JOSEPH FRANCIS LaPORTE’s Condensed CV (February 2008)

 

Email (spelled out to frustrate spammers):  jlaporte [at symbol] hope [period] edu.

 

Phone:  (616) 395-7621.

 

Address

Philosophy Dept., Hope College, Lubbers Hall, 126 E. 10th St. 214, Holland, MI  49423

 

 

EDUCATION

Ph.D. in philosophy, University of Massachusetts at Amherst:  May, 1998. 

 

M.A. in philosophy, University College London:  1993.

 

B.A., summa cum laude, in philosophy, Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio: 1991.

 

 

TEACHING POSITIONS

9/94-1/97:  Instructor and teaching assistant:  University of Massachusetts/Amherst

 

9/98-Present:  Assistant Professor and Associate Professor:  Hope College, Holland, MI.

 

 

AREAS OF RESEARCH

My primary research areas are in the philosophy of language, metaphysics, philosophy of biology, philosophy of science.  I also do some work in the philosophy of religion and epistemology.  Currently I’m working on a book about rigid designators for properties and theoretical identities, especially psychophysical identities. 

 

RECENT PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES

In October of 2007, I spoke in Birmingham UK and Turku Finland on natural kinds.  The former event was Nature and its Classification:  a Metaphysics of Science Conference, which opened up with a symposium on my book Natural Kinds and Conceptual Change (see http://www.bristol.ac.uk/metaphysicsofscience/programme.html).

 

In March of 2008, I will be a speaker at the Edges & Boundaries of Biological Objects Workshop, at the University of Utah (see http://www.phylosophy.org/eb).

In April of 2008, I will be a speaker for a symposium on natural kinds at the Central Division APA meeting in Chicago.

 

ARTICLES

(forthcoming) "On Two Reasons for Denying that Bodies Can Outlast Life," Mind.

 

(2007) "In Defense of Species,” Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 38, 255-69.

 

(2006) “Rigid Designators,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.  http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/rigid-designators/index.html

 

(2006) “Two-Dimensionalism Against Materialism,” supplementary document for “Rigid Designators,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.  http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/rigid-designators/twodim.html

 

(2006) "Species as Relations:  Examining a New Proposal," Biology and Philosophy. 21, pp. 381-93.

 

(2006) “Rigid Designators for Properties,” Philosophical Studies 130, pp. 321-36.

 

(2005) “Is There a Single Objective, Evolutionary Tree of Life?” The Journal of Philosophy 102, pp. 357-74.

(2003) “Does a Type Specimen Necessarily or Contingently Belong to Its Species?” Biology and Philosophy 18:  583-588.

(2002) “Must Signals Handicap?” The Monist 85:  86-104.

 

(2001) “Selection for Handicaps,” Biology and Philosophy 16:  239-249.

 

(2000) “Rigidity and Kind,” Philosophical Studies, 97:  293-316. 

 

(1998) “Living Water,” Mind, 107:  451-455.

 

(1997)  “Essential Membership,” Philosophy of Science, 64:  96-112.

 

(1996) “Chemical Kind Term Reference and the Discovery of Essence,” NOÛS, 30:  112-132.

 

(1996)  “Locke’s Semantics and the New Theory of Reference to Natural Kinds,” Locke Newsletter, 27:  41-64.

 

 (1995) “In Search of Pigeonholes,” The Philosophical Quarterly, 45:  499-505.

 

 

 BOOK

(2004 February) Natural Kinds and Conceptual Change.  New York:  Cambridge UP.  Table of contents and Introduction are available online:  http://assets.cambridge.org/052182/5997/sample/0521825997ws.pdf.

 

PUBLISHED RESPONSES TO MY WORK

Natural Kinds and Conceptual Change has been reviewed by the following:

C. J. Bolton in Mind 116, 2007, pp. 184-7.

G. McOuat, in Isis 97, 2006, p. 594.

D. Braddon-Mitchell in Biology and Philosophy 20, 2006, pp. 859-68.

Jochen Faseler in Review of Metaphysics 59, 2005, pp. 438-40. 

Rachel Cooper in History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences 27, 2005, p. 543.

Muhammad Ali Khalidi in Philosophy of Science 72, 2005, p. 519-23

Thomas Reydon in the Philosophical Quarterly 55, 2005, pp. 672-4;

RA Richards in International Philosophical Quarterly 45, 2005, pp. 412-413

Andrew Woodfield in Philosophical Books 3, 2005, pp. 272-3.

John Dupre in Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews, 2004.06.01:  see http://ndpr.nd.edu/review.cfm?id=1439

Neil Levy in Metapsychology Online Reviews, 2004, 8, 8:  see http://mentalhelp.net/books/books.php?type=de&id=2069

Rob Wilson in Philosophy in Review 24, 2004, pp. 423-6.

Robin Hendry in Philosophical Writings 27, 2004, pp. 71-4.

Other high-quality discussions of my work include:

Bird, Alexander (2007) “Essences of Natural Kinds:  Discovered or Stipulated?  Remarks on Joseph LaPorte’s Natural Kinds and Conceptual Change,” available in full text online at http://www.bristol.ac.uk/metaphysicsofscience/programme.html.

Devitt, Michael (2005)  “Rigid Application,” Philosophical Studies 125:  139-65.

Hacking, Ian (2007)  “The contingencies of ambiguity,” Analysis 67, pp. 269–77.

Oderberg, David (forthcoming)  Real Essentialism.  Routledge.

Okasha S. (2002)  “Darwinian Metaphysics: Species and the Question of Essentialism,” Synthese, 131, pp. 191-213.

Schwartz, Stephen P. (2002)  “Kinds, General Terms, and Rigidity:  A Reply to LaPorte,” Philosophical Studies 109, 265-77.

Segal, Gabriel (2000)  A Slim Book About Narrow Content.  Cambridge, MA:  MIT Press.