Department of Philosophy and Religion

"To be clear-headed rather than confused; lucid rather than obscure; rational rather than otherwise; and to be neither more, nor less, sure of things than is justifiable by argument or evidence. That is worth trying for." — Geoffrey Warnock

Biography

I am a Professor of Philosophy at Appalachian State University. My research interests primarily lie within aesthetics and ethics. I mainly focus on video games, the philosophy of music, philosophy of technology, and media ethics. I have additional research interests in perception (especially sound) and methodological issues in experimental philosophy. 

I am the author of Aesthetics and Video Games (Bloomsbury, 2024) and Video Games, Violence, and the Ethics of Fantasy: Killing Time (Bloomsbury 2020). 

As an undergraduate, I studied sound engineering at Berklee College of Music and worked as a recording engineer in the Boston area for four years before deciding that I wanted to study philosophy. I then moved to England where I received my MA from the University of Bristol and my PhD from King's College London. In addition to my love of philosophy, I also enjoy cycling, music, and playing games with my daughter. 

• View my PhilPeople page
• View my Google Scholar page

Education

• Ph.D. (2007) King's College London
• M.A. (2000) University of Bristol
• B.M. (1997) Berklee College of Music

Courses Taught

• Aesthetics
• Artificial Intelligence, Virtual Reality, and Ethics
• Ethical Theory
• Introduction to Philosophy
• Metaphilosophy
• Perception, Color, and Sound
• Philosophy and Popular Culture
• Philosophy and Video Games
• Philosophy of Art
• Philosophy of Mind
• Philosophy of Music
• Philosophy, Society, and Ethics
• Relativism

Publications

Books

• Aesthetics and Video Games. Bloomsbury Academic (2024).
• Video Games, Violence, and the Ethics of Fantasy: Killing Time. Bloomsbury Academic (2020).
  • See a review here and here.

Articles and Book Chapters

• "When a Balloon is Enough: An Attention-Based Account of Toys and Games", British Journal of Aesthetics (2025). 
• "The Robo-Barbie Dilemma: How should we treat artificial moral patients?", co-authored with Morgan Luck and Thomas Montefiore, Philosophical Quarterly (2025).
• “Videogames as Vehicles for Empathetic Perspective Shifting: Imagining Psychosis in Hellblade”, in Empathy and the Aesthetic Mind: Perspectives on Fiction and Beyond, edited by Katerina Bantinaki, Efi Kyprianidou, and Fotini Vassiliou. Bloomsbury (2025): 106-129.
• "Representations of Violence in Games", in The Routledge Handbook for the Philosophy of Games, edited by C. Thi Nguyen and John Sageng. Routledge (2025). 
• "Ethics and Video Games", in the Oxford Handbook of Ethics and Art, edited by James Harold. Oxford University Press (2023): 474-489.
• "Computer Art, Technology, and the Medium", in Being and Value in Technology, edited by Enrico Terrone and Vera Tripodi. Palgrave Macmillan (2022): 141-161.
• "Edgar Degas, Little Dancer Aged Fourteen (La Petite Danseuse de Quatorze Ans)". In D.H. Hick (Ed.). Case Studies in Comtemporary Aesthetics. New York: Bloomsbury Academic (2022). http://dx.doi.org/10.5040/9781350930063.0002 
• "Pluralism, Eliminativism, and the Definition of Art", co-authored with Jack M. C. Kwong, Estetika: The European Journal of Aesthetics 58.2 (2021): 100-113. 
• “Art, Aesthetics, and the Medium: Comments for Nguyen on the Art-Status of Games”, Journal of the Philosophy of Sport (2021). 
• "Ordinary Monsters: Ethical Criticism and the Lives of Artists", Contemporary Aesthetics 17 (2019). 
• "Hypocrisy as Either Deception or Akrasia", The Philosophical Forum 50 (2019): 269-281. 
• "The Ontology of Musical Works and the Role of Intuitions: An Experimental Study", European Journal of Philosophy 26 (2018): 348-367. 
  • CLICK HERE for files relating to the experimental study reported in this paper.
• “‘It’s Just a Story’: Pornography, Desire, and the Ethics of Fictive Imagining”, co-authored with Anna Cremaldi, British Journal of Aesthetics 58 (2018): 37-50. 
  • For a summary of the above, see “Are our fantasies immune from morality?”. Co-authored with Anna Cremaldi. OUPblog, 25 January 2019.
• "Ontology and Transmedial Games", in The Aesthetics of Videogames, edited by Grant Tavinor and Jon Robson, Routledge (2018): 9-23.
• "Rock as a Three-Value Tradition", Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 75 (2017): 143-154.
• "Free Will and Moral Responsibiliy in Video Games", Ethics and Information Technology 17 (2015): pp. 285-293.
• "The Metaphysics of Mash-Ups", Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 73 (2015): pp. 297-308.
• "The Puzzle of Historical Criticism", Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 70 (2012): pp. 213-222.
• "Resolving the Gamer's Dilemma", Ethics and Information Technology 14 (2012): pp. 11-16.
• "Music Without Metaphysics?", British Journal of Aesthetics, vol. 51 (2011): pp. 383-398.
• “The ‘Fine Art’ of Pornography?” In Porn: Philosophy for Everyone, Dave Monroe (ed) (Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010): pp. 153-165.
• "Understanding Manipulative Performance Art", Philosophical Frontiers, vol. 5 (2010): pp. 43-54.
• "Originality and Value", Hermeneia, vol. 10 (2010): pp. 66-77.
• “Conceptual Content and Aesthetic Perception”, Analyses: Proceedings of the 2^nd National Meeting for the Portuguese Society for Analytic Philosophy. Porto, Portugal: Faculdade de Letras da Universidade do Porto, (2006): 299-306. 
• "Musical Thought and Compositionality", Postgraduate Journal of Aesthetics 3 (2006): pp. 25-36.

Encyclopedia Articles

• "Cognitive Science and Aesthetics", in the Encyclopedia of Aesthetics, Michael Kelly (ed), Oxford: Oxford University Press (2014): pp. 70-74.

Academic Blog Contributions

• "Video Games as Vehicles for Projective Imagining". The Junkyard, 27 March 2024.
• "The Hidden Privilege of 'The Great British Bake Off'". Aesthetics for Birds, 29 February 2024. 
• "Why Video Game Violence Isn't Innocent". Aesthetics for Birds, 27 October 2020.
  • Reprinted as "The Resonance of Violence". Institute of Arts and Ideas 96, 8 June 2021.
• "Playing Games with History: Philosophers on the Ethics of Historical Board Games". Aesthetics for Birds, 21 August 2019.
• “Are our fantasies immune from morality?”. Co-authored with Anna Cremaldi. OUPblog, 25 January 2019.
• Critical precis of John Holliday’s essay, “The Puzzle of Factual Praise”. Aesthetics for Birds, 11 May 2017.
• “Punk Music and the Ontology of Rock Recordings”. Aesthetics for Birds, 21 November 2013.

Book Reviews

• Experience Machines: The Philosophy of Virtual Worlds, by Mark Silcox (ed.). Journal of the Philosophy of Games (2018).
• Music and Aesthetic Reality, by Nick Zangwill, Philosophy in Review 36 (1): 42-43.
• Musical Understandings, by Stephen Davies, Mind, vol. 123 (2014): pp. 1184-1187.
• Art and Pornography, edited by Hans Maes and Jerrold Levinson, British Journal of Aesthetics, vol. 54 (2014): pp. 510-512.
• How Music Moves Us, by Jeanette Bicknell, Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Vol. 68 (2010): pp. 317-319.
• The Performance of Reading, by Peter Kivy, Philosophical Quarterly, Vol. 60 (2010): pp. 220-222.
• Works of Music, by Julian Dodd, Philosophical Quarterly, Vol. 59 (2009): pp. 760-762.
• Listening to Popular Music, by Theodore Gracyk. British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol. 48 (2008): pp. 357-359.
• The Musical Representation, by Charles O. Nussbaum. Philosophy in Review, Vol. 28 (2008): pp. 212-214.
• Art and Value, by George Dickie, British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol. 45 (2005): pp. 94-96.
• Is Art Good for Us? Beliefs about High Culture in American Life, by Joli Jensen, British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol. 44 (2004): pp. 93-96.

Media

• Click here for a short video on CNN about how I and other professors can tell when an essay is written with ChatGPT.
• Click here for an interview with me on the AUXORO Podcast.
• Click here for an interview with me on The Neutral Ground podcast.
• Click here for an interview with me on the Ethics and Video Games podcast.
• Click here for an interview with me on Religion in Life.
• Click here for a short piece co-authored by Anna Cremaldi and I on the ethics of fantasy.
• Click here for a short piece outlining my account of the ethics of video game violence.
• Click here for a BBC article on the use of comic books in philosophy courses.