My work is primarily in Philosophy of Mind, on the topic of Other Minds, and is historically influenced. What has come to be known as the ‘Problem of Other Minds’ in philosophy is usually understood in its epistemological formulation: roughly, ‘how do we know about others’ thoughts and feelings?’, or more radically, ‘how do we know others exist?’. I approach the problem in a not-standardly-epistemological way. The basic view I hold, following the phenomenological tradition, is that there is a sui generis act of consciousness (empathy) that makes other persons available to one as objects of cognition and thought. I also approach the problem of other minds with the conviction that the way philosophers picture human persons’ basic relation to others—even where that concerns knowledge and existence—has consequences in other domains. As Iris Murdoch once wrote: ‘Man is a creature who makes pictures of himself, and then comes to resemble the picture.’ (‘Metaphysics and Ethics’) Our picture of our most basic relation to others can be a blueprint for how we relate to others. 

Research

Publications

“The Problem of Other-Awareness” (forthcoming in Acta Analytica)

Abstract: There has been a recent resurgence of interest in the problem of other minds. Although there was once near consensus that there is in fact no problem of knowledge about others, that is no longer so clear. This paper introduces a problem about our awareness of others. By isolating and drawing on features of two familiar problems about other minds—epistemological and conceptual—I point to a problem about other minds that, unlike these other formulations of the problem, shows it to be unique. An upshot of this is that the topic of other minds, or ‘other-knowledge’, is as deserving of its own investigation as the topic of self-knowledge has proven to be in philosophy. I begin by drawing on phenomenology, in which philosophers have had a different orientation toward the problem of others. Some phenomenologists, I argue, ask about what sort of awareness is involved in the basic relation we stand in to others, where this is understood to be different from the basic relation we stand in to the non-mental world. This problem captures two features of the topic of other minds that I claim are unique: mediation and asymmetry. 

Works in Progress

(selected; drafts available upon request)

“Knowing Who I Am” (under review) A paper on knowing ourselves in relation to others.

“What Is It to Read?” (under review) A paper on what sort of mental act reading is.

“Empathic Understanding” (in progress) A paper on the structure of the act of empathy.

“Can Epistemic Asymmetry Motivate the Problem of Other Minds?” (in progress) A paper on why self/other asymmetries are not sufficient to motivate the problem of other minds.