•  19
    The Germans have a lovely word: Millimeterarbeit. Literally, it means "millimeter work" but a more accurate translation would be "very precise work." Abraham Anderson's Kant, Hume, and the Interruption of Dogmatic Slumber qualifies as Millimeterarbeit, because the entire book is devoted to unpacking the meaning of a single sentence from page 4:260 of the Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics That Will Be Able to Come Forward as Science: "I freely confess: it was the objection of David Hume that …Read more
  •  10
    Epistemologists who have studied disagreement have started to devote attention to the notion of epistemic standing (i.e., epistemic peerhood, superiority, or inferiority). One feature of epistemic standing they have not drawn attention to is a distinction between what I call “broad” and “narrow” epistemic standing. Someone who is, say, your broad epistemic peer with respect to some topic is someone who is generally as familiar with and good at handling the evidence as you are. But someone who is…Read more
  •  23
    Kant's Theory of Evil: An Interpretation and Defense
    Dissertation, University of Michigan. 2008.
    Kant’s theory of evil, presented most fully in his Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason, has been consistently misinterpreted since he first presented it. As a result, readers have taken it to be a mess of inconsistencies and eccentricities and so have tried to mine it for an insight or two, dismissed it altogether, or sought to explain how Kant could have gone so wrong. In this work, I provide an interpretation of Kant’s theory of evil that renders it consistent and plausible. The main…Read more
  •  60
    Epistemologists who have studied disagreement have started to devote attention to the notion of epistemic standing. One feature of epistemic standing they have not drawn attention to is a distinction between what I call “broad” and “narrow” epistemic standing. Someone who is, say, your broad epistemic peer with respect to some topic is someone who is generally as familiar with and good at handling the evidence as you are. But someone who is your narrow epistemic peer with respect to that topic i…Read more
  •  9
    Why Is Kant Noncommittal About Grace?
    Con-Textos Kantianos 6 272-284. 2017.
    In Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason, Kant claims that we may need to invoke divine aid in order to explain how a person can change from evil to good. Kant’s language is a bit curious; why does he not more clearly assert, either that we must posit divine grace, or that we may not? The explanation is this: if we affirm that God grants aid, then this could convince people to passively await it or to think, upon becoming good, that they are part of a special elect. On the other hand, if we …Read more
  •  44
    Kant’s Theory of Emotion: Emotional Universalism, written by Diane Williamson (review)
    Journal of Moral Philosophy 15 (2): 217-220. 2018.
  •  37
    Kant’s Theodicy and its Role in the Development of Radical Evil
    Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie 100 (1): 46-75. 2018.
    In the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals and the Critique of Practical Reason, Kant claims that rational beings should want to have no inclinations. But in Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason, he asserts that the inclinations are good in themselves. While many commentators hold that Kant simply wrote hyperbolically in the Groundwork and the second Critique, I argue Kant was sincere, and changed his mind about the worth of the inclinations between the second Critique and the Religion.…Read more
  •  37
    21% versus 79%: Explaining philosophy’s gender disparities with stereotyping and identification
    with Debbie Ma, Clennie Webster, and Nanae Tachibe
    Philosophical Psychology 31 (1): 68-88. 2018.
    This study tests the hypothesis that the perception of philosophy as a male-oriented discipline contributes to the pronounced gender disparity within the field. To assess the hypothesis, we determined the extent to which individuals view philosophy as masculine, and whether individual differences in this correspond with greater identification with philosophy. We also tested whether identification with philosophy correlated to interest in it. We discovered, first, that the more women view philoso…Read more
  •  77
    True religion in Hume’s Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion
    with Tim Black
    British Journal for the History of Philosophy 25 (2): 244-264. 2017.
    Many think that the aim of Hume’s Dialogues is simply to discredit the design argument for the existence of an intelligent designer. We think instead that the Dialogues provides a model of true religion. We argue that, for Hume, the truly religious person: believes that an intelligent designer created and imposed order on the universe; grounds this belief in an irregular argument rooted in a certain kind of experience, for example, in the experience of anatomizing complex natural systems such as…Read more
  •  52
    "Free Will," by Joseph Keim Campbell (review)
    Teaching Philosophy 35 (2): 223-226. 2012.
  •  73
    Review: Anderson-Gold, Sharon, and Muchnik, Pablo, Kant's Anatomy of Evil (review)
    Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews 2010 (7). 2010.
    In this book review, I assess the merits of the book as a whole (it's good!) while focusing in particular on chapters by Claudia Card, Patrick Frierson, Robert Louden, Pablo Muchnik, Jeanine Grenberg, and Allen Wood.
  • Kant: Morality and the Good
    Philosophical Forum 42 (3): 316-317. 2011.
  •  155
    Recent work on Kantian maxims I: Established approaches
    Philosophy Compass 5 (3): 216-227. 2010.
    Maxims play a crucial role in Kant's ethical philosophy, but there is significant disagreement about what maxims are. In this two-part essay, I survey eight different views of Kantian maxims, presenting their strengths, and their weaknesses. Part I: Established Approaches, begins with Rüdiger Bubner's view that Kant took maxims to be what ordinary people of today take them to be, namely pithily expressed precepts of morality or prudence. Next comes the position, most associated with Rüdiger Bitt…Read more
  •  49
    Review: Hare, John E., God and Morality: A Philosophical History (review)
    Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews 2007 (11). 2007.
    In this book, John Hare talks about the relationship between theism and the moral theories of four influential philosophers: Aristotle, Duns Scotus, Kant, and R. M. Hare.
  •  140
    Recent work on Kantian maxims II
    Philosophy Compass 5 (3): 228-239. 2010.
    Maxims play a crucial role in Kant's ethical philosophy, but there is significant disagreement about what maxims are. In this two-part essay, I survey eight different views of Kantian maxims, presenting their strengths and their weaknesses. In Part II: New Approaches, I look at three more recent views in somewhat greater detail than I do the five treatments canvassed in 'Recent Works on Kantian Maxims I: Established Approaches'. First, there is Richard McCarty's Interpretation, which holds that …Read more
  •  50
    Review: Firestone, Kant and Theology at the Boundaries of Reason (review)
    International Journal for Philosophy of Religion 67 (3): 187-191. 2010.