My research focuses on the intersection of epistemology, ethics, and meta-normative theory. I have worked on the nature of justified belief, radical scepticism, and epistemic anti-realism. I am especially interested in fundamental questions about the similarities and differences between epistemology and other normative disciplines, such as ethics, or aesthetics. More recently, I’ve been exploring questions about epistemic blame, interpersonal relations, and the foundations of epistemic normativity.
I am a Senior Research Associate at the African Centre for Epistemology and Philosophy of Science, University of Johannesburg.
2024-2026: Nicolas Nicola (U of T/Miami) recently joined me at BU for a 2-year SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellowship! His project is titled “Epistemic Blame and the Practice of Blame Avoidance”. More details soon!
2022-2025: I am the principle investigator on a three-year SSHRC Insight Development Grant titled “Norms of Epistemic Criticism”. The project looks at normative questions about our practice of criticizing one another for epistemic failings.
2023-2025: I am a member of the Epistemic Reparations Global Working Group, funded by a Buffett Global Catalyst Grant. The co-leads of the project are Jennifer Lackey and Ben Frommer.
2024. Epistemic Blame: The Nature and Norms of Epistemic Relationships, Oxford University Press. (order here)
Forthcoming. The Relational Foundations of Epistemic Normativity. Philosophical Issues.
2024. Epistemic Blame as Relationship Modification: Reply to Smartt. Philosophical Studies, 181: 387-396.
2024. Pragmatism, Truth, and Cognitive Agency, Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy. 67(6): 1811-1824.
2024. Degrees of Epistemic Criticizability. The Philosophical Quarterly, 74(2): 431-452.
2023. Epistemic Complicity, Episteme, 20(4): 870-893.
2023. Access to Collective Epistemic Reasons: Reply to Mitova, Asian Journal of Philosophy, 2(60): 1-9. (Article Symposium: The Collective Epistemic Reasons of Social Identity Groups)
2023. The Significance of Epistemic Blame. Erkenntnis, 88(2): 807-828.
2021. Epistemic Blame. Philosophy Compass, 16(8):1-12.
2021. Standing to Epistemically Blame. Synthese, 199:11355-11375.
2021. The (Virtue) Epistemology of Political Ignorance, American Philosophical Quarterly, 58(3):217-232.
2020. There is a Distinctively Epistemic Kind of Blame, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research. Online First.
2020. Epistemic Judgment and Motivation, The Philosophical Quarterly (with Sebastian Köhler), 70(281):738-758.
2019. Excuses, Exemptions, and Derivative Norms, Ratio, 32(2):150-158.
2018. An Explanatory Challenge for Epistemological Disjunctivism, Episteme, 15(2):141-153.
2017. Hoops and Barns: a New Dilemma for Sosa, Synthese (with Kelp, C., Broncano-Berrocal, F., Dimmock, P., Ghijsen, H. & Simion, M.), Epub ahead of print DOI 10.1007/s11229-017-1461-5.
2017. Categorical Norms and Convention-Relativism About Epistemic Discourse, dialectica, 71(1): 85-99.
2017. Epistemic Normativity and the Justification-Excuse Distinction, Synthese, 194(10): 4065-4081.
2017. Knowledge and Attributability, Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, 98(1): 329-350.
2017. Epistemic Conditions on “Ought”: E=K as a Case Study, Acta Analytica, 32(2): 223–244.
2016. Excusing Prospective Agents, Logos & Episteme, 7(2):119-128.
2013. Epistemic Principles and Sceptical Arguments: Closure and Underdetermination, Philosophia, 41 (4):1125-1133.
2013. Wittgensteinian Anti-Scepticism and Epistemic Vertigo, Philosophia (with Duncan Pritchard), 41(1):27-35.
2021. The Epistemic Responsibilities of Citizens in a Democracy, in The Routledge Handbook of Political Epistemology, Hannon, M. & DeRidder, J. (eds.), Routledge.
2020. Epistemic Virtues and Virtues with Epistemic Content, in Virtue Theoretic Epistemology: New Methods and Approaches (with Kelp, C., Simion, M. and Schnurr, J.), Greco, J. & Kelp, C. (eds.), Cambridge University Press.
2019. Review of The Brain in a Vat (Goldberg, S. (ed.), Cambridge University Press), International Journal for the Study of Skepticism, 9(1): 75-82.
2017. Review of Naturalizing Epistemic Virtue (Fairweather, A. & Flanagan, O. (eds.), Cambridge University Press), Journal of Moral Philosophy, 14(5): 604-607.
Invited. The Relation-Regarding Dimension of Epistemic Reparations. Philosophical Studies, SI: Epistemic Reparations.
Invited. Group Responsibility Without Motivation: Reply to Brown. Inquiry. Symposium on Jessica Brown’s Groups as Epistemic and Moral Agents.
Invited. Skepticism, Rape Culture, and Our Relations as Knowers: Reply to Ichikawa. International Journal of Philosophical Studies, Symposium on Jonathan Ichikawa’s Epistemic Courage.
“The Relation-Regarding Dimension of Epistemic Reparations”, Work in Progress Pilot Sessions, Eastern APA, New York (Jan)
“TBA”, ZEGRa Epistemology Group on Rationality – Research Colloquium, University of Zurich (Nov)
“The Relational Foundations of Epistemic Normativity”, Philadelphia Normative Philosophy Conference, U Penn – Philadelphia, PA (Oct)
“Relation-Based Epistemology”, Epistemic Accountability Workshop, University of Notre Dame Australia, Sydney
“Epistemic Reparations and Our Relations as Knowers”, Epistemic Reparations and the Right to be Known in Post-Apartheid South Africa, ACEPS and Hector Pieterson Community Centre – Soweto, Johannesburg
“Group Responsibility Without Motivation: Reply to Brown”, Symposium on Jessica Brown’s Groups as Epistemic and Moral Agents, COGITO, University of Glasgow
“The Relational Foundations of Epistemic Normativity”, Philosophy Senior Seminar, University of Glasgow
“Epistemic Reparations and Our Relations as Knowers”, Epistemic Reparations and Carceral Justice Workshop, Northwestern University and Stateville Correctional Centre, IL
“The Relational Foundations of Epistemic Normativity”, Invited Session: The Epistemic and the Interpersonal, Central APA, New Orleans, LA
“Epistemic Complicity”, 18th Episteme Conference, Stone Town, Zanzibar
Invited comments on “The Agent-Directed Account of Epistemic Blame”, Colloquium Session Pacific APA, San Fransisco, CA
“Epistemic Blame and Social Power”, Epistemic Wrongs and Epistemic Reparations Workshop, African Centre for Epistemology and Philosophy of Science, University of Johannesburg
“Degrees of Epistemic Criticizability”, Western Canadian Philosophical Association, Winnipeg, MB
“Degrees of Epistemic Criticizability”, European Epistemology Network Meeting, University of Glasgow
“The Puzzle of Epistemic Blame”, Responsibility for Beliefs Workshop, University of Helsinki
Invited comments on “The Quality of Thought”, Colloquium Session Pacific APA, Vancouver, BC
“Epistemic Criticism and Epistemic Risk”, The Social and Political Dimensions of Epistemic Risk, University of Seville
“Norms of Epistemic Criticism”, Epistemic Blame: Theory and Practice Workshop, University of Johannesburg
Invited comments on Eugene Chislenko’s “Blame as Attention”, Symposium Session, Central APA, Chicago, Il.
Book symposium on “The Puzzle of Epistemic Blame”, COGITO Centre for Epistemology, University of Glasgow
“Democratic Participation and the Value of Epistemic Blame”, MANCEPT Workshops in Political Philosophy – Epistemic Responsibilities of Democratic Citizens, University of Manchester September
“TBA”, European Epistemology Network Meeting, University of Glasgow [CANCELLED]
“A Relationship-Based Account of Epistemic Blame”, Brown Bag Meetings, CONCEPT Cologne Center for Contemporary Epistemology and the Kantian Tradition, University of Cologne January
“A Relationship-Based Account of Epistemic Blame”, Symposium presentation, Commentators: Tim Kwiatek (Columbia University) and Sara Ghaffari (Bowling Green State University), 2021 Eastern APA Meeting, New York, NY
“Epistemic Blame and the Business Condition on Standing to Blame”, Social (Distance) Epistemology: Weekly Virtual Events, Social Epistemology Network Online
“A Relationship-Based Account of Epistemic Blame”, COGITO Zoom Work in Progress Seminar, University of Glasgow
“Epistemic Blame and the Business Condition on Standing to Blame”, Philosophy Visiting Speaker Colloquium, University of Manitoba
Comments on Michael Hannon’s “Truth, Understanding, and Deliberative Democracy” and Leandro De Brasi’s “Citizen Incompetence and the Epistemic Structure of Society”, 2nd Social Epistemology Network Event, Yonsei University – South Korea
“Epistemic Normativity in Groups”, Roundtable discussion, Canadian Philosophical Association Annual Congress, University of British Columbia
“Epistemic Blame?”, 2018 Annual Meeting of the Western Canadian Philosophical Association. University of Calgary
“Epistemic Blame?”, Cogito New Directions in Social Epistemology Speaker Series, University of Glasgow
“The (Virtue) Epistemology of Political Ignorance”, First Flemish Epistemology Workshop, KU Leuven
“The (Virtue) Epistemology of Political Ignorance”, Cardiff Social Epistemology Workshop: Themes from Sandy Goldberg”, Cardiff University
“Epistemic Judgment and Motivation” (with Sebastian Köhler), The Future of Normativity, Kent University
“The (Virtue) Epistemology of Political Ignorance”, European Epistemology Network Meeting, VU Amsterdam
“Against Epistemic Blame”, Pre-Read Epistemology Work-in-Progress Workshop, VU Amsterdam
“The (Virtue) Epistemology of Political Ignorance”, Canadian Philosophy Association Annual Congress, Montreal
“Intellectually Responsible Democracy”, Faculty of Arts Speaker Series, Brandon University
“Political Ignorance and Epistemic Sensibility”, Guest Lecture in Epistemology, Dec 15 2017, Centre for Logic and Analytic Philosophy, KU Leuven
“Categorical Norms and Convention-Relativism About Epistemic Discourse”, 2017 Aristotelian Society Open Sessions, University of Edinburgh
“Epistemic Virtues and Virtues with Epistemic Content” (with Chris Kelp and Mona Simion), Bled Epistemology Conference 2017
“Response to Saskia Aerts'”The Formation of Epistemic Authority in the Neoplatonic Textual Community”, 3rd CLAW-DWMC Symposium
“Epistemic Judgment and Motivation”, Leuven-Southampton Epistemology Workshop, KU Leuven
Intro to Philosophy (70:160)
Theory of Knowledge (70:261)
Intro to Philosophy (70:160)
Philosophy of Science (70:369)
Directed Topics (70:499)
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