John Findlay Visiting Professor, 2007-08
Interests: political philosophy, game theory, ethics, Hobbesian and Humean moral and political theory
Professor Vanderschraaf has previously taught at the California Institute of Technology and Carnegie Mellon University. In the 2006-2007 academic year he was visiting associate professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the Program in Philosophy, Politics and Economics sponsored by Duke University and the University of North Carolina.
Professor Vanderschraaf’s research focuses on the analysis of convention and its applications in moral and political philosophy. His work on convention draws upon and contributes to contemporary philosophical analysis, scholarship on figures of the early modern philosophical period, and formal theory in the social sciences including game theory and public choice theory. He has taught courses in many different areas of philosophy, including ethical theory, political philosophy, decision theory, applied ethics and early modern philosophy. His recent publications include “Justice as Mutual Advantage and the Vulnerable” (forthcoming), “Game Theory Meets Threshold Analysis: Reappraising the Paradoxes of Anarchy and Revolution” (forthcoming), “Covenants and Reputations” (2007), “The Circumstances of Justice” (2006) and “War or Peace?: A Dynamical Analysis of Anarchy” (2006).
At Boston University in the fall 2007 semester, Professor Vanderschraaf will lead the courses “Great Philosophers” (PH 110) and “Philosophy of Social Science” (PH 477/677).