What are you going to work with at IFIKK?
I’m a postdoctoral research fellow in Modeling Happiness, a research project that seeks to integrate (ancient) philosophical and (modern) psychological ideas about human happiness and the good life. In my research, I’ll mainly be concerned with Platonic ethics. More specifically, I aim to shed light on the puzzling Platonic proposal that our pleasures can be false, unreal, or deceptive. This idea has often been dismissed as silly and not worth taking seriously, but I hope to show that it is more subtle, more cogent, and more interesting than typically thought. More than that, it strikes me that this insight is of contemporary relevance—not just to the way psychologists and philosophers (should) think about well-being, but also to the way in which we (should) live our lives. In my project, I hope to do three things: (1) supply a comprehensive overview of the different ways in which Plato believes our pleasures can go wrong, (2) offer a careful and charitable analysis of these types of hedonic error and their underlying mechanics, (3) shed some light on the connection between the possibility of hedonic error and the human good. In addition, I have a couple of papers in the pipeline about cognitivist theories of emotion and their therapeutic application, Plato’s proto-Aristotelian formal criteria for what counts as a good life, Aristotle on how we should understand contemplation and why it counts as the highest good, Plato’s tyrant (as depicted in Gorgias and Republic 8 and 9) and his addictive psychological tendencies, and psychological integration as an ethical ideal (found in thinkers as different as Plato, Aristotle, Freud, and Schwartz’s Internal Family Systems—a popular and effective recent therapeutic modality).
Can you tell us a bit about your research interests?
With a background in classics, philosophy, and psychology, I see myself as a historian of philosophy who is mainly interested in ancient ethics and ancient moral psychology—with a specific focus on Plato. My interests are not antiquarian, though: I primarily care about what the ancient sources have to offer in terms of contemporary relevance (e.g. for virtue ethics and how we thing about what makes for a life worth living). Additionally, I am passionate about existentialism (especially the existentialist psychotherapy of people like Viktor Frankl and Irvin Yalom), psychedelic science and psychedelic therapy, and the philosophy of psychology.
What do you like to do in your spare time?
I love people, cats, Iris Murdoch novels, Beethoven’s late string quartets, Schönberg’s Verklärte Nacht, and Bach’s Goldberg Variations, dancing or listening to (very minimal) electronic music (Ion Ludwig), playing the piano, meditation (especially relational mindfulness), yoga, cold water plunges, sauna’s, running, cycling, swimming, bouldering, climbing, long (preferably multi-day) hikes, art (Munch and van Gogh), cinema (Terence Malick, Gaspar Noë, David Lynch). In addition to my academic work, I devote a large chunk of my time to try and help people live better, more examined lives. I am currently doing a four-year training in mindfulness-based, body-oriented psychotherapy at the European Hakomi Institute, I organize retreats, and I regularly give workshops or talks where I share my passion for philosophizing with non-academics.