William D'Alessandro

Me

Hi! I'm Bill D'Alessandro. I'm a philosopher of science, mathematics and technology. I'm an Assistant Professor in the philosophy department at William & Mary.

Previously I was a Marie Curie/UKRI Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Oxford, a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Munich Center for Mathematical Philosophy at LMU Munich, and a Philosophy Fellow at the Center for AI Safety.

Some philosophy of science topics I've written about include explanation, understanding, models, proof, and imagination. A unifying theme in this side of my work is the importance of paying close attention to scientific and mathematical practice.

I think artificial intelligence will be a transformative technology; philosophers have important roles to play in deciding how to use it wisely. I'm interested in the role of AI in science and in our personal lives, and generally in the problem of living well with powerful artificial minds.

I also have interests in applied ethics (e.g. lookism and relationship ethics) and aesthetics (e.g. truth in fiction).

You can contact me at wbdalessandro [at] wm.edu.

If you like photography, you can see some of mine on Instagram at @patienceintheblue.

News

August 2025

My review of Mark Povich's book Rules to Infinity (OUP, 2024) is forthcoming in Philosophia Mathematica.
My paper "Toward a Methodology for the Philosophy of Mathematical Practice" appeared in Philosophy of Science.

July 2025

Giving a talk, "Explainable AI and Idealized Models", at the Philosophy, Politics & Economics Society meeting in London.

April 2025

Received a $5000 William & Mary Faculty Research Grant to support work on "Explainable AI and Idealized Models".
W&M's Philosophy Club, of which I'm faculty advisor, held its 15th annual undergraduate conference.
Giving an invited talk, "Imagination, Methodology and Ontology", at Virginia Commonwealth University.

November 2024

Giving a talk, "Toward a Methodology for the Philosophy of Mathematical Practice", at the 2024 Philosophy of Science Association meeting in New Orleans. (The paper version of this talk was accepted to the upcoming Philosophy of Science conference proceedings special issue.)

October 2024

My paper "Mature Intuition and Mathematical Understanding" (coauthored with Irma Stevens) was accepted to the Journal of Mathematical Behavior.

September 2024

My paper "A Noetic Account of Explanation in Mathematics" (coauthored with Ellen Lehet) was accepted to Philosophical Quarterly.

August 2024

Started as Assistant Professor in the Philosophy Department at William & Mary, in lovely Williamsburg, Virginia.

May 2024

My paper "Deontology and Safe Artificial Intelligence" was accepted to the Philosophical Studies special issue on AI safety.

April 2024

Co-organizing a workshop on philosophy of mathematical practice at Oxford (with Alex Paseau), where I'm giving a talk on the methodology of PMP.
Giving a talk, "AI Domination and Control of Humanity's Future", at the Midwest Ethics Symposium.

February 2024

Appointed Assistant Professor of Philosophy at William & Mary, starting fall 2024. Hurrah! 🎉🎉

January 2024

My "Artificial Intelligence: Arguments for Catastrophic Risk" (coauthored with Adam Bales and Cameron Domenico Kirk-Giannini) was published in Philosophy Compass. (Open Access, so check it out.)
Giving a talk, "Toward a Methodology for the Philosophy of Mathematical Practice", at the Explanation and Understanding in Mathematics (ExUnMa) virtual workshop.

November 2023

Giving a talk, "AI and Control of Humanity's Future", at the AI & Humanity Lab at the University of Hong Kong.

October 2023

I begin work at Oxford as a Marie Curie / UKRI Postdoctoral Fellow.
I've been invited to contribute two survey articles to Philosophy Compass, on AI risk arguments (with A. Bales and C.D. Kirk-Giannini) and AI safety strategies (with C.D. Kirk-Giannini).

Older

My paper "Large Language Models and Biorisk" was accepted by the American Journal of Bioethics (coauthored with H. Lloyd and N. Sharadin).
My paper "AI Language Models Cannot Replace Human Research Participants" was accepted by AI & Society (coauthored with N.G. Laskowski, J. Harding and R. Long).
From January to August 2023 I'm a Philosophy Fellow at the Center for AI Safety in San Francisco.
My paper "Transferable and Fixable Proofs" was accepted by Episteme.
My paper "Unrealistic Models in Mathematics" was accepted by Philosophers' Imprint.
I've been invited to give a talk at the 11th Oxford Workshop on Global Priorities Research in December 2022.
Ellen Lehet and I will be talking about mathematical explanation and understanding at the 2022 Philosophy of Science Association meeting in Pittsburgh in November.
My Longtermism @ LMU talk series, funded by a grant from EA Funds, is underway during Summer 2022.
I wrote a short piece on a photograph from Matthieu Gafsou's Vivants series for the site Philosophy & Photography Lab.
I helped organize the Summer School on Mathematical Philosophy for Female Students at the MCMP this summer. Good times were had by all.
My review of Collin Rice's Leveraging Distortions: Explanation, Idealization, and Universality in Science has appeared in the BJPS Review of Books. It's freely available online here.
I talked about unrealistic models in math at the 4th Scientific Understanding and Representation conference at Fordham University in April.
I'll talk about a joint project with Ellen Lehet -- "Mathematical Explanation and Understanding: A Noetic Account" -- at the Understanding Progress conference at the University of Iceland in June. I also gave this talk at the Czech Academy of Sciences in May.

Me

Hi! I'm Bill D'Alessandro.

I'm a philosopher of science, mathematics and artificial intelligence.

Some philosophy of science topics I've written about include explanation, understanding, models, proof, and imagination. A unifying theme in my work is the importance of paying close attention to scientific and mathematical practice.

I think AI is likely to be a transformative technology; we need to think about how to use it wisely. I'm interested in the role of AI in science and in our personal lives, and generally in the problem of living well with powerful artificial minds.

I'm a Marie Curie/UKRI Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Oxford and an External Member of the Munich Center for Mathematical Philosophy (MCMP). Previously I was a Philosophy Fellow at the Center for AI Safety and a Postdoctoral Fellow at the MCMP.

You can contact me at william.dalessandro [at] ox.ac.uk.

If you like photography, you can see some of mine on Instagram at @patienceintheblue.

News

November 2023

Giving a talk, "AI and Control of Humanity's Future", at the AI & Humanity Lab at the University of Hong Kong.

October 2023

I begin work at Oxford as a Marie Curie / UKRI Postdoctoral Fellow.
I've been invited to contribute two survey articles to Philosophy Compass, on AI risk arguments (with A. Bales and C.D. Kirk-Giannini) and AI safety strategies (with C.D. Kirk-Giannini).

Older

My paper "Large Language Models and Biorisk" was accepted by the American Journal of Bioethics (coauthored with H. Lloyd and N. Sharadin).
My paper "AI Language Models Cannot Replace Human Research Participants" was accepted by AI & Society (coauthored with N.G. Laskowski, J. Harding and R. Long).
From January to August 2023 I'm a Philosophy Fellow at the Center for AI Safety in San Francisco.
My paper "Transferable and Fixable Proofs" was accepted by Episteme.
My paper "Unrealistic Models in Mathematics" was accepted by Philosophers' Imprint.
I've been invited to give a talk at the 11th Oxford Workshop on Global Priorities Research in December 2022.
Ellen Lehet and I will be talking about mathematical explanation and understanding at the 2022 Philosophy of Science Association meeting in Pittsburgh in November.
My Longtermism @ LMU talk series, funded by a grant from EA Funds, is underway during Summer 2022.
I wrote a short piece on a photograph from Matthieu Gafsou's Vivants series for the site Philosophy & Photography Lab.
I helped organize the Summer School on Mathematical Philosophy for Female Students at the MCMP this summer. Good times were had by all.
My review of Collin Rice's Leveraging Distortions: Explanation, Idealization, and Universality in Science has appeared in the BJPS Review of Books. It's freely available online here.
I talked about unrealistic models in math at the 4th Scientific Understanding and Representation conference at Fordham University in April.
I'll talk about a joint project with Ellen Lehet -- "Mathematical Explanation and Understanding: A Noetic Account" -- at the Understanding Progress conference at the University of Iceland in June. I also gave this talk at the Czech Academy of Sciences in May.

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