In my dissertation I argue that Kant, often taken to be a classical source of the opposition of freedom and feeling, is in fact one of the most insightful guides toward a coherent non-dualistic view of this relationship. Specifically, I demonstrate that implicit in Kant’s account of the feeling of moral respect is the remarkable idea that human emotion is a unique mode of self-consciousness—self-revelation and self-understanding--constitutive of practical agency, and therefore of freedom. Click here for an overview of my dissertation project.

My next project will build directly on this work: I will explore how in light of this new understanding of Kant, the Idealists’ thought should be seen not simply as a critique of Kant but as a continuation and deepening of the project of understanding the human emotions as a condition and manifestation of reason and freedom.

My study will show the Idealists’ project to be of enduring relevance to the most urgent contemporary philosophical debates, first to the problem of conceptually incorporating our emotional experience into our self-understanding as rational and free, and second to the broader goal of clarifying our apparently exclusive forms of self-understanding: the ordinary and humanistic, on the one hand, and the naturalistic, scientific, on the other. Click here for a description of my "Non-Subjective Freedom in German Idealism" research project.

Click here to see my research statement, an overview of my current and future research goals.