Many of our everyday choices take place within sprawling and complex political structures and processes that bring about outcomes that we view as harms. Yet, because an individual's actions do not contribute measurably ...

In this dissertation, I defend a novel analysis of emotional expression, and then use it to explore the myriad ways in which emotional expressions function in communication. I argue that emotional expressions may be best ...

In this dissertation, I defend dependence on moral testimony. To that end, against pessimistic views regarding dependence on moral testimony I argue that moral testimony can confer epistemic warrant and that dependence on ...

Moods are powerful forces in our lives. When we enter into a mood—such as an anxious, irritable, depressed, bored, tranquil, or cheerful mood—we often find ourselves thinking, feeling, and acting in ways that are out of ...

There is growing interest in using non-coercive interventions to promote and protect public health, in particular "health nudges." Behavioral economist Richard Thaler and law scholar Cass Sunstein coined the term nudge to ...

Ethical theorists have traditionally analyzed duties, both individual and collective, into two categories: duties to others and duties to oneself. Reflection upon the moral domain, however, suggests cases in which an ...

Desire-fulfillment (DF) theories and objective list (OL) theories are the two dominant types of theories of human well-being. I argue that DF theories fail to capture the good part of `good for', and that OL theories fail ...

This dissertation provides a philosophical investigation of key claims arising from the psychiatric user/survivor movement. Users/survivors insist that psychiatric conditions do not necessarily diminish someone’s agency ...

Nearly everyone believes that we have special moral obligations to care for the children we create. Surprisingly, a satisfying philosophical justification of this belief has proved elusive. Causalist accounts ground these ...