In applying to the graduate program in philosophy, I hope to further my research into the three main areas that I have studied as an undergraduate: moral philosophy, logic and ancient philosophy.
My foremost interest lies in moral philosophy, including issues in metaethics, normativity, and constructing moral theories. As an undergraduate I have taken several upper-division courses in moral philosophy; varying in topics from metaethical theory (e.g. practical reason and normativity), Kantian ethics (I am a participant in a graduate seminar in the German department on the formation of Kant’s ethics) and contemporary ethics (including a graduate seminar with [Professor X] last spring). My honours thesis (which is included as my writing sample) focuses on T.M. Scanlon’s contractualist ethics and how it deals with issues such as obligation and retributivism, two other areas I have spent a great deal of time researching. Next semester I will be a participant in another graduate seminar with [Professor X], in which we will delve into issues involving how we value persons.
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Last year I took the first half of the graduate logic requirement at our university and from there proceeded to do my own research into issues in philosophy of logic and non-classical logics. I’m particularly interested in the intersection between logic and ethics (e.g. similarities/differences in normativity in both disciplines), as well as foundations and paradoxes. I’m currently involved in a graduate seminar on the philosophy of mathematics, co-taught by [Professors Y and Z], in which we are looking at various nominalist and platonist programmes, including neo-logicism and modal structuralism. Next semester I will be taking a class on non-classical logics and paradoxes, as well as one on modal logic. I will also be involved in the Foundations Interest Group reading group in the