Marquette University
Department of Philosophy
PhD, 2015
CV
Santa Barbara, California, U.S.
  •  2839
    Subversive Humor
    Dissertation, Marquette. 2015.
    Oppression is easily recognized. That is, at least, when oppression results from overt, consciously professed racism, for example, in which violence, explicit exclusion from economic opportunities, denial of adequate legal access, and open discrimination perpetuate the subjugation of a group of people. There are relatively clear legal remedies to such oppression. But this is not the case with covert oppression where the psychological harms and resulting legal and economic exclusion are every bit…Read more
  •  1857
    The discovery of mirror neurons in both primates and humans has led to an enormous amount of research and speculation as to how conscious beings are able to interact so effortlessly among one another. Mirror neurons might provide an embodied basis for passive synthesis and the eventual process of further communalization through empathy, as envisioned by Edmund Husserl. I consider the possibility of a phenomenological and scientific investigation of laughter as a point of connection that might in…Read more
  •  1265
    An Existentialist account of the role of humor against oppression
    Humor: International Journal of Humor Research 26 (4). 2013.
    I argue that the overt subjugation in the system of American slavery and its subsequent effects offer a case study for an existentialist analysis of freedom, oppression and humor. Concentrating on the writings and experiences of Frederick Douglass and the existentialists Simone De Beauvoir and Lewis Gordon, I investigate how the concepts of “spirit of seriousness”, “mystification”, and an existentialist reading of “double consciousness” for example, can elucidate the forms of explicit and concea…Read more
  •  1063
    Subversive Humor as Art and the Art of Subversive Humor
    The Philosophy of Humor Yearbook 1 (1). 2020.
    This article investigates the relationships between forms of humor that conjure up possible worlds and real-world social critiques. The first part of the article will argue that subversive humor, which is from or on behalf of historically and continually marginalized communities, constitutes a kind of aesthetic experience that can elicit enjoyment even in adversarial audiences. The second part will be a connecting piece, arguing that subversive humor can be constructed as brief narrative thought…Read more
  •  975
    World-Traveling, Double Consciousness, and Laughter
    Israeli Journal for Humor Research 2 (6): 93-119. 2017.
    In this paper I borrow from Maria Lugones’ work on playful “world-traveling” and W.E.B. Du Bois’ notion of “double consciousness” to make the case that humor can facilitate an openness and cooperative attitude among an otherwise closed, even adversarial audience. I focus on what I call “subversive” humor, that which is employed by or on behalf of those who have been continually marginalized. When effectively used, such humor can foster the inclination and even desire to listen to others and, if …Read more
  •  579
    The Philosophy of Humor: What makes Something Funny
    1000-Word Philosophy: An Introductory Anthology. 2022.
    People can laugh at almost anything. What’s the deal with that? What makes something funny? This essay reviews some theories of what it is for something to be funny. Each theory offers insights into this question, but no single approach provides a comprehensive answer.
  •  429
    Parrhesia, Humor, and Resistance
    Israeli Journal of Humor Research 9 (1): 22-46. 2020.
    This paper begins by taking seriously former slave and abolitionist Frederick Douglass’ response in his What to the Slave is the Fourth of July? to systematic violence and oppression. He claims that direct argumentation is not the ideal mode of resistance to oppression: “At a time like this, scorching irony, not convincing argument, is needed.” I will focus on a few elements of this playful mode of resistance that conflict with the more straightforward strivings for abstract, universal, objectiv…Read more
  •  357
    Moral Imaginative Resistance to Heaven: Why the Problem of Evil is So Intractable
    de Ethica: Journal of Philosophical, Theological and Applied Ethics 1 (5): 51-67. 2018.
    The majority of philosophers of religion, at least since Plantinga’s reply to Mackie’s logical problem of evil, agree that it is logically possible for an omnibenevolent, omniscient, and omnipotent God to exist who permits some of the evils we see in the actual world. This is conceivable essentially because of the possible world known as heaven. That is, heaven is an imaginable world in a similar way that logically possible scenarios in any fiction are imaginable. However, like some of the imagi…Read more
  •  304
    “ A man orders a whole pizza pie for himself and is asked whether he would like it cut into eight or four slices. He responds, ‘Four, I’m on a diet ”’ (Noël Carroll) While not hilarious --so funny that it induces chortling punctuated with outrageous vomiting--this little gem is amusing. We recognize that something has gone wrong. On a first reading it might not compute, something doesn’t quite make sense. Then, aha! , we understand the hapless dieter has misapplied general rules of thumb, menta…Read more
  •  297
    Dave Chappelle's Positive Propaganda
    In Mark Ralkowski (ed.), Dave Chappelle and Philosophy, Popular Culture and Philosophy. pp. 75-88. 2021.
    Some of Dave Chappelle’s uses of storytelling about seemingly mundane events, like his experiences with his “white friend Chip” and the police, are examples of what W.E.B. Du Bois calls “Positive Propaganda.” This is in contrast to “Demagoguery,” the sort of propaganda described by Jason Stanley that obstructs empathic recognition of others, and undermines reasonable debate among citizens regarding policies that matter: the justice system, welfare, inequality, and race, for example. Some of Chap…Read more
  •  251
    Incongruity and Seriousness
    Florida Philosophical Review 15 (1): 1-18. 2015.
    In the first part of this paper, I will briefly introduce the concept of incongruity and its relation to humor and seriousness, connecting the ideas of Arthur Schopenhauer and the contemporary work of John Morreall. I will reveal some of the relations between Schopenhauer's notion of "seriousness" and the existentialists such as Jean Paul Sartre, Simone Be Beauvoir, and Lewis Gordon. In section II, I will consider the relationship between playfulness and incongruity, noting the role that enjoyme…Read more
  •  193
    In two very influential papers from 2008, Tamar Gendler introduced the concept of “alief” to describe the mental state one is in when acting in ways contrary to their consciously professed beliefs. For example, if asked to eat what they know is fudge, but shaped into the form of dog feces, they will hesitate, and behave in a manner that would be consistent with the belief that the fudge is really poop. They alieve that it is disgusting, while they believe it is not. This paper investigates laugh…Read more
  •  187
    Review of A Philosophy of Humour (review)
    The Philosophy of Humor Yearbook 1 (1): 309-314. 2020.
    In A Philosophy of Humour, Alan Roberts presents a brief but extremely well-resourced overview of the history of the philosophy of humor (I will omit “u” for brevity, the soul of wit), and offers a new theory of humor focusing on the role of amusement. This text does not assume any prior acquaintance with theories of humor or philosophy, and in light of this, Roberts does well to define, either in the text or a brief note, the philosophical concepts necessary to help the reader follow along. Eve…Read more
  •  174
    "The Mind is not a Vessel to be Filled but a Fire to be Kindled", and "Education is Not the Filling of Pail But the Lighting of a Fire", and ... Something About a Horse ... You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it smile? Because of the long face and all? (No, that can’t be it). Anyway, borrowing a bit from Plutarch and Yeats (maybe, there is no agreement on whether he said that about pails and fires), and some idiom from 12th Century Old English about horses walking on water, I assum…Read more
  •  164
    Argumentation, Metaphor, and Analogy: It's Like Something Else
    Inquiry: Critical Thinking Across the Disciplines 33 (2). 2024.
    A "good" arguer is like an architect with a penchant for civil and civic engineering. Such an arguer can design and present their reasons artfully about a variety of topics, as good architects do with a plenitude of structures and in various environments. Failures in this are rarely hidden for long, as poor constructions reveal themselves, often spectacularly, so collaboration among civical engineers can be seen as a virtue. Our logical virtues should be analogous. When our arguments fail due to…Read more
  •  144
    This chapter will evaluate humor used with the specific intent to reveal glaring epistemic errors that lead to injustice; flaws in reasoning so transparent that straightforward logic, argument, and evidence seem ineffectual against them, and in some cases, just silly to think such tools would be needed. Laughter seems to be one of the only sane responses. In particular, I will assess how humor can combat conspiracy theories, propaganda, lies, and bullshit. The last one I view in Harry Frankfurt'…Read more
  •  78
    Artificial Intelligence, Phenomenology, and the Molyneux Problem
    The Philosophy of Humor Yearbook 4 (1): 225-226. 2023.
    This short article is a “conversation” in which an android, Mort, replies to Richard Marc Rubin’s android named Sol in “The Robot Sol Explains Laughter to His Android Brethren” (The Philosophy of Humor Yearbook, 2022). There Sol offers an explanation for how androids can laugh--largely a reaction to frustration and unmet expectations: “my account says that laughter is one of four ways of dealing with frustration, difficulties, and insults. It is a way of getting by. If you need to label my conce…Read more
  •  59
    New Populism, New Conspiracism, and the Old Rhetoric of Purity
    Encyclopedia of New Populism and Responses in the 21St Century. 2023.
    This entry investigates the connections between neo-populism and neo-conspiracism in the USA. One central thread is the rhetoric of purity that fosters rigid dichotomies of thought about identities, contributing to both populism and conspiracism, eliciting a neologism: conspirapopulism.
  •  15
    Mark Twain’s Serious Humor and That Peculiar Institution: Christianity
    In Alan H. Goldman (ed.), Mark Twain and Philosophy, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. pp. 125-136. 2017.
    According to Manuel Davenport, “The best humorists--Mark Twain, Will Rogers, Bob Hope, and Mort Sahl--share [a] mixture of detachment and desire, eagerness to believe, and irreverence concerning the possibility of certainty. And when they become serious about their convictions--as Twain did about colonialism…they cease to be humorous” (p. 171). I agree with the first part, but not the second. Humor does require disengagement, but not completely such that one has no emotional interest in the subj…Read more
  •  11
    A Wise Person Proportions Their Beliefs With Humor
    The Philosophy of Humor Yearbook 2 (1): 141-143. 2021.
    “Just as philosophy begins with doubt, so also a life that may be called human begins with irony” (Kierkegaard The Concept of Irony with Continual Reference to Socrates, pg.6, thesis XV) What has proportion to do with humor or irony? And what do either of these have to do with being human? Jokes, laughter, and funniness connote excess, exaggeration, incongruity, dissonance, etc., the opposite of proportion--balance, symmetry, Aristotle’s golden mean. Yet, The Philosopher maintains, the wit has f…Read more
  • The Playful Thought Experiments of Louis CK
    In Mark Ralkowski (ed.), Louis CK and Philosophy. pp. 225-236. 2016.
    It is trivially true that comedians make jokes and thus are not serious; they are “just playing.” But watching Louis CK, especially his performances in Chewed Up, Shameless, and Hilarious, it is evident that he has more in mind than simply getting his audience to frivolously guffaw. I will make the case that this is so given the content of some of his humor which centers on areas of socio-political-ethical tensions that can be uncomfortable when addressed in a direct, “bona-fide” communicative m…Read more
  • How Socratic Is Swift's Irony?
    In Janelle Pötzsch (ed.), Jonathan Swift and Philosophy. pp. 13-25. 2017.
    Was Swift correct that “reasoning will never make a man correct an ill opinion, which by reasoning he never acquired” (Letter to a Young Gentleman)? If so, what recourse is there to change attitudes especially among those who continue to fervently believe unjustified claims and act upon them in a way that affects other people? I will answer the first question with a qualified yes, and the second I will follow Swift’s implicit proposal to rely upon humor, satire, playful ridicule, and especially …Read more