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David O. Brink
UC Distinguished Professor and Interim Department Chair
Valtz Family Endowed Chair in Philosophy
Ph.D. Cornell University, 1985
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0480, Phone: (858) 534-4881
Ethical theory, history of ethics, and jurisprudence; historical and systematic perspectives on practical reason, moral demands, and the normativity of ethics; nature of law and legal interpretation in substantive areas of constitutional and criminal jurisprudence
Faculty
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Saba Bazargan-Forward
Associate Professor
Ph.D. Rutgers University, 2009
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0458, Phone: (858) 822-2685
Normative ethics; individual responsibility for collective action; complicity; war ethics; ethics of benefiting from injustice -
Reuven Brandt
Assistant Professor
Ph.D. University of Western Ontario, 2015
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0497, Tel: (858) 822-2806
Applied ethics with a focus on human reproduction and responsibility -
David O. Brink
UC Distinguished Professor and Interim Department Chair
Valtz Family Endowed Chair in Philosophy
Ph.D. Cornell University, 1985
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0480, Phone: (858) 534-4881
Ethical theory, history of ethics, and jurisprudence; historical and systematic perspectives on practical reason, moral demands, and the normativity of ethics; nature of law and legal interpretation in substantive areas of constitutional and criminal jurisprudence -
Craig Callender
Professor
Ph.D. Rutgers University, 1997
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0456, Phone: (858) 822-4911Philosophy of physics, the metaphysics of science, and philosophy of science in general
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Jennifer Carr
Associate Professor
Ph.D. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2013
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0466, Phone: (858) 246-2499Theoretical philosophy, including epistemology, logic, decision theory, and philosophy of language
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Nancy Cartwright
UC Distinguished Professor
Ph.D. University of Illinois
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0449, Phone: (858) 793-1979
Philosophy of the natural, social and policy sciences with specialization in physics and economics; questions of causality, objectivity in science, and evidence, especially for evidence-based policy -
Eddy Keming Chen
Associate Professor
Ph.D. Rutgers University, 2019
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0493, Phone: (858) 534-9281Philosophy of physics, philosophy of science, metaphysics, decision theory, Chinese philosophy -
Jonathan Cohen
Professor
Ph.D. Rutgers University, 2000
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0453, Phone: (858) 534-6812
Philosophy of mind, language, and perception, particularly as these are informed by the cognitive sciences; color and color vision -
David Danks
Professor
Ph.D. University of California, San Diego, 2001
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0462, Phone: (858) 246-4549
Ethics & technology, philosophy of science, causation, and cognitive science -
Matthew Fulkerson
Associate Professor
Ph.D. University of Toronto, 2010
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0495, Phone: (858) 534-6643
Philosophy of mind and philosophy of cognitive science; philosophical issues that arise from the investigation of human haptic touch; multisensory experience, spatial representation, the affective character of perception, and the relationship between perception and bodily awareness -
Rick Grush
Professor
Ph.D. University of California, San Diego, 1995
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0457, Phone: (858) 822-4440
Theoretical cognitive neuroscience and the metaphysics of mind and representation; interests in linguistics and early modern; emulation theory of representation, and spatial and temporal representation -
Michael Hardimon
Professor
Ph.D. University of Chicago, 1985
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0492, Phone: (858) 822-0473
Critical philosophy of race, 19th century German philosophy (especially Hegel), role theory -
Mara Harrell
Teaching Professor
Ph.D. University of California, San Diego, 2000
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0464, Phone: (858) 246-4548
Pedagogy, Philosophy of Physics, Ethics and Public Health, Epistemology & Metaphysics, Ethics and Social-Political Philosophy, Philosophy of Science -
Monte Johnson
Professor
Ph.D. University of Toronto, 2003
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0451, Phone: N/A
Early Greek philosophy; Aristotle Studies; Hellenistic philosophy; the reception of Greco-Roman philosophy in modern philosophy and science; the reconstruction of lost and fragmentary works; and comparative ancient philosophy -
Alexander (Arc) Kocurek
Assistant Professor
Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley, 2018
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 – Arts & Humanities - Room 0445, Phone: TBDPhilosophical logic, philosophy of language, metaphysics & epistemology
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Karen Kovaka
Assistant Professor
Ph.D. University of Pennsylvania, 2017
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0450, Phone: (858) 534-6802
Conceptual foundations of evolutionary biology, public understanding of and participation in science, and philosophy of environmental conservation -
Andy Lamey
Teaching Professor
Ph.D. University of Western Australia, 2011
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0491, Phone (858) 534-9111
Applied ethics, normative ethics and political philosophy -
Patricia Marechal
Assistant Professor
Ph.D. Harvard University, 2018
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0498, Phone (858) 534-9190
Ancient Greek philosophy, especially Plato and Aristotle's moral psychology and ethics. And Greco-Roman medicine, especially Galen -
Kerry McKenzie
Associate Professor
Ph.D. University of Leeds, England, 2012
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0499, Phone (858) 534-2566
Metaphysics of science, especially modality, fundamentality, structuralism, naturalism, and realism -
Dana Nelkin
On Sabbatical Academic Year 2024-2025
dnelkin@ucsd.eduProfessor
Ph.D. University of California, Los Angeles, 1995
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0479, Phone: (858) 822-3658
Moral psychology, ethics, and philosophy of action -
Samuel Rickless
On Sabbatical Academic Year 2024-2025
srickless@ucsd.eduProfessor
Ph.D. University of California, Los Angeles, 1996
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0494, Phone: (858) 822-4910
Ancient philosophy (particularly Plato), early modern philosophy (particularly Locke and Berkeley), ethics, and jurisprudence -
Rachel Rudolph
Assistant Professor
Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley, 2019
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 – Arts & Humanities - Room 443, Phone: TBDPhilosophy of language and mind, especially their intersections with value theory and social philosophy; conceptual engineering; philosophy of artificial intelligence
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Gila Sher
Professor
Ph.D. Columbia University, 1989
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0482, Phone: (858) 534-8504
Foundational issues involving knowledge, truth, and logic -
Christopher Shields
UC Distinguished Professor
Henry E. Allison Endowed Chair in the History of Philosophy
Ph.D. Cornell University, 1986
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities – Room 0447, Phone: (858) 534-3072Ancient Philosophy and Metaphysics
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Clinton Tolley
Professor
Ph.D. University of Chicago, 2007
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0496, Phone: (858) 822-2686
History of modern European philosophy, with focuses on Kant and German Idealism, early analytic philosophy, phenomenology, philosophical psychology, critical theory and the philosophy of culture (incl aesthetics); the reception-history of European philosophy in the Americas (esp the US and Mexico); Mexican philosophy -
Manuel Vargas
Professor
Ph.D. Stanford, 2001
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0468, Phone: (858) 534-8135Moral psychology, free will, moral responsibility, Latin American and Latinx philosophy
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Eric Watkins
UC Distinguished Professor
Ph.D. University of Notre Dame, 1994
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0486, Phone: (858) 822-0082
Kant's theoretical philosophy and its place within modern philosophy and science; early modern philosophy (especially Leibniz), German idealism and the history of philosophy of science -
Yuan Yuan
Assistant Professor
Ph.D. Yale University, 2020
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 – Arts & Humanities - Room 0470, Phone: TBDEthics, political philosophy, philosophy of law, and just war theory
Faculty Affiliates
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Mary Devereaux
Chief of Bioethics, Rady Children’s Hospital
Director, UCSD Biomedical Ethics Seminars
Assistant Director, Research Ethics Program & San Diego Research Ethics Consortium
Department of Pathology
Ph.D. in Philosophy, University of Chicago, 1981
Office: BSB 2092, Phone: (858)822-5764
Bioethics, Clinical Ethics, Research Ethics, Stem Cell Ethics, Medical Humanities, Aesthetics -
David Wiens
Associate Professor, Political Science; Faculty Affiliate, Philosophy
Ph.D. in Philosophy, University of Michigan, 2011
Office: SSB 387
Political philosophy, philosophy of social science, game theory and social choice theory, political economy.
Emeriti Faculty
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Henry E. Allison
Professor Emeritus
Kant, Spinoza, German idealism, and eighteenth and nineteenth-century philosophy
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Georgios Anagnostopoulos
Professor Emeritus
Ph.D. Brandeis University, 1971
Ancient philosophy centered around ethics, metaphysics, science, technology and human values -
Richard Arneson
Professor Emeritus
Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley, 1975
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0489, Phone: (858) 534-6810
Political and moral philosophy, with an emphasis on theories of justice; some applied ethics -
William Bechtel
Professor Emeritus
Ph.D. University of Chicago, 1977
Ridge Walk Academic Complex - Bldg 1 - Arts & Humanities - Room 0455, Phone: (858) 822-4461
History and philosophy of the life sciences with a special emphasis on the strategies of mechanistic explanation employed and the invocation of active mechanisms to explain how biological systems maintain themselves far from equilibrium -
Patricia Churchland
Professor Emerita
B.Phil. Oxford University, 1969
Interface between neuroscience and philosophy; explores the impact of neuroscientific developments on our understanding of consciousness, the self, free will, decision making, ethics, learning, and religion -
Paul Churchland
Professor Emeritus
Ph.D. University of Pittsburgh, 1969
Philosophy of science (neurosciences, physics, astronomy); philosophy of mind (psychology); epistemology (cognitive science, artificial intelligence); philosophy of language; and the history of philosophy -
Gerald Doppelt
Professor Emeritus
Ph.D. Johns Hopkins University, 1969
Philosophy of science and political philosophy including theory of justice, Rawls work, political liberalism, multiculturalism, the role of self-respect in political theory, communitarianism, and issues of gender and race -
Edward Lee
Professor Emeritus
Ph.D. Princeton University -
Donald Rutherford
Professor Emeritus
Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley, 1988
Early modern philosophy and the reception of ancient philosophy in the early modern period; Kant's critical philosophy and its development, and Nietzsche