Stanford University
Department of Philosophy
PhD, 1998
Los Angeles, California, United States of America
  •  39
    The Norm Shift Theory of Punishment
    Ethics 132 (2): 478-507. 2021.
    The philosophy of punishment’s focus on the question of justification has left the question of definition neglected. This article explains why there is a need for necessary and sufficient conditions for punishment and offers a new account. Under the theory proposed, to inflict a punishment is to make fewer things permissible for another to do. Since not every such restriction is punishment, an account is offered of the additional conditions needing to be met. One implication of the resulting the…Read more
  •  39
    Time in the movies
    Midwest Studies in Philosophy 27 (1). 2003.
  •  39
    This essay replies to the thoughtful commentaries, by Michael Bratman, David Brink, Larry Alexander, and Michael Moore, on my book Attempts.
  •  39
    Mens Rea by the Numbers
    Criminal Law and Philosophy 12 (3): 393-409. 2018.
    Before the recent presidential election, a bipartisan congressional effort was made to pass a criminal justice reform bill. The bill faltered in part because of a proposed default mens rea provision: statutes silent on mens rea, that were not explicitly identified as strict liability by the legislature, would be taken to require for guilt proof of knowledge with respect to each material element. This paper focusses on a prominent line of disagreement about the default mens rea provision. Propone…Read more
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  •  37
    The essays in this collection are all studies in the history of modern philosophy. Together they provide a cross-section of current efforts to reconstruct ...
  •  37
    Moore on causing, acting, and complicity
    Legal Theory 18 (4): 437-458. 2012.
    In Michael Moore's important book Causation and Responsibility, he holds that causal contribution matters to responsibility independently of its relevance to action. We are responsible for our actions, according to Moore, because where there is action, we typically also find the kind of causal contribution that is crucial for responsibility. But it is causation, and not action, that bears the normative weight. This paper assesses this claim and argues that Moore's reasons for it are unconvincing…Read more
  •  36
    More Attempts: A Reply to Duff, Husak, Mele and Walen (review)
    Criminal Law and Philosophy 6 (3): 429-444. 2012.
    In this paper, I reply to the very thoughtful comments on my book by Antony Duff, Doug Husak, Al Mele and Alec Walen
  •  32
    Book review (review)
    The Journal of Ethics 11 (4): 485-497. 2007.
  •  32
    Punishing Non-citizens
    Criminal Law and Philosophy 14 (3): 347-364. 2020.
    This paper considers the question of why the non-citizenship of offenders poses an obstacle to their criminal punishment. Several proposals are rejected, including Antony Duff’s proposal. It is proposed, instead, that governments are not authorized to punish any offender who cannot be attributed with the norm he violates. The government cannot attribute the norm that a non-citizen violates to him, if the non-citizen can raise in his favor the fact that he has no say over the law. Under certain c…Read more
  •  31
    Revisiting the “But Everybody Does That!” Defense
    Law and Philosophy 41 (2): 419-440. 2022.
    It’s not uncommon for people to try to shield themselves from blame or punishment by saying, “But everybody does that!”. This BEDT defense seems more appealing as a defense to some offenses than to others. In a neglected paper, Doug Husak describes various types of crime to which the BEDT ought, he argues, be a defense. This paper extends his work by identifying a category he overlooks. The paper argues that often the BEDT shields from blame and punishment because the prevalence of the offense i…Read more
  •  30
    Gideon Yaffe presents a theory of criminal responsibility according to which child criminals deserve leniency not because of their psychological, behavioural, or neural immaturity but because they are denied the vote. He argues that full shares of criminal punishment are deserved only by those who have a full share of say over the law.
  •  30
    Conditional intent and mens Rea
    Legal Theory 10 (4): 273-310. 2004.
  •  29
    In Defense of Criminal Possession
    Criminal Law and Philosophy 10 (3): 441-471. 2016.
    Criminal law casebooks and treatises frequently mention the possibility that criminal liability for possession is inconsistent with the Voluntary Act Requirement, which limits criminal liability to that which includes an act or an omission. This paper explains why criminal liability for possession is compatible with the Voluntary Act Requirement despite the fact that possession is a status. To make good on this claim, the paper defends the Voluntary Act Requirement, offers an account of the natu…Read more
  •  26
    Locke on Suspending, Refraining and the Freedom to Will
    History of Philosophy Quarterly 18 (4). 2001.
  •  25
    Is Akrasia Necessary for Culpability? On Douglas Husak’s Ignorance of Law
    Criminal Law and Philosophy 12 (2): 341-349. 2018.
    This paper discusses Douglas Husak’s view that ignorance of the law always reduces culpability since the only fully culpable agents are those who are akratic—who act, that is, in a way that they judge to be wrongful, all things considered. The paper argues that this position is in tension with Husak’s avowed commitment to a reasons-responsiveness theory of culpability, given a plausible way of understanding what that means, and what a reason is.
  •  25
    This is a reply to Alex Guerrero’s, Erin Kelly’s and Gabe Mendlow’s commentaries on Gideon Yaffe’s The Age of Culpability: Children and the Nature of Criminal Responsibility. The reply focuses on their objections concerning the nature of legal reasons, desert, and the political arrangements that make a difference to criminal culpability.
  •  23
    Reid on the Perception of Visible Figure
    Journal of Scottish Philosophy 1 (2): 103-115. 2003.
  •  21
    Legality
    Philosophical Review 121 (3): 457-460. 2012.
  •  21
    "the Government Beguiled Me": The Entrapment Defense and the Problem of Private Entrapment
    Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy 1 (1): 1-50. 2005.
    Defendants who are being tried for accepting a temptation issued by the government sometimes employ the entrapment defense. Acquittal of some of them is thought to be justified either on the grounds that culpability was undermined by the temptation or on the grounds that the government acted objectionably in issuing the temptation . Advocates of the objective approach often criticize those who employ the subjective by citing what is here called “the problem of private entrapment”: we don’t grant…Read more
  •  17
    This is a reply to David Brink, Jeff Howard and Stephen Morse’s commentaries on my book, The Age of Culpability.
  •  14
    Free Will and Agency at its Best
    Noûs 34 (s14): 203-229. 2000.
  •  13
    When Does Evidence Support Guilt “Beyond a Reasonable Doubt”?
    In Larry Alexander & Kimberly Kessler Ferzan (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Applied Ethics and the Criminal Law, Springer Verlag. pp. 97-116. 2019.
    Criminal defendants cannot be punished unless found guilty “beyond a reasonable doubt”. Under probabilistic accounts, this means that the probability of guilt given the evidence is above a certain numerical threshold, such as 0.9. Under psychological accounts, by contrast, what is essential is that a factfinder reaches a certain psychological attitude toward guilt, such as certainty or unwavering belief, when contemplating the evidence. An adequate account should provide a normative explanation …Read more