University of St. Thomas, Houston

Graduate Student, Philosophy Department / Center for Thomistic Studies

Graduate Student, Adjunct Philosophy Professor

Thesis Title: The Doctrine of Being in Avicenna’s Metaphysics of the Shifā’: The Introduction of Modalities into First Philosophy

About

I am a graduate student at the Center for Thomistic Studies in Houston, TX, working on my Ph.D.

My historical research focuses on the inner sense psychology of Thomas Aquinas, Avicenna, and Averroes, the commentary tradition on Aristotle's de Anima up to Aquinas, and the metaphysics of Avicenna and Thomas Aquinas.  My research in contemporary philosophical issues has focused on attempts to integrate Thomistic philosophical anthropology with the insights of phenomenology and Wittgenstein, like one finds in the work of Karol Wojtyła, Robert Sokolowski, David Braine, Peter Geach, and Elizabeth Anscombe, as well as the work of Bernard Lonergan.  I am also interested in philosophical problems prompted by neuroscience, especially concerning the compatibility of hylomorphism with neuroplasticity.

I will be taking my doctoral comprehensive exams in the Spring of 2012 and I should be submitting my dissertation proposal by May 2012. I will be writing on the doctrine of being within Avicenna's Metaphysics of the Shifā' and the introduction of existence and modal logic into Aristotelian metaphysics.

In 2010 I presented conference papers at the International Medieval Congress in Kalamazoo, MI, at the University of Marquette, University of St. Thomas, and the Annual Conference of American Catholic Philosophical Association in Baltimore, MD. In March, 2011 I presented a paper on Addiction and Thomistic Anthropology at The Catholic University of America, and in August I attended the 2011 Thomistic Seminar at Princeton University.

I received the 2010 American Catholic Philosophical Association's Young Scholars Award for my paper: "Linguistic Apprehension as Incidental Sensation in Thomas Aquinas" and the 2011 American Maritain Association, Yves R. Simon Institute Graduate Student Award for my paper: “Sensation and Intentions in the Medium: Yves Simon, Thomistic Transcendentals, and James Gibson’s Ambient Energy.”

This past fall, 2011, I presented papers at 3rd Annual Lonergan on the Edge Graduate Student Conference at Marquette University, the 35th Annual International Meeting of the American Maritain Association at Notre Dame, the 36th International Patristic, Medieval, and Renaissance Conference at Villanova University, and two papers at the 85th Annual Meeting of the American Catholic Philosophical Association.

In March 2012 I will be giving a paper on the metaphysics of truth in Avicenna at the 63rd Annual Meeting of the Metaphysical Society of America and receiving their Aristotle Prize. In May 2012 I will be presenting a paper at the 48th International Congress on Medieval Studies.

Contact Information