Self-Knowledge
I am interested in the issue of how we know what we are thinking. How do we have access to our own mental states? And what makes that access special? I have tried to offer an answer to these questions for the cases of belief and desire that draws on the so-called 'transparency' of belief. I defend the view that we attribute beliefs and desires to ourselves based on our grounds for those beliefs and desires. I have also developed three applications of this view to put forward a solution to Moore's paradox, an account of the thought-insertion delusion, and an explanation of self-deception. In the future, I am hoping to extend this model to account for our knowledge of our own actions. I am currently working on an account of our awareness of our mental states as being our own.
This research is being funded by the Australian Research Council as part of the Future Fellowship project "The ownership of minds".
Publications
BOOK
(2013) Transparent Minds: A Study of Self-Knowledge. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
EDITED VOLUME
(2009) (with Tim Bayne) Delusion and Self-Deception: Affective influences on belief formation . New York: Psychology Press.
BOOK CHAPTERS
[Forthcoming] "Delusion and self-deception", in E. Sullivan-Bissett (Ed.) Routledge Handbook of the Philosophy of Delusion. London: Routledge.
(2023) "Thought insertion and commitment", in T. McClelland and P. López Silva (Eds.) Intruders in the Mind: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Thought Insertion. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 273-292.
(2023) “The ownership of memories”, in M. García-Carpintero & M. Guillot (Eds.) Self-Experience. Essays on Inner Awareness. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
(2015) "Externalism, Self-Knowledge and Memory" in S. Goldberg (Ed.) Externalism and Skepticism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
(2009) "Introspection" in John Symons & Paco Calvo (eds.) Routledge Companion to the Philosophy of Psychology. London: Routledge.
(2009) (with Tim Bayne) "Delusion and Self-deception: Mapping the terrain" in T. Bayne and J. Fernandez (Eds.) Delusion and Self-Deception: Affective influences on belief formation . New York: Psychology Press.
JOURNAL ARTICLES
(2016) (with Suzanne Bliss) "Schizophrenia and the estranged self", in the Journal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice.
(2013) "Self-Deception and Self-Knowledge", in Philosophical Studies.
(2010) "Thought Insertion and Self-Knowledge", in Mind & Language.
(2007) "Desire and Self Knowledge", in the Australasian Journal of Philosophy.
(2005) "Self-knowledge, rationality and Moore's paradox", in Philosophy and Phenomenological Research.
(2005) "Privileged Access Revisited" in The Philosophical Quarterly.
(2004) "Externalism and Self-Knowledge: A puzzle in two dimensions" in The European Journal of Philosophy.
(2003) "Privileged access naturalized" in The Philosophical Quarterly.
BOOK REVIEWS
(2009) "Review of 'Describing Inner Experience?' by Eric Schwitzgebel and Russell Hurlburt", in Mind.
(2006) "Review of 'Speaking my Mind' by Dorit Bar-On", in The Philosophical Quarterly.