Currently, I am working on issues at the intersection between the metaphilosophical debate around conceptual engineering and the descriptive and normative debates around harmful speech, especially hate speech and slurs. I am particularly interested in the questions of how exactly we should understand the term ‘hate speech’ and of whether or not reclamation or re-appropriation is plausibly viewed as a form of conceptual engineering.

Besides my academic activities, I am an active member of the think tank Forum für Streitkultur.

Areas of Specialization

• Philosophy of Language, esp. vagueness and context-sensitivity, the semantics-pragmatics divide, non-ideal speech (hate speech, slurs, generics).

• Metaphilosophy, esp. conceptual engineering & conceptual analysis, Ordinary Language Philosophy.

Areas of Competence (Teaching)

• Philosophy of Mind & Epistemology, esp. mind-body problem, skepticism.

• Logic, both classical and non-classical.

Selected Publications

• How to Swim in Sinking Sands: The Sorites Paradox and the Nature and Logic of Vague Language; Paderborn: mentis, forthcoming.

• „Contextualism and the Sorites Paradox“ (with Diana Raffman), in Oms, Sergi & Zardini, Elia (eds), The Sorites Paradox, Cambridge University Press, 2019, 63–77.

Talks (Recent & Upcoming)

• „Pornography without Dehumanization“, 2020 Joint Session of the Aristotelian Society and the Mind Association, July 10–12, 2020, University of Kent

• „Pornography without Dehumanization“, Society for Applied Philosophy Annual Conference, July 3–5, 2020, University of Edinburgh

• „Das wird man ja wohl noch sagen dürfen? Hate Speech und Meinungsfreiheit“, Collegium Gissenum, June 23, 2020, Justus-Liebig-Universität Giessen

• „Ein Sandkorn macht noch keinen Haufen? Paradoxien der Vagheit“, Ringvorlesung Paradoxien, January 13, 2020, Carl-von-Ossietzky-Universität Oldenburg (invited)

• Conference on „Philosophical Method(s)?“, December 5 & 6, 2019, Zagreb [Title omitted to ensure anonymity of blind review]

• „Engineering ‘Hate Speech’“, Tagung für Praktische Philosophie, September 26 & 27, 2019, Salzburg

• „Engineering ‘Hate Speech’“, Society for Applied Philosophy Annual Conference, June 28–30, 2019, Cardiff University

• „Engineering ‘Hate Speech’“, 11th LOGOS Workshop on Issues in Conceptual Ethics and Conceptual Engineering, May 30–31, 2019, Barcelona

• Workshop with Avner Baz, December 10, 2018, Zürich [Title omitted to ensure anonymity of blind review]

Short CV

www.ibones.de

www.forum-streitkultur.de