Research Interests
Post-Kantian German Philosophy (esp. Hegel and German Idealism); Early Modern Philosophy (esp. Spinoza);
Kant; Social & Political Philosophy; European Social Theory
Dissertation Project
My dissertation, titled “Subject or Substance? Hegel, Spinoza, and the Metaphysics of Freedom,” presents anti-acosmism as a central theme orienting the metaphysics of both Hegel and Spinoza and examines how this shared metaphysical commitment grounds their respective theories of human freedom. Here are some of the topics that I discuss in the dissertation:
Hegel's critique of Spinoza and the transition from the Doctrine of Essence to the Doctrine of the Concept
Relevance of Hegel and Spinoza for the contemporary metaphysics of grounding
Spinoza's critical engagement with Cartesian physics
Hegel's response to Jacobi's critique of reason
Spinoza's theory of individuation, causation, and negation
Spinoza's theory of activity and passivity
Spinoza on dispositionalism and mereological nihilism
Hegel's Social and Political Philosophy
Besides my dissertation project, I maintain a serious interest in Hegel's social and political philosophy, and its contemporary reverberations in critical theory. My first publication (“Hegel on the Ethical Limits of Property” in the European Journal of Philosophy) argues that Hegel’s defense of private property is institutionally flexible within definite ethical constraints and can therefore accommodate Marx’s critique of capitalism. I am in the process of completing its sequel, which takes up the issue of how Hegel’s account of labor and recognition in the Master/Servant dialectic illuminates his theory of civil society in the Philosophy of Right. I have also worked with Rahel Jaeggi on Hegel’s philosophy of history and am currently developing a paper on Hegel’s account of social structure and its historical progress.
Spinoza's Ontology of the Self and Social Freedom
I have two ongoing projects on Spinoza outside my dissertation. The first project examines the role of affects and imagination in the constitution of self-identity. What makes certain objects or experiences mine or yours, and how do these boundaries transform? Spinoza attributes a crucial role to affects and imagination in answering these questions, marking a radical departure from the Cartesian explanation of the self. This essay will also explore the extent to which Freudian psychoanalysis can illuminate Spinoza's theory of the self. My second project is on the third kind of knowledge (scientia intuitiva). I argue that the third kind of knowledge is not some kind of Stoic self-reflection that happens like a leap once and for all. I submit that the third kind of knowledge is a piecemeal and practical process of making explicit collective agency already operative in reality (such as friendship with other beings, not just humans). My tentative thesis is that such a practical reading of the third kind of knowledge illuminates Spinoza's incomplete account of democracy in the Political Treatise.