Research Interests
My research lies at the intersection of bioethics, the philosophy of science, and the philosophy of cognitive science, with an emphasis on philosophical problems in animal cognition.
My current work falls into three primary research streams. The first of these, which began with my dissertation, concerns the role of simplicity judgments in the scientific study of the animal mind. In this project, I show how a preference for simpler explanations can bias scientific methodology, yielding not only a less reliable science of animal minds, but one that is less likely to identify morally relevant properties of mind in animals. The second project turns to animals who have long been regarded as too simple to merit serious philosophical consideration: invertebrate animals such as insects and arachnids. I argue that emerging scientific evidence of the complex cognitive and affective worlds of these beings presses us to reconsider traditional approaches to mind, morality, and perhaps meaning. The third research stream shifts the focus away from animal minds and toward scientific practice itself. In this set of projects, I advance a novel view of scientific experimentation on which scientific studies that do not involve interventions on the system of interest may count among experiments proper.
In addition to these core topics, I also have active research interests in the philosophy of sex and gender medical ethics and moral and political philosophy, especially the illiberal implications of the ‘democratization’ of information via unregulated social media and propaganda in the digital age.
My current work falls into three primary research streams. The first of these, which began with my dissertation, concerns the role of simplicity judgments in the scientific study of the animal mind. In this project, I show how a preference for simpler explanations can bias scientific methodology, yielding not only a less reliable science of animal minds, but one that is less likely to identify morally relevant properties of mind in animals. The second project turns to animals who have long been regarded as too simple to merit serious philosophical consideration: invertebrate animals such as insects and arachnids. I argue that emerging scientific evidence of the complex cognitive and affective worlds of these beings presses us to reconsider traditional approaches to mind, morality, and perhaps meaning. The third research stream shifts the focus away from animal minds and toward scientific practice itself. In this set of projects, I advance a novel view of scientific experimentation on which scientific studies that do not involve interventions on the system of interest may count among experiments proper.
In addition to these core topics, I also have active research interests in the philosophy of sex and gender medical ethics and moral and political philosophy, especially the illiberal implications of the ‘democratization’ of information via unregulated social media and propaganda in the digital age.
