods work, I guess. Archival research? Yes! Data collection? Yes! Quantitative analysis? Yes! Close reading? Yes! Case studies? Yes! Theoretical speculation? Yes! Let’s do it all why not
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Nat Hansen @nathansen.bsky.social · 03/02/2026
Twin peaks: The Return
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