Chancellor’s Professor · UC Irvine · Logic & Philosophy of Science
Physicist, mathematician, and philosopher.
My work concerns the mathematical and conceptual foundations of classical and quantum field theories — with side interests in the foundations of statistics, the history of physics, and models of financial markets.
Research
Current projects and research programs.
Geometrical Foundations of Classical Field Theories
How the geometric structure of spacetime underwrites classical field physics — from Newtonian gravitation to gauge theory.
The Social Dynamics of False Belief
Network models of how social structure shapes the spread of belief, with Cailin O’Connor.
Philosophy of Cosmology
What makes cosmology a science: confirmation, model-building, and the limits of observation.
John von Neumann
A scientific biography of the 20th century’s most consequential mathematician.
Books
Recent publications
- “On (Some) Gauge Theories of Gravity.” Forthcoming in Philosophy of Science. Preprint.
- “We Were Never Sophisticated,” with C. Bradley. Forthcoming in Philosophy of Physics. Preprint.
- “Deterministic Theories,” with H. Halvorson and JB Manchak. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research.
- “Correctness, Artificial Intelligence, and the Epistemic Value of Mathematical Proof,” with J. Wolfson. Journal for the Philosophy of Mathematics.
- “Natural Theories,” with E. March. Forthcoming in The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science. Preprint.
- “Spacetime Models for Cosmology.” Forthcoming in LMPST: Science and Values in an Uncertain World.
SoCal Philosophy of Physics
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Next meeting
2026-2027
Upcoming talks 7 November 2026 Sebastian de Haro (Amsterdam), “Dualities and the Geometric View of Theories“ In the recent literature on the semantic conception, it has been argued that a bare collection of models subject to kinematical or dynamical conditions is not…