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Edited Volume

1. Susan Stebbing: Analysis, Common Sense, and Public Philosophy
   

   Oxford University Press (forthcoming) (co-edited with Annalisa Coliva)

   

   This is the first edited volume to be dedicated exclusively to the philosophy of Susan Stebbing (1885–1943)—a pivotal figure in early analytic philosophy and Britain’s first female professor of philosophy who has, until recently, been unjustly neglected. This volume collects eleven new essays that explore various elements of Stebbing’s prolific output. The volume and its contributors aim to reinstate Stebbing’s place in the analytic tradition by examining her ideas in context and elucidating their significance.

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Articles and Chapters

Moore’s Fourth Condition


Journal of the History of Philosophy (forthcoming)

It is widely assumed that G. E. Moore was either oblivious or indifferent to circularity worries surrounding his enigmatic proof of an external world. I argue that this assumption is false. Drawing on unpublished archival evidence and overlooked passages in Moore’s posthumously published lectures, I provide, for the first time, an account of Moore on circular proof. I show that, as early as 1928–29 and as late as 1938–39, Moore identified an “important” and “unimportant” sense of begging the question (epistemic circularity and premise circularity, respectively) and maintained that a genuine proof should avoid both forms. Curiously, however, this standard is not upheld in his 1939 “Proof,” where this “important” sense is conspicuously absent from Moore’s discussion. This discrepancy raises an interpretative puzzle: Why does Moore’s standard for proof change? I provide an answer and explore its philosophical implications, clarifying the paradoxical nature of the proof and re-diagnosing the sense of intellectual dissatisfaction experienced by many commentators.

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Bergmann’s Intuitions


Canadian Journal of Philosophy (forthcoming)

My contribution to a workshop on Michael Bergmann's Radical Skepticism and Epistemic Intuition held at Arizona State University, December 7, 2024. I raise some worries about Bergmann’s use of intuitions in combating skepticism.

[Draft down for revisions]

Making Sense of Stebbing and Moore on Common Sense


In A. Coliva and L. Doulas (eds.), Susan Stebbing: Analysis, Common Sense, and Public Philosophy, Oxford University Press (forthcoming)

This paper reexamines Stebbing and Moore’s views about common sense. I first draw on overlooked textual evidence to argue that Moore’s common sense views are far less monolithic than has been traditionally assumed. I use this to show that Stebbing and Moore were largely aligned with respect to the extent to which the truths of common sense may be philosophically analyzed. I then develop an alternative reading of Stebbing’s common sense program, which I argue is decidedly distinct from Moore’s. For Stebbing, unlike Moore, science and common sense form a unity. I trace how this idea is developed across several of her works, culminating in her view that commonsense knowledge constitutes a form of probable knowledge.

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Philosophical (and Scientific) Progress: A Hinge Account


In S. Goldberg and M. Walker (eds.), Attitude in Philosophy, Oxford University Press (forthcoming) (with Annalisa Coliva)

Just as skepticism about our knowledge of the external world is thought to engender a kind of despair, skepticism about our philosophical knowledge, if true, engenders a despair of a similar kind. We remain optimistic. Despair, we urge, needn’t get the best of us. Philosophical knowledge is attainable. Progress is possible. But we aren’t overly optimistic either. Philosophical skepticism has its place. In this chapter, we show how philosophical knowledge and philosophical progress is possible in light of widespread disagreement in philosophy.

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Philosophical Progress, Skepticism, and Disagreement


In M. Baghramian, J. A. Carter, and R. Rowland (eds.), The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Disagreement, Routledge (2024) (with Annalisa Coliva)

This chapter serves as an opinionated introduction to the problem of convergence (that there is no clear convergence to the truth in philosophy) and the problem of peer disagreement (that disagreement with a peer rationally demands suspending one’s beliefs) and some of the issues they give rise to, namely, philosophical skepticism and progress in philosophy. After introducing both topics and surveying the various positions in the literature, we explore the prospects of an alternative, hinge-theoretic account.

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What Philosophical Disagreement and Philosophical Skepticism Hinge On


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

Philosophers disagree. A lot. Pervasive disagreement is part of the territory; consensus is hard to find. Some think this should lead us to embrace philosophical skepticism: skepticism about the extent to which we can know, or justifiably believe, the philosophical views we defend and advance. Most philosophers in the literature fall into one camp or the other: philosophical skepticism or philosophical anti-skepticism. Drawing on the insights of hinge epistemology, this paper proposes another way forward, an intermediate position that appeals both to skeptical and anti-skeptical intuitions concerning the possibility and scope of philosophical knowledge. The main advantage of our account is that it’s able to recover some philosophical knowledge while also being compatible with philosophical skepticism.

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Against Philosophical Proofs Against Common Sense


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

Many philosophers think that common sense knowledge survives sophisticated philosophical proofs against it. Recently, however, Bryan Frances (2021) has advanced a philosophical proof that he thinks common sense cannot survive. Exploiting philosophical paradoxes like the Sorites, Frances attempts to show how common sense leads to paradox and therefore that common sense methodology is unstable. In this paper, we show how Frances’s proof fails and then present Frances with a dilemma.

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A Puzzle About Moorean Metaphysics


Philosophical Studies (2021) 178: 493–513

Some metaphysicians believe that existence debates are easily resolved by trivial inferences from Moorean premises. This paper considers how the introduction of negative Moorean facts—negative existentials that command Moorean certainty—complicates this picture. In particular, it shows how such facts, when combined with certain plausible metaontological principles, generate a puzzle that commits the proponents of this method to a contradiction.

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