After training in analytic philosophy, I became fascinated by American pragmatism, particularly the thought of Charles Peirce. I completed a PhD at Australian National University on Peirce's three philosophical categories, entitled "Modes of Being". My thesis presented an extended argument against Quine's famous 'mid-century' dictum: "to be is the value of a bound variable..." (in our best scientific theory), as the template for a realist ontology. I argued that that we should be realist about not only particular existent objects (what Peirce referred to as 'Secondness'), but also universals ('Thirdness') and real chance and possibility ('Fir…
After training in analytic philosophy, I became fascinated by American pragmatism, particularly the thought of Charles Peirce. I completed a PhD at Australian National University on Peirce's three philosophical categories, entitled "Modes of Being". My thesis presented an extended argument against Quine's famous 'mid-century' dictum: "to be is the value of a bound variable..." (in our best scientific theory), as the template for a realist ontology. I argued that that we should be realist about not only particular existent objects (what Peirce referred to as 'Secondness'), but also universals ('Thirdness') and real chance and possibility ('Firstness').
Since then, I've brought Peirce's ideas into mainstream philosophy debates concerning realism and truth, modal epistemology and the grounds of logical normativity. Most recently, I've been working on perception and cognition, where I've engaged with both Pittsburgh School philosophy and contemporary work in embodied cognition. Since 2019, I've served as editor of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry "Pragmatism".
I have long-standing secondary research interests in formal ontology and knowledge representation, having briefly worked in artificial intelligence research as an ‘applied ontologist’. I've also recently begun publishing in philosophy of education, where Peircean ideas such as active learning and the 'community of inquiry' find much resonance.
