PhD Dissertations and Placements

Of the 80 Ph.D. graduates since the program’s inception, approximately 80 percent have found secure (meaning tenured, tenure-track, or similarly secure continuing) employment. Another 11 have less secure positions (for example, one year teaching positions) and one is undertaking further graduate study. Of the 59 positions, 39 are in academic settings, 17 are in non-academic settings related to the graduate’s course of study, and 4 are unrelated to the course of study. Thus 93 percent of our Ph.D. graduates have found positions doing work related to their area of graduate study.   Almost all of those with less secure employment or who are still seeking employment have graduated within the past 3 years.

Completed PhD Dissertations and Graduate Placements

• Ezekeal Grounds (2023)
  "[Dissertation Title]"
  Advisor: Michael Weber
  Current Position:
  
• Xuanpu Zhuang (2023)
  "[Dissertation Title]"
  Advisor: Michael Weber
  Current Position: Tenure track position, Department of Philosophy, Zhejiang University, China
  
• Nathan Mulch (2023)
  "[Dissertation Title]"
  Advisor: Michael Weber
  Current Position:
  
• Yuzhou Wang (2022)
  "Normativity and Rationality: Analyzing the Norms for Disagreements and Judgment Suspension"
  Advisor: Christian Coons
  Current Position: Assistant Professor, Peking University
• Erica Nichols (2022)
  "Mulitiple Personhood in Dissociative Identity Disorder: Lives and Deaths of Invisible People"
  Advisor: Sara Worley
  Current Position: Visiting Assistant Professor, University of Cincinnati 

• Austin McGrath (2021)
  "Alienation and Identification"
  Advisor: Christian Coons
  Initial Position: Philosophy Instructor, Bowling Green State University; Current Position: Visiting Assistant Professor of Philosophy, Husson University, Maine
  
• Amitabha Palmer (2020)
  "Scientific Facts in the Space of Public Reason: Moderate Idealization, Public Justification, and Vaccine Policy Under Conditions of Widespread Misinformation and Conspiricism"
  Advisor: Kevin Vallier
  Current Position: Clinical Ethics Fellow at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center
• Tatiana Gracyk (2020)
  "A Revised Principlist Framework for Decision-Making in Healthcare"
  Advisor: Michael Weber
  Current Position: College Assistant Professor, Cleveland State University
• Scott Simmons (2020)
  "Reasons to Believe There Are No Reasons? Epistemological Challenges to Normative Nihilism"
  Advisor: Michael Weber"A Revised Principlist Framework for Decision-Making in Healthcare"
  Current Position: Full-time Instructor, Indian River State College (Fort Pierce, Florida)
• Mark Herman (2019)
  "Subjective Moral Biases and Fallacies: Developing Scientifically and Practically Adequate Moral Analogues of Cognitive Heuristics and Biases"
  Advisor: Sara Worley
  Current Position: Lecturer, Department of English and Philosophy, Arkansas State University
  Dr Herman's website
  
• Jessica Mefford-Katz (2018)
  "What in the World is Morality?"
  Advisor: Christian Coons
  
• Jacob Sparks (2018)
  "Ethical Inference"
  Advisor: Christian Coons
  Initial Position: Postdoctoral Fellow, UCSD; Current Position: Assistant Professor (Tenure-track), California Polytecnic State University, San Luis Obispo, California
  
• Marcus Schultz-Bergin (2017)
  "Animal Rights in a Diverse Society"
  Advisor: Michael Weber
  Current Position: Assistant Lecturer, Department of Philosophy and Comparative Religion, Cleveland State University
  
• David Schwan (2017)
  "The Nature and Morality of Empathy"
  Advisor: Michael Weber
  Current Position: Lecturer, Central Washington University
  
• Eileen Baker (2017)
  "Autonomy and Informed Consent"
  Advisor: Michael Weber
  Current Position: Assistant Professor and Medical Director for Ethics Curriculum at University of Toledo College of Medicine and Life Sciences
  Emergency physician with Riverwood Emergency Services, Toledo, Ohio
  
• Ben Bryan (2016)
  "Natural Rights and Convention"
  Advisor: Fred Miller
  Initial Position: Lecturer, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Current Position: Instructor, University of Nevada, Reno
• Peter Bornschein (2016)
  "Right-Libertarianism and the Destitution Objection"
  Advisor: Michael Weber
  Current Position: Lecturer (part-time), Eastern Michigan University
  
• Wes Dempster (2016)
  "Pragmatism, Growth, and Democratic Citizenship"
  Advisor: Donald Callen
  Initial Position: Lecturer, Philosophy Department, University of Dayton, Ohio; Current Position; Lecturer, Western Governors University
  
• Elijah Weber (2015)
  "Resentment and Morality"
  Advisor: Michael Weber
  Current Position: Medical Bioethics Director for Kaiser Permanente, Fontana Medical Center, California
• Mark Wells (2014)
  "Value, Well-Being, and the Meaning of Life"
  Advisor: Michael Weber
  Initial Position: Visiting Assistant Professor, The College of Wooster; Current Position: Visiting Lecturer, Northeastern University, Boston
  
• Jeanne Kusina (2014)
  "Seduction, Coercion, and an Exploration of Embodied Freedom"
  Advisor: Don Callen
  Current Position: Visiting Faculty, Women's and Gender Studies Department, University of Toledo, Ohio
  
• Noah Levin (2014)
  "The Role of Death in the Moral Permissibility of Solid Organ Procurement After Cardiac Death and its Implications"
  Advisor: Michael Bradie
  Current Position: Lead Instructor of Philosophy, Department of Liberal Arts and Culture, Golden West College
  
• Arthur Ward (2013)
  "Against Natural Teleology and its Application in Ethical Theory"
  Advisor: Daniel Jacobson
  Initial Position: Postdoctoral Fellow, Harvard School of Public Health; Current Position: Teaching Professor of Philosophy, Lyman Briggs College at Michigan State University
  
• Nicole Smith (2013)
  "The Character of Character: New Directions for a Dispositional Theory"
  Advisor: Daniel Jacobson
  Initial Position: Lecturer, NC State University; Current Position: Lecturer, University of Texas at Austin
  
• David Faraci (2012)
  "How to Be (And How Not to Be) a Normative Realist"
  Advisor: David Shoemaker
  initial Position: Visiting Assistant Professor, Virginia Tech University; Current Position: Assistant Professor, Durham University (UK)
•  Christoph Hanisch (2012)
  "Why the Law Matters to You: Citizenship, Agency and Public Identity"
  Advisor: Fred Miller
  Initial Position: Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Vienna; Current Position: Assistant Professor, tenure-track, Philosophy Department, Ohio University
• Hong Lee (2012)
  "Biological Functionalism and Mental Disorder"
  Advisor: Sara Worley
  Current Position: Medical Ethicist, Salem Health, Salem Hospital Campus, Salem, Oregon
• Peter Jaworski (2012)
  "Me, Myself, and Mine: The Scope of Ownership"
  Advisor: Fred Miller
  Current Position: Associate Teaching Professor, McDonough School of Business, Georgetown University
  See Peter Jaworski's web page here.
  
• Sangeeta Sangha (2011)
  "Neo-Aristotelian Flourishing and Tragic Dilemmas"
  Advisor: Fred Miller
  Current Position: Instructor, Philosophy Department, Highline College
  
• Carolyn Council (2010)
  "Honoring Their Services: Why Blacks in the United States Should Be Paid Reparations"
  Advisor: Lou Katzner
  Initial Position: Assistant Professor, Florida A & M University
• Robyn Peabody Hall (2010)
  "John Dewey's Theory of Growth and Amy Allen's Feminist Theory of Power Applied to the Work of Domestic Violence Shelters"
  Advisor: Michael Bradie
  Program Planning and Monitoring Specialist at United Way of Greater Toledo
• Fred Olwendo (2010)
  "Quasi-Unconditionality: Higher Call to the Virtue of Forgiveness"
  Advisor: Donald Callen
  
• Jonathan Miles (2009)
  "A Perfectionist Defense of Free Speech"
  Advisor: Daniel Jacobson
  Current Position: Associate Professor, Department of Philosophy, Quincy University
• Steven Weimer (2009)
  "Autonomy and the Utilitarian State"
  Advisor: Steven Wall
  Current Position: Associate Professor, Arkansas State University
• Peter Celello (2009)
  "Desert in Context"
  Advisor: Steven Wall
  Current Position: Senior Lecturer, Ohio State University-Newark
  
• Leanne Kent (2008)
  "Tragic Dilemmas, Virtue Ethics and Moral Luck"
  Advisor: Fred Miller
• Katherine Erbeznik (2008)
  "Liberal Cosmopolitanism and Economic Justice"
  Advisor: Steven Wall
  Transaction Tax M&A, Ernst and Young LLP, New York, NY
• Galen Foresman (2008)
  "A Practical Distinction in Value Theory: Qualitative and Quantitative Accounts"
  Advisor: Dan Jacobson
  Current Position: Full Professor, North Carolina A & T University, Greensboro, NC
  
• Greg Hakos (2007)
  "Experience in the World of the Living"
  Advisor: Michael Bradie
  Visiting Lecturer, University of Central Missouri
• John Milliken (2007)
  "The Authority of Morality"
  Advisor: Ray Frey
  Assistant Professor, Department of Theology, LCC International University, Klaipeda, Lithuania
• Nicholas Maloberti (2007)
  "Individual Sovereignty and Political Legitimacy"
  Advisor: Fred Miller
  Fellow at Liberty Fund, Indianapolis, Fall 2007
• Matthew Stichter (2007)
  "The Skill of Virtue"
  Advisor: Dan Jacobson
  Current Position: Associate Professor, Washington State University
• Jonathan Miller (2007)
  "Mystical Experiences, Neuroscience, and the Nature of Reality"
  Advisor: Marvin Belzer
  Department of Philosophy, Pasadena City College, Pasadena, California.
  
• Fred Curry (2006)
  "Motivation Matters: Evaluating Evolutionary Arguments for Psychological Altruism"
  Advisor: Michael Bradie
  Instructor, Golden West College, California
  
• Jason Gatliff (2006)
  "Terrorism and Just War Tradition: Issues of Compatibility"
  Advisor: Don Scherer
  Integrated Ethics Program Officer, Louis Stokes Cleveland VA Medical Center
  Director of Ethics Consultation, Center for Biomedical Ethics, Metrohealth Medical Center, Cleveland, OH
• Russell Disilvestro (2006)
  "Capacities and Moral Status"
  Advisor: R.G. Frey
  Associate Professor, California State University, Sacramento, California.
• Jason Grinnell (2006)
  "Biology, Policy, and the Racial Contract"
  Advisor: Michael Bradie
  Associate Professor, Buffalo State College, Buffalo, New York
• Aaron Simmons (2006)
  "In Defense of an Animal's Right to Life"
  Advisor: R.G. Frey
  Assistant Professor, Philosophy Department, Marywood University, Scranton, PA
  
• Pam Phillips (2005)
  "Beyond Subjective Well-Being"
  Advisor: Fred Miller
  
• Ben Dixon (2005)
  "Toward a Leopoldian Theory of Moral Progress"
  Advisor: Don Scherer
  Assistant Professor (tenure track) at Stephen F. Austin State University, Nacodoches, Texas
  
• Amy White (2004)
  "The Obscenity of Internet Pornography: A Philosophical Analysis of the Regulation of Sexually Explicit Internet Content"
  Advisor: Loren Lomasky
  Tenure-track position at Ohio University, Zanesville, Ohio.
• Marybeth Bauer (2004)
  "Planning in Social Context: A Guide for Environmental Practitioners"
  Advisor: Donald Scherer
  Human Dimensions Specialist, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Silver Springs, Maryland
• Robert Bass (2004)
  "Toward a Constructivist Eudaemonism"
  Advisor: Ned McClennen
  Adjunct Associate Professor, Department of Philosophy, University of North Carolina at Pembroke
  
• Cecilia Nalagon (2003)
  "Poverty: Deprivation in Basic Capabilities"
  Advisor: Loren Lomasky
  Executive Publisher, Marketing Research Journal, Rotterdam, Netherlands
• Mahesh Ananth (2003)
  "Boorse and His Critics: Toward a Naturalistic Concept of Health"
  Advisor: Fred Miller
  Associate Professor, University of Indiana at South Bend, Indiana
• Kalevi Lehto (2003)
  "Functionalism and Qualia" Advisor: Sara Worley
• Karen Hornsby (2003)
  "Education in a Just Liberal Society" Advisors: Lou Katzner and Jim Child
  Tenure-track position, North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, Greensboro, North Carolina
• Csaba Nyiri (2003)
  "Nation State or Cosmopolis? A Liberal Approach to Sovereignty and Borders"
  Advisor: Chris Morris
  Adjunct faculty, Heidelberg College, Tiffin, Ohio
• Ana Lita (2003)
  "'Seeing' Human Goodness: Iris Murdoch: A Contemporary Inquiry into the Moral Self" Co-Advisors: Don Callen and Ned McClennen
  Executive director of the IHEU-Appignani Center for Bioethics at the United Nations in New York
• Kyle Swan (2003)
  "Republican Liberty and Needs: A Kantian Welfare State" Advisor: Loren Lomasky
  Assistant Professor, Philosophy Department, Sacramento State University, California
  
• Jana Craig (2002)
  "Quality of Life: The Grounds for Attribution" Advisor: R. G. Frey
  Kaiser Permanente, Oakland, California
  
• Austin Dacey (2002)
  "How To Talk About Religion in Politics" Advisor: Loren Lomasky
  Assistant Professor in the Department of Humanities at Mercy College
  For Dr Dacey's web page, click here.
• Alfred Decker (2002)
  "A Liberal Theory of Punishment" Advisor: Loren Lomasky
  Al passed away in 2003
• Carrie-Ann Biondi (2002)
  "Belonging and Becoming: Toward a Consensualist Conception of Citizenship"
  Co-advisors: Christopher Morris, Fred Miller
  Associate Professor of Philosophy, Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies, Marymount Manhattan College, NY.
• Collette Palamar (2002)
  "Dwelling"
  Advisor: Donald Scherer
  For Dr. Palamar's website, click here.
• Mario Pascalev (2002)
  "Territory: An Account of the Territorial Authority of the State"
  Advisor:Christopher Morris
  Lead Information Systems Analyst at Government Employees Insurance Company, (GEICO) Washington, DC.
• Carol Powers (2002)
  "What's Wrong With Pornography?: An Argument by way of Philosophy and Psychoanalysis" Advisor: Donald Callen
  Retired from Raasch Professional Law Offices, Milwaukee, Wisconsin
  
• H.Sterling Burnett (2001)
  "Ecosystemic Goods: The Pros and Cons of a Property Rights Approach"
  Advisor: Fred Miller
  Research Fellow, The Heartland Institute, Illinois
  Dr. Burnett's Webpage
  
• Peter Found (2001)
  "Never Judge a Dutch Book by Its Cover" Advisor: Edward McClennen
  Decision Support Analysis, Canadian Tire Corporation,
• Uri Henig (2001)
  "The Logic of Desire and Deliberation"
  Advisor: Edward McClennen
• Alexei Marcoux (2001)
  "Legal Normativity Reconsidered: Raz, Positivism, and Political Authority"
  Advisors: Jim Child and Christopher Morris
  Professor of Business Ethics and Society, and Research Scholar in the Institute for Economic Inquiry, in Creighton University’s Heider College of Business.  For Alexei Marcoux's website, click here.
• Assya Pascalev (2001)
  "Medical Metaphors of Death and Dying: An Ethical Analysis"
  Advisor: Michael Bradie
  Associate Professor and Director, Program in Health Care Ethics, Department of Community and Family Medicine, Howard University College of Medicine, Washington, DC.
  Summer Director, Bulgarian Center for Bioethics, Sofia
  Consultant for European Commission's Directorate of Research, Science and Society
  
• James Spence (2001)
  "The Moral Foundations of the Duty to Rescue" Advisor: R.G. Frey
  Associate Professor, Department of Philosophy and Religion, Adrian College, Michigan.
  Director of Adrian College Institute for Ethics
  
• Gene Torisky (2001)
  "The Possibility of Supererogation Based on the Integrity of the Moral Agent"
  Advisor: Mike Robins
  Associate Professor and Philosophy Department Chair (commencing Fall 2008), St Vincent College, Latrobe, Pennsylvania.
  Dr. Torisky's website
  
• Ian Young (2001)
  "Reconciling Social Unity and Cultural Diversity"
  Advisor: Christopher Morris
  Senior Lecturer in Philosophy Department at Bowling Green State University.
  
• Kathryn Bradie (2000)
  "Illuminations of Terrorism" Advisor: Donald Callen.
  Retired from Philosophy Department at Heidelberg College, Tiffin OH
  
• Laura DeHelian (2000)
  "Evolutionary Theory as a Framework for Moral Psychology" Advisor: Michael Bradie
  Assistant Professor, Department of Nursing, Cleveland State University, OH
• Waldemar Hanasz (2000)
  "Between Egosim and the Common Good: Niccola Machiavelli's Model of the Political Agent" Advisors: Edward McClennen and Loren Lomasky.
  Assistant Professor, Department of Philosophy, University of Massachusetts Lowell, Lowell, MA.  Email: waldemar_hanasz@uml.edu
• William Kline (2000)
  "Stability, Convention and the Sensible Knave: The Foundations of Hume's Theory of Justice"
  Advisor: James Child
  Chair of Business Administration and Economics,  University of Illinois, Springfield, Illinois
  Email: wklin2@uis.edu
  
• Rado Kotorov (2000)
  "Innovation, Entrepreneurship and the Firm: The Wealth of Individual"
  Advisors: Edward McClennen and James Child
  Director, Strategic Product Management and Competitive Strategy, Information Builders
  New York, NY.
• Laura Newhart (2000)
  "PostModern Procreation: Subjectivities and Sexual Difference Beyond Phallocentrism" Advisor: Donald Callen
  Associate Professor (tenured), Eastern Kentucky University.
  
• Pam Ryan (2000)
  "Sublimely Metaphysical: Kant's Politics of Revolution" Advisor: James Child.
  Instructor, Morehead State University, Kentucky.
  
• James Taylor (2000)
  "Personal Autonomy: It's Theoretical Foundations and Role in Applied Ethics"
  Advisor: R.G. Frey
  Assistant Professor (tenure-track), Department of Philosophy and Religion, College of New Jersey. For Dr Taylor's Web Page, click here.
  
• Drew Ackerman (1999)
  "Local Liberty and Respect for Individual Autonomy (A Tocquevillian Critque of Liberal Neutrality)"
  Advisors: James Child and Michael Bradie.
  Registrar's Office, University of Hartford, Connecticut
  
• Peter Boltuc (1998)
  "Moral Partiality"
  Advisor: R.G. Frey
  Louise Hartman Schewe and Karl Schewe Professor in Liberal Arts and Sciences, University of Illinois, Springfield, IL.
  
• Robert Hood (1998)
  "Ecosystem Health: A Critical Analysis"
  Advisor: Donald Scherer
  Director of Accreditation, Association for Accreditation of Human Research Protection Programs, Inc., Washington, DC
  
• Lingqing Yang (1997)
  "State Activism in Late Development" Advisor: Edward McClennen
  Financial Firm in Philadelphia
• Samuel Zinaich (1997)
  "The Justification of Moral Knowledge in John Locke's Essay Concerning Human Understanding" Advisor: Edward McClennen
  Associate Professor of Philosophy, Department of History and Philosophy, Purdue University Northwest, Hammond, IN.
  
• Mark Aulisio (1996)
  "Intention, Foresight, and the Doctrine of Double Effect"
  Advisor: R.G. Frey
  Susan E. Watson Professor and Chair, Department of Bioethics at Case Western Reserve University and Director of Clinical Ethics at the MetroHealth Hospital System, Cleveland OH
  For Dr Aulisio's Web Page, Click Here
  
• Steven Sheinberg (1995)
  "Kant's Theory of Political Economy" Advisor: Michael Robins.
  General Counsel and Special Assistant to the National Director, Anti-Defamation League, New York City.
  For Dr. Sheinberg's web page, click here.
• Yujian Zheng (1995)
  "Motivation, Deliberation, and Rationality for Dynamic Choice" Advisor: Edward McClennen
  Associate Professor, Philosophy department, Lingnan University, Hong Kong. For Dr. Zheng's web page, click here.
  
• Tom May (1994)
  "Autonomy, Authority and Moral Responsibility" Advisor: R.G. Frey
  Floyd and Judy Rogers Endowed Professor, Elson S. Floyd College of Medicine, Washington State University.
• Lynn Walkiewicz (1994)
  "Antigone: A Genealogy of the Critical Idea of Phallocentrism" Advisor: Donald Callen
  Philosophy Department, University of Southern Maine, Augusta. For Dr. Walkiewicz's web page, click here.
  
• Kenneth Cust (1993)
  "A Just Minimum of Health Care" Advisor: Christopher Morris
  Associate Professor and Founding Director, Center for Applied & Professional Ethics, Central Missouri State University. For Dr. Cust's web page, click here.
• Barbara Daly (1993)
  "A Philosophical Approach to Resource Allocation in Health Care" Advisor: R. G. Frey
  Associate Professor in School of Nursing, Case Western Reserve University and School of Medicine, Center for Biomedical Ethics; Director of Clinical Ethics Service at University Hospitals; Chair of the Ethics Committee. For Dr. Daly's web page, click here.

For Graduates at the Masters Level click here.