Professor
Ph.D., Princeton University, 1983
Appointed at UMass: 1990

Prior Teaching Appointments:

Yale University, 1981-9
University of Notre Dame, 1980-1.

Areas of Interest:

Metaphysics, Philosophy of Language, Philosophy of Science, Philosophy of Mathematics, Mathematical and Philosophical Logic.

Current Research:

Ongoing paper projects on modality, truth, identity over time, objective chance, and structuralism in mathematics.

Selected Publications:

"Island Universes and the Analysis of Modality", in G. Preyer, F. Siebelt (eds.), Reality and Humean Supervenience: Essays on the Philosophy of David Lewis, Rowman and Littlefield, Jan., 2001.

"Isolation and Unification: The Realist Analysis of Possible Worlds", Philosophical Studies 84 (1996), 225-238.

"The Fabric of Space: Intrinsic Vs. Extrinsic Distance Relations," Midwest Studies in Philosophy 18, French, Uehling, and Wettstein (eds.), University of Notre Dame Press (1993), 271-294.

"Plenitude of Possible Structures," The Journal of Philosophy 88 (November, 1991), 607-619.

"Quantified Modal Logic and the Plural De Re," Contemporary Perspectives in the Philosophy of Language, II, Midwest Studies in Philosophy 14, French, Uehling, and Wettstein (eds.), University of Notre Dame Press (1989), 372-394.

"Reducing Possible Worlds to Language," Philosophical Studies 52 (1987), 331-355.

"Prudence," The Journal of Philosophy 77 (July, 1980), 381-401.

On-Line Papers (comments welcome!):

"Absolute Actuality and the Plurality of Worlds", John Hawthorne (ed.), Philosophical Perspectives 2006, Metaphysics (Oxford: Blackwell), 2008..

"David Lewis: On the Plurality of Worlds.  Central Works of Philosophy, Vol. 5: The Twentieth Century: Quine and After, Acumen Publishing, 2006.

"Concrete Possible Worlds", Contemporary Debates in Metaphysics, J. Hawthorne, T. Sider, and D. Zimmerman (eds.), Blackwell Publishing.

Book Review:  Travels in Four Dimensions, by Robin le Poidevin. British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 57 (2006):  453-458.

"McGinn on Non-Existent Objects and Reducing Modality" (This is a discussion of McGinn's book Logical Properties. Philosophical Studies 118 (2004), 439-451).

"The Relation Between General and Particular: Entailment vs. Supervenience", in Dean Zimmerman (ed.), Oxford Studies in Metaphysics, Volume 2.  Oxford University Press, 2006.

"Island Universes and the Analysis of Modality" (see above).

"Plenitude of Possible Structures" (This is the complete version of the 1991 J. Phil. paper. Sections V and VI comparing my view with those of Robert Adams and David Lewis were omitted from the published version due to space limitations.)

"Properties".  The Encyclopedia of Philosophy Supplement.  New York:  Simon & Schuster Macmillan, 1996.

"Identity".  The Encyclopedia of Philosophy Supplement.  New York:  Simon & Schuster Macmillan, 1996.

"The Fabric of Space: Intrinsic versus Extrinsic Distance Relations" (see above).

Worlds and Propositions: The Structure and Ontology of Logical Space , Doctoral Dissertation, Princeton University, 1983.

The following two papers were given as talks at conferences and universities. I do not expect to publish them in their current form.

"Realism Without Parochialism" (1992)

"On Living Forever" (1985)