Harper-Schmidt Affiliated Faculty
Harper-Schmidt Fellows in the Humanities are Assistant Professors in the College whose primary teaching is in the Humanities Common Core, sequences of general education courses required of all undergraduates in the College. In addition, they teach at least one undergraduate course in the Department of Philosophy during the course of their appointment and they regularly participate in workshops and graduate seminars, providing significant additional intellectual resources for our philosophical community.
Nathan Bauer
Nathan received his PhD in philosophy from the University of Chicago in 2008. Much of his current research concerns Kant, both as a prominent figure in the history of philosophy and as a relevant guide to contemporary problems in the discipline. His dissertation, “Kant's Transcendental Deductions of the Categories,” examines Kant’s account of our relation to the world as thinkers by way of a detailed examination and comparison of the two versions of the Deduction-argument in the Critique of Pure Reason. The reading that emerges from this project is meant to get Kant right, while also suggesting a strategy for addressing a variety of current philosophical debates on topics including perceptual skepticism, the intentionality of thought, and the status of transcendental arguments. This reflects Nathan’s broader commitment to the view that the history of philosophy is itself a form of philosophical inquiry. When not pondering the starry skies above him, he enjoys the more down-to-earth pleasures of playing poker and skiing.
CV (PDF)
Contact Information
Gates-Blake 330
773-702-1713
nathanbauer@uchicago.edu
Office Hours: Wednesday, 10am – noon, or by appointment
Selected Publications
- “Kant’s Subjective Deduction” (forthcoming, British Journal for the History of Philosophy)
- “Kant’s Conceptualism: The Developmental Approach” (under review, Southern Journal of Philosophy)
- “Again into the Breach: Kant’s Rewriting of the Deduction” (in progress)
- “Subjective and Objective Aspects of Duty in Kant’s Groundwork” (in progress)
Current and Recent Teaching
Philosophical Perspectives (Fall 2009, Chicago)
Modern Philosophy (Spring 2009, Temple University)
American Philosophy (Spring, 2009, Rowan University)
Edmund Dain
Ed Dain is a Collegiate Assistant Professor and Harper-Schmidt Fellow in the Humanities. He received his Ph.D. from Cardiff University in 2006, and joined the philosophy department at the University of Chicago later the same year. He has long-standing interests in the philosophy of language, Wittgenstein, and the history of analytic philosophy. More recently, he has begun writing on issues in metaethics, where he is interested in defending a form of non-naturalist moral realism. Current research projects include a critique of hermeneutic moral fictionalism, titled “Projection and Pretence in Ethics”, a review of the ongoing controversy over “resolute” readings of Wittgenstein’s Tractatus for the journal Philosophical Papers, and a reply, co-authored with James Conant, to a paper by Roger White for a forthcoming collection of essays on the Tractatus.
CV (PDF)
Contact Information
Office: Stuart 231-D
Office hours: Tuesday afternoons by appointment
Tel: 773-834-0087
Email: dain@uchicago.edu
Link to info on the Society of Fellows webpages:
http://societyoffellows.uchicago.edu/junior.html#Dain
Selected Publications
- 2008 “Wittgenstein, Contextualism and Nonsense”, Journal of Philosophical Research, 33, 101-125.
- 2007 (Co-authored with Gideon Calder) “Not Cricket? Ethics, Rhetoric and Sporting Boycotts”, Journal of Applied Philosophy, 24(1), 95-109.
- 2006 “Contextualism and Nonsense in Wittgenstein’s Tractatus”, South African Journal of Philosophy, 25(2), 91-101.
- 2005 “Austerity and Ineffability”, Philosophical Writings, 30, 49-58.
Recent Courses
Greek Thought and Literature
The first two quarters of this sequence are designed as a complete unit, and they approach their subject matter both generically and historically. First, they offer an introduction to humanistic inquiry into the most important genres of Western literature: epic poetry (Homer); tragedy (Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides); historiography (Herodotus and Thucydides); philosophic dialogue (Plato); and comedy (Aristophanes). Secondly, they offer a broad introduction to ancient Greek thought and culture, which aims at understanding what ancient works meant to their original authors and audiences as well as how they reflect the specific historical conditions of their composition. In Spring Quarter, each section builds on the experience of the previous two quarters by tracing the development of a different literary genre (e.g., historiography or tragedy) or cultural mode of expression (e.g., philosophy or oratory) from the Greeks and Romans into the modern period. In these sections, we will focus on some central texts in the development of ethics, beginning with Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, and looking at the work of Kant and Mill, before turning to some contemporary attempts to revive an Aristotelian approach. (Autumn, Winter, & Spring)
Early Analytic Philosophy: Frege-Russell-Wittgenstein
In this course, we will make a detailed and patient study of some of the most important texts of the early analytic tradition, texts from which arose much of modern logic and philosophy of language. We will make a close reading of several classic papers by both Frege and Russell, before turning to Wittgenstein’s early work, the Tractatus, discussing too some of the most influential and important contributions to the secondary literature, such as Geach’s “Saying and Showing in Frege and early Wittgenstein” and Russell’s own introduction to the Tractatus. Although these texts are difficult, an understanding of them is essential to an understanding of many of the central developments of later analytic philosophy. The course will be largely discussion based, focusing on making a careful reading of the primary texts.(Spring 2008)
Contemporary Analytic Metaethics: Moral Realism and Its Enemies
This course will provide an introduction to the central issues, themes and positions in one of the most dynamic and interesting areas of contemporary analytic philosophy by way of a close reading of some of the most important and influential texts in the field. Focusing on the dispute between moral realists and anti-realists, we will pursue questions in metaphysics (Are there moral facts and properties? If so, what kind of facts and properties are they?), epistemology (Can we know which moral statements are true and which false? If so, how?), philosophy of language (What does it mean to say that something is good or bad, right or wrong, in an ethical sense?) and moral psychology (Are moral judgments intrinsically motivating?), among other areas. The range of positions discussed will include classic stances such as G. E. Moore's particular brand of non-naturalism, as well as newly emerging positions such as moral fictionalism.(Winter 2008)
Meaning and Scepticism
This course introduces some central theories and currents in contemporary analytic philosophy of language. In the first half of the course we will discuss some positive, systematic attempts to give an account of meaning, starting with Frege's distinction between sense and meaning (or reference) and Russell's response to Frege here. The second half of the course will turn to scepticism about meaning and Saul Kripke's influential argument, drawing on the later Wittgenstein, that there can be no such thing as meaning anything by any word. We will look in detail at that argument, as well as at Kripke's own attempted solution to it, before turning to some of the most central responses to it in contemporary philosophy of language in the works of, e.g., Colin McGinn, Crispin Wright and John McDowell. (Autumn 2007)
Intro to Epistemology
This course will introduce students to a range of the most central questions in contemporary theory of knowledge and some classic attempts to answer them. We will focus on the concepts of knowledge and justification, asking what knowledge is, whether we can have it (and, if so, of what), what its sources, structure and limits are, what justification is, what justifies justified beliefs, and whether justification is internal or external to one's own mind. In the final weeks of the course, we will turn to look at Wittgenstein's discussion of knowledge, certainty and scepticism in his On Certainty.(Autumn 2007)
Brandon Fogel
Brandon Fogel received his Ph.D. in the history and philosophy
of science from the University of Notre Dame in 2008. He also received a
Masters degree in physics from Notre Dame. He specializes in philosophy of
science, with particular focus on physics, and has interests in philosophy
of biology, philosophy of mathematics, and history of science, physics and
biology in particular. His current research concerns Bell's Theorem and
notions of causation and mechanism in physics.
CV (PDF)
Contact
office: Gates-Blake 412
office phone: 773/834-2573
office hours: Thursdays, 10:30 am -11:30 am in the Classics Cafe
email: bfogel@uchicago.edu
Selected Publications
• Formalizing the separability condition in Bell’s theorem, Studies in
History and Philosophy of Modern Physics, 38 (2007): 920-937.
• Creating a Physical Biology: The Three-Man Paper and the Origins of
Molecular Biology, University of Chicago Press, projected 2009. Editor
(with P. Sloan).
• Translation of “Über die Natur der Genmutation und der Genstruktur”
by N. Timoféeff-Ressovsky, K. Zimmer, and M. Delbrück, Akademie der
Wissenschaften, Göttingen: Mathematische-physikalische Klasse, Nachrichten
aus der Biologie, vol. 1 (1934–35), p. 190–245. To appear in Creating a
Physical Biology.
Recent Courses
Philosophical Perspectives on the Humanities. Fall/Winter 2008-9