My research interests lie in agency, moral responsibility and free will, metaphysics, the philosophy of action, applied ethics, and the intersections between these areas.
Much important philosophical work on moral responsibility and agency has traditionally focused on the positive aspects of our agency - what it is to be praiseworthy or blameworthy for our actions, what it is for our behaviors to belong to us, what it is to act intentionally, and so on? Much of my research centers on investigating the negative side of our agency - responsibility for our omissions, non-doings, etc. For instance, can I cause my plant to die by failing to water it, and can I be blameworthy for that omission?
In my dissertation "Much to Do about Non-Things: Exploring Agency and Responsibility Through Omissions," I defend a unified account of moral responsibility for actions and omissions based on abilities. I also explore several important resulting asymmetries between actions and omissions, which impact agency, regret, moral responsibility, luck, causation, and issues in applied ethics. I have also expanded this research to include collective omissions and failures to act. This involves exploring how we can contribute to collective harms – such as famines, climate change, and structural injustices – via our failures to act, in addition to our actions. I model when, why, and how we can be morally responsible for these contributions.
I also have projects on omissions of omissions (forgetting not to do something is importantly different than simply doing it) and impairments to agency found primarily in cults.
I (unfortunately) enjoy making bad puns in my writing.
