Students currently being advised
Brady
Fullerton (PhD Candidate)
Brady is a photographer and
philosopher who specializes on the evolution
of aesthetic traditions. His research brings
together the philosophy of aesthetics with the
study of cultural evolution. One of his aims
is to develop methods for rigorously testing
evolutionary claims about aesthetic preference
in order to advance this field beyond
the level of "just so" story telling.
John
Klasios (PhD candidate)
John studies human nature from an evolutionary
perspective. He has published several
articles on issues in Evolutionary Psychology,
especially with respect to human mating and
mate choice.
Former Students
Lukas
Nicholson (MA 2022)
Lukas
is a philosopher of technology interested in
the use of precautionary reasoning to oppose
novel technologies. He is particularly
interested in the way that risk assessment
is conducted for projects in geoengineering
and data-science
Stefan
Schneider (PhD 2020)
Stefan works in the area of AI and machine
learning. He brings together training in
ecology and computer science to develop deep
learning algorithms capable of re-identifying
animals using camera trap images and video. He
is assisting with my research on octopus
cognition. Stefan is being co-advised by
Stefan Kremer in the School of Computer
Science. Yes, there are three Stefans involved
in this project!
Keiran
Pattullo-Graf (MA 2016)
Keiran completed an M.A. in philosophy
under my supervision in 2016. His
thesis explored the debate between the
established agricultural industry and the
organic farming movement. Keiran focused
on the ways that opposing stakeholders in this
debate appeal to ecological science to support
their respective positions.
Jamie Robertson (MA 2011)
Jamie is
interested in a broad range of issues in
environmental ethics and economics. Her
Masters thesis "A Case for Decision-Maker
Based Justification of Environmental
Policy," critically evaluated both David
Pearce's defense of cost benefit analysis as
well as Mark Sagoff's opposition to this
framework. After completing her MA
under my supervision in 2011, Jamie became
Coordinator of the Ethics Center at the
University of Sudbury. She later returned to
York University, where she is currently
completing a PhD in Philosophy.
Jordan
Bartol (MA 2011)
Jordan
is interested in philosophical issues in
genomics, especially as they pertain to
larger issues surrounding causation and
explanation in the philosophy of
science. His MA thesis undertook a
detailed critique of the field of
personalized genomics. Jordan completed
his MA under my supervision in 2011, and
went on to accept a prestigious PhD
scholarship at the University of Leeds. We
continued to collaborate on a project
critical of Damasio's somatic marker
hypothesis during his PhD research.
Scientific
Collaborators
W.
Ford Doolittle
Ford is a
renound evolutionary molecular biologist who
describes himself as a philosopher of nature.
He has collaborated with numerous philosophers
on topics ranging from the nature of life, to
the Gia hypothesis, to microbial evolution. We
have collaborated on two articles and a
co-edited volume on the ascription of
functions to "junk" DNA.
T. Ryan Gregory
Ryan is an evolutionary biologist
interested in non-coding DNA, transposable
elements, and genome size. He is an adjunct
professor in the Philosophy Department at the
University of Guelph. We co-teach a graduate
seminar on the Philosophy of Biology most fall
semesters (unless one of us is on sabbatical),
and he has served on several philosophy
graduate committees. Ryan and I have
co-authored approximately five articles and
continue to collaborate on new projects.
Jonathan
A. Newman
Jonathan is a philosophically-minded ecologist
and current Dean of Research at Wilfred
Laurier University. In addition to an
extensive list of scientific papers and a textbook
on climate change biology, Jonathan has two
philosophical publications. One is a critical
examination of the ecosystem
concept. The other is a book on the science
and philosophy of biodiversity conservation,
co-authored with me and Gary Varner (TExas
A&M). Jonathan often serves on the
committees of my philosophy grad students.
Karl
Cottenie
Karl is another philosophical ecologist at the
University of Guelph. He specializes on the
theory of meta-community biology and has
undertaken several philosophical/conceptual
research projects. One of these is a plea for
consistent terminology of metacommunity
concepts. Another manuscript
differentiates between processes at the
metacommunity and biogeography scales . I have
co-authored approximately five articles with
Karl, including work on the nature and
existence of ecological laws. We continue to
collaborate on an analysis of biodiversity
concepts and on genome-level ecology.
Stefan
Kremer
Stefan is a computer scientist interested in
natural language processing and induction. We
have collaborated on several papers, including
a recent simulation model of transposon
accumulation without organismal benefit.
Tyler
Elliott
Tyler is an expert on the molecular biology of
tranpsoable elements and is interested in the
science and philosophy of genomics. After
completing his PhD in 2016, he took a research
position the Biodiversity Institute of
Ontario. Tyler is working towards the creation
of an improved database for annotating
transposable elements.
Brent
Saylor
Brent is a Uof G PhD graduate formerly
supervised by Karl Cottenie and Stefan Kremer.
We have collaborated on several papers on
conceptual issues in genomics and ecology.
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