Matt Haber
Assistant Professor, Philosophy
Philosophy
Carolyn Tanner Irish Humanities Building
215 South Central Campus Drive, 4th Floor
Salt Lake City, Ut 84112
Office: 455 CTIHB
Email:
>> Curriculum Vitae
My Website: www.phylosophy.org/
Degrees:
2005 Ph.D. Philosophy, with affiliation in Population Biology UC Davis
1999 MSc History & Philosophy of Science London School of Economics
1995 BA Biology; Philosophy Grinnell College
I graduated from Grinnell College with a double major in biology & philosophy. After a few years bouncing around as a lab tech and line cook I ended up back in school, first getting an MSc in History and Philosophy of Science at LSE, followed by a PhD in Philosophy at UC Davis. While at UC Davis, I was also an affiliate in their Population Biology graduate group.
Selected Publications:
Philosophy of Biology
(Book Section), 2009
[citation]
Social Insects and the Individuality Thesis: Cohesion and the Colony as a Selectable Individual.
(Book Section), 2009
[citation]
[text]
Phylogenetic Inference
(Book Section), 2008
[ISBN]
[citation]
[text]
Clade Selection and Levels of Lineage: A Reply to Rieppel
(Journal Article), 2009
Moral Confusion and Developmental Essentialism in part-human hybrid research.
(Journal Article), 2008
[citation]
Samir Okasha's Evolution and the Levels of Selection (Review - Mind)
(Reviews), 2008
[text]
“Not So Innocent: Methodology and Metaphysics of Evolution.” (Review of "Doubting Darwin? Creationist Designs on Evolution," by Sahotra Sarkar for BioScience.
(Reviews), 2008
Research Statement
My area of specialty is Philosophy of Biology and Philosophy of Science. I am interested in the philosophical and conceptual issues in systematics, particularly those stemming from a commitment to phylogenetic thinking. My current projects include elucidating the nature of phylogenetic inference, tracking conceptual debates in biological classification and nomenclature, examining the use of models in phylogenetics, the ontology of biological objects, and accounting for how (and why) scientists shift from one set of theoretical and conceptual commitments to another. Other topics of interest are research ethics, including a project on the ethics of research involving crossing species boundaries (especially the human/non-human boundary).
Research Keywords, Regions of Interest and Languages:
Keywords:
Evolutionary Biology; Philosophy of biology (7); Philosophy of Science (12); Phylogenetics (2); Systematics
Current Courses
PHIL 3210-1 Fnds Probability/Stat
Courses I Teach
HONOR 3215 Phylogenetics & Systematics
PHIL 3200 Deductive Logic
PHIL 3210 Fnds Probability/Stat
PHIL 3310 Science And Society
PHIL 3370 Philosophy of Biology
PHIL 5192 Philosophy of _____
PHIL 6192 "Philosophy of"
Awards
2008
Obert C. and Grace A. Tanner Humanities Center Virgil C. Aldrich Fellowship in the Humanities - Tanner Humanities Center
2007
The Edges & Boundarires of Biological Objects - National Science Foundation - NSF