Below are the courses I’ve taught or am teaching. If you’re a student, please refer to the course website as the syllabi below may not be up to date.

Courses taught at the University of Notre Dame (2025-26)

Fall 2025: Introduction to Ethics and Politics (syllabus)

Course description: What makes a life worth living? And what do we owe to each other along the way? In this course, we’ll explore these big questions through a mix of classic and modern texts in ethics and political philosophy. We’ll begin with some big-picture questions: Is morality just a matter of opinion? Does it depend on God? And why should we be moral at all? Next, we’ll look at real-life moral dilemmas—like how to weigh lives in crisis situations, whether we have a duty to help strangers, and how to think about abortion and the treatment of animals. Then, we'll turn to exploring what makes a good life. We’ll talk about emotions like gratitude, anger, and love, and how relationships with friends, family, and fellow citizens shape who we are. We’ll also think about our responsibilities in public life: Do we have to obey the law? What does it mean to be a ‘decent’ member of society? Should we have faith in our fellow citizens, even in fraught times? Finally, we’ll tackle questions about death and meaning: Is dying bad? Would it be better to live forever? And what, if anything, gives our lives meaning?

Spring 2026: The Philosophy of Love (syllabus forthcoming)

Course description: This course is an exploration of the nature of love and its place in a good life. We'll start by asking what love is: is it a union (or at least a desire for union) with another, or a special kind of concern for another, or a way of seeing another's value? We'll then turn to a central debate about what justifies loving someone: is love justified by a person’s qualities, by the shared history of a relationship, by the value of persons themselves, or is love ultimately beyond such justification? Then, we'll turn to love's ethical significance. We'll consider whether love for particular others is in tension with the ethical ideals of fairness and impartiality, as well as the possibility of love being at the centre of all ethics. We'll explore a few different kinds of love (romantic, familial, and friendship), reflect on ways love can sometimes go wrong, and ask whether love is essential to living a meaningful life.