I am an assistant professor in Philosophy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison since Fall 2003. I work in metaphysics and the intersection between metaphysics and ethics.
E-mail
(pdf) I argue that counterfactual dependence is not even a sufficient condition for causation.
(pdf) Forthcoming in Philosophical Studies. I argue that, according to commonsense morality, there is moral pressure to leave things "as is."
(pdf) Forthcoming in Noûs. I argue that omissions make trouble for causal theories of agency.
Philosophy Compass 2007. I discuss different views about the relation between moral responsibility and causation and I defend an unorthodox view.
(pdf) Journal of Philosophy 103 (2006). I argue that there is reason to believe in the existence of disjunctive causes.
(pdf) Forthcoming in Oxford Handbook of Causation, Beebee, Hitchcock and Menzies (eds.). I discuss the role of causation in consequentialism, the distinction between killing and letting die, the doctrine of double effect, and the concept of moral responsibility.
(pdf) Philosophical Perspectives 20 (2006). It might seem that, if I cause X and Y, I also cause their sum. I argue that this principle fails, at least for omissions, and I draw some implications of this failure for the problem of famine.
(pdf) Philosophical Studies 129 (2006). I offer conditions under which causing an outcome to happen in a certain way is not sufficient for causing the outcome. The principle works as an argument against the transitivity of causation.
(pdf) Noûs 39 (2005). I argue that there is a moral asymmetry between actions and omissions, which has its source in a causal asymmetry.
(pdf) Philosophical Studies 123 (2005). I defend a principle according to which causes are difference-makers with respect to their effects.
(pdf) Philosophical Perspectives 18 (2004). I argue that being morally responsible doesn't entail being a cause, and I offer an alternative way of understanding the relationship between responsibility and causation.