Recent Student Publications
Students in the Graduate Program in Philosophy are active in publishing their research.
Tania Aiyar
Title: Hypocrisy, Hypercrisy, and Standing to Blame
Journal: Philosophical Studies
Year: Forthcoming
Abstract: "It is widely agreed that hypocrites lack standing to blame, but there is substantial disagreement about why this is so. According to Taking Norms Seriously accounts, hypocrites lack standing to blame because they fail to take moral norms seriously, while Moral Equality accounts ground their lack of standing in their implicit rejection of the moral equality of persons. This paper aims to break the recent stalemate between these views in favor of Taking Norms Seriously accounts by presenting novel cases of hypocrisy and its converse, hypercrisy: the act of blaming oneself significantly more than one blames others for relevantly similar wrongs. Unlike standard cases discussed in the literature, I focus on hypocrites who possess insufficient self-regard and hypercrites who have insufficient regard for others. I argue that, in such cases, both hypocrites and hypecrites intuitively retain their standing to blame, despite rejecting the moral equality of persons, because they continue to take the norms seriously."
Kira Kiesler
Title: Exploring Human Obligations to Disabled Animals
Journal: Journal of Animal Ethics
Year: 2026
Abstract: "Most domesticated animals are created for the purpose of humans to exploit or use them in some way. But what happens when these animals cannot fulfill the “purpose” they were created for? This article explores what humans owe toward these disabled domestic animals. Using Tom Regan's theory of animal rights, along with existing human medical ethics and individual case studies, the topics of euthanasia, quality of life, and veterinary ethics are all explored. The article concludes that we have a moral obligation to care for the animals that we have created to be reliant on us. This obligation does not disappear because of an animal's “unprofitability,” disability, or illness."
Link: https://doi.org/10.5406/21601267.16.1.07
Dylan Goodman
Title: Truthlikeness and Progress in Naturalistic Metaphysics
Journal: Synthese
Year: 2025
Abstract: "How does scientifically informed metaphysics make progress? One idea is that metaphysics based on science makes progress on the back of science. If science makes progress, then so too does the metaphysics based on that science. Some argue that there is a problem with this line of reasoning. Kerry McKenzie claims that naturalistic metaphysics cannot make progress, even in principle, because metaphysical theories cannot approximate the truth as science can. In this paper, I offer a response to the worry McKenzie raises. I claim that metaphysics is capable of making progress given an alternative account of scientific progress to hers, the truthlikeness account of progress. I argue that metaphysical theories, in principle, can increase in truthlikeness. According to the truthlikeness account of progress, if theories in a discipline increase in truthlikeness, then the discipline makes progress. Finally, I address two responses to an additional concern that those sharing McKenzie's perspective might have. In doing so, I sketch the groundwork for an alternative account of progress, one that leverages the tool-building approach to metaphysics that others have defended."
Link: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-025-05270-6
Francisco Martinez Avina
Journal: Journal of Logic and Computation
Year: 2024
Abstract: "In this paper, I argue against the thesis that the meaning of ‘computability’ is logic-dependent. I do this from a category-theoretic perspective. Applying a method due to Mortensen and Lavers [26], I show that we can dualize the internal logic of the effective topos, in order to obtain a model of paraconsistent computability theory. Since the dualization leaves the structural properties of universal constructions in the topos unchanged, in particular the properties of the natural numbers object, I conclude that, at least in this case, changing the logic does not change our characterization of computability."
Link: https://academic.oup.com/logcom/advance-article/doi/10.1093/logcom/exae015/7638553
Lel Jones
Title: Microaggression Accountability: Blameworthiness, Blame, and Why it Matters.
Journal: Hypatia
Year: 2024
Abstract: Despite the broad agreement that microaggressions cause harm, there is disagreement on how to capture microaggressor's accountability. Friedlaender (2018) argues that, in many cases, survivors of microaggressions are not justified in holding the microaggressor blameworthy or blaming them (Friedlaender 2018, 14). I argue, in contrast, that we are generally justified in holding most microaggressors blameworthy and blaming them. By adopting a broadly blame-inclusive account of microaggressor accountability, we are in a position to satisfy the desiderata an ideal account should meet: (1) account for cumulative harm; (2) consistently allow for standing to forgive; and (3) be risk sensitive to the microaggressed. By possessing these virtues, I believe my view of microaggressor accountability better equips us to take seriously the harm caused by microaggressions and center the well-being of microaggressees. I respond to Friedlaender's concerns regarding epistemic ignorance and what they call the disaggregation problem. In contrast to Friedlaender's broadly blame-exclusive responsibility model, I motivate a broadly blame-inclusive model for holding microaggressors accountable, explaining how it fulfills the desiderata. I respond to the objection that my account is too blame-inclusive by providing examples of (1) justified microaggressions; (2) excused microaggressions; and (3) blameworthiless microaggressions where blame is justified all the same.
Link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/hyp.2024.17
Jerome Romagosa
Selcuk Kaan Tabakci
Title: Categoricity Problem for LP and K3
Journal: Studia Logica
Year: 2024
Abstract: Even though the strong relationship between proof-theoretic and model-theoretic notions in one’s logical theory can be shown by soundness and completeness proofs, whether we can define the model-theoretic notions by means of the inferences in a proof system is not at all trivial. For instance, provable inferences in a proof system of classical logic in the logical framework SET-FMLA do not determine its intended models as shown by Carnap (Formalization of logic, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1943), i.e., there are non-Boolean models that satisfy its provable inferences. In the literature, this is known as the Categoricity problem or Carnap’s problem. In this paper, we will discuss the Categoricity problem (or Carnap’s problem) for three-valued logics K3 and LP. We will provide three different restrictions on admissible models that will deliver us categoricity results, some of which draw from the solutions provided for the Categoricity problem for classical logic in Belnap and Massey (Stud Log 49(1):67–82, 1990) and Bonnay and Westerståhl (Erkenntis 81(4):721–739, 2016). We will then argue that two of those solutions are philosophically well-motivated: (1) restricting the admissible models where negation is interpreted as a Strong Kleene truth-function, and (2) restricting the admissible models where a complex formula is assigned the third value when its immediate subformulas are assigned the third value.
Link: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11225-024-10098-1
Title: Subminimal Negation on the Australian Plan
Journal: Journal of Philosophical Logic
Year: 2024
Abstract: Frame semantics for negation on the Australian Plan accommodates many different negations, but it falls short on accommodating subminimal negation when the language contains conjunction and disjunction. In this paper, I will present a multi-relational frame semantics –multi-incompatibility frame semantics– that can accommodate subminimal negation. I will first argue that multi-incompatibility frames are in accordance with the philosophical motivations behind negation on the Australian Plan, namely its modal and exclusion-expressing nature. Then, I will prove the soundness and completeness results of a subminimal logic that consists of the multi-incompatibility semantics and a proof system with operational rules that characterize subminimal negation, conjunction and disjunction. Lastly, I will prove some key correspondence theorems that relate frame conditions to certain principles that are associated with stronger negations, which will give rise to a new kite of negations that includes subminimal negation.
Link: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10992-022-09661-9