My research focuses on understanding the human place in nature, in relation to God and creatures. This includes reference to contemporary questions concerning the nature of the human animal, and the ethical status of other animals and our shared environments, in environmental philosophy. It also includes more classical questions concerning ontology, the philosophy of nature, and ethics. Both 19th Century Philosophy and phenomenology have provided valuable lenses by which to address these kinds of questions within the modern cosmological context.
I love teaching, and I love inviting students to join me in addressing the kinds of questions mentioned above: questions about God, the human person, animals, ethics, and nature. I especially enjoy introducing students to the resources of the Catholic intellectual tradition, and am both grateful and excited to be able to do so at Gonzaga.
Peer-reviewed articles:
2021. “Being Consistently Biocentric: On the (Im)possibility of Spinozist Animal Ethics.” Journal for Critical Animal Studies 18:1, 52-72.
2020. “Suspension of a Conflict in a Darkened Son.” Diakrisis Yearbook of Theology and Philosophy 3, 19-37.
2020. “Psychoanalyzing Nature, Dark Ground of Spirit.” Journal of the Pacific Association for the Continental Tradition 3, 1-19.
2020. “Hegel and Schelling on the Path of Aristotelian Ascent.” The Heythrop Journal 61:5, 763-774.
2018. “Beyond Biosecurity.” Environmental Philosophy 15:1, 7-19.
2017. “Schelling in the Kierkegaardian Project: Between Kantian Critique and the Second Ethics.” Kierkegaard Studies Yearbook 22, 245-265.
2016. “Eros After Nature.” Soundings 99:3, 223-245.
2016. “Schleiermacher, Kierkegaard, and the Problem of First Immediacy.” International Journal for Philosophy of Religion 80:3, 259-278.
2016. “Schleiermacher in the Kierkegaardian Project: Between Socratic Ignorance and Second Immediacy.” Kierkegaard Studies Yearbook 21, 141-158.
2015. “From the Shadows of Mt. Moriah: Approaching Faith in Fear and Trembling.” Religious Studies and Theology 34:1, 41-52.
Book Chapter:
2020. “The Dark Night of Ecological Despair: Awaiting Reconsecration in Paul Schrader’s First Reformed.” In Philosophy, Film, and the Dark Side of Interdependence, ed. Jonathan Beever, 69-81. Lanham, Maryland: Lexington. Co-authored with Tober Corrigan.
Book Reviews:
2021. “After Dark: Nullifying Nihilism.” Review of Melancholic Joy by Brian Treanor. Journal of the Pacific Association for the Continental Tradition 4, 184-190.
2020. Review of Thinking Nature: An Essay in Negative Ecology by Sean J. McGrath. Continental Philosophy Review 53:4, 517-521.
2017. Review of Søren Kierkegaard: Subjectivity, Irony, and the Crisis of Modernity by Jon Stewart. Religious Studies Review 43:4, 389.
2017. Review of Interpreting Nature: The Emerging Field of Environmental Hermeneutics, edited by Forest Clingerman, Brian Treanor, Martin Drenthen, and David Utsler. The Trumpeter 32:2, 206-209.
2016. Review of The Animal Side by Jean-Christophe Bailly, translated by Catherine Porter. Between the Species 19:1, 215-220.
- Environmental Philosophy
- 19th Century Philosophy
- Phenomenology
