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33Reuniting philosophy and science to advance cancer researchBiological Reviews 98 (5): 1668-1686. 2023.Cancers rely on multiple, heterogeneous processes at different scales, pertaining to many biomedical fields. Therefore, understanding cancer is necessarily an interdisciplinary task that requires placing specialised experimental and clinical research into a broader conceptual, theoretical, and methodological framework. Without such a framework, oncology will collect piecemeal results, with scant dialogue between the different scientific communities studying cancer. We argue that one important wa…Read more
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15Redrawing therapeutic boundaries: microbiota and cancerTrends in Cancer 8 (2): 87-97. 2022.The unexpected roles of the microbiota in cancer challenge explanations of carcinogenesis that focus on tumor-intrinsic properties. Most tumors contain bacteria and viruses, and the host’s proximal and distal microbiota influence both cancer incidence and therapeutic responsiveness. Continuing the history of cancer–microbe research, these findings raise a key question: to what extent is the microbiota relevant for clinical oncology? We approach this by critically evaluating three issues: how the…Read more
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21Cancer's second genome: Microbial cancer diagnostics and redefining clonal evolution as a multispecies processBioessays 44 (5): 2100252. 2022.The presence and role of microbes in human cancers has come full circle in the last century. Tumors are no longer considered aseptic, but implications for cancer biology and oncology remain underappreciated. Opportunities to identify and build translational diagnostics, prognostics, and therapeutics that exploit cancer's second genome—the metagenome—are manifold, but require careful consideration of microbial experimental idiosyncrasies that are distinct from host‐centric methods. Furthermore, t…Read more
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51The Role of Similar Vulnerability in Aristotle’s Account of CompassionAncient Philosophy 38 (2): 347-355. 2018.
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7Theism, Coherence, and Justification in Thomas Reid’s EpistemologyIn Todd Buras & Rebecca Copenhaver (eds.), Thomas Reid on Mind, Knowledge and Value, Oxford University Press. 2015.On the standard simple foundationalist interpretation of Thomas Reid’s epistemology, his epistemic appeals to God seem problematic. These appeals are generally dismissed as dogmatic, viciously circular, or mere irrelevant pieties. This chapter responds first that, even on the standard foundationalist interpretation, theism can sometimes boost the epistemic justification of first principles. It then argues that Reid’s epistemology is plausibly interpreted as containing coherentist strands. While …Read more
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40Reconciling Robert Adams’ Accounts of Virtues and Motivational VirtuesSouthwest Philosophy Review 27 (2): 123-140. 2011.
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27The role of theism in Thomas Reid’s epistemology remains an unresolved question. Opinions range from outright denials that theism has any relevance to Reid’s epistemology to claims that Reid’s epistemology depends upon theism in a dogmatic or a viciously circular manner. This dissertation attempts to bring some order to this interpretive fray by answering the following question: What role or roles does theism play in Reid’s epistemology, particularly in relation to the epistemic justification of…Read more
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40Why Care for the Severely Disabled? A Critique of MacIntyre's AccountJournal of Medicine and Philosophy 39 (4): 459-473. 2014.In Dependent Rational Animals, Alasdair MacIntyre attempts to ground the virtues in a biological account of humans. Drawing from this attempt, he also tries to answer the question of why we should care for the severely disabled. MacIntyre’s difficulty in answering this question begins with the fact that his communities of practices do not naturally include the severely disabled within their membership and care. In response to this difficulty, he provides four reasons for why we should care for t…Read more
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42Glenn McGee: Bioethics for beginners: 60 cases and cautions from the moral frontier of healthcare: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012, 192 pp, $25.95 , ISBN: 978-0-470-65911-3Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics 35 (6): 469-472. 2014.Reading and reflecting on real cases helps ethics come alive for students. Good cases grip our attention, engage our imagination, and show the real-life implications of abstract ethical theories, ideals, commitments, and policies. Finding good case studies is both difficult and time-consuming for instructors, so I was excited to learn about Glenn McGee’s book Bioethics for Beginners: 60 Cases and Cautions from the Moral Frontier of Healthcare. According to the publisher, its target audiences are…Read more
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Shorter UniversityDepartment Of HumanitiesAssistant Professor Of Liberal Arts
Waco, Texas, United States of America