​I'm mainly interested in Buddhist ethics and epistemology and Classical Chinese philosophies, especially Confucianism and Daoism.

Works in progress

• A paper on Buddhist epistemology (especially the Open Questions and the Buddha's 'Noble Silence').

 

• A paper on Buddhist vice theory.

• A paper on Buddhism and social activism.

 

• A paper challenging claims about the compatibility of Buddhism and science.

 

• '"The Bell Clapper of Heaven": Confucius on Courage in the Face of the Death of Moral Possibilities' - for a volume on courage.

• A paper on the moral significance of gardens in East Asian philosophies, in progress.

• A short paper on 'gardens of refuge' and the fragility of goodness.​

Published and forthcoming:

• ‘Gardens and the Good Life in Confucianism and Daoism’, Laura D’Olimpio, Panos Paris, Aidan Thompson (eds.), Educating Character Through the Arts (London: Routledge, 2022), forthcoming.*

• ‘Happiness for a Fish: Zhuāngzǐ and Huizi at the Hao River’, Helen de Cruz (ed.), Philosophy Illustrated: 40 Thought Experiments to Broaden your Mind (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2022), 57-60.*​​

• ‘Shénnóng and the Agriculturalist School’, Daily Philosophy, 22 April 2022.

• ‘Gardens of Refuge’, Daily Philosophy, 4 October 2021.
  • ​This piece discusses Chinese philosophy of gardens.

• ‘Going Slow’, Daily Philosophy, 11 September 2021.
  • ​Much of this paper draws on Buddhist, Confucian, and Daoist ideas.

• ‘Ghosts in Classical Chinese philosophy’, Fortean Times 407 (July 2021): 54-55.

• 'Varieties of Philosophical Misanthropy', Journal of Philosophical Research 46 (2021): 27-44.
  • ​Two sections of this paper argue that Kongzi and early Daoism were misanthropic, in the sense defined in the paper.

 

• 'Reloading the Canon', The Philosopher's Magazine 93 (2021): 57-63.*
  • ​​​This article reflects on a prejudice - which I call xenophilia - which distorts people's engagements with 'non-Western' philosophies. This article has also been translated into Chinese by Wu Wanwei.

• 'Vices, Misanthropy, and Daoism', Philosophy in Three Words podcast, University of Exeter Royal Institute of Philosophy Lecture Series, May 2019.*

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• ‘“Following the Way of Heaven”: Exemplarism, Emulation, and Daoism’, Journal of the American Philosophical Association 6.1 (2020): 1-15.
  • Selected by the Editors for the JAPA Special Series in Non-Western Philosophy.

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• 'Daoism, Humanity, and the Way of Heaven', Religious Studies 56 (2020) 56, 111–126.
  • ​Special issue: Philosophy of Religions: Cross-Cultural, Multi-Religious Approaches, edited by Mikel Burley.

 

• 'Admiration, Attraction, and the Aesthetics of Exemplarity', Journal of Moral Education 48:3: 369-380.
  • ​Special issue on education and exemplarism edited by Michel Croce and Maria Silvia Vaccarezza. My case study is the Confucian aesthetics of exemplarity.

 

• 'Adversity, Wisdom, and Exemplarism', Journal of Value Inquiry, 52 (2018): 379–393.
  • ​​​Contains case studies of Kongzi and Lunyu and the Buddha and the Mahaparinibbana (the record of the Buddha's last days).

 

• 'Confucianism, Curiosity, and Moral Self-Cultivation', in Ilhan Inan, Lani Watson, Dennis Whitcomb, and Safiye Yigit (eds.), The Moral Psychology of Curiosity (New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2018), 97-116.*

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• 'Beautiful Bodhisattvas: The Aesthetics of Spiritual Exemplarity', Contemporary Buddhism 18.2 (2017): 331-345.

 

• ‘Beauty, Virtue, and Religious Exemplars’, Religious Studies 53.2 (2017): 171-181.

 

• ‪‘Nature, Mystery, and Morality: A Daoist View’, Religious Studies 51.2 (2015): 165-181.

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