Publications

Books

1. The Philosophy of Susan Stebbing
   

   Oxford University Press (co-edited with Annalisa Coliva)

   This is the first volume to be dedicated exclusively to the philosophy of Susan Stebbing (1885–1943). Through fourteen, previously unpublished essays, this book traces and explores the depth and breadth of Stebbing’s philosophical contributions across a diverse range of issues in analytic philosophy—from logic and science, to public philosophy and politics—and reinforces the importance of Stebbing’s place in that history as well as the saliency of her ideas to issues still under dispute today.

Articles

2. What Philosophical Disagreement and Philosophical Skepticism Hinge On
   

   Synthese (2022) 200: 1–14 (with Annalisa Coliva)

3. Philosophical Progress, Skepticism, and Disagreement
   

   The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Disagreement (2022) (with Annalisa Coliva)

4. Against Philosophical Proofs Against Common Sense
   

   Analysis (2021) 81: 207–215 (with Evan Welchance)

5. A Puzzle About Moorean Metaphysics
   

   Philosophical Studies (2021) 178: 493–513

In Progress

1. Proof in Parts: Understanding Moore’s Elusive Proof

   Despite the attention Moore’s “Proof of an External World” has received, there remain a host of interpretive puzzles that have gone either unresolved or unaddressed. In this paper, I offer an unified interpretation of “Proof” that resolves these puzzles. In particular, I advance what I call a dual-aspect reading of Moore’s proof: that the proof should be taken literally and straightforwardly, as an empirical proof, but also non-literally, as a metaphilosophical rejection of a certain “transcendental” approach to philosophy. In this respect, Moore’s proof is successful: he has empirical knowledge of an external world and this knowledge is compatible with lacking the sort of “transcendental” proof or evidence that his skeptical and idealist opponents demand. If Moore’s proof is a failure in any way, it’s not for the usual reasons (that it begs the question or is circular) but because Moore fails to make explicit his methodological commitments.

2. Making Sense of Moore and Stebbing on Common Sense

   Moore is known for championing a “common sense” view of the world. But his appeals to common sense can seem dubious—what exactly is common sense anyway? The aim of this paper is to demystify Moore’s appeals to common sense and clarify what this common sense picture really amounts to. To do this, I start not with Moore, but with Susan Stebbing—a close colleague of Moore’s whose philosophical contributions have been unjustly overlooked—and use her conception of common sense to sharpen and develop Moore’s own. Against received views, I argue that common sense, as Moore and Stebbing conceive it, is more Quinean than Archimedean: although common sense knowledge may enjoy more centrality in our “web of beliefs” than scientific knowledge, it’s an extension of such knowledge and, hence, just as corrigible. This shifts the way Moore’s “credibility comparisons” should be understood: not as an indefeasible appeal to common sense over abstract philosophy, but as a defeasible appeal to the best evidence we currently have: experience.

3. Questions with and without Method: Moore, Carnap, and Wittgenstein

   This paper brings together three influential figures of analytic philosophy and examines their status as “anti-philosophers.” By “anti-philosopher,” I mean that all three philosophers were keen on circumscribing the limits and scope of what the philosophical method, and philosophy more generally, could achieve. All three, however, did this in interestingly different but related ways. To situate my discussion, I focus on the question concerning the external world and examine how each philosopher understood this question (as well as related questions) and then draw out some of the anti-philosophical commitments that unite them.

4. What Moore’s Hands Mean

   Draft available upon request.

5. Moorean Modesty in Metaphysics

   When it comes to common sense, some metaphysicians are disbelievers: common sense either has no place in serious metaphysical theorizing or else it does but it’s highly defeasible. Others give common sense a role to play but a superficial one: common sense is right about there being tables, but this doesn’t entail that there really are tables. These metaphysicians thus attempt to pay their respects to common sense at the cost of downgrading it to mere sentential truth. Accordingly, call such metaphysician downgraders. Disbelievers and downgraders have disowned common sense in two distinct ways. In this paper, I explain why I think this is a mistake.

6. Remembering What You Know

   I make the case for what I call everyday epistemology: the idea that our ordinary, everyday epistemic practices are sophisticated and satisfying enough to answer various skeptical philosophical challenges. This picture ends up presupposing a certain conception of philosophy. Philosophy, I argue, involves a certain kind of overthinking which can take either virtuous or vicious forms. When virtuous, philosophical overthinking can lead to increased understanding, perhaps even knowledge. But when vicious, philosophical overthinking can be epistemically harmful; it can confuse us, causing us to forget what we know. The value in practicing everyday epistemology, then, is in its ability to remind us of what we know. Reviewing, for example, Moore’s infamous proof or Austin’s dismantling of the argument from illusion, can function as philosophically sobering antidotes to the doubt we may experience when in the grip of certain skeptical attitudes generated by philosophical overthinking.