Research
My research addresses a range of topics in philosophy, including uncertainty, medicine, practical rationality, meta-ethics, and decision theory. As of September 2023, I am working on a new research project (funded by a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellowship) titled, Normative Principles and Uncertainty: a User's guide. The abstract for this project is below:
***** When we are uncertain about what to do we may look to normative principles for guidance. But what does it mean for a principle to be "action-guiding"? In particular, how can these principles guide action when one is uncertain about something pertinent to the context, or even about the principle itself? This research will propose, defend, and apply a novel theory of action-guidance: both what it means for norms to guide action and the sense in which doing so is a desideratum for normative principles. I will argue that both matters are sensitive to the relevant norm, agent, and context, and demonstrate the theoretical virtues of this view over standard "one-size-fits-all" alternatives. I will then put this theory to work, applying it to several challenges to our understanding of rational deliberation under uncertainty. I will thereby draw new connections between abstract meta-ethical theory and concrete matters of practical reason. *****
Alongside this project, I have an ongoing programme of research into the nature of uncertainty in clinical medicine. This research is motivated by the observation that, in medicine, the decision makers (agents) must often make choices for the benefit of others (patients), but norms of rational choice are conventionally grounded in the agent's own desires and beliefs. This raises a number of new and important questions related to challenges facing conventional accounts of rational choice: How should decisions be made when agents are uncertain about the values or preferences of their patient? How should choices be made that are associated with transformative or aspirational changes to patients' values? How can we accommodate within decision models the epistemic state of agents and patients when they lack the concepts requires to understand the experiences of illness and health? And how can decision theory deal with the risk attitudes of both agents and patients in the same choices? In exploring these questions, I will investigate both what decision theory can tell us about medical decision making, and what medical contexts can reveal about decision theory itself.
I also carry out research on the phenomenon of moral doubt and its implications for rational choice. My PhD research project investigated the idea that the ways in which rational agents reason under moral doubt depends on the nature of their moral judgements.
***** When we are uncertain about what to do we may look to normative principles for guidance. But what does it mean for a principle to be "action-guiding"? In particular, how can these principles guide action when one is uncertain about something pertinent to the context, or even about the principle itself? This research will propose, defend, and apply a novel theory of action-guidance: both what it means for norms to guide action and the sense in which doing so is a desideratum for normative principles. I will argue that both matters are sensitive to the relevant norm, agent, and context, and demonstrate the theoretical virtues of this view over standard "one-size-fits-all" alternatives. I will then put this theory to work, applying it to several challenges to our understanding of rational deliberation under uncertainty. I will thereby draw new connections between abstract meta-ethical theory and concrete matters of practical reason. *****
Alongside this project, I have an ongoing programme of research into the nature of uncertainty in clinical medicine. This research is motivated by the observation that, in medicine, the decision makers (agents) must often make choices for the benefit of others (patients), but norms of rational choice are conventionally grounded in the agent's own desires and beliefs. This raises a number of new and important questions related to challenges facing conventional accounts of rational choice: How should decisions be made when agents are uncertain about the values or preferences of their patient? How should choices be made that are associated with transformative or aspirational changes to patients' values? How can we accommodate within decision models the epistemic state of agents and patients when they lack the concepts requires to understand the experiences of illness and health? And how can decision theory deal with the risk attitudes of both agents and patients in the same choices? In exploring these questions, I will investigate both what decision theory can tell us about medical decision making, and what medical contexts can reveal about decision theory itself.
I also carry out research on the phenomenon of moral doubt and its implications for rational choice. My PhD research project investigated the idea that the ways in which rational agents reason under moral doubt depends on the nature of their moral judgements.
Research articles
Suppositional Desires and Rational Choice Under Moral Uncertainty
(previously titled: Preference and Commitment Under Moral Uncertainty)
Forthcoming in Ergo. Pre-print available here.
Proposes a new method for accommodating moral uncertainty within a decision theoretic model of rational choice, which avoids a number of problems undermining existing models, and provides a role for agents' preferences that is conspicuous in its absence elsewhere in the literature.
The Balance and Weight of Reasons
Forthcoming in Theoria. Available here.
Claims that practical reasons can be characterised along two dimensions that influence our preferences - their balance and their weight - and demonstrates how recognising the weight of reasons is crucial for an adequate analysis of "hard choices" as those between options that are on a par.
Patients, Doctors and Risk Attitudes.
Forthcoming in Journal of Medical Ethics. Available here.
Shows that familiar arguments for widely held anti-paternalistic views about medicine can be extended to include not only patients’ evaluations of possible health states, but also their attitudes to risk.
Attitudinal Ambivalence: Moral Uncertainty for Non-cognitivists
Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 2022. Available here.
Presents a scientifically informed reconciliation of non-cognitivism and moral uncertainty, according to which moral doubt is analysed in terms of ambivalent non-cognitive attitudes, rather than partial degrees of belief.
The How and Why of Approximating Bayesian Ideals.
Philosophical Psychology, 2022. Available here.
Book review of "Unsettled Thoughts: A theory of degrees of rationality", by Julia Staffel.
The Possibility of Intertheoretic Value Comparisons Under Uncertainty About Population Axiology
Under review. Draft available upon request.
Demonstrates that the Problem of Intertheoretic Comparisons is best thought of as two distinct problems, and that neither of these poses a challenge to maximising expected moral value under moral uncertainty about population axiology.
The Relevance of Belief: Subjective Norms Under Moral and Empirical Uncertainty
Manuscript. Draft available upon request.
Defends the view that the norms most relevant to choice under moral uncertainty are the action-guiding subjective norms of instrumental rationality.
Reasons for Belief and the Possibility of Intentionally Biased Inquiry.
Manuscript. Draft available upon request.
Defends the rationality of intentionally biased inquiry as a strategy for inducing beliefs that are desirable for pragmatic reasons.
(previously titled: Preference and Commitment Under Moral Uncertainty)
Forthcoming in Ergo. Pre-print available here.
Proposes a new method for accommodating moral uncertainty within a decision theoretic model of rational choice, which avoids a number of problems undermining existing models, and provides a role for agents' preferences that is conspicuous in its absence elsewhere in the literature.
The Balance and Weight of Reasons
Forthcoming in Theoria. Available here.
Claims that practical reasons can be characterised along two dimensions that influence our preferences - their balance and their weight - and demonstrates how recognising the weight of reasons is crucial for an adequate analysis of "hard choices" as those between options that are on a par.
Patients, Doctors and Risk Attitudes.
Forthcoming in Journal of Medical Ethics. Available here.
Shows that familiar arguments for widely held anti-paternalistic views about medicine can be extended to include not only patients’ evaluations of possible health states, but also their attitudes to risk.
Attitudinal Ambivalence: Moral Uncertainty for Non-cognitivists
Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 2022. Available here.
Presents a scientifically informed reconciliation of non-cognitivism and moral uncertainty, according to which moral doubt is analysed in terms of ambivalent non-cognitive attitudes, rather than partial degrees of belief.
The How and Why of Approximating Bayesian Ideals.
Philosophical Psychology, 2022. Available here.
Book review of "Unsettled Thoughts: A theory of degrees of rationality", by Julia Staffel.
The Possibility of Intertheoretic Value Comparisons Under Uncertainty About Population Axiology
Under review. Draft available upon request.
Demonstrates that the Problem of Intertheoretic Comparisons is best thought of as two distinct problems, and that neither of these poses a challenge to maximising expected moral value under moral uncertainty about population axiology.
The Relevance of Belief: Subjective Norms Under Moral and Empirical Uncertainty
Manuscript. Draft available upon request.
Defends the view that the norms most relevant to choice under moral uncertainty are the action-guiding subjective norms of instrumental rationality.
Reasons for Belief and the Possibility of Intentionally Biased Inquiry.
Manuscript. Draft available upon request.
Defends the rationality of intentionally biased inquiry as a strategy for inducing beliefs that are desirable for pragmatic reasons.