Philosophy’s Hilary Kornblith Selected to Deliver 2027 Ernest Sosa Prize Lecture

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Hilary Kornblith, Distinguished Professor of philosophy in the College of Humanities and Fine Arts, has been selected by the American Philosophical Association (APA) to deliver the 2027 Ernest Sosa Prize Lecture, an honor recognizing significant achievement in epistemology. 

The Ernest Sosa Prize Lecture, awarded every two years by the APA, honors scholars who have made outstanding contributors to epistemology, the philosophical study of knowledge. Recipients deliver the lecture at an APA divisional meeting and discuss a major contribution to the field in a way that is accessible to a broad philosophical audience. 

“I’m bowled over by this," Kornblith said. “This award is an extraordinary honor, and the fact that it carries the name of Ernie Sosa, whose work has had a profound influence on me since the very beginning of my career, is just an added bonus.”

In announcing its selection, the prize committee described Kornblith as one of the leading figures in epistemology, citing both his contributions to numerous specific debates and his advocacy for a broad vision of epistemology as a naturalistic, empirically informed discipline that is continuous with the sciences. 

The committee also noted that although Kornblith’s work is unified by a comprehensive vision, it spans a wide range of topics. Those topics include nature of knowledge, the role of reflection, justification and agency, the epistemology of disagreement, epistemic normativity and the role of intuitions in philosophy.

He is the author of several books, including “Inductive Inference and Its Natural Ground” (1993), “Knowledge and Its Place in Nature” (2002), “On Reflection” (2013), “A Naturalistic Epistemology: Selected Papers” (2014), “Second Thoughts and the Epistemological Enterprise” (2019), and “Scientific Epistemology: An Introduction” (2021). A volume of essays on his work, “Kornblith and His Critics,” was published in 2025.

Kornblith is expected to deliver the lecture at the APA Eastern Division meeting Jan. 13-17, 2027, in Boston. The meeting program schedule will be finalized this fall. 

For more information about the Ernest Sosa Prize Lecture, visit the APA news webpage.