Sean Aas
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Name:
Sean Aas
Entered Brown:
Fall 2006
Previous Education:
B.A./B.S. (concentrations in philosophy, political economy, physics, and mathematics), Evergreen State College, 2003; M.A., philosophy, Georgia State University, 2006
Hometown:
Maple Valley, WA
Email:
Sean_Aas@brown.edu
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Philosophical Interests:
Are cheap, I suppose: I'm interested in too many things to easily list.
But most of my work seems to be in political philosophy and (for lack of a better word) 'meta-normativity'.
In political philosophy, I've been thinking and writing about the nature of the concept/property of social justice and its relation to local (/sub-state) and global (/supra-state) justice; the relation of justice to other values; Rawls on justice, legitimacy, and the nature of political philosophy; and Hannah Arendt on action, justice, and the nature and purpose of politics. Though most of my work is squarely in the Rawlsian/liberal tradition, I'm also fascinated by the radical left; including radical feminism and political anarchism, about which I know little but would like to know much more.
In 'meta-normativity', I've been working on: 'buck-passing' accounts of normative concepts (including, I've been arguing lately, *modal* concepts quite generally); the nature of substantive moral theories; the distinction between realist and irrealist meta-normative views (particularly as it relates to the normativity of the mental); and the concept of a normative reason. And, though it would be a little presumptuous to say that I'm 'working' on it, at present- 'tentatively speculating' would be more accurate- I'd really like to know (a) which kind of thing are fundamentally normative (properties/concepts/both?) and; (b) what it is for things of that kind to be normative.
Other Interests:
Few I'd care to admit to. Lower Pleasures; Narcissism; Liberal Guilt. Alienation. The Spectacle. Angst.
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