Research

Books

• Kant’s Fundamental Assumptions. Oxford University Press. forthcoming. With Colin Marshall.
  In the past two decades, much work on Kant has aimed to delimit and evaluate the bedrock assumptions of Kant's mature Critical philosophy. This volume brings together leading Kant scholars to address this issue in conversation with each other, articulating and interrogating Kant's critical assumptions.
• Kant's Order of Reason: On Rational Agency and Control. Oxford University Press. 2025.
  The aim of Kant's Order of Reason is to give an account of Kant's conception of rational agency that clarifies and explains both the scope and nature of such activity, and elucidates the centrality of Kant's account of rational determination for his mature critical philosophy. As I see it, the core Kantian insight concerning rational determination is that the capacity for rationality is based in a…Read more

  The aim of Kant's Order of Reason is to give an account of Kant's conception of rational agency that clarifies and explains both the scope and nature of such activity, and elucidates the centrality of Kant's account of rational determination for his mature critical philosophy. As I see it, the core Kantian insight concerning rational determination is that the capacity for rationality is based in and derived from the capacity for exercising a very specific kind of causality in the world–namely, free, or controlled, causality The book consists of three parts. In the first I provide a historically contextualized but nevertheless rigorous metaphysical framework for understanding Kant's conception of mental activity, his theory of freedom, and its importance for understanding his conception of the difference between rational and non-rational forms of activity. I then argue that Kant has a control-centered or "enkratic" account of rational activity and agency. According to this view, control is the central and essential aspect of all rational activity, and a rational being is one that can exercise her diverse powers, or use her diverse intellectual faculties, in a manner that is under her own control. Building on this structure, in part two I show how Kant applies his conception of controlled activity to the various forms of activity of which the rational mind is capable, in increasing order of complexity (i.e. attention, conception, judgment, inference, and comprehension). I then put this account to work with respect to longstanding disputes regarding self-consciousness, reason, evil, and alienation.

Published articles

• Thinking of Necessity. Philosophical Review 134 (3): 355-362. 2025.
• Kant on Transcendental Freedom, Priority Monism, and the Structure of Intuition. In Dai Heide & Evan Tiffany (eds.), The Idea of Freedom: New Essays on the Kantian Theory of Freedom, Oxford University Press. pp. 39-63. 2023. With Derk Pereboom.
  This chapter argues that Kant’s commitment to conceiving space as exhibiting a kind of priority monistic or “part-on-whole” ontological dependence stems from his more fundamental conception of the structure of intuitive representation. The chapter explicates this structure and make three claims: First, that there is no obviously cogent inference from Kant’s claims regarding the structure of space …Read more

  This chapter argues that Kant’s commitment to conceiving space as exhibiting a kind of priority monistic or “part-on-whole” ontological dependence stems from his more fundamental conception of the structure of intuitive representation. The chapter explicates this structure and make three claims: First, that there is no obviously cogent inference from Kant’s claims regarding the structure of space to adopting transcendental idealism as a means of blocking determinism and securing rational belief in human freedom. Second, it points out that Kant’s aim of securing the legitimacy of belief in freedom by way of transcendental idealism is in apparent tension with his conception of divine intellectual intuition, since God’s intuition of the noumenal realm exhibits the very same sort of freedom-threatening monism that our anthropocentric intuitions of space and time do. Third, the chapter argues that this threat may in fact be avoided even if priority monism about the noumenal holds.
• Rationality: What difference does it make? Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 107 (1): 1-26. 2023.
  A variety of interpreters have argued that Kant construes the animality of human beings as ‘transformed’, in some sense, through the possession of rationality. I argue that this interpretation admits of multiple readings and that it is either wrong, or doesn't result in the conclusion for which its proponents argue. I also explain the sense in which rationality nevertheless significantly different…Read more

  A variety of interpreters have argued that Kant construes the animality of human beings as ‘transformed’, in some sense, through the possession of rationality. I argue that this interpretation admits of multiple readings and that it is either wrong, or doesn't result in the conclusion for which its proponents argue. I also explain the sense in which rationality nevertheless significantly differentiates human beings from other animals.
• Rationality: What difference does it make? Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 107 (1): 99-124. 2022.
  A variety of interpreters have argued that Kant construes the animality of human beings as ‘transformed’, in some sense, through the possession of rationality. I argue that this interpretation admits of multiple readings and that it is either wrong, or doesn't result in the conclusion for which its proponents argue. I also explain the sense in which rationality nevertheless significantly different…Read more

  A variety of interpreters have argued that Kant construes the animality of human beings as ‘transformed’, in some sense, through the possession of rationality. I argue that this interpretation admits of multiple readings and that it is either wrong, or doesn't result in the conclusion for which its proponents argue. I also explain the sense in which rationality nevertheless significantly differentiates human beings from other animals.
• Henry E. Allison, Kant’s Conception of Freedom: A Developmental and Critical Analysis Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020 Pp. xxiii + 531 ISBN 9781107145115 (hbk), $140. Kantian Review 27 (1): 159-165. 2022. With Yoon Choi.
• “I Am the Original of All Objects”: Apperception and the Substantial Subject. Philosophers' Imprint 20 (26): 1-38. 2020.
  Kant’s conception of the centrality of intellectual self-consciousness, or “pure apperception”, for scientific knowledge of nature is well known, if still obscure. Here I argue that, for Kant, at least one central role for such self-consciousness lies in the acquisition of the content of concepts central to metaphysical theorizing. I focus on one important concept, that of <substance>. I argue that…Read more

  Kant’s conception of the centrality of intellectual self-consciousness, or “pure apperception”, for scientific knowledge of nature is well known, if still obscure. Here I argue that, for Kant, at least one central role for such self-consciousness lies in the acquisition of the content of concepts central to metaphysical theorizing. I focus on one important concept, that of <substance>. I argue that, for Kant, the representational content of the concept <substance> depends not just on the capacity for apperception, but on the actual intellectual awareness of oneself in such apperception. I then defend this interpretation from a variety of objections.
• Kantian Conceptualism/Nonconceptualism. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 2020.
  Overview of the (non)conceptualism debate in Kant studies
• Fellow Creatures, by Christine Korsgaard. Oxford University Press, 2018. ISBN 0198753853. 272 pp. $24.95. European Journal of Philosophy 28 (1): 258-262. 2020.
• On the Transcendental Freedom of the Intellect. Ergo: An Open Access Journal of Philosophy 7 35-104. 2020.
  Kant holds that the applicability of the moral ‘ought’ depends on a kind of agent-causal freedom that is incompatible with the deterministic structure of phenomenal nature. I argue that Kant understands this determinism to threaten not just morality but the very possibility of our status as rational beings. Rational beings exemplify “cognitive control” in all of their actions, including not just r…Read more

  Kant holds that the applicability of the moral ‘ought’ depends on a kind of agent-causal freedom that is incompatible with the deterministic structure of phenomenal nature. I argue that Kant understands this determinism to threaten not just morality but the very possibility of our status as rational beings. Rational beings exemplify “cognitive control” in all of their actions, including not just rational willing and the formation of doxastic attitudes, but also more basic cognitive acts such as judging, conceptualizing, and synthesizing.
• Animals and Objectivity. In John J. Callanan & Lucy Allais (eds.), Kant and Animals, Oxford University Press. pp. 42-65. 2020.
  Starting from the assumption that Kant allows for the possible existence of conscious sensory states in non-rational animals, I examine the textual and philosophical grounds for his acceptance of the possibility that such states are also 'objective'. I elucidate different senses of what might be meant in crediting a cognitive state as objective. I then put forward and defend an i…Read more

  Starting from the assumption that Kant allows for the possible existence of conscious sensory states in non-rational animals, I examine the textual and philosophical grounds for his acceptance of the possibility that such states are also 'objective'. I elucidate different senses of what might be meant in crediting a cognitive state as objective. I then put forward and defend an interpretation according to which the cognitive states of animals, though extremely limited on Kant's view, are nevertheless minimally objective.
• Kant and the Demands of Reflection. SGIR Review 2 (1): 42-59. 2019.
  From an author meets critics session on Melissa Merritt's *Kant on Reflection and Virtue*.
• The Mind's "I". European Journal of Philosophy 27 (1): 255-265. 2019.
  Critical notice of Béatrice Longuenesse's book *I, Me, Mine*.
• Waxman on Intuition and Apperception. Critique. 2018.
  A critical discussion of Waxman's recent book, Kant's Anatomy of the Intelligent Mind
• Nicholas Stang, Kant's Modal Metaphysics. Philosophical Review 127 (4): 523-528. 2018.
• Motion and the Affection Argument. Synthese 195 (11): 4979-4995. 2018.
  In the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, Kant presents an argument for the centrality of <motion> to our concept <matter>. This argument has long been considered either irredeemably obscure or otherwise defective. In this paper I provide an interpretation which defends the argument’s validity and clarifies the sense in which it aims to show that <motion> is fundamental to our conception…Read more

  In the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, Kant presents an argument for the centrality of <motion> to our concept <matter>. This argument has long been considered either irredeemably obscure or otherwise defective. In this paper I provide an interpretation which defends the argument’s validity and clarifies the sense in which it aims to show that <motion> is fundamental to our conception of matter.
• Kant's Transcendental Deduction: An Analytical‐Historical Commentary, by Henry Allison. Oxford University Press, 2015, 496 pp. ISBN 13: 978‐0‐19‐872485‐8 hb £75.00. European Journal of Philosophy 25 (2): 546-554. 2017.
• Intuition and Presence. In Andrew Stephenson & Anil Gomes (eds.), Kant and the Philosophy of Mind: Perception, Reason, and the Self, Oxford University Press. pp. 86-103. 2017.
  In this paper I explicate the notion of “presence” [Gegenwart] as it pertains to intuition. Specifically, I examine two central problems for the position that an empirical intuition is an immediate relation to an existing particular in one’s environment. The first stems from Kant’s description of the faculty of imagination, while the second stems from Kant’s discussion of hallucination. I shall su…Read more

  In this paper I explicate the notion of “presence” [Gegenwart] as it pertains to intuition. Specifically, I examine two central problems for the position that an empirical intuition is an immediate relation to an existing particular in one’s environment. The first stems from Kant’s description of the faculty of imagination, while the second stems from Kant’s discussion of hallucination. I shall suggest that Kant’s writings indicate at least one possible means of reconciling our two problems with a conception of “presence” such that perceptual and hallucinatory states might be understood as different kinds of intuition. This may not be sufficient to secure the relationalist’s claim that intuition is an immediate relation to an existing particular in one’s environment, but it does show that opposition to this claim will require further argument.
• Getting Acquainted with Kant. In Dennis Schulting (ed.), Kantian Nonconceptualism, Palgrave. pp. 171-97. 2016.
  My question here concerns whether Kant claims that experience has nonconceptual content, or whether, on his view, experience is essentially conceptual. However there is a sense in which this debate concerning the content of intuition is ill-conceived. Part of this has to do with the terms in which the debate is set, and part to do with confusion over the connection between Kant’s own views and con…Read more

  My question here concerns whether Kant claims that experience has nonconceptual content, or whether, on his view, experience is essentially conceptual. However there is a sense in which this debate concerning the content of intuition is ill-conceived. Part of this has to do with the terms in which the debate is set, and part to do with confusion over the connection between Kant’s own views and contemporary concerns in epistemology and the philosophy of mind. However, I think much of the substance of the debate concerning Kant’s views on the content of experience can be salvaged by reframing it in terms of a debate about the dependence relations, if any, that exist between different cognitive capacities. Below, in Section 2, I clarify the notion of ‘content’ I take to be at stake in the interpretive debate. Section 3 presents reasons for thinking that intuition cannot have content in the relevant sense. I then argue, in Section 4, that the debate be reframed in terms of dependence. We should distinguish between Intellectualism, according to which all objective representation (understood in a particular way) depends on acts of synthesis by the intellect, and Sensibilism, according to which at least some forms of objective representation are independent of any such acts (or the capacity for such acts). Finally, in Section 5, I further elucidate the cognitive role of intuition. I articulate a challenge which Kant understands alethic modal considerations to present for achieving cognition, and argue that a version of Sensibilism that construes intuition as a form of acquaintance is better positioned to answer this challenge than Intellectualism.
• From Empiricism to Expressivism: Brandom Reads Sellars. Ethics 126 (3): 808-816. 2016.
  One of the better known of the many bons mots of the Sellarsian corpus concerns his definition of philosophy: it is the attempt to understand “how things in the broadest possible sense of the term hang together in the broadest possible sense of the term.” When applied to Sellars’s philosophy in particular, one might be forgiven for doubting the possible success of such an endeavor. Richard Rorty o…Read more

  One of the better known of the many bons mots of the Sellarsian corpus concerns his definition of philosophy: it is the attempt to understand “how things in the broadest possible sense of the term hang together in the broadest possible sense of the term.” When applied to Sellars’s philosophy in particular, one might be forgiven for doubting the possible success of such an endeavor. Richard Rorty once quipped of Sellars’s followers that they were either “left-wing” or “right-wing,” emphasizing one line of thought in Sellars’s work to the exclusion of the other. The two lines of thought to which Rorty referred were, first, Sellars’s conception of the normativity of all thought and language, famously captured by his evocative phrase “the space of reasons.” Second, and equally important to Sellars, was his “scientia mensura,” the notion ðshared with contemporaries such as Quine that “in the dimension of describing and explaining the world, science is the measure of all things, of what is that it is, and of what is not that it is not” Wilfrid Sellars, “Empiricism and the Philosophy of Mind,” Minnesota Studies in the Philosophy of Science 1 [1956]: 41,303). The left-wing adherents to the normativity thesis included Rorty himself, along with John McDowell and Robert Brandom. Among the right-wing naturalists are such as Ruth Milliken, Jay Rosenberg, and Paul Churchland. Such a disparate group of philosophers suggests irreconcilable differences. Brandom himself reports in the introduction to his newest book, From Empiricism to Expressivism, that, “for a dismayingly long time, I did not really see how all the pieces of [Sellar's] work hung together, even in the broadest possible sense of the term”.
• Kant on Perceptual Content. Mind 125 (497): 95-144. 2016.
  Call the idea that states of perceptual awareness have intentional content, and in virtue of that aim at or represent ways the world might be, the ‘Content View.’ I argue that though Kant is widely interpreted as endorsing the Content View there are significant problems for any such interpretation. I further argue that given the problems associated with attributing the Content View to Kant, interp…Read more

  Call the idea that states of perceptual awareness have intentional content, and in virtue of that aim at or represent ways the world might be, the ‘Content View.’ I argue that though Kant is widely interpreted as endorsing the Content View there are significant problems for any such interpretation. I further argue that given the problems associated with attributing the Content View to Kant, interpreters should instead consider him as endorsing a form of acquaintance theory. Though perceptual acquaintance is controversial in itself and in attribution to Kant, it promises to make sense of central claims within his critical philosophy
• Comments on Lucy Allais, Manifest Reality. Critique. 2016.
  Extended critical discussion of Lucy Allais, *Manifest Reality*
• Review of Lanier Anderson, The Poverty of Conceptual Truth. Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews. 2015.
• Kant: Philosophy of Mind. Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 2015.
  Kant: Philosophy of Mind Immanuel Kant was one of the most important philosophers of the Enlightenment Period in Western European history. This encyclopedia article focuses on Kant’s views in the philosophy of mind, which undergird much of his epistemology and metaphysics. In particular, it focuses on metaphysical and epistemological doctrines forming the … Continue reading Kant: Philosophy of Min…Read more

  Kant: Philosophy of Mind Immanuel Kant was one of the most important philosophers of the Enlightenment Period in Western European history. This encyclopedia article focuses on Kant’s views in the philosophy of mind, which undergird much of his epistemology and metaphysics. In particular, it focuses on metaphysical and epistemological doctrines forming the … Continue reading Kant: Philosophy of Mind →.
• Two Kinds of Unity in the Critique of Pure Reason. Journal of the History of Philosophy 53 (1): 79-110. 2015.
  I argue that Kant’s distinction between the cognitive roles of sensibility and understanding raises a question concerning the conditions necessary for objective representation. I distinguish two opposing interpretive positions—viz. Intellectualism and Sensibilism. According to Intellectualism all objective representation depends, at least in part, on the unifying synthetic activity of the mind. In…Read more

  I argue that Kant’s distinction between the cognitive roles of sensibility and understanding raises a question concerning the conditions necessary for objective representation. I distinguish two opposing interpretive positions—viz. Intellectualism and Sensibilism. According to Intellectualism all objective representation depends, at least in part, on the unifying synthetic activity of the mind. In contrast, Sensibilism argues that at least some forms of objective representation, specifically intuitions, do not require synthesis. I argue that there are deep reasons for thinking that Intellectualism is incompatible with Kant's view as expressed in the Transcendental Aesthetic. We can better see how Kant’s arguments in the first Critique may be integrated, I suggest, by examining his notion of the 'unity' [Einheit] of a representation. I articulate two distinct ways in which a representation may possess unity and claim that we can use these notions to integrate Kant’s arguments in the Aesthetic and the Transcendental Deduction without compromising the core claims of either Sensibilism or Intellectualism—that intuition is a form of objective representation independent of synthesis, and that the kind of objective representations that ground scientific knowledge of the world require synthesis by the categories.
• The Kantian (Non)‐conceptualism Debate. Philosophy Compass 9 (11): 769-790. 2014.
  One of the central debates in contemporary Kant scholarship concerns whether Kant endorses a “conceptualist” account of the nature of sensory experience. Understanding the debate is crucial for getting a full grasp of Kant's theory of mind, cognition, perception, and epistemology. This paper situates the debate in the context of Kant's broader theory of cognition and surveys some of the major argu…Read more

  One of the central debates in contemporary Kant scholarship concerns whether Kant endorses a “conceptualist” account of the nature of sensory experience. Understanding the debate is crucial for getting a full grasp of Kant's theory of mind, cognition, perception, and epistemology. This paper situates the debate in the context of Kant's broader theory of cognition and surveys some of the major arguments for conceptualist and non-conceptualist interpretations of his critical philosophy
• Comments on Stefanie Grüne's *Blinde Anschauung*. Critique. 2014.
  Extended critical discussion of Stefanie Grüne's *Blinde Anschauung*
• Kant on Animal Consciousness. Philosophers' Imprint 11. 2011.
  Kant is often considered to have argued that perceptual awareness of objects in one's environment depends on the subject's possession of conceptual capacities. This conceptualist interpretation raises an immediate problem concerning the nature of perceptual awareness in non-rational, non-concept using animals. In this paper I argue that Kant’s claims concerning animal representation and consciousn…Read more

  Kant is often considered to have argued that perceptual awareness of objects in one's environment depends on the subject's possession of conceptual capacities. This conceptualist interpretation raises an immediate problem concerning the nature of perceptual awareness in non-rational, non-concept using animals. In this paper I argue that Kant’s claims concerning animal representation and consciousness do not foreclose the possibility of attributing to animals the capacity for objective perceptual consciousness, and that a non-conceptualist interpretation of Kant’s position concerning perceptual awareness can actively endorse this attribution. Kant can consistently allow that animals have a point of view on the objective world which possesses a distinctive phenomenal character while denying what seems most important to him – viz. that animals have the capacity to take cognitive attitudes towards, and thus self-ascribe, their own representational states.
• Three Skeptics and the Critique: Review of Michael Forster's Kant and Skepticism. Philosophical Books 51 (4): 228-244. 2010. With Andrew Chignell.
  A long critical notice of Michael Forster's recent book, "Kant and Skepticism." We argue that Forster's characterization of Kant's response to skepticism is both textually dubious and philosophically flawed. -/-.

Book reviews

• Markus Kohl, Kant on Freedom and Rational Agency. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2023. 399pp. Philosophical Review 134 (2): 212-219. 2025.