Our people

Dr Nevin Climenhaga

Senior Research Fellow

Areas of expertise: epistemology; philosophy of science; philosophy of religion; metaphysics; ethics

ORCID ID: 0000-0002-7376-8788

Phone: +613 9230 8391

Email: Nevin.Climenhaga@acu.edu.au

Location: ACU Melbourne Campus

Before joining ACU, I was a postdoc at the University of Notre Dame, where I worked as the Managing Editor for Studies in History and Philosophy of Science. I received my Ph.D. in 2017 from the Philosophy Department at Notre Dame, with a graduate minor in History and Philosophy of Science. Prior to that, I received an M.A. in Philosophy from Western Michigan University and a B.A. in Humanities and Peace & Conflict Studies from Messiah College.

My research interests include epistemology, philosophy of science, philosophy of religion, metaphysics, and ethics. I have published papers on Bayesian confirmation theory, inference to the best explanation, causal inference, the use of intuitions in philosophy, and the problem of evil.

I am currently working on two main research programs. The first defends infallibilism about knowledge, according to which we know all and only those propositions that are certain for us. I see knowledge, so understood, as playing a foundational role in determining the rationality of belief, in that we ought to be confident in a proposition to the extent that it is made probable by what we know. My second research program examines the nature of this probabilistic support relation, and how we can determine the values of probabilities.

Select publications

• ‘Causal Inference from Noise’(co-authored with Lane DesAutels and Grant Ramsey). Forthcoming in Noûs: 1-19.
• ‘Infinite Value and the Best of All Possible Worlds’, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 97 no. 2 (2018): 367-392.
• ‘Intuitions Are Used as Evidence in Philosophy’, Mind 127 no.1 (2018): 69-104.
• ‘Inference to the Best Explanation Made Incoherent’, Journal of Philosophy 114 no. 5 (2017): 251-273.
• ‘How Explanation Guides Confirmation’, Philosophy of Science 84 no. 2 (2017): 359-368.
• ‘A Problem for the Alternative Difference Measure of Confirmation’, Philosophical Studies 164 no. 3 (2013): 643-651.

Accolades and awards

• "Intuitions are Used as Evidence in Philosophy" one of three Mind articles named in Oxford University Press' 2018 "Best of Philosophy" collection.

Public engagement

• ‘The concept of probability is not as simple as you think’, Aeon ideas
• ‘Is it right to use intuition as evidence?’, OUPblog

Appointments and affiliations

• Research Fellow (Level B), Dianoia Institute of Philosophy, Faculty of Theology and Philosophy, Australian Catholic University (since April 2019)
• Research Fellow (Level B), Institute for Religion and Critical Inquiry, Faculty of Theology and Philosophy, Australian Catholic University (July 2018-April 2019)
• Postdoc, Managing Editor for Studies in History and Philosophy of Science: University of Notre Dame (July 2017-June 2018)

Editorial roles

• Managing Editor for Studies in History and Philosophy of Science (2017-2018)
• Reviewer for Analysis (2019), Australasian Journal of Philosophy (2017-2018), British Journal for Philosophy of Science (2016-2019), Dialectica (2018), Ergo (2019), Erkenntnis (2017-2018), European Journal for Philosophy of Religion (2017), Faith & Philosophy (2018), Grazer Philosophische Studien (2018), Journal of Applied Philosophy (2018), Journal of Philosophy (2018), Noûs (2019), Pacific Philosophical Quarterly (2018), Philosophy of Science (2015, 2017, 2019), Philosophical Studies (2018), Religious Studies (2018), Review of Philosophy and Psychology (2017-2018), Sophia (2017-2018), Studies in History and Philosophy of Science (2013-2015).

Research video