EDUCATION

Learning how to ask better questions.

Every qualification taught me something different. The most valuable lesson from each was not the content alone, but a different way of asking questions.

01 · CURRENT

Master of Secondary Teaching

English and Philosophy & Reason · University of Newcastle

After years of university teaching and youth work, I wanted to understand pedagogy with the same seriousness I had brought to philosophy.

The degree has deepened my understanding of curriculum, assessment, literacy, classroom practice and the ethical responsibilities of teaching. It has also placed questions about AI, authorship and understanding inside the daily realities of education rather than treating them as abstract possibilities.

Pedagogy is not the simplification of knowledge. It is the design of conditions in which understanding can develop.

02 · RESEARCH

Master of Philosophy

Environmental Philosophy · The University of Queensland

My MPhil examined Val Plumwood’s environmental philosophy through relational ontology, naturalism and the philosophical consequences of how the world is described.

Philosophy of science provided the methodological grounding for building naturalism into the project. The thesis asked how metaphysical commitments shape ethical relationships with the more-than-human world, and that question continues to influence my teaching and current research direction.

Metaphysical descriptions are never ethically neutral.

Read thesis abstract →

03 · FOUNDATION

First Class Honours in Philosophy

Class IA · The University of Queensland

Honours was the point at which philosophy became more than the interpretation of existing arguments. It became something I could contribute to.

My two theses developed linked accounts of Val Plumwood’s environmental philosophy, relational ecology and the use of Spinozist metaphysics in environmental thought.

Research begins when a question becomes precise enough to resist an easy answer.

04 · BEGINNING

Bachelor of Arts

Extended Major in Philosophy · The University of Queensland

My undergraduate studies established the disciplinary foundations for everything that followed: metaphysics, ethics, logic, philosophy of science and the history of philosophical argument.

The degree gave me the conceptual range to see environmental philosophy not as a niche concern, but as a site where metaphysics, science and ethics meet.

A broad philosophical education made later specialisation possible.

Where this education is leading

My current work brings together philosophy, pedagogy and artificial intelligence. Rather than treating them as separate fields, I am interested in how philosophical questions about understanding, judgement and explanation become increasingly important as AI changes the conditions under which people learn.