Curriculum Vitae

 

Current Research

Book Projects

  • Aristotelian Liberalism (Based on my dissertation.)
  • I also want to edit an anthology of essays on Aristotelian liberalism.

Working Papers

Papers I want to write (when I get the time):

  • "Is Libertarianism Only a Political Philosophy?"
  • "The Speaker for the Dead: Narrator of the Search for Eudaimonia."
  • "On the Free Market and Eudaimonia: Nonexchangeable Goods, Praxeology, and Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs."
  • "In Defense of Crusoe and the ERE: Culture and Imaginary Constructions in Economic Theory."
  • "Rousseau and Marx Against Society: The Necessity of the Division of Labor."
  • "Enlightenment Constructivist Rationalism and Social Engineering."
  • "The Search for Something to Be."
  • "The Roots of the Totalitarian Impulse."
  • "Democracy, Gnosticism, and Political Religions."
  • "The Ethics of Nonviolence." (Hint: It won't be a defense of pacifism, but rather will be an attempt to lay out an Aristotelian framework for distinguishing when violent and nonviolent resistance are justified both politically (i.e., by justice and rights) and, in the broader context, morally (i.e., in terms of the virtues).)

Research Interests

  • Philosophy, primarily political philosophy/theory but also and by extension: ethics, of law, epistemology/methodology/of science, metaphysics/ontology, and even aesthetics (see below); Classical liberal/libertarian, Aristotelian, Objectivist, and American philosophy.
  • Praxeology and the Austrian school of political economy and sociology.
  • Developing an Austro-Aristotelian philosophy of science, primarily of social science, the core of which would be Aristotelian apriorism and praxeology, and dialectics (defined a la Sciabarra as "the art of context-keeping"), but could also include as tools when properly grounded such methods as (realist) phenomenology, hermeneutics, and narrative.
  • Applying praxeology to political science, especially reconstructing international relations and foreign policy theories of conflict and war with praxeology.
  • Philosophy, politics, and popular culture (especially fantasy and science-fiction, comics, graphic novels, movies, and the like).
  • Social evolution, the cycle of civilizations, and the clash of civilizations.
  • The ethics of nonviolence.

Publications

Journal Articles

  1. 2007. "On Atlas Shrugged and the Importance of Dramatizing Our Values." Journal of Libertarian Studies Vol. 21, No. 4 (Winter): 11-22. Symposium Issue on the 50th Anniversary of Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged. (Invited)

Chapters in Books

  1. Forthcoming. “Freedom Is the Right of All Sentient Beings: Virtue, Rights and the Transformers.” Transformers and Philosophy. Popular Culture and Philosophy Series. Edited by John Shook and Liz Stillwaggon. Chicago: Open Court Publishing Company.

Book Reviews

  1. 2007. "A Review of Mark A. Young's Narrating the Good Life: Aristotle and the Civil Society (2005)." Journal of Value Inquiry Vol. 41, No. 2-4 (December): 387-393.

Ph.D. Dissertation in Political Science (May 2009)

  • Aristotelian Liberalism: An Inquiry into the Foundations of a Free and Flourishing Society
    (It can also be found at LSU's Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Library.)
    • Prospectus
    • Front Matter (Title page, acknowledgments, table of contents, abstract)
    • Chapter One: Introduction
    • Chapter Two: Eudaimonia and the Right to Liberty: Rights as Metanormative Principles
    • Chapter Three: Eudaimonia, Virtue and the Right to Liberty: Rights as Both Metanormative Principles and Interpersonal Normative Principles
    • Chapter Four: Eudaimonia and the Basic Goods and Virtues
    • Chapter Five: Liberal and Communitarian Conceptions of Society
    • Chapter Six: The New Left and Participatory Democracy
    • Chapter Seven: Immanent Politics and the Pursuit of Eudaimonia
    • Chapter Eight: Free Markets and Free Enterprise: Their Ethical and Cultural Principles and Foundations
    • Chapter Nine: Conclusion
    • Bibliopgraphy and Vita

M.A. Thesis in Philosophy (December 2006)

M.A. Thesis in Political Science (August 2004)


 

Other Essays

Reaction Papers

           Written for in-class presentation, these were generally written in a rush the day before and/or late at night. I don't necessarily agree with everything in these (anymore) but they are interesting.

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