essays
selected philosophy writing. still a work in progress — I am slowly collecting and compiling essays from the past few years.
Philosophy
A Phenomenology of Love and its Necessity
Undergraduate Philosophy Thesis, Spring 2024. Argued that current theories of love do not sufficiently address why people feel that it is a necessary aspect of life. [PDF]
Ethical Challenges of the Recommendation Algorithm: Should we make social media more boring?
Undergraduate coursework. Argued that social media recommendation algorithms undermine free will (and thus personhood, as free will is necessary for personhood). [PDF]
Should Companies be Allowed to Patent Vaccines?
Undergraduate coursework. Argued that it is immoral for companies to patent vaccines. [PDF]
Is there a special kind of love that we can have only toward a person?
Undergraduate coursework. Argued that love towards a person and an animal is not necessarily different. [PDF]
Romantic Love and Self-Creation: Stefano and Lila in My Brilliant Friend
Undergraduate coursework. Argued that romantic love is one of the most damaging obstacles to self-creation. [PDF]
Happiness: A Pernicious Fantasy
Undergraduate coursework. Argued that there is no singular definition of happiness, and that believing there is one prevents us from achieving it. [PDF]
Happiness and Superheroes
Undergraduate coursework, in-class presentation. [Slides] [Script PDF]
Becoming who you are: Gay Science 290 and Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
Undergraduate coursework. Argued that self-creation can be seen as becoming rather than creating, with reference to Nietzsche’s Gay Science. [PDF]
Evaluating Paul Grice’s Theory of Conversational Implicature
Undergraduate coursework. [PDF]
The Problems of Intentionality
Undergraduate coursework. [PDF]
The Prison of Ignorance, or the Prison of Truth?
Undergraduate coursework. Argued that although truth is valuable in many circumstances, we should not conceptualize it as an intrinsic moral good or a goal of life. [PDF]
Will the Truth Set You Free? Truth and Freedom in The Matrix and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Undergraduate coursework. Argued for the subjectivity of truth, and that it is possible to have true beliefs that are contradictory and that do not correspond to universal objective truth. [PDF]
Memory and Suffering in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Undergraduate coursework. Argued that we should not take a utilitarian approach when considering the value of memory and suffering. [PDF]