My name is Henry Schiller.
I’m a Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellow at the University of Sheffield.
h.i.schiller (at) sheffield (dot) ac (dot) uk
Curriculum Vitae
About me
I’m an analytic philosopher. My work explores how creatures like us can use linguistic tools to change one another's minds. Some questions I address in my research:
- To what extent is linguistic communication a rational, cooperative activity?
- How do we change through learning, and what does this tell us about human difference (and authenticity)?
- How do we represent our mental states – to ourselves and to others – and what is the function of doing so?
- How do our innate and default cognitive capacities shape normative social systems (like scientific inquiry)?
My work is at the intersection of philosophy of language, social philosophy, and cognitive science.
I completed my PhD at the University of Texas at Austin under the supervision of Josh Dever and Mark Sainsbury. In May of 2022 I took up a 3-year Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship at the University of Sheffield. Outside of philosophy, I have been involved in various music projects in New York City and Austin, Texas.
Published Writing
︎Directing Thought - Ergo (forthcoming)
︎Genericity and Inductive Inference - Philosophy of Science (2023)
︎What’s your opinion? Negation and ‘Weak’ Attitude Verbs - Phil. Quarterly (2023)
︎Meaning and Responsibility w/ Ray Buchanan - Mind & Language (2023)
︎Pragmatic Particularism w/ Ray Buchanan - PPR (2022)
︎A Hole in the Box and a Pain in the Mouth w/ Laurenz Casser - Phil. Quarterly (2021)
︎This Paper Might Change Your Mind w/ Josh Dever - Noûs (2021)
︎Illocutionary Harm - Philosophical Studies (2021)
︎Acts of Desire - Inquiry (2021)
︎Is that a threat? - Erkenntnis (2021)
︎Phenomenal Dispositions - Synthese (2020)
︎The Nyaya Argument for Disjunctivism - History of Philosophy Quarterly (2019)
Work in Progress
revise and resubmit
︎A paper about what we learn from imperatives
︎A paper about domain restriction and cognitive defaults w/ Katherine Ritchie
under review [email for drafts]
︎A paper about how imperatives motivate w/ Shaun Nichols
︎A paper about practical questions and planning w/ Dan Harris
︎Two papers about the attitude of relief w/ Casey O’Callaghan
in progress [email to confirm existence of drafts]
︎A paper about rational learning and discourse structure
︎A paper about rational learning and desire satisfaction
︎A paper about rational learning and Jeffrey conditionalization w/ Josh Dever
︎A paper about domain restriction and discourse structure
︎A paper about domain restriction and rule learning w/ Shaun Nichols
︎A paper about what desires it’s rational to have w/ Daniel Drucker
︎A paper about norms of attention in relationships w/ Margherita Harris
︎A book review of The Politics of Language by David Beaver & Jason Stanley
Recent and Upcoming Talks (2024)
6/2024: “The Functions of Folk Psychology”, Genre and Conversation Workshop
4/2024: “Default Domain Restriction Possibilities”, Dublin Language Workshop
3/2024: “Explaining Abilities”, Ability: Language and Action, Berlin
2/2024: “Wanting Brought to an End”, Washington University in St. Louis
Recent Activities
- Nico Kirk-Giannini (Rutgers) and I will be teaching a seminar on speech acts in dynamic pragmatics at ESSLLI this summer.
- My paper “Wanting Brought to an End” is one of the co-winners of the Twelfth Annual Essay Prize at the Centre for Philosophical Psychology (Bence Nanay's research group).