Research Fellows

Justin E. H. Smith works mostly in the history of early modern philosophy, the history and philosophy of the life sciences, and the history and philosophy of technology, especially computing technology. He received his Ph.D. in Philosophy at Columbia University in New York in 2000. He has published five books with Princeton University Press. In 2015 a Main-Belt asteroid, 13585 Justinsmith, was named in his honor.

Ayelet Shavit is a philosopher of science, recipient of the Bloomfield Prize, Israel’s Higher Education national prize and the chair of the Israeli Philosophy Association. Ayelet studies the interplay of facts and values in fundamental biological concepts – ‘Individuality’, Collectivity’ and ‘locality’ – and her research interlaces with her social activity at Town Square Academia. Her research is published in Journal of Philosophy, Philosophy of Science, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B and BioScience, and in three books: One for All? (The Magnes Press in 2008), Stepping in the Same River Twice (Yale University Press, 2017) and Landscapes of Collectivities (MIT Press, 2018).

In my research, I focus on the intersection between intelligent software products and services (e.g., AI/ML-powered systems), Ethics, and Customer behavior. I rely on and develop quantitative methods leveraging field experiments, to answer substantive questions and improve on quality-preserving methodologies, to help customers benefit from high-quality products and for companies to make better decisions during the development of smart products.

Dr. Pelman is Research Fellow in humanities at the Technion and Assistant Professor at Shenkar College of Engineering and Design. He works mainly on the philosophy of science (esp. reduction and the scientific method), environmental thinking (esp. ethics and ecological footprint), metaphysics (esp. comparative ontology), and philosophy of language (esp. modal semantics). He also occasionally ventures into the philosophy of mind and the philosophy of technology.
Dr. Pelman holds a PhD in Philosophy from the University of London (UCL). He has published his work in journals such as Analysis, Ratio, Journal of Consciousness Studies, Metaphysica, and Acta Analytica. He is also the author of Philosophy of Science (Open University Press), and Way – Reflections on the Art of Living (Asia Publishers) – which has gained wide media coverage.

Dr. Avigail Ferdman is a research fellow at the Department of Humanities and Arts. Her research juxtaposes ethics, morality and the social and political conditions for human flourishing. She is interested in technology’s impact on human well-being, and the moral commitments that follow from technological innovations. Her work has been published in journals such as Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy, Transport Reviews and Philosophy & Social Criticism. She is co-editor of  Solidarity and Public Goods published by Routledge. Dr. Ferdman is co-leader of the Technion “Embedded Ethics” program: integrating ethical issues and ethical thinking into science and engineering courses across the Technion.