I am an Associate Professor in the Philosophy Department at California Polytechnic State University. Cal Poly, located in San Luis Obispo on California's beautiful Central Coast, has been rated the best public master's university in the west by U.S. News & World Report for 19 consecutive years (1992-2011). San Luis Obispo routinely makes top-ten lists for places to live. At Cal Poly I teach courses in Epistemology, Metaphysics, Aesthetics, Philosophical Classics, and Philosophy of Religion. My main research area is Epistemology, but I also work in Metaphysics (especially freedom & moral responsibility), Philosophy of Religion, and Aesthetics. During 2009-10, while on sabbatical from Cal Poly, I worked as Visiting Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Rochester. During 2003-4 I was a Postdoctoral Fellow in The Center for Philosophy of Religion at the University of Notre Dame, and I taught Ethics for Notre Dame's Philosophy Department. I received my Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Rochester in 2003. My dissertation, Justification-Skepticism, was advised by Richard Feldman (director), Earl Conee, and Edward Wierenga.

More personal information is available here.

Specialization: Epistemology
Concentration: Metaphysics, Philosophy of Religion
Competence: History of Early Modern Philosophy, Ethics, Applied Ethics, Critical Thinking, Aesthetics, College Writing

CV

Full curriculum vitae

PUBLICATIONS

"Mentalist Evidentialism Vindicated (and a Super-Blooper Epistemic Design Problem for Proper Function Justification)", Philosophical Studies 157:2 (2012) 251-266. doi: 10.1007/s11098-010-9635-8.

"A Proper De Jure Objection to the Epistemic Rationality of Religious Belief", Religious Studies 46:3 (2010) 375-394; © Cambridge University Press 2010; doi: 10.1017/S00034412509990382.

"Proper Function Justification and Epistemic Rationality", Southwest Philosophy Review 26:1 (2010) 189-195.

"What Kinds of Diversity Are We to Promote in the University?", Moebius 8:1 (2010) 37-45.

"Is it True that 'Evolution is a Theory, Not a Fact'?", International Journal of Applied Philosophy, 21:1 (2007) 89-108.

“Moderate Reasons-Responsiveness, Moral Responsibility, and Manipulation”, in Freedom and Determinism (eds.) Joe Keim Campbell, Michael O'Rourke, and David Shier (MIT Press, 2004) 151-172. A review of this paper by Eddy Nahmias appears in Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews.

“Belief or ‘Belief': Rush Rhees on Religious Belief Language”, Philosophical Writings, 12 (1999) 21-45.

“A Selective Defense of Tolstoy's What is Art?”, Philosophical Writings , 8 (1998) 15-25.

REVIEWS

Review of Earl Conee and Theodore Sider, Riddles of Existence, Teaching Philosophy, 31:1 (2008) 98-101.

Book Note of Stephen Hetherington, Reality? Knowledge? Philosophy!, Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 83: 3 (2005) 447. [preprint available here]

Review of H.O. Mounce, Tolstoy on Aesthetics: What is Art?, Teaching Philosophy, 25:4 (2002) 367-370.

Review of David M. Holley, Self-Interest and Beyond, Teaching Philosophy, 25:2 (2002), pp. 163-165.

Ph.D. DISSERTATION

Justification-Skepticism [abstract] , University of Rochester, 2003 (Director: Richard Feldman; Committee Members: Earl Conee and Edward Wierenga).

PRESENTATIONS

2011-12

"Information Manipulation and Moral Responsibility", Department of Philosophy, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, September 9, 2011 (colloquia details here).

"Moral Responsibility, Information Manipulation, and Divine Justice", Society of Christian Philosophers Mountain-Pacific Regional Conference, Westmont College, January 13-14, 2012 (conference details here).

"Epistemic Conditions for Information Manipulated Responsible Action", Bowling Green Workshop in Applied Ethics and Public Policy: Manipulation, Bowling Green State University, March 16-17, 2012 (conference details here)

Full Presentations List

PROFESSIONAL SERVICE

I have served as a referee or reviewer for papers or books on topics in epistemology or metaphysics of free will and moral responsibility for the following:

American Philosophical Quarterly
Australasian Journal of Philosophy
Broadview Press
Dialectica
Erkenntnis
Journal of Philosophical Research
Mind
MIT Press
Nous
Philosophical Studies
Philosophia
Routledge
Synthese
Wiley-Blackwell

AWARDS & HONORS

Awarded tenure, California Polytechnic State University (2009)

Promotion to Associate Professor, California Polytechnic State University (2009)

Full-Year Sabbatical, California Polytechnic State University, 2009-10

CFA Distinguished Educator Award Nominee, California Faculty Association, Cal Poly, 2004-5

Postdoctoral Fellowship: Center for Philosophy of Religion, University of Notre Dame, 2003-4

Teaching Assistant of the Year: Graduate Program in Philosophy, University of Rochester, 2002-3

Best Essay of the Year: Graduate Program in Philosophy, University of Rochester, 2002-3

Edward Peck Curtis Award for Excellence in Teaching by a Graduate Student, 2003 Nominee (nominated by Department of Philosophy), University of Rochester

Teaching Assistant of the Year: Graduate Program in Philosophy, University of Rochester, 2001-2

Best Essay of the Year: Graduate Program in Philosophy, University of Rochester, 2000-1

Fellowship/Teaching Assistantship: Graduate Program in Philosophy, University of Rochester, 1999-2003

Pew Younger Scholar: Graduate Summer Seminar: Foundationalism in Politics, Liberalism, Natural Law Theory and the Pluralist Alternative (Nicholas Wolterstorff), St. Edwards University, Summer 1999

Phillip S. Bashor Award: Outstanding Graduate Work in Philosophy, University of Arkansas, 1998-9

Teaching Assistantship: Graduate Program in Philosophy, University of Arkansas, 1998-9

Rotary Scholar: Ambassadorial Academic-Year Scholarship, University of Wales Swansea, 1997-8

Pre-Dissertation Work with Distinction: University of Wales Swansea

Outstanding Graduate Student in Philosophy Award: University of Southern Mississippi, 1994-5

Teaching Assistantship: Graduate Program in Philosophy, University of Southern Mississippi, 1994-5

Gamma Beta Phi National Honor Society, inducted 1995

Pi Tau Chi National Honor Society in Religion (and Scholarship recipient), 1995

GRANTS

California State Faculty Support Grant, Manipulation and Moral Responsibility, Fall 2006

Junior Faculty Support Grant, College of Liberal Arts, Cal Poly, Spring 2006

COURSES: CURRENT & UPCOMING

Winter 2012

Metaphysics

Philosophical Classics: Knowledge & Reality

Spring 2012

Epistemology of Religious Belief

Philosophical Classics: Knowledge & Reality

ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICE

Administrative Service list

PERSONAL

Personal information & pictures

SUPER LINKS

Links to stuff I care about

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