The Department actively assists its graduates in their search for either employment or further education. Doing so is a priority for the faculty, and we are proud of our placement record.
Job Prospects for Philosophy Professors
GSU Philosophy MAs Who Are Now Faculty
Careers That Do Not Require the PhD
The Department has collected data on everyone who has received the M.A. since 1995. Here we present the data back to 1999. The older data is available on request.
| Year | MA Thesis Title | Applied to Ph.D. Programs? | Comments (all Ph.D. program admissions are with funding unless otherwise noted) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2013 | Libertarian Paternalism and the Authority of the Autonomous Person | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolling at University of California San Diego. Also accepted into University of Colorado, University of California Davis, University of Maryland, University of Minnesota, and Syracuse (waitlisted for funding) |
| 2013 | Can the content of conscious visual experience represent natural-kind properties? | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolling at University of Virginia (awarded Jefferson Fellowship). Also accepted into University of Arizona, University of California San Diego, Wisconsin, and Washington University at St. Louis PNP program |
| 2013 | Kant's Humanity Formula in the Groundwork | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolling at Cornell. Also accepted into University of Illinois at Chicago |
| 2013 | Can Adam Smith Answer the Normative Question? | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolling at University of California Riverside. Also accepted into University of California Santa Cruz |
| 2013 | The Thought Experiments are Rigged: Mechanistic Understanding Impedes Mentalistic Understanding | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolling at University of California San Diego. Also accepted into University of Connecticut |
| 2013 | Adam Smith: A Relational Egalitarian Interpretation | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolling at University of California San Diego. Also accepted into Georgetown, University of Pennsylvania, Indiana University and Tulane |
| 2013 | Causal Compatibilism: A Non-Reductive Physicalist Solution to the Exclusion Problem | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolling at University of Pittsburgh HPS program. Also accepted into University of California San Diego, Washington University at St. Louis PNP program, University of Connecticut, and University of Massachusetts (waitlisted for funding) |
| 2013 | Kant and the Priority of Self-Knowledge | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolling at University of California San Diego |
| 2013 | Willpower and Ego-Depletion: Philosophical Implications | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolling at Florida State |
| 2013 | Global Distributive Justice and the State | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolling at University of California Irvine. Also accepted into University of California Davis, University of Washington and University of Minnesota |
| 2013 | Political Liberalism without Truth | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolling at University of Pennsylvania. Also accepted into University of Missouri and Georgetown (waitlisted for funding) |
| 2013 | Resolving Conflicts within The Mind: Internal Warfare In Non-Human Primates | No | Working as a clinical psychology intern in Washington D.C. |
| 2013 | The Practical Impossibility of Cohen’s Rescuing Justice & Equality | No | Account Manager at Atlanta computer printer equipment company and musician |
| 2013 | Extending Tomas Kulka’s Aesthetic Dualism: Value, Not Meaning, in the Case of Absolute Music | No | |
| 2013 | Betrayal of Love and Volitional Necessity | No | |
| 2013 | Smith on Self-Command and Moral Judgment | No | |
| 2013 | Stoic Moral Psychology: The Implications of Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex Damage | No | |
| Year | MA Thesis Title | Applied to Ph.D. Programs? | Comments (all Ph.D. program admissions are with funding unless otherwise noted) |
| 2012 | Against the Linguistic Analogy of Moral Cognition | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of California San Diego. Also accepted into University of California Santa Cruz |
| 2012 | The Expanded Cluster Account of Art | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at McGill |
| 2012 | The Failure of Desire: A Critique of Kantian Cognitive Autonomy in Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of California Riverside. Also accepted into Memphis |
| 2012 | On the Pernicious Influence of the Ideal/Non-Ideal Distinction in Political Philosophy | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of Wisconsin Madison. Also accepted into University of California San Diego, Washington University at St. Louis, Syracuse University, and University of Nebraska |
| 2012 | The Abstract/Concrete Paradox in Moral Psychology | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Washington University at St. Louis PNP program (accepted prior to enrolling at GSU and deferred admission) |
| 2012 | Why Not Penal Torture? | Yes (philosophy) | Accepted into University of Virginia, Rice University and University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign |
| 2012 | Patient-Relativity and the Efficacy of Epicurean Therapy | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of California Santa Barbara. Also accepted into University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Purdue |
| 2012 | Content and Contrastive Self-Knowledge | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of Massachusetts, Amherst |
| 2012 | Multiple realizability, universality, and dynamical kinds | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolling at University of Wisconsin Madison (deferred admission) |
| 2012 | Hume on the Nature of Moral Freedom | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Boston University |
| 2012 | Physics and Faith in Kant's First Critique | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at St. Louis University. Also accepted into Purdue and Tulane |
| 2012 | In Defense of Valence: How to Solve Hume's Puzzle About Emotions | Yes (psychology) | Enrolled at New York University. Also accepted into University of California San Diego and University of Denver |
| 2012 | A Test of Prinz's AIR Theory: Is Attention Sufficient for Conscious Emotion? | Yes (psychology) | Enrolled at Emory (received Woodruff Fellowship). Also accepted into University of California San Diego, University of Georgia and University of Kansas |
| 2012 | Hegel's Critique of Ancient Skepticism | Yes (communication) | Enrolled at Georgia State (Rhetoric and Politics program) |
| 2012 | Utility, Character, and Mill's Argument for Representative Government | No | Senior Implementation Consultant for an insurance software company |
| 2012 | How Music Makes Us Feel | No | Enrolled at Brierley Price Prior (BPP) Law School (in London) and has been awarded full funding by Travers Smith LLP (a law firm). |
| 2012 | Moral Responsibility 'Expressivism,' Luck, and Revision. | No | Instructor of interns at Washington D.C. think tank |
| 2012 | International Luck Egalitarianism | No | |
| 2012 | Against Collective Consequentialism | No | |
| 2012 | A Problem Of Access: Autism, Other Minds, And Interpersonal Relations | No | |
| Year | MA Thesis Title | Applied to Ph.D. Programs? | Comments (all Ph.D. program admissions are with funding unless otherwise noted) |
| 2011 | Autonomy, de facto and de jure | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Stanford. Also accepted into Brown, University of California-Riverside, Georgetown, Boston University, Johns Hopkins, and Utah |
| 2011 | Rescuing Hart and Inclusive Legal Positivism from the Charge of Inconsistency | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Maryland. Also accepted into McMaster |
| 2011 | Friends with Benefits: Other-regard in Epicurean Ethics | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. Also accepted into Purdue (no funding) |
| 2011 | Can the Contextualist Win the Free Will Debate? | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Wisconsin. Also accepted into Indiana, Oxford (BPhil, no funding) and Cincinnati |
| 2011 | Probabilistic Causation in Kane's Libertarian Free Will | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Cincinnati. Also accepted into York |
| 2011 | The Role of Poetry and Language in Hegel's Philosophy of Art | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Guelph. Also accepted into Purdue (joint program in philosophy and literature, no funding) |
| 2011 | Nietzsche on Copernicus | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of South Florida. Previously taught philosophy at Spelman and Georgia Perimeter College. |
| 2011 | The Promise and Limits of Natural Normativity in a Neo-Aristotelian Virtue Ethics | Yes (philosophy) | Accepted into Memphis. Enrolled at Georgetown Law School and teaching philosophy part-time at Marymount University and Northern Virginia Community College |
| 2011 | Normative Judgments, 'Deep Self' Judgments, and Intentional Action | Yes (psychology) | Enrolled at Emory |
| 2011 | Non-Cooperative Communication and the Origins of Human Language | Yes (cognitive psychology) | Enrolled at Delaware |
| 2011 | Bayle’s Theory of Toleration | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at NYU Law (partial scholarship). Also accepted into law school at Cardozo, Colorado, Georgetown, and Texas at Austin |
| 2011 | Providing Assurance on Scanlon's Account of Promises | Yes (philosophy) | Entered into Teach for America program in Denver, Colorado |
| 2011 | Rethinking Legal Retribution | No | Enrolled at University of Virginia Law |
| 2011 | Dignified Animals: How "Non-Kantian" is Nussbaum's Conception of Dignity? | No | Enrolled at John Marshall Law School (full scholarship). Also accepted into Loyola Chicago, Chicago-Kent, William Mitchell (half scholarship), and University of St. Thomas (Dean's Scholarship). |
| 2011 | A Defense of Moral Error Theory | No | Enrolled at Masters programs in Counseling Psychology at University of Denver. Also accepted into Counseling Psychology programs at University of Minnesota, Seattle Pacific University, Seattle University and Adler School. |
| 2011 | The Many Faces of Besire Theory | No | Monk at Saint Meinrad Archabbey |
| 2011 | Rational Requirements for Moral Motivation: The Psychopath's Open Question | No | Teaching mathematics and philosophy at the Royal University of Phnom Penh |
| 2011 | Secular Foundations of Liberal Multiculturalism | No | Lecturer of Philosophy, UN Alliance of Civilizations Institute, Fatih Sultan Mehmet University in Istanbul, Turkey |
| 2011 | Nietzsche's Causally Efficacious Account of Consciousness | No | Project Manager/Implementation Consultant for a healthcare software company in Madison, WI |
| 2011 | But What Kind of Badness? An Inquiry into the Ethical Significance of Pain | No | Teaching philosophy at Oxford College of Emory University |
| 2011 | Consciousness, Self Control and Free Will in Nietzsche | No | Currently a tenure-track faculty member in the Department of English and Philosophy at Northland Pioneer College |
| 2011 | Considering a Human Right to Democracy | No | |
| 2011 | The Fundamental Naturalistic Impulse: Extending the Reach of Methodological Naturalism | No | |
| Year | MA Thesis Title | Applied to Ph.D. Programs? | Comments (all Ph.D. program admissions are with funding unless otherwise noted) |
| 2010 | Mindreading, Language and Simulation | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at City University of New York. Also accepted into University of Pittsburgh (HPS), University of California-San Diego, Indiana University (HPS/CogSci), Washington University at St. Louis (PNP), University of British Columbia, University of Maryland, and University of Pennsylvania |
| 2010 | Can Bayesianism and Inference to the Best Explanation Be Friends? | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Columbia. Also accepted into Brown and University of California - Irvine (LPS) |
| 2010 | Decisions as Performatives | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of California-Berkeley. Also accepted into Brown, UC-San Diego, Cornell, Washington University at St. Louis (PNP), and City University of New York |
| 2010 | The Justificatory Role of Habit in Hegel's Theory of Ethical Life | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Georgetown. Also accepted into University of Illinois - Chicago |
| 2010 | Foucauldian Genealogy as Situated Critique, or Why is Sexuality so Dangerous? | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Boston University |
| 2010 | Literature and the Moral Imagination: Smithean Sympathy and the Construction of Imagined Experience through Readership | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Monash University |
| 2010 | Can Consciousness Be Taken Seriously When it Comes to Personal Identity? | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of Virginia |
| 2010 | Marx, Economic Sustainability, and Ideal Capital | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at SUNY-Binghamton |
| 2010 | Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: Seeking Natural Kinds in a Controversial Diagnosis | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at UC-Hastings Law. Also accepted into Emory Law, UC-Davis Law, and Santa Clara Law |
| 2010 | Autism, Social Comprehension, and Cognitive Impenetrability | Yes (cognitive psychology) | Enrolled at University of Georgia. Also accepted into University of Alabama and Georgia State University |
| 2010 | Moral Injury and the Puzzle of Immunity-Violation | No | Enrolled at NYU Law. Previously enrolled at Emory Law (with fellowship). Also accepted into Northwestern Law, Fordham Law, and George Washington University Law. |
| 2010 | Dworkian Liberalism and Gay Rights: A Defense of Same-Sex Relations | No | Enrolled at NYU Law. Also accepted into law school at Georgetown, University of Virginia, and University of Michigan. Previously worked for U.S. Department of Justice. |
| 2010 | Pogge's Institutional Cosmopolitanism | No | Enrolled in Master of Public Affairs program at Indiana University - Bloomington |
| 2010 | Special Problems for Democratic Government in Leveraging Cognitive Bias: Ethical, Political, and Policy Considerations for Implementing Libertarian Paternalism | No | |
| 2010 | Kant's Use of Transcendental Arguments | No | |
| 2010 | Subjectivity and Fallibility in the Instrumental and Epistemic Defenses of a "Right to Do Wrong" | No | |
| Year | MA Thesis Title | Applied to Ph.D. Programs? | Comments (all Ph.D. program admissions are with funding unless otherwise noted) |
| 2009 | Motivating Emotional Content | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of California-San Diego. Also accepted into Brown University, University of Maryland, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Ohio State, University of British Columbia, University of Miami, and University of Alberta |
| 2009 | Raz and His Critics: Defending Razian Authority | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of Virginia. Also accepted into University of Minnesota, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, and University of Missouri |
| 2009 | Teleosemantics, Externalism, and the Content of Theoretical Concepts | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of California-San Diego. Also accepted into University of Maryland and University of British Columbia |
| 2009 | The Ethical Significance of Plato's Afterlife Myths | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of Pennsylvania |
| 2009 | Kantian Conceptualism and Apperception | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Ohio State. Also accepted into University of Illinois-Chicago |
| 2009 | Personal Responsibility and Drug Addiction | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of Missouri |
| 2009 | Defending Noe's Enactive Theory of Perception | Yes (psychology) | Enrolled at University of Kansas. Also accepted into York University |
| 2009 | The Moral Reality of War: Defensive Force and Just War Theory | No | Philosophy Instructor, in the Department of English, USMA at West Point |
| 2009 | The Proper Metric of Justice in Justice as Fairness | No | Enrolled at GSU Law School |
| 2009 | An Incompatibility between Intentionalism and Multiple Authorship in Film | No | Enrolled at law school |
| 2009 | Epicurean Friendship: Are Friends Really Pleasurable? | No | Enrolled at high school teaching certification program |
| Year | MA Thesis Title | Applied to Ph.D. Programs? | Comments (all Ph.D. program admissions are with funding unless otherwise noted) |
| 2008 | Sextus was no Eudaimonist | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of Texas at Austin. Also accepted into University of Colorado at Boulder, Washington University at St. Louis, Northwestern, and Emory |
| 2008 | Retribution Requires Rehabilitation | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Rice. Also accepted into University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign |
| 2008 | The Concept "Woman": Feminism after the Essentialism Critique | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of Western Ontario. Also accepted into Utah. Currently Sophia Libman Professor in the Humanities at Hood College |
| 2008 | Freedom and Forfeiture: Responding to Galen Strawson's Basic Argument | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Florida State University |
| 2008 | Kim's Pairing Problem and the Viability of Substance Dualism | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at St. Louis University |
| 2008 | Freedom and the Ideal Republican State | Yes (philosophy) | Accepted into University of South Carolina and University of Kentucky |
| 2008 | The Non-Moral Basis of Cognitive Biases of Moral Intuitions | Yes (neuroscience) | Enrolled at University of Iowa |
| 2008 | Aristotelian Liberal Virtues | No | Residence Hall Director at Georgia Tech |
| 2008 | The Aesthetic Idea and the Unity of Cognitive Faculties in Kant's Aesthetics | No | Instructor of Philosophy at Clayton State |
| 2008 | Facing the Problems of Feminism: Working Toward Resolution | No | Teaching high school |
| 2008 | Is Core Affect a Natural Kind? | No | Taught at Georgia State as a Visiting Instructor. Enrolled in law school at Georgia State. |
| 2008 | Against Pyrrhonian Equipollence | No | |
| 2008 | Child Abuse, Racism and the State | No | |
| 2008 | A Description of the Natural Place of Magic in Philosophy and Religious Studies | No | |
| 2008 | A Comparative Study of the Ethics of Christine M. Korsgaard and Jean-Paul Sarte | No | |
| Year | MA Thesis Title | Applied to Ph.D. Programs? | Comments (all Ph.D. program admissions are with funding unless otherwise noted) |
| 2007 | Naturalism and Moral Realism | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Also accepted into Florida State, University of Wisconsin - Madison, and Bowling Green State University. Currrently Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Dickinson College |
| 2007 | Hard Compatibilism and the Varieties of Manipulation | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of California - Riverside; also accepted into Florida State and Rochester. Currently Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Houston |
| 2007 | Under Pressure from the Empirical Data: Does Externalism Rest on a Mistaken Psychological Theory? | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Johns Hopkins. Also accepted into University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Washington University at St. Louis (PNP), University of South Florida, and University of Western Ontario |
| 2007 | Eudaimonistic Agent-Relativity and Moore's Criticisms of Naturalism | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Bowling Green State University |
| 2007 | In Defense of Rawlsian Constructivism | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of Memphis |
| 2007 | Perspectives on Perspectivism: Nietzsche and His Commentators | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of Kentucky |
| 2007 | Neuroeconomics and the Rationality Debate | Yes (psychology with philosophy minor) | Enrolled at the University of Arizona |
| 2007 | Resting in the Court of Reason: Kant's Resolution to the Antinomy of Pure Reason | Yes (religion) | Enrolled at Emory. Also accepted into Boston University |
| 2007 | Father Knows Best: A Critique of Joel Feinberg's Soft Paternalism | No | Teaching high school |
| 2007 | Irony, Finitude and the Good Life: A Reading of Plato’s Symposium | No | |
| 2007 | Defending Lucretius’Symmetry Argument against the Fear of Death | No | Working in Human Resources for the IBM China Beijing Office |
| 2007 | Contextualist Responses to Skepticism | No | Project manager in Washington D.C. |
| 2007 | Nietzsche on Naturalism, Egoism, and Altruism | No | Enrolled in an MA in Counseling Psychology program and teaching philosophy part time |
| 2007 | Between Being and Nothingness: the Metaphysical Foundations Underlying Augustine’s Solution to the Problem of Evil | No | Working at Georgia State's library as the subject specialist and liaison for Philosophy, Religious Studies and Middle East Insititute |
| Year | MA Thesis Title | Applied to Ph.D. Programs? | Comments (all Ph.D. program admissions are with funding unless otherwise noted) |
| 2006 | Rawls' Cosmopolitan Law of Peoples? The Place of Persons in a Peoples' World | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Brown University. Also accepted to University of Pennsylvania. |
| 2006 | The Impossibility of Evil Qua Evil: Kantian Limitations on Human Immorality | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at the University of Illinois - Chicago. Also accepted into Emory and the University of Washington |
| 2006 | Liberalism and the Worst-Result Principle: Preventing Tyranny, Protecting Civil Liberty | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Boston University. Also accepted to Washington University at St. Louis. Currently Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Clemson University |
| 2006 | Wittgenstein and Religion | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Claremont Graduate University |
| 2006 | Marriage as Unconstitutional: How Not Allowing Homosexual Marriage Violates the First Amendment | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Vanderbilt |
| 2006 | Nietzsche on the Future and Value | Yes (philosophy) | Accepted to the University of South Florida and Marquette University, but declined offers |
| 2006 | A Defense of Moral Realism | Yes (health care ethics) | Enrolled at Saint Louis University |
| 2006 | A Defense of Soft Positivism: Justice and Principle Processes | No | Enrolled at George Washington University Law School to obtain a Master's of Law (LLM) in International and Comparative Law |
| 2006 | Bonjour's Positions on Justification: From Coherentism to Foundationalism | No | |
| 2006 | Rossian Moral Pluralism: A (Partial) Defense | No | Enrolled at Catholic University of America Law school |
| 2006 | The Female Voices of Islam | No | Working for a non-profit agency for human rights advocacy |
| 2006 | On the Stepehen Macedo and John Finnis Exchange: Natural Law, Liberalism, and Homosexuality | No | Teaching high school |
| Year | MA Thesis Title | Applied to Ph.D. Programs? | Comments (all Ph.D. program admissions are with funding unless otherwise noted) |
| 2005 | Ways to skin the zombie-cat: a look at the problems associated with Chalmers's zombie-argument | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of Washington |
| 2005 | A defense of the principle of alternative possibilities and a critique of Humean compatibilism | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at University of California, Riverside |
| 2005 | The role of self-interest in Aristotle's moral theory | Yes (philosophy) | Enrolled at Rice University. Currently Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Lone Star College |
| 2005 | Defining the human being: personhood as a first principle of human teleology in Wojtyla's Aristotelian-Thomistic anthropology | Yes (theology) | Enrolled at Ave Maria University |
| 2005 | Scepticism and contextualism | No | |
| 2005 | Teaching Creation Science in public schools: an examination of the creation/evolution controversy | No | Critical thinking instructor at Clayton State University |
| Year | MA Thesis Title | Applied to Ph.D. Programs? | Comments (all Ph.D. program admissions are with funding unless otherwise noted) |
| 2004 | The Deontological Conception of Justification | Yes | Enrolled at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst |
| 2004 | Anti-Reductionism and Reversibility in Merleau-Ponty's Rejection of Dualism | Yes | Applied to Ph.D. program in Shanghai, acceptance and matriculation status unknown |
| 2004 | Shadows of Things to Come: The Theological Implications of Intelligent Life on Other Worlds | Yes | Instructor in Philosophy at Georgia Perimeter College and enrolled in MA program (English) at Georgia State |
| 2004 | Reassessing Feinberg's View of Abortion | Yes | Accepted into the PhD program in Philosophy at Purdue University and the PhD in Religious and Theological Studies Joint Ph.D. Program at the University of Denver/Iliff School of Theology, but declined these offers to pursue law school |
| 2004 | The "Unfolding" of Everlasting Torment in Hell? Assessing the Role of Outside Influence and Interpretive Assumptions in the Formation of the Traditional and Annihilationist Christian Views of Hell | No | Enrolled in graduate degree in Library Sciences in the Alabama state university system. |
| 2004 | The Ideology of Freedom: An Immanent Critique of the Latent Theory of Human Nature in the Frankfurt School | No | Enrolled at Emory Law School |
| 2004 | Violent Benevolence: An Ethical Assessment of Humanitarian Military Intervention | No | Enrolled at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University in Boston for MA |
| 2004 | Willing the Overman: An Analysis of Friedrich Nietzsche's Will to Power, Eternal Recurrence, and Overman | No | |
| 2004 | "Who Does Karma For This Body?" Death and Dying in Hindu Communities in Metropolitan Atlanta | No | Working at departments of philosophy and religious studies |
| Year | MA Thesis Title | Applied to Ph.D. Programs? | Comments (all Ph.D. program admissions are with funding unless otherwise noted) |
| 2003 | Passionate Entanglements, Desire, Fear, and Perception of Coercive Power | Yes (Philosophy) | Enrolled at Emory University |
| 2003 | Goldman’s Reliabilist Theory of Epistemic Justification: Is It Viable? | Yes | Enrolled at St. Louis University |
| 2003 | Nothingness and the Possibility of Responsible Choice in Jean-Paul Sartre's Phenomenological Ontology | Yes (Philosophy) | Enrolled at Duquesne University |
| 2003 | A Wittgensteinian Resolution of the Debtor's Paradox | No | Has since taught as an instructor in Philosophy at Georgia State |
| 2003 | The Problem of Induction: A Critical Review of Recent Proposals | No | |
| 2003 | Evil and the Human Experience | No | Now teaches religion and philosophy courses at a community college in Florida |
| 2003 | Do I Know What I Know?: Knowledge in Moral and Scientific Epistemology | No | Has since taught as an instructor in Philosophy at Georgia State |
| 2003 | Bell’s Theorem and the Metaphysical Implications of Quantum Physics | No | |
| 2003 | Data Monitoring in Clinical Trials and the Ethics of Human Experimentation | No | |
| 2003 | On the Law of Peoples and Its Aims: Machiavelli Writ Large? | No | Enrolled at Georgia State Law School |
| 2003 | Authenticity as Idiosyncratic Interpretive Comportment | No | Currently enrolled in a program in advertising in Milan, Italy |
| Year | MA Thesis Title | Applied to Ph.D. Programs? | Comments (all Ph.D. program admissions are with funding unless otherwise noted) |
| 2002 | A Pragmatic Meta-Ethics for Environmental Ethics | Yes (Philosophy) | Enrolled at the University of Washington |
| 2002 | What is Good-Sense Pragmatism? | No | |
| 2002 | Environmental Aesthetics and the Protection of the Perceptual Resource | No | |
| 2002 | Tolstoy on Art | Yes (Philosophy) | Enrolled at Emory. Currently Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the State University of New York-Oneonta. |
| 2002 | A Moral Defense of Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research | Yes (Philosophy) | Accepted at University of Utah |
| 2002 | Genealogy and Rhetoric | No | |
| 2002 | Against Coincident Entities | Yes (Philosophy) | Enrolled at CUNY Graduate Center |
| Year | MA Thesis Title | Applied to Ph.D. Programs? | Comments (all Ph.D. program admissions are with funding unless otherwise noted) |
| 2001 | Emotion as Action and Transformation: A View of Emotion Through the Thought of Sartre and Gordon | No | |
| 2001 | The Question of Human Cloning: Are We Thinking It Through | No | |
| 2001 | Voluntariness with a Vengeance: Miranda and a Modern Alternative | No | |
| 2001 | The Ethics of Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research | Yes (History) | Enrolled at Georgia State University |
| 2001 | The Philosophy of Henry Suso: A Modern Appraisal | No | |
| 2001 | Pluralism, Religious Freedom, and Fringe Religions in a Liberal Society | Yes (Philosophy) | Enrolled at Washington University; also accepted at University of Virginia |
| 2001 | Reliability Theories of Justification and the Notion of Warrant | Yes (Philosophy) | Enrolled at UC-Santa Barbara. |
| Year | MA Thesis Title | Applied to Ph.D. Programs? | Comments (all Ph.D. program admissions are with funding unless otherwise noted) |
| 2000 | A Common Misunderstanding Regarding Criteria and Knowledge of the Sensations of Others in Wittgenstein's Philosophy | Yes (Architecture) | Studying architecture at New Jersey Institute of Technology (support status unknown) |
| 2000 | A Prolegomena to Information Ethics | No | |
| 2000 | The Ethical Analysis of Advanced Care Planning in Georgia | No | |
| 2000 | Degrees of Terrorism: An Applied Examination of Terrorism as a Mean to Political Ends | No | |
| 2000 | What Is Wrong With Indeterminate Identity? | Yes (Philosophy) | Enrolled at U Mass-Amherst |
| 2000 | Wittgenstein on Grammar and Essence | Yes (Philosophy) | Enrolled at University of Reading (in the UK) |
| 2000 | Nelson Goodman's Theory of Representation | No | |
| Year | MA Thesis Title | Applied to Ph.D. Programs? | Comments (all Ph.D. program admissions are with funding unless otherwise noted) |
| 1999 | The Intended Audience of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics | Yes (Philosophy) | Enrolled at University of Georgia |
| 1999 | A Critique of Chalmers' Theory of Naturalistic Dualism and the Objections Stemming From Epiphenomenalism | No | |
| 1999 | David Chalmers and the Hard Problem of Consciousness: Criticism from Type-B Materialism | No | |
| 1999 | Mental Physical Logical Supervenience: Ontological Definitions and Analysis of Concepts | No | |
| 1999 | Aristotle's Method: Fact or Belief | Yes (Philosophy) | Enrolled at University of Calfornia, Davis |
| 1999 | Non-Relativist Perspectives and Abortion Disagreements: Considering the Ideas of Bambrough and Stout | Yes (Philosophy) | Enrolled at University of Tennessee. Currently Lecturer of Philosophy Clayton State University. |
| 1999 | Without Prejudice: A Wittgensteinian Approach to Socrates' "What is F?" Question | Yes (Philosophy) | Attended Florida State University; currently a tenure-track faculty member at Dickinson College. |
| 1999 | Toward A Conception of Moral Agency Based on Unconditional Love, Compassion and Altruism | No |
A good number of GSU Philosophy MAs are now faculty. However, individuals applying to do graduate work in philosophy who hope to become professors of philosophy need to be aware that there are currently many more candidates for tenure-track philosophy positions than there are positions available. The American Philosophical Association reports that there are over twice as many candidates as jobs and that over half the jobs are not tenure-track. Those considering Ph.D. programs should ask the departments to which they apply detailed questions about their job-placement records. In particular, they should ask how many graduates received offers for tenure-track positions.
Dr. Katy Fulfer is the Sophia Libman Professor in the Humanities at Hood College.
Dr. Fulfer earned her MA in philosophy at Georgia State University in 2008. Her thesis, “The Concept ‘Woman’: Feminism after the Essentialism Critique,” was directed by Dr. Christie Hartley and Dr. A.I. Cohen. In her thesis, she constructs a concept of “woman” that focuses on how women are sexually subordinated to men. This conception is intended to meet challenges raised by the essentialism critique in feminist theory that women’s diverse experiences cannot be discussed in a unified way. Dr. Fulfer then went on to the PhD program at Western University (formerly University of Western Ontario) and specialized in feminist philosophy and applied ethics. Her dissertation, “Hannah Arendt and Feminist Agency,” was directed by Helen Fielding and Carolyn McLeod. In her dissertation, she draws on Hannah Arendt to articulate a conception of feminist agency, which is women’s agency that aims at resisting oppression. She also applies her conception of feminist agency to the practice of transnational contract pregnancy. Dr. Fulfer’s current research focuses on the intersections between Hannah Arendt’s philosophy and bioethics. She has published “The Capabilities Approach to Justice and the Flourishing of Nonsentient Life” (Ethics & the Environment, June 2013) and “The Capabilities Approach and the Dignity of Nonsentient Life” (in The Capability Approach on Social Order. Ed. B. Hawa and N. Weidtmann. Münster: LIT Verlag, 2012).
Mr. Bryan Russell is a tenure-track faculty member in the Department of English and Philosophy at Northland Pioneer College.
Mr. Russell earned his MA in philosophy at Georgia State University in 2011. His thesis, “Consciousness, Self-Control and Free Will in Nietzsche,” was directed by Dr. Jessica Berry. Northland Pioneer College primarily serves the native American populations in the Four-Corners area of the Southwest.
Dr. Justin Coates is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Houston.
Dr. Coates earned his MA in philosophy at Georgia State University in 2007. His thesis, “Manipulation and Hard Compatibilism,” was directed by Dr. Eddy Nahmias. In the thesis, he defended compatibilism (the thesis that moral responsibility and causal determinism are compatible) against the manipulation argument. Dr. Coates then went on to the PhD program in philosophy at the University of California, Riverside. His dissertation, “Reasons and Resentment,” was directed by John Martin Fischer. In the dissertation, he developed an instrumentalist theory of practical reasons. After defending his dissertation in June of 2012, Dr. Coates was appointed the Law and Philosophy Fellow at the University of Chicago Law School. Dr. Coates has published papers on free will, moral responsibility, blame, and love in journals such as Philosophical Studies, The Journal of Ethics, Philosophy Compass, and Philosophical Psychology. He is an editor (with Neal Tognazzini) of Blame: Its Nature and Norms (Oxford University Press, 2012).
Dr. James Sias is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Dickinson College.
Dr. Sias earned his MA in Philosophy at Georgia State University in 2007. His MA thesis, entitled "Naturalism and Moral Realism," was directed by Dr. Andrew Altman. In the thesis, Dr. Sias argues that ethical naturalists cannot construe the supervenience relation between the moral and the natural in a way that preserves both the objectivity of morality and the possibility of moral knowledge. Dr. Sias then entered the PhD program at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His dissertation, entitled "Emotion and Virtue in Moral Judgment," was directed by Robert Adams. In the dissertation, Dr. Sias argued that the epistemic status of moral intuitions is not threatened by emotion, as is typically assumed, as long as one's emotions are to a sufficient degree shaped by virtue. In addition to his work in metaethics and moral psychology, Dr. Sias has also published in the philosophy of language. His "Varieties of Expressivism," coauthored with Dorit Bar-On, is forthcoming in Philosophy Compass.
Dr. Candice Delmas is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Clemson University.
Dr. Delmas came to Georgia State University as part of the Sorbonne Exchange program and earned her MA in Philosophy at GSU in 2006. Her thesis, directed by Dr. Andrew Altman, was “Liberalism and the Worst-Results Principle: Preventing Tyranny, Protecting Civil Liberty.” In the thesis, Dr. Delmas brought together the ideas of Montesquieu, Judith Sklar, and Roberto Unger in order to argue for a liberal political principle that focuses on safeguarding basic freedoms and preventing civil strife. Dr. Delmas then entered the philosophy PhD program at Boston University, where her dissertation, “The Duty to Disobey,” was directed by David Lyons. She has published "Three Conceptions of Practical Authority," Jurisprudence 2 (1):143-160 (2011), coauthored with Daniel Star, and "State Legitimacy and Political Obligation in Justice for Hedgehogs: The Radical Potential of Dworkinian Dignity," Boston University Law Review 90 (2):737-758 (2010), coauthored with Susanne Sreedhar.
Dr. Anthony Carreras is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Lone Star College.
Dr. Carreras earned his MA in Philosophy at GSU in 2005. His thesis, directed by Dr. Tim O’Keefe, was “The Role of Self-Interest in Aristotle's Moral Theory.” In the thesis, Dr. Carreras argued that Aristotle endorses a defensible form of ethical egoism. Dr. Carreras then entered the philosophy PhD program at Rice University, where his dissertation, “Aristotle's Ideals of Friendship and Virtue” was directed by Donald Morrison. His “Aristotle on Other-Selfhood and Reciprocal Shaping” is forthcoming in History of Philosophy Quarterly.
Dr. Alessandra Stradella is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the State University of New York-Oneonta.
Dr. Stradella earned her MA in Philosophy at GSU in 2002. Dr. Stradella then entered the philosophy PhD program at Emory University.
Dr. Thomas Nadelhoffer is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the College of Charleston.
Dr. Nadelhoffer earned his MA in Philosophy at GSU in 1999. He then entered the philosophy PhD program at Florida State University. He was Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Dickinson College and has held fellowships at The University of California-Santa Barbara and Duke University. He is the author of more than 25 articles and book chapters.
Dr. Sanjay Lal is Lecturer of Philosophy Clayton State University.
Dr. Lal earned his MA in Philosophy at GSU in 1999. He then entered the philosophy PhD program at the University of Tennessee. He has published several articles on the thought of Gandhi.
Dr. Linda Martin Alcoff is Professor of Philosophy at Hunter College and the City University of New York Graduate Center.
Dr. Alcoff earned her BA in philosophy at Georgia State (with honors) in 1980. In 1983, she earned her MA in Philosophy at Georgia State. She then enter the philosophy PhD program at Brown University where she earned her PhD in 1987. She has had faculty appointments at institutions such as Syracuse University, The State University of New York-Stony Brook, and Aarhus University (Denmark). She has authored or edited more than ten books including Visible Identities: Race, Gender and the Self (Oxford 2006). She has written more than 80 articles and book chapters. She is currently President of the American Philosophical Association.
Many students who have received the M.A. in philosophy at Georgia State have elected not to pursue a Ph.D. These students have gone on to use their philosophical skills in a diverse set of careers such as community college instructors, high school teachers, ethics consultants, army officers, and artists. Many have gone to careers in different sorts of business settings.
Contact Dr. Tim O'Keefe, Director of Graduate Studies
philgrad (at) gsu (dot) edu
Department of Philosophy
Georgia State University
P.O. Box 4089
Atlanta, Georgia 30302-4089
Phone: (404) 413-6108