Teaching

My goal in teaching is first and foremost to help students develop their ability to think clearly, carefully, and critically, especially about the many important moral and epistemic questions and issues that they’re apt to be confronted with in their everyday lives. A more particular aim I have that often falls out of this overarching goal is to foster in students skills that enable them to identify and fruitfully evaluate the (oftentimes implicit) arguments that underlie our personal beliefs and the unceasing torrent of claims we’re bombarded with by those who seek to influence and persuade us. There’s more to critical thinking, however, than simply having the ability to reliably assess the validity and strength of arguments you’re presented with. Also crucially important is the possession of certain epistemically virtuous attitudes and traits, like intellectual humility and a willingness to be intellectually charitable. In my teaching, I actively try to cultivate these virtues in my students.

Here are some of the courses that I've taught:

• Thinking Critically / Critical Thinking in a Politically Polarized Age (student evaluations)

• Biomedical Ethics and Social Justice / Medical Ethics (student evaluations: part 1, part 2)

• Business Ethics (student evaluations)

• Intro to Ethics (student evaluations)

• Problems in Social Thought: Do Our Irrational Brains Doom Democracy? (student evaluations)