Deborah G. Mayo

Deborah G. Mayo, Professor Emerita of Philosophy

_{Department of Philosophy

Major Williams Hall

Blacksburg, VA 24061

mayod@vt.edu}

Deborah G. Mayo, professor of philosophy in the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences at Virginia Tech, has been conferred the title of “professor emerita” by the Virginia Tech Board of Visitors.

The emeritus title may be conferred on retired professors, associate professors, and administrative officers who are specially recommended to the board by Virginia Tech President Timothy Sands. Nominated individuals who are approved by the board receive an emeritus certificate from the university.

A member of the Virginia Tech community since 1979, Mayo brought international visibility to the university through her scholarship in the philosophy of statistics, principles of inference, and the philosophy of science.

She wrote an award-winning book, Error and the Growth of Experimental Knowledge, and authored or coauthored more than 80 peer-reviewed journal articles, book chapters, and reviews.

Mayo held leadership positions in such professional organizations as the Philosophy of Science Association and served as a visiting professor at the Centre for Philosophy of Natural and Social Science at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Among her many professional honors and awards was the 1998 Lakatos Award in Philosophy of Science.

In the classroom, she taught both undergraduate and graduate courses. She served on numerous master’s degree and doctoral committees in philosophy, economics, and science and technology studies.

She held appointments in the Virginia Tech Center for the Study of Science and Society and in the Department of Economics.

Principal Areas of Research Focus

Philosophy of Statistics
Philosophy of Science

Education

PhD, University of Pennsylvania, 1979

Professional Roles

Philosophy of Science Association

Awards and Honors

Lakatos Award in Philosophy of Science

Publications

Books

Statistical Inference as Severe Testing: How to Get Beyond the Statistics Wars; Cambridge University Press, 2018.
Error and Inference: Recent Exchanges on Experimental Reasoning, Reliability, and the Objectivity and Rationality of Science, Cambridge University Press, 2010.
Error and the Growth of Experimental Knowledge, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996.
Acceptable Evidence: Science and Values in Risk Management, co-edited with R.D. Hollander, New York: Oxford University Press, 1994.

Journal Articles

Mayo, D. (2014) “On the Birnbaum Argument for the Strong Likelihood Principle,” (with discussion and rejoinder) Statistical Science, 29(2), 227-239, 261-266.

Mayo D. and Cox, D. R. (2011) “Statistical Scientist Meets a Philosopher of Science: A Conversation with Sir David Cox” in Rationality, Markets and Morals: Studies at the Intersection of Philosophy and Economics, (M. Albert, H. Lkiemt and B. Lahno eds), An open access journal publiched by the Frankfurt School: Verlag. Volume 2 (2011), 103-114. http://www.rmm-journal.de/downloads/Article_Cox_Mayo.pdf

Mayo, D. and Spanos, A. (2011) "Error Statistics" in Philosophy of Statistics , Handbook of Philosophy of Science Volume 7 Philosophy of Statistics, (Volume eds. Prasanta S. Bandyopadhyay and Malcolm R. Forster. General editors: Dov M. Gabbay, Paul Thagard and John Woods) Elsevier: 1-46.

Mayo, D. (2010). "Error, Severe Testing, and the Growth of Theoretical Knowledge" in Error and Inference: Recent Exchanges on Experimental Reasoning, Reliability and the Objectivity and Rationality of Science (D. Mayo and A. Spanos eds.), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 28-57.

Mayo, D. (2010). "An Error in the Argument from Conditionality and Sufficiency to the Likelihood Principle" in Error and Inference: Recent Exchanges on Experimental Reasoning, Reliability and the Objectivity and Rationality of Science (D Mayo and A. Spanos eds.), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 305-14.
Cox D. R. and Mayo. D. (2010). "Objectivity and Conditionality in Frequentist Inference" in Error and Inference: Recent Exchanges on Experimental Reasoning, Reliability and the Objectivity and Rationality of Science (D Mayo and A. Spanos eds.), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 276-304.
Mayo, D. (2008). “How to Discount Double-Counting When It Counts: Some Clarifications,” British Journal of Philosophy of Science, 59: 857–879.
Mayo, D. (2008). Some Methodological Issues in Experimental Economics, Philosophy of Science, 75: 633-645.
Mayo, D. and Spanos, A. (2008). "Risks to Health and Risks to Science: The Need for a Responsible 'Bioevidential Scrutiny,'" Biological effects of low Level Exposures, Newsletter 14(3): 18-22.
Mayo, D. (2006). "Critical Rationalism and Its Failure to Withstand Critical Scrutiny," in C. Cheyne and J. Worrall (eds.) Rationality and Reality: Conversations with Alan Musgrave, Kluwer Series Studies in the History and Philosophy of Science, Springer: The Netherlands: 63-99.
Mayo, D. and Cox, D. R. (2006) "Frequentists Statistics as a Theory of Inductive Inference," Optimality: The Second Erich L. Lehmann Symposium(ed. J. Rojo), Lecture Notes-Monograph series, Institute of Mathematical Statistics (IMS), Vol. 49: 77-97.
Mayo, D. and Spanos, A. (2006). "Severe Testing as a Basic Concept in a Neyman-Pearson Philosophy of Induction" British Journal of Philosophy of Science, 57: 323-357.
Mayo, D. (2005). "Evidence as Passing Severe Tests: Highly Probable versus Highly Probed Hypotheses" in P. Achinstein (ed.), Scientific Evidence, Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore: 95-127.
Mayo, D. (2005). Peircean Induction and the Error-Correcting Thesis," in R. Mayorga (guest ed.) Peirce-spectives on Metaphysics and the Sciences, Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society: 299-319.
Mayo, D (2004). "Models of Error and the Limits of Experimental testing," in M. Carrier, g. Massey, and L. Reutsche (eds.) Science at Century's End: Philosophical Questions on the Progress and Limits of Science. Pittsburgh-Konstanz Series in the Philosophy and History of Science. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press: 179-188.
Mayo, D. (2003). "Severe Testing as a Guide for Inductive Learning," in H. Kyburg (ed.), Probability Is the Very Guide in Life. Chicago: Open Court: 89-117.