A paper on Kant's casuistical questions

available on request

A paper on dehumanization and metaphor

available on request

A paper on the enlightenment project

available on request

A book on the practical purpose and limits of moral philosophy in Kant

in progress

"The Efficacy Problem"

Legal Theory (forthcoming) 

Legal theorists agree widely on two necessary and jointly sufficient conditions for the existence of a legal system: a legal system exists if (i) legal officials adopt a critically reflective attitude toward the legal system’s foundational rule, and (ii) the substantive laws of the system are “by and large” efficacious. The latter “efficacy condition” plausibly applies to all posited law, paradigmatically including modern centralized legal systems and less paradigmatic instances like international law. And yet, philosophers have also frequently pointed out the difficulty in determining precisely what this efficacy amounts to. In this article, I argue that the persisting difficulty of explaining the efficacy of law results from three tempting but inadequate assumptions about posited law and that our basic assumptions need to be revised accordingly.

"Kant's Derivation of Imperatives of Duty"

Kantian Review (2024)

On the currently dominant reading of the 'Groundwork,' Kant’s derivation of ‘imperatives of duty’ exemplifies a decision-procedure for the derivation of concrete duties in moral deliberation. However, Kant’s response to an often-misidentified criticism of the 'Groundwork' by G. A. Tittel suggests that Kant was remarkably unconcerned with arguing for the practicality of the categorical imperative as a decision-procedure. Instead, I argue that the main aim of Kant’s derivation of imperatives of duty was to show how his analysis of the form of moral judgement is indeed presupposed in the four types of moral imperative that philosophers of his time recognized.

"Kant's Racism as a Philosophical Problem"

Pacific Philosophical Quarterly (2023)

Immanuel Kant was possibly both the most influential racist as well as the most influential moral philosopher of modern, western thought. So far, authors have either interpreted Kant as an ‘inconsistent egalitarian’ or as a ‘consistent inegalitarian.’ On the former view, Kant failed to draw the necessary conclusions from his own moral philosophy; on the latter view, Kant did not consider non-white people as persons at all. However, both standard interpretations face significant textual difficulties; instead, I argue that Kant’s moral egalitarianism is so thin as to remain almost entirely useless as an antidote to racism. Consequently, we should neither regard Kant’s racism as a mere personal failure nor as a quaint 18th century belief in ‘sub-humans.’ Instead, I argue that Kant’s racism highlights a perennial philosophical difficulty: how do we get from abstract principles to substantive ideals in a way that doesn’t merely polish up our existing prejudices?

"Is the rule of recognition really a duty-imposing rule?"

Journal of Legal Philosophy (2023)

According to a persistent assumption in legal philosophy, the social rule at the foundation of a legal system (the Rule of Recognition) serves both an epistemic and a duty-imposing function. Thus, some authors have claimed that it would be a formidable problem for legal philosophy to explain how such social rules can impose duties, and some have taken it upon themselves to show how social practices might just do that. However, I argue that this orthodox assumption about the dual function of rule of recognition is ill-founded. Contrary to the orthodox view, we have no good reasons to ascribe more than an epistemic function to the rule of recognition. Accordingly, the norms deriving immediately from the rule of recognition are no different than those entailed by other epistemic, grammatical or syntactic norms. Consequently, accounts of the normativity of law need not explain how social practices like conventions or plans might impose duties on the officials of a legal system.

"Fichte's Deduction of the Concept of Right"

Manuscrito (2023)

Fichte’s ambitious project in the Foundations of Natural Right is to provide an a priori deduction of the concept of right independently from morality. So far, interpretations of Fichte’s deduction of the concept of right have persistently fallen into one of two rough categories: either they (re)interpret the normative necessity of right in terms of moral or quasi-moral normativity or they interpret right’s normative necessity in terms of hypothetical imperatives. However, each of these interpretations faces significant exegetical difficulties. By contrast, I argue that we can understand the normative necessity of right in terms of conceptual necessity. On this view, right does not tell us what ought to be done, but instead tells us what we are doing and have done. Not only does this provide for a promising philosophical account of the non-moral normativity of right, but also provides a compelling reading of Fichte’s text in both the deduction of the concept of right in the Foundations of Natural Right as well as his discussion of the application of the concept of right and coercion.

"Origins of Critical Theory"

University of Chicago, 2025 (upcoming)

"Humanities Core: Human Being and Citizen"

University of Chicago, 2024

"The Nature of Law"

University of Chicago, 2022

Postdoctoral Teaching Fellow

University of Chicago

PhD

University of Chicago

LLM

University of Cambridge

LLB

King's College London

Kant

Ethics

Philosophy of Law

Social and political philosophy

Early Modern Philosophy

Post-Kantian German philosophy

Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles

"The Efficacy Problem"

Legal Theory (forthcoming)

"Kant's Derivation of Imperatives of Duty"

Kantian Review

"Kant's Racism as a Philosophical Problem"

Pacific Philosophical Quarterly

"Is the rule of recognition really a duty-imposing rule?"

Journal of Legal Philosophy

"Fichte’s Deduction of the Concept of Right"

Manuscrito

Graduate Council Research Award

University of Chicago

Graduate Council Research Award

University of Chicago

St Edmunds College Prize

University of Cambridge

Affiliated Doctoral Fellow

Franke Institute for the Humanities, University of Chicago

UC Mellon Dissertation Completion Fellow

Division of the Humanities, University of Chicago

Ernst Freund Fellow in Law and Philosophy

University of Chicago Law School

Visiting Doctoral Fellow

Forschungskolleg Analytic German Idealism, Universität Leipzig

Visiting Doctoral Fellow

Forschungskolleg Analytic German Idealism, Universität Leipzig

"Kant's Dialectic of Enlightenment"

Annual Conference of the Israeli Philosophical Association, Haifa University

"Dehumanization as Conceptual Metaphor"

Franke Affiliated Fellows’ Meeting, University of Chicago

"The Emotional Labor of Enlightenment"

German Philosophy Workshop, University of Chicago

"The Efficacy Puzzle"

Practical Philosophy Workshop, University of Chicago

"Dehumanization and the Metaphorical Structuring of Social Experience"

X. Conference for Practical Philosophy, Universität Salzburg

"Kant’s Derivation of Imperatives of Duty"

Leuven Kant Conference, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven

"The Post-Colonial Critique of Kant"

German Philosophy Workshop, University of Chicago

"Kant’s Racism as a Philosophical Problem"

Munich Graduate Conference in Ethics, Ludwig-Maximilians Universität München

"Kant on Reflection in Moral Knowledge"

Practical Philosophy Workshop, University of Chicago

"Kant’s Racism as a Philosophical Problem"

UCSD Modern Philosophy Graduate Workshop, University of California, San Diego

"Kant on the Purpose of Moral Philosophy"

German Philosophy Workshop, University of Chicago

"Is the Rule of Recognition really a duty-imposing rule?"

Symposium at the APA Central Division Meeting (online)

"Hegel’s Empty-Formalism Charge"

German Philosophy Workshop, University of Chicago

"Fichte’s Deduction of the Concept of Right"

German Philosophy Workshop, University of Chicago