Curriculum Vitæ

Thomas Hofweber

Department of Philosophy

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Caldwell Hall, CB # 3125

Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3125

(919) 843-4501

hofweber@unc.edu

Employment

•Associate Professor, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2007 - present

•Assistant Professor, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2003 - 2007

•Assistant Professor, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, 1999 - 2003

Education

•Ph.D., Philosophy, Stanford University, 1999.

•Dissertation: Ontology and Objectivity Co-supervised by Solomon Feferman and John Perry. Stanford 1999.

M.A., Philosophy (major), Logic, and Mathematics (minors), University of Munich, Germany, 1994.

Areas of Specialization

•Metaphysics, philosophy of language, philosophy of mathematics.

Areas of Competence

•Epistemology, mathematical logic, philosophy of logic.

Honors and Awards

•“Innocent statements and their metaphysically loaded counterparts” selected by the Philosopher’s Annual as “one of the ten best articles published in philosophy in 2007”, (2008).

•Winner of the Phillip and Ruth Hettleman Prize for Artistic and Scholarly Achievement. “Highest research award for early to mid career faculty at the University of North Carolina”, (2007).

•Winner of the fourth APA Article Prize for “Inexpressible Properties and Propositions”, awarded by the American Philosophical Association for “the best article published in the previous two years.” (2006).

•Winner of the first Oxford Studies Younger Metaphysician Prize for “Inexpressible Properties and Propositions" awarded by the Editorial Board of Oxford Studies in Metaphysics for a paper by a philosopher within ten years of the PhD, (2004).

•“Proof-Theoretic Reduction as a Philosopher’s Tool” selected by the Philosopher’s Annual as “one of the ten best articles in philosophy to appear in the year 2000.”, (2001).

•Wolfgang-Stegmüller-Preis for Ontology and Objectivity. Awarded by the German Analytic Philosophy Society for “outstanding work by a philosopher under age 40.”, (2000).

Publications

•Books

•Empty Names, Fiction and the Puzzles of Non-Existence, (co-editor) with A. Everett. CSLI Publications, 2000.

Articles

•“How to Endure” (with J. David Velleman) in Philosophical Quarterly vol. 61.1. January 2011. Pages 37-57.

•“From Remnants to Things, and back again" in Meanings and other Things: essays on Stephen Schiffer. (with a reply by Stephen Schiffer). G. Ostertag (ed.). MIT Press. 2011.

•“Inferential Role and the Ideal of Deductive Logic” in Meaning, Understanding, and Knowledge, B. Armour-Garb, D. Patterson, and J. Woodbridge (eds.).The Baltic International Yearbook of Cognition, Logic and Communication vol. 5. October 2010. 26 pages

http://thebalticyearbook.org/journals/baltic/issue/view/4

•“Formal Tools and the Philosophy of Mathematics” in New Waves in the Philosophy of Mathematics, O. Bueno and Ø. Linnebo (eds.) Palgrave Macmillan. Pages 197-210. 2009.

•“Ambitious, yet Modest, Metaphysics” in Metametaphysics, D. Chalmers, D. Manley, and R. Wasserman (eds.). Oxford University Press. Pages 260-89. 2009.

•“The Meta-Problem of Change” in Noûs, vol. 43.2. Pages 286-314. 2009.

•“Validity, Paradox, and the Ideal of Deductive Logic” in Revenge of the Liar, JC Beall (ed.) Oxford University Press, 2008.

•“Innocent Statements and their Metaphysically Loaded Counterparts” The Philosophers’ Imprint vol. 7, no. 1. (February 2007):

http://www.philosophersimprint.org/007001/

•Reprinted in The Philosopher’s Annual 2008.

“From Remnants to Things, and back again" in Meanings and other Things: essays on Stephen Schiffer. (with a reply by Stephen Schiffer). G. Ostertag (ed.). MIT Press. 2011.

“Schiffer’s New Theory of Propositions" in Philosophy and Phenomenological Research. (with a reply by Stephen Schiffer in the same volume). vol. LXXIII. July 2006. Pages 211 - 17.

“Number Determiners, Numbers, and Arithmetic” The Philosophical Review. vol. 114.2. April 2005. Pages 179 - 225.

“Supervenience and Object Dependent Properties” The Journal of Philosophy, vol. CII, no 1, January 2005. Pages 5 - 32.

“Inexpressible Properties and Propositions" Oxford Studies in Metaphysics, vol. 2, D. Zimmerman (ed.) Oxford University Press. 2006. Pages 155 - 206.

•Winner of the Oxford Studies Younger Metaphysician Prize

•Winner of the APA Article Prize

“A Puzzle about Ontology" Noûs vol. 39, no. 2. 2005. Pages 256 - 83.

•reprinted in Italian translation as “Un enigma per l’ontologia” in Rivista di Estetica. vol. 46:2 pp. 41-69. 2006.

“Logic and Ontology" (13,000 word survey article), 2004. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 2004.

“Proof-Theoretic Reduction as a Philosopher’s Tool” Erkenntnis 53, 2000. Pages 127-146.

•reprinted in The Philosopher’s Annual XXIII, 2001.

“Quantification and Non-Existent Objects” in Empty Names, Fiction and the Puzzles of Non-Existence, edited by A. Everett and T. Hofweber, CSLI Publications, 2000. Pages 249 - 273.

“Contextualism and the Meaning-Intention Problem” In Cognition, Agency and Rationality, edited by K. Korta, E. Sosa and J. Arrozola, Kluwer, 1999. Pages 93-104.

Reviews and other publications

•“Review of John Burgess’ Mathematics, Models and Modality” Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews, January 2010.

•“My answers to five questions” in Five Questions: Metaphysics, A. Steglich-Petersen (ed), Automatic Press. 2010.

•“Review of Graham Priest’s Towards Non-Being” The Bulletin of Symbolic Logic, vol 14:1. 2008. Pages 116-18.

•“Review of Jody Azzouni’s Deflating Existential Consequence” The Philosophical Review, vol 116.3. 2007. Pages 465-67.

•“Review of Wolfgang Künne’s Conceptions of Truth" The Philosophical Review vol. 114.1. 2005. Pages 136-39.

•“Consistency, Existence, and the Philosophical Ambitions of Proof Theory." (Abstract) The Bulletin of Symbolic Logic, vol 10.3. September 2004. Pages 442-3.

•“Review of James R. Brown’s Philosophy of Mathematics” The British Journal of the Philosophy of Science, 52, 2001. Pages 413-416.

•“Review of John Burgess and Gideon Rosen’s A Subject with no Object” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, LXII, 2001. Pages 723-727.

•“Much ado about Nothing” (with A. Everett). Introduction to Empty Names, Fiction and the Puzzles of Non-Existence, edited by A. Everett and T. Hofweber, CSLI Publications, 2000. Pages ix - xxi.

•“Equivalence Principles and Neo-Fregean Approaches to the Philosophy of Mathematics.” (Abstract) The Bulletin of Symbolic Logic, 2000.

•“Numbers and Number Determiners” (Abstract) The Bulletin of Symbolic Logic, vol. 4.2, June 1998. Page 213.

•“Nominalismus” Enzyklopädie der Philosophie, Felix Meiner Verlag, 1999. [in German]

Talks

•Invited Talks

•“Carnap’s big idea”, Symposium on Carnap’s legacy for meta-ontology. Central APA meeting, Minneapolis. (4/2011)

•“Ontology and the ambitions of metaphysics” Presented at:

•Princeton University, philosophy department colloquium. (3/2011)

•University of Toronto, philosophy department colloquium. (3/2011)

“On the question of the existence and reality of ordinary objects” presented at

•Virginia Commonwealth University, philosophy department colloquium. (11/2010)

•Auburn Philosophy Conference on Ordinary Objects. Auburn University (02/2010)

“Numbers and the Philosophy of Mathematics” Wake Forest University, philosophy department colloquium, Winston-Salem, NC (11/2009)

“Esoteric and egalitarian metaphysics” Virginia Commonwealth University, philosophy department colloquium, Richmond, VA (10/2009)

“The domain of metaphysics and the ontological question about properties” Colloquium on nominalistic theories of properties, GAP 7, Bremen, Germany. (09/2009)

“Inferential Role and the Ideal of Deductive Logic” Fifth International Symposium for Cognition, Logic and Communication. Riga, Latvia. (08/2009)

“Fictional Objects and Two Kinds of Object Dependence" Special session on fictional objects, APA meeting, Philadelphia (12/2008)

“Ambitious, yet Modest, Metaphysics” presented at:

•NC State University, philosophy department colloquium. (9/2008)

•eidos Metaphysics Conference, Geneva. (7/2008)

•Ohio State University, philosophy department colloquium. (4/2008)

•Arizona Ontology Conference. Tucson, Arizona. (1/2008)

“Semantics, Ontology, and the Ambitions of Metaphysics” Semantics and Philosophy in Europe, Paris. (5/2008)

“Numbers and the Philosophy of Mathematics” Hettleman Prize talk. UNC. (2008)

“From Remnants to Things, and back again”. Presented at a conference in honor of Stephen Schiffer, Pecs, Hungary. (5/2007)

“The Ideal of Deductive Logic”, Invited talk, Dubrovnik Conference. (5/2007)

“Ontology as a Philosopher’s Project”,  Inland Northwest Philosophy Conference on Meta-Metaphysics. (04/2007)

“The Ideal of Deductive Logic”, NYU, Philosophy department colloquium. (4/2007)

“Abandoning the Ideal of Deductive Logic” presented at:

•Rutgers, philosophy department colloquium (2/2007)

•ECU, philosophy department colloquium. (11/2006)

•UNC, philosophy department colloquium. (10/2006)

“Logicism without Logic” presented at:

•University of California at Santa Barbara. Philosophy department colloquium. (5/2006)

•University of California at Irvine. Logic and philosophy of science department colloquium. (4/2006)

•MIT. Philosophy department colloquium. (4/2006)

•Princeton University. Philosophy department colloquium. (3/2006)

•Workshop on logicism. Joint meeting of the NC-SC philosophy societies. Columbia. (2/2006)

•University of Paris, 1. IHPST colloquium. (1/2006)

“Number Words and Non-referring Terms” Workshop on non-referring terms. University of Paris, 1. (1/2006)

“Ontology as a Philosophical Project” University of Pennsylvania. Philosophy department colloquium. (11/2005)

“The Meta-Problem of Change" 8th Inland Northwest Philosophy Conference on “Time and Identity". (4/2005)

“Formal Tools and the Philosophy of Mathematics" presented at Solomon Feferman’s retirement symposium, Stanford. (1/2004)

“Ontological Questions" University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (3/2003)

“Inexpressible Properties" Presented at:

•Syracuse University (9/2002)

•University of Manitoba (9/2002)

Colloquium on Logicism. Philosophy of Mathematics Spring Seminar. University of Notre Dame. (2/2002)

“Number Determiners, Numbers, and Basic Arithmetic” Midwest Philosophy of Mathematics Workshop. University of Notre Dame. (9/2001)

“Fictionalism, Pretense, and Semantics” Symposium on Semantic Pretense. Eastern Division Meeting of the American Philosophical Association (APA). (12/2000)

“Innocent Statements and their Metaphysically Loaded Counterparts” New York University. (2/99)

“A Puzzle about Ontology” Presented at:

•University of Alberta, Edmonton (10/2000)

•University of Lethbridge (10/2000)

•University of Southern California (2/99)

•University of Notre Dame (2/99)

•University of Texas, Austin (1/99)

•Yale University (1/99)

•University of California, Santa Cruz (1/99)

•University of Michigan, Ann Arbor (1/99)

“Compositionality and the Alleged Explanatory Role of a Compositional Semantics” Presented at CogLunch 98, an interdisciplinary lecture series in Cognitive Science, CSLI, Stanford. (5/98)

“Objects and Objectivity” Departmental Colloquium, Philosophy Department, Stanford University. (5/98)

“Does a Compositional Semantics Play an Explanatory Role? ” Symposium on Compositionality, European Summer School in Logic, Language and Information, ESSLLI 97, Aix-en-Provence, France. (8/97)

“Contextualist Theories of Knowledge and of Knowledge Ascriptions” Co-Main Invited Address in the section “Knowledge in Context” of the International Conference in Cognitive Science, ICCS-97, San Sebastian, Spain. (5/97)

“Inferential Role and Domain Conditions” 6th Workshop in Logic, Language and Computation, CSLI, Stanford. (5/97)

Contributed Talks

•Refereed Conferences

•“Inexpressible Properties” presented at GAP 4, the fourth international congress of the German Analytic Philosophy Society. (9/2000)

•“Equivalence Principles and Neo-Fregean Approaches to the Philosophy of Mathematics” presented at the 2000 Annual Meeting of the Association for Symbolic Logic, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. (6/ 2000)

•“Supervenience and Object-Dependent Properties” Pacific Division Meeting of the American Philosophical Association (APA), San Francisco. (4/2000)

•“Inexpressible Properties” Pacific Division Meeting of the APA, Berkeley. (4/99)

•“Numbers and Number Determiners” Spring Meeting of the Association for Symbolic Logic, Los Angeles. (3/98)

•“Proof-Theoretic Reduction as a Nominalist’s Tool” Workshop on Notions of Reduction in Mathematics and Philosophy, Munich, Germany. (9/97)

•“Abriß eines nominalistischen Programms” Third International Conference of the German Analytic Philosophy Society, GAP 3, Munich, Germany. (9/97)

•“Inferential Role and Domain Conditions” Workshop on Quantification, Collectivity and Reciprocals, European Summer School in Logic, Language and Information, ESSLLI 97, Aix-en-Provence, France. (8/97)

Other Talks

•Comments on Cian Dorr and on Matti Eklund at the Metaphysical Mayhem, Rutgers. (5/2008)

•Comments on Sam Scott’s “Saying something about Santa Claus" Pacific APA meeting, San Francisco. (3/2005)

•Comments on Susan Vineberg’s “Nominalism and Naturalism in the Philosophy of Mathematics” Pacific APA meeting, San Francisco. (3/2001)

•“Quantification and Non-Existent Objects” Conference on Empty Names, Fiction, and the Puzzles of Non-Existence, CSLI, Stanford. (3/98)

•“Numbers and Number Determiners” Stanford Logic Lunch. (2/98)

Fellowships

•Reynolds Faculty Fellowship (Spring 2010)

•Spray Randleigh Fellowship (2007)

•Junior Faculty Development Award (2004)

•Rackham Summer Interdisciplinary Institute Faculty Fellowship (2002)

•Rackham Summer Fellowship (2001)

•Mellon Pre-Doctoral Fellowship (1998-1999).

•Dissertation Fellowship, Stanford University (1994-1998).

Teaching experience

•Courses taught

•University of North Carolina

•First year seminar: Death (Fall 2010)

•Reading seminar in metaphysics (Fall 2009)

•Advanced Logic: Set Theory (Spring 2009) (graduate seminar)

•Metaphysics (Spring 2009) (Fall 2010)

•Philosophy of Logic (Spring 2008) (Graduate seminar)

•The domain and methods of metaphysics (graduate seminar) (Spring 2007)

•Topics in Mathematical Logic (Fall 2006)

•Kenan Seminar in the Philosophy of Logic (with Keith Simmons) (Graduate seminar) (Fall 2005)

•Meta-metaphysics (Graduate seminar) (Spring 2005)

•Introduction to Mathematical Logic (Fall 2004) (Fall 2005) (Fall 2007) (Fall 2009) (Graduate seminar)

•Introduction to Mathematical Logic online taught virtually every semester since (Fall 2004)

•Introduction to Mathematical Logic (Fall 2004) (Fall 2006) (Spring 2007) (Spring 2008) (Summer 2008) (Fall 2008)

•Recent Work in Ontology (Graduate Seminar) (Spring 2004)

•Philosophy of Time (Fall 2003)

•Honors Introduction to Philosophy (Fall 2003) (Spring 2004)

University of Michigan

•Philosophy of Mathematics (Winter 2003)

•Objectivity (Graduate seminar) (Fall 2002)

•Knowledge and Reality (Fall 2002)

•Mathematical Logic (Winter 2001)

•Proseminar (Graduate level survey of contemporary philosophy of language and philosophy of mind) (Fall 2000)

•Neo-Carnapian Approaches to Ontology (Graduate seminar) (Winter 2000)

•Metaphysics. (Fall 99) (Winter 2001)

•Honors Introduction to Philosophy. (Fall 99) (Winter 2000) (Fall 2000) (Winter 2003)

Stanford University

•Science, Philosophy and God. (Summer 98)

Professional Service

•Referee for:

•Book manuscripts: Oxford University Press, CSLI Publications, Blackwell Publishers.

•Major Grants: European Science Foundation, National Science Foundation

•Member of the European Science Foundation’s Pool of Referees (2007-present)

•Articles: American Philosophical Quarterly, Australasian Journal of Philosophy, British Journal of the Philosophy of Science, Canadian Philosophical Association, Dialectica, Inquiry, Linguistics and Philosophy, Mind, The Monist, Noûs, Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, Philosopher’s Imprint, Philosophia Mathematica, Philosophical Papers, Philosophical Quarterly, Philosophical Studies, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Studia Logica, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Theoria.

Co-Organizer of a workshop on the Philosophy of Logic, Chapel Hill, 2004.

Co-Organizer of the Conference Empty Names, Fiction and the Puzzles of Non-Existence. Stanford, 1998.