Our Team
Senior Scholars
Anne Jeffrey | Principal Investigator & Associate Professor at Baylor University
Anne Jeffrey works primarily in metaethics and normative ethics. Her current book project, Being and Becoming Good: On the Diversity of Human Goodness and Virtue, under contract with Oxford University Press, develops and defends an inclusivist Aristotelian metaethics and ethics. She is author of God and Morality (Cambridge University Press) as well as numerous articles on political philosophy, philosophy of religion, and virtue ethics.
Tim Pawl | Co-Principal Investigator & Professor of Philosophy at the University of St. Thomas
Tim Pawl works on metaphysics, philosophical theology, and moral psychology. In moral psychology he’s worked with psychologists on questions concerning how best to grow in virtue, and whether the traditional wisdom of the Christian moral tradition is conducive to growth in virtue.
Vincent Ng | Co-Principal Investigator & Assistant Professor of Psychology at the University of Houston
Vincent Ng received his B.A. in Psychology from Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York. He then went on to receive his M.S. in industrial/organizational psychology Salem State University and then his M.S. and Ph.D. in industrial/organizational psychology at Purdue University. He is interested in understanding character and, more broadly, the relationship between well-being and morality at work and beyond.
Denise Vigani | Associate Professor of Philosophy at Seton Hall University
Denise Vigani works on virtue ethics and moral psychology. Her research involves elaborating and elucidating Aristotle’s views on the virtues, developing accounts of individual virtues, and investigating the relationship between virtue and practical reasoning. Much of Dr. Vigani’s work is informed by empirically-oriented research in psychology and cognitive science.
Christian B. Miller | A.C. Reid Professor of Philosophy at Wake Forest University
Christian B. Miller works on metaethics, moral psychology, moral character, action theory, and philosophy of religion. He is currently the Director of the Honesty Project, funded by a $4.4 million grant from the John Templeton Foundation. In recent years he was the Philosophy Director of the Beacon Project and the Director of the Character Project. He is the author of over 120 academic papers as well as Moral Psychology with Cambridge University Press (2021) and four books with Oxford University Press.
Matthew Pianalto | Professor of Philosophy at Eastern Kentucky University
Matthew Pianalto has published articles on many topics in ethics, including papers on patience, courage, integrity, and tolerance, on animal and environmental ethics, and on the philosophers Ludwig Wittgenstein and Friedrich Nietzsche. His first book, On Patience, was published by Lexington Books in 2016. He is also co-editing an interdisciplinary collection of new essays on patience with Baylor University psychologist Sarah Schnitker.
Public Philosophy Fellows
Jennifer Frey | Dean of the Honors College at the University of Tulsa
Jennifer Frey works primarily in moral psychology and virtue. She has co-edited a volume titled Self-Transcendence and Virtue with her former colleague Candace Vogler, and she is finishing up a volume titled Practical Truth with her husband and colleague, Christopher Frey. A third volume, titled Practical Wisdom, is under contract with Oxford University Press. In 2015, she was awarded a multi-million dollar grant from the John Templeton Foundation, titled “Virtue, Happiness, and the Meaning of Life.” She frequently writes more popular essays and book reviews in places like Breaking Ground, First Things, Image, and The Point. She hosts a philosophy, theology, and literature podcast called Sacred and Profane Love.
Sukaina Hirji | Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania
Sukaina Hirji focuses primarily on ancient philosophy, Aristotelian ethics, and contemporary ethics. She works in Ancient Greek philosophy, and in contemporary moral and feminist philosophy. Dr. Hirji’s work seeks to illuminate the often subtle ways in which material conditions and oppressive structures can limit our ability to fully be what we are, to fully express the parts of ourselves central to our identity. She received her PhD in philosophy from Princeton University.
Zoë Johnson King | Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Harvard University
Zoë Johnson King works primarily in ethics, metaethics, and epistemology. She mostly does non-ideal moral psychology: thoughts about motivation and praiseworthiness for messy humans in an unjust world. She is currently an Assistant Professor in the Philosophy Department at Harvard. Before Harvard, Zoë was an Assistant Professor at USC. And before USC, was a Bersoff Fellow at NYU. Zoe earned her PhD in Philosophy at the University of Michigan.
Science-Engaged Philosophy Fellows
Olivia Bailey | Assistant Professor of Philosophy at UC Berkeley
Olivia Bailey’s work is concerned with the ways that different kinds of epistemic virtues enable, constitute, and (perhaps) interfere with ethical virtues. She’s particularly interested in the significance of emotionally-charged imagination and understanding, and in the gap between intellectually comprehending and knowing something “in one’s heart.” Her work in these areas draws inspiration from the Scottish Enlightenment of the 18th century.
Juan Pablo Bermudez | Professor at Externado de Colombia University
Juan Pablo is a philosopher and cognitive scientist working on the issue of control: How do we exert control over our actions? What are the limits of that control? And what are the ethical and political implications of our limitations, as they intersect with social contexts and new technologies? In addition to his professorship at Externado de Colombia University, he is a research associate in the Ethics of Human-Computer Interaction at Imperial College London.
Matthew Haug | Associate Professor of Philosophy at William & Mary
Matthew Haug’s primary research interests are in the intersection of philosophy of mind, metaphysics, and philosophy of science, and he has published papers on these topics in such journals as Philosophy of Science, Philosophical Studies, Synthese, and Erkenntnis. He is also interested in questions about philosophical methodology, especially concerning the prospects of naturalistic approaches to philosophy and their implications for metaphysics. His book manuscript, Rethinking Self-Control, is under contract with Routledge.
Samuel Murray | Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Providence College
Samuel Murray works on issues related to temporally-extended self-regulation, forgetfulness, the dynamics of consciousness, and cultural variability in moral attitudes. He’s also started working on the pedagogy of civil discourse with the Dialogue, Inclusion, and Democracy Lab at Providence College. Before coming to Providence, He was a postdoctoral researcher in Felipe De Brigard’s Imagination and Modal Cognition Lab (Duke University) and a postdoctoral associate working with Santiago Amaya and William Jiménez-Leal at the Universidad de los Andes (Bogotá).
John Schwenkler | Professor of Philosophy at the University of Illinois
John Schwenkler’s research is the philosophy of mind and action, including topics in ethics and moral psychology. He also thinks a lot about language, and does some research in experimental philosophy and the philosophy of cognitive science. He is working on a book, to be titled Describing Human Action.
Zina Ward | Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Florida State University
Zina Ward’s primary research areas are general philosophy of science, philosophy of cognitive science, and moral psychology. She received her PhD in History and Philosophy of Science from the University of Pittsburgh in 2020. Before that, she completed MPhils in Philosophy and in History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge. Her time in Cambridge was funded by a Herchel Smith Fellowship.
Baylor Team
Paul Rezkalla | Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Philosophy at Baylor University
Paul Rezkalla holds a PhD in philosophy from Florida State University, a M.Sc. in cognitive and evolutionary anthropology from the University of Oxford, an M.A. in philosophy from the University of Birmingham (U.K.), an M.A. in theology from Saint John’s University. He works mainly on questions at the intersection of ethics and the sciences.
Rich Eva | Graduate Fellow and Administrator
Rich Eva is a PhD candidate in Philosophy at Baylor University. His research is in ethics and political philosophy. In particular, his dissertation investigates the ethics of politicization. He is also interested in a variety of applied ethical issues in tech ethics, medical ethics, business ethics, and environmental ethics.
Lizzy Davis | BRIGHTS Center Associate Director at Baylor University
Lizzy Davis is the Associate Director of BRIGHTS Center at Baylor University. In her role, she helps foster interdisciplinary research around human thriving and assists faculty in writing, receiving, and managing grants. She’s worked with grants for over 5 years now and at Baylor for 15+ years in a variety of roles including advancement and leadership development. Her educational background is in psychology (M.S., Educational Psychology; B.A., Psychology)
