I am a PhD-student in philosophy at NTNU. My work revolve around the issue of how, exactly, our conceptual practices interface with our environment; the nuts and bolts of their relationship. I approach this issue from the vantage point of contemporary pragmatism, with the tools developed by the science of complex systems, mechanistic explanations and causal modeling. More generally, I have broad interest in philosophy of science, cognitive science, pragmatism, the Pittsburgh School, and the history of philosophy - especially the line from Kant through Hegel, Peirce, Sellars, Rorty and contemporary figures like Robert Brandom, Huw Price, and Mark Wilson.
PhD Project
The topic of my PhD project is conceptual niche construction: the causal process by which we adapt our conceptual practices to the environment, and our environment to our conceptual practices. My aim is explanatory: I want to explain how, exactly, such conceptual niche construction works; the "nuts and bolts” by which it operates. My main claim is that to do so, we ought to search for the causal mechanisms or complex systems that make niche construction possible in the first place, and that we can employ standard mechansitic- or causal modelling techniques to describe how they operate. Doing so will be valuable because the resulting models can be used in first-order practical enterprises like business or politics or marketing, and because it breaks new theoretical ground and opens hitherto unexplored philosophical terrain.
Education
- Bachelor, Physics & Mathematics. Agder University. 2018 - Unfinished.
- Master, Philosophy. Copenhagen University. 2014 - 2016. Thesis: Against Realism about Mechanisms: a problem with realism about mechanisms in constitutide mechanistic explanations.
- History, Bachelor. Agder University. 2010 - 2013.
