Department Highlights

Kathryn Petrozzo has a forthcoming chapter titled “Mental Illness as a Life Sentence: The (Mis)treatment of Individuals with Psychiatric Diagnoses in the Courtroom” in the interdisciplinary volume Institutionalized Madness: The Interplay of Psychiatry and Society’s Institutions (eds. Arnoldo Cantú, Eric Maisel, and Chuck Ruby).

Timothy Kirschenheiter has a forthcoming paper in Asian Bioethics Review titled “A Defense of Abortion on the Basis of Self-defense.” In this paper, he defends the moral permissibility of abortion even on the assumption that the fetus is a person with full moral rights.

In December, August Gorman will give a talk called "Discursive Injustice and Neurodivergent Behavior: Reclaiming Agent-Meaning" at the conference Philosophy, Disability and Social Change 5.

In November, August Gorman will give a talk called "ADHD and Blameworthiness for Omissions" at a Freedom and Responsibility workshop at the University of Arizona.

In November, Kathryn Petrozzo will present a paper (along with Dr. Natalia Washington) titled "Essentializing Atypicality: Insanity, Executive Dysfunction, and Synchronic Control,” at the Association for the Advancement of Philosophy & Psychiatry session at the Philosophy of Science biennial meeting in New Orleans.

In November, Michael Doan will present his paper, “Three Images of Automation,” at the University of Waterloo Philosophy Department Colloquium Series in Waterloo, ON.

Elysa White has a forthcoming paper (with Dean McKay of Fordham University) in the journal of the American Psychological Association - American Psychologist. Their paper is titled “Philosophical Errors and Unintended Harms in Recrafting the Foundation of Counseling and Psychotherapy: Commentary on Sue, Neville & Smith.”

Michael Doan has a forthcoming paper, “Responsibility for the Future," at the Washington University Review of Philosophy.

Kathryn Petrozzo has a forthcoming Open Peer Commentary in the American Journal of Bioethics titled "The Role of Law Enforcement in Coercive Psychiatric Interventions." Her commentary is in response to the article "When Treatment Pressures Become Coercive: A Context-Sensitive Model of Informal Coercion in Mental Healthcare" (Hempeler et alum).

In October, Michael Doan presented a paper, “Recovering Dialectical Humanism,” at the biennial conference of the Radical Philosophy Association in Salt Lake City, UT.

Ben White published "The Timing Problem for Dualist Accounts of Mental Causation" in Erkenntnis. Link to article

Elysa White published an open peer commentary in the American Journal of Bioethics called "REDI, Set, Caution" with colleagues Dean McKay (Fordham University) and Rich McNally (Harvard University). Link to article

August Gorman published "Against Neuronormativity in Moral Responsibility" in Feminist Philosophy Quarterly. Link to article

Michael Doan published "Feminist Epistemology and Social Epistemology: Another Uneasy Alliance" in the APA Studies on Feminism and Philosophy. Link to article

Timothy Kirschenheiter published “Why Harm Reduction Programs Should Be Extended to Include Psychedelic Drugs” in The Palgrave Handbook of Philosophy and Psychoactive Drug Use (ed. Rob Lovering). Link to chapter

Timothy Kirschenheiter published “Two Counterexamples to Carey on Misinformation” in Social Philosophy Today. Link to article

In June, Ami Harbin and Michael Doan were guests on the thinking bodies podcast, hosted by Anna Mudde and Kristin Rodier. Other guests included Alexis Shotwell, Kathryn Norlock, and Christine Koggel. Link to podcast

Ben White had his paper, "A Structuralist Theory of Phenomenal Intentionality," accepted for publication in Inquiry. Link to article

Fritz McDonald published an article, “AI, Alignment, and the Categorical Imperative,” in the journal AI and Ethics. Link to article

August Gorman contributed a chapter, "Neurodiversity and the Ethics of Access," to The Bloomsbury Guide to Philosophy of Disability (edited by Shelley Lynn Tremain).

August Gorman published "What is the Difference Between Weakness of Will and Compulsion?" in the Journal of the American Philosophical Association. Link to article

Elysa White taught a note-taking workshop at Berkley High School.

In July, Michael Doan presented his paper, “Feminist Epistemology and Social Epistemology: Another Uneasy Alliance,” at the 40^th International Social Philosophy Conference (hosted by the North American Society for Social Philosophy) here at Oakland University.

Also in July, Michael Doan (with C. Heller and W. Curtis) gave a presentation titled “Thinking Dialectically” as part of the 2023 Summer Intensive Course: All Power to the People! Social Ecology and the Black Radical Tradition in Today's Revolutionary Movements. This program was hosted by the Institute for Social Ecology and the James and Grace Lee Boggs Center to Nurture Community Leadership in Detroit, MI.

Timothy Kirschenheiter published an article, “Responsibility Arguments in Defence of Abortion: When One Is Morally Responsible for the Creation of a Fetus,” in The New Bioethics. In this article, he explains why he thinks that Judith Jarvis Thomson-style defenses of abortion fail. Link to article

Timothy Kirschenheiter published an article, “Xenophanes’ Epistemology: Empiricist, Global Skeptic, or Both?” in the journal Akroterion. In this article, he attempts to unite two divergent interpretations of the ancient Greek philosopher's understanding of knowledge. Link to article

Here is a selection of some our faculty's accomplishments from 2022 and before:

In 2022, Timothy Kirschenheiter published “Objecting to the ‘Doesn’t Justify the Denial of a Defeater’ Theory of Knowledge: A Reply to Feit and Cullison.” in the journal Logos & Episteme. Link to article

In 2021, Michael Doan and Ami Harbin (with Shea Howell) contributed the chapter "Waging Love from Detroit to Flint” to Urban Emergency (Mis)Management and the Crisis of Neoliberalism (edited by Terressa Benz and Graham Cassano). Link to chapter

Prior to 2020, Elysa White led National High School Ethics Bowl teams at Oak Park High School and at Berkley High School.