Department of Philosophy - University of Missouri-Columbia

From the Chair

Welcome to the Department of Philosophy at the University of Missouri! Whether you're working for a BA, MA, or PhD, or just taking a course or two, we undertake to provide excellent teaching in philosophy. We offer introductory and historical courses, courses in traditional areas of philosophy such as metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, and logic, and courses in non-traditional areas of philosophy such as philosophy of biology, decision theory, and Asian philosophy.

At the undergraduate level, we are strongly committed to fostering transferable intellectual skills that will serve students well for the rest of their lives. One such skill is argumentative writing. All upper-level undergraduate (3000-level or 4000-level) courses, other than those in logic, include a substantial paper-writing component, typically in the form of one or more thesis-defense papers.

In our graduate program, we strive to maintain an atmosphere of cooperation and mutual support in which every student receives the individual attention that he or she needs in order to succeed.

The education we provide at every level is nourished by the passion for philosophy and outstanding research of our nationally and internationally renowned faculty. Their books have been published by outstanding presses such as Oxford University Press and Cambridge University Press, and their papers have appeared in outstanding international refereed journals such as The Philosophical Review, Journal of Philosophy, Noûs, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, and Mind.

In centuries past, philosophy was the almost exclusive preserve of upper-class white men, but this is no longer the case. Anyone can profit from the study of philosophy. If you have an interest in philosophy, you are welcome here.

Andrew Melnyk
Chair and Professor of Philosophy

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News

5-3-12: Two of our alums have done us proud by winning teaching awards at their respective institutions—Justin McBrayer (PhD, 2008), of Fort Lewis College, Colorado, has won the New Faculty Teaching Award for 2011-12, and Michael Hartsock (PhD, 2010), of Millikin University, Illinois, has won the Alpha Lambda Delta Teacher of the Year Award. Great job, guys!

5-1-12: Congratulations to former major Stephanie Hake (BA, May '11) for getting a funded offer from the Philosophy PhD program at the University of Minnesota!

4-2-12: Congratulations to Xiaofei Liu (ABD) for obtaining a one-year post-doctoral position at Calvin College starting this August!

3-26-12: Congratulations to former major Jeremy Davis (BA, May '11) for winning a Connaught Fellowship to pursue graduate study in philosophy at the University of Toronto! He will start in the fall.

3-16-12: Hearty congratulations to Collin Rice (ABD)! Yesterday he accepted a tenure-track job at Lycoming College starting in Fall 2013 and a Post-doc at the University of Pittsburgh (Fall 2012-Spring 2013)!

2-3-2012: Congratulations to Collin Rice on several recent accomplishments. Two papers published or forthcoming: (1) Rice, C. (2011). "Massive Modularity, Content-integration, and Language", Philosophy of Science, 78(5), 800-812 and (2) Rice, C. (forthcoming). "Concept Empiricism, Content, and Compositionality", Philosophical Studies, DOI 10. 1007/s11098-011-9782-6. He also has two other forthcoming paper presentations: (1) "Optimality Explanations: Equilibrium, Idealization and Tradeoffs", is to be presented at Philosophy of Biology at Madison Workshop (POBAM), Madison, June 2012 and (2) "Using Optimality Models to Explain Evolutionary Phenomena", is to be presented at the American Philosophical Association Pacific Division Meeting, Seattle, April 2012.

1-31-2012: Yasha Rohwer, graduate student in philosophy, presented a paper “Modeling the Evolution of Human Intelligence: Our Lousy Iterated Theory of Mind." at the American Philosophical Association Eastern Division meeting. Yasha and Collin Rice's paper  “Abstract Pattern Idealization and Explanatory Models” has been accepted by the American Philosophical Association Central Division to be presented at their 2012 meeting.

1-30-2012: Great job to Collin Rice and Joshua Smart on their published paper, "Interdisciplinary Modeling: A Case Study of Evolutionary Economics". Read about it here.

10-17-11: Congratulations to Ted Poston (PhD, 2006) of the University of South Alabama on winning the highly prestigious 2011 Younger Scholars Prize in Philosophical Theology for his paper, "Social Evil", which is forthcoming in Oxford Studies in Philosophy of Religion.

7-20-11: More great news for Andrew Moon (PhD, 2010)! Not only has he won the MU Distinguished Dissertation Award for 2010-2011, but he's also had a second paper accepted for publication by Mind, one of the handful of top philosophy journals in the world.

5-27-11: Great news on job placement! Crystal Allen (ABD) has accepted an indefinitely renewable assistant professorship at Principia College (to begin in Fall 2012); Joel Dittmer (PhD, 2010) has accepted a tenure-track position at Missouri University of Science and Technology; Mat Konieczka (PhD, 2007) has accepted a tenure-track position at Newbury College; and Melanie Johnson-Moxley (PhD, 2008) will be a visiting assistant professor next year at Columbia College.

3-3-11: Andrew Moon (PhD, 2010) and Justin McBrayer (PhD, 2008) are two of 15 recent PhDs and ABD graduate students from the US and Canada who have been accepted into the all-expenses-paid, two-week 2011 Purdue Summer Seminar on Perceptual, Moral, and Religious Skepticism. Congratulations to them both! News archives >>