I work primarily in metaethics, metaphysics, and epistemology — specifically, on the metaphysics of normative properties and the ethics of belief. 

Publications

The Applied Moral Turn of the Ethics of Belief Debate forthcoming in Evidentialism at 40: New Arguments, New Angles (edited by Kevin McCain, Scott Stapleford, and Matthias Steup) [Penultimate Draft]

Moral Encroachment and #BelieveWomen (forthcoming) Oxford Studies in Epistemology [Penultimate Draft]

What is Non-naturalism? (2022) Ergo 8 [Published Version]

In Defense of the Right Kind of Reason (with Chris Howard) (2022) in Chris Howard and Richard Rowland’s Fittingness (Oxford University Press) [Penultimate Draft]

Epistemic Reasons for Action: a puzzle for pragmatists (2022) Synthese 200/248 [Penultimate Draft] [Published Version]

Banks, Bosses, and Bears: a pragmatist argument against encroachment (2021) Philosophy and Phenomenological Research [Penultimate Draft], [Published Version]

Normativity (2020) in Michael Raven’s Routledge Handbook of Metaphysical Grounding

Grounding the Domains of Reasons (2020) Australasian Journal of Philosophy 98/1 [Penultimate Draft], [Published Version]

Choosing Normative Properties: a reply to Eklund's Choosing Normative Concepts (2020) Inquiry 63/5 [Penultimate Draft] [Published Version]

In Defense of Practical Reasons for Belief (2017) Australasian Journal of Philosophy 95/3 [Penultimate Draft] [Published Version]

Non-naturalism and Normative Necessities (2017) Oxford Studies in Metaethics 12 [Penultimate Draft] [Published Version]

Defending Internalists from Acquired Sociopaths (2017) Philosophical Psychology 30 [Penultimate Draft] [Published Version]

Works in progress

(1) Nonnaturalism without Contingentism (with Chris Howard) forthcoming in Oxford Studies in Metaethics: Gideon Rosen and Anandi Hattiangadi have recently argued that non-naturalists must accept moral contingentism. We argue, however, that there are multiple good ways for non-naturalists to avoid these arguments. And we take that to be good news for the non-naturalist because moral contingentism amounts to a view of morality that is unsatisfying to a moral realist—or so we argue. (Draft)

(2) A Metaphysics-First Approach to Metaethics The standard approach to metaethical inquiry is mind-and-language-first: we start by asking what our actual ethical thought and talk is like, what it’s about, and then we ask how the stuff that our ethical thought and talk is about (if there is any) fits into the rest of reality and how we know about it. In this paper, I argue that this standard approach to metaethics faces two problems: it makes metaethical inquiry uninteresting and not substantive and it fails to speak to one of the central questions in metaethics—the question of realism. Moreover, I propose that we adopt a metaphysics-first approach to metaethical inquiry according to which metaethics is primarily about what reality is like—whether it backs certain ways of responding to it—and secondly, what kind of ethical thought and talk we should have (e.g., a cognitivist realist, non-cognitivist, or error-theorist way of talking). After defending this approach to metaethics, I briefly sketch some of its important implications for longstanding metaethical debates. (Draft)

(3) Pluralist Pragmatism and Rationality Recently, Kelly and Cohen (2024) argue that intuitions about rationality provide a good argument against the pragmatist’s claim that there are practical reasons for and against belief. While Rinard (2024) offers an insightful response to their “Rationality Argument” on behalf of robust pragmatism (the view that there are only practical reasons for and against belief), this paper offers a response to the argument on behalf of pluralist pragmatism (the view that there are both practical and epistemic reasons for and against belief). I argue that contrary to what Kelly and Cohen claim, the pluralist pragmatist may adopt the very same view of rationality and all the same intuitive claims about cases as the the anti-pragmatist. So, intuitive judgments about rationality can’t be wielded as an argument against pluralist pragmatism. Moreover, I argue that even if the pluralist pragmatist adopts a different view of rationality than the anti-pragmatist, they can still accommodate Kelly and Cohen’s intuitions about the sorts of cases they appeal to. So, no matter which view of rationality the pluralist pragmatist accepts, Kelly and Cohen’s Rationality Argument fails. (Draft)