Philosophy Café

The Philosophy Café is an open exchange of philosophical ideas led by a University of Regina Philosophy Professor or a Graduate Student that runs each Fall and Winter semester. The Philosophy Café is free and open to the general public and all are welcome to attend.

The Philosophy Café will take place on Thursday, March 30, 2023 at 4:00pm in Ad Hum 348. Everyone is welcome to attend!

"Privacy and Control of Information"
Presented by: Dr. Eldon Soifer, Professor in Philosophy in the Philosophy and Classics Dept.

Privacy is often understood as control over information about oneself. Critics, however, have raised a number of intriguing challenges to this sort of view. If privacy is control of information, they ask, do people still have privacy if another person could easily access information about them, but chooses not to do so? What if people try to reveal information about themselves, but are unsuccessful? What if what an observer gets is not new information at all (e.g. a former lover, who has seen it all before, spying on their ex)? This talk will explore such problematic cases, and propose a particular account of what privacy is that seems to offer a promising way of resolving them.