Research
My research concerns proper functions, modal properties, and mental disorder. Across philosophy of biology, philosophy of mind, philosophy of medicine and psychiatry, and metaphysics, I ask how natural systems can have objective standards of correct, successful, or healthy functioning.
Proper Functions in Life, Mind, and Medicine
Proper functions are used to classify biological and cognitive systems and to identify malfunction and dysfunction. My current work develops a role-based approach according to which proper functions share a minimal etiological core, while different explanatory projects require different specifications of that core. I apply this framework to biological classification, teleosemantics, computation, health, and psychiatric disorder.
Health, Mental Health, and the Blueprint View
The Blueprint View understands complete health in terms of the abilities an organism would have if its components were fully functional. My current work extends this approach to mental health, rational ability, reasons-responsiveness, and self–illness ambiguity. It examines how objective functional standards relate to practical limitations, human agency, and psychiatric classification.
Teleosemantics and Representation
I investigate how proper functions can ground representational content and error in biological and artificial systems. Current projects concern etiological service functions, internal representation in artificial neural networks, and the relations between function, content, misrepresentation, and malfunction.
Dispositions and Causal Bases
My work on dispositions examines how biological and psychological capacities are grounded, individuated, and realized across levels. This includes research on causal bases, selected dispositions, abilities, and the modal structure of functional standards.
Research Groups and Collaborative Projects
International Teleosemantics Work-in-Progress Group
Since November 2025, I have organized an international online pre-read group for work in progress on teleosemantics. The group meets regularly to discuss draft papers on proper functions, content, error, representation, and related topics. Researchers interested in presenting work or joining the mailing list are welcome to contact me.
Psychiatric Disorders: Advances in Ability-Based Approaches
I am co-editing this volume with Garson Leder, Sanja Dembić, and Tadeusz Zawidzki. The volume brings together recent work on ability-based accounts of psychiatric disorder and is under contract with Springer.