About Rick
Background
I am originally from the South San Francisco Bay Area in California. I grew up as something of a geek, interested in history, sci-fi/fantasy books, and computers. In 2003, I enlisted in the US Marine Corps, where I worked in various intelligence-related specialties. (The question is inevitable, so: yes, I have deployed to both Iraq and Afghanistan.) While in the Marine Corps, I earned my AA in Chinese-Mandarin from the Defense Language Institute-Foreign Language Center in Monterey, California, and a BA in Philosophy from American Military University. After leaving military service in 2012, I moved home to the Bay Area and earned my MA in Philosophy from San Jose State. I initially intended to do work in either practical ethics or the philosophy of religion, but my interest in biology and Paleolithic-type dietary plans pulled me toward the philosophy of biology by the end of my first year.
I am currently finishing my dissertation on evolutionary mismatch, and I am taking a run at the academic job market.
Philosophical interests
- Philosophy of biology: my primary interest here is, of course, evolutionary mismatch. I also have active research interests in astrobiology.
- Moral theory: my intuitions are pretty consequentialist. Williamsian worries about alienation, for example, leave me completely unmoved. I am interested in ways that we might integrate moral insights from the primary moral theories (consequentialism, deontological approaches, virtue ethics, and relational ethics) in order to build a more unified moral theory.
- Practical ethics: self-defense, public policy, and criminal justice all interest me.
- Philosophy of religion: philosophy of religion was my first love in philosophy, and it was debating the existence of God with high school friends that first pulled me into philosophy in the first place. I'm casually interested in many issues in the analytic philosophy of religion.
- Military/intelligence issues: having spent a large chunk of my adult life in the intelligence community and the military, I am interested in the various moral and practical challenges which come up in warfare and intelligence collection. I have a particular interest in the moral symmetry of combatants, in part because my intuitions vary somewhat unpredictably.
- Ancient philosophy: here, my interests are entirely non-professional. I get a kick out of Marcus Aurelius and other Stoics.