My research mostly lies within normative and practical ethics, though I'm also interested metaphysics. I am generally interested in the ethics of helping and harming, with particular interest in issues surrounding aggregation, distributive justice, and risk. I am keen to explore the practical applications of ethical theory to public policy, especially health policy and AI.
My doctoral research, funded by the Open-Oxford-Cambridge AHRC Doctoral Training Partnership, focused on the moral reasons we have to do less than best, and how these might map onto practical debates, including longtermism and, more generally, our obligations to help future people. My thesis - Doing Less Than Best - can be found here. You can hear me talk about my research here and here.
Below you can find an overview of some of my more developed work.
Articles
1. (2025). Longtermism and Aggregation, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, doi: 10.1111/phpr.70007
2. (2024). "Impairing the Impairment Argument", Journal of Medical Ethics, with Kyle van Oosterum
3. (2022). "Must We Vaccinate the Most Vulnerable? Efficiency, Priority, and Equality in the Distribution of Vaccines", Journal of Applied Philosophy, with Stephen John
Blog post: Why should we protect the vulnerable?
4. (2021). "Costa, Cancer, and Coronavirus: contractualism as a guide to the ethics of lockdown", Journal of Medical Ethics, with Stephen John
Blog post: Coffee or COVID?
Chapters
5. (in preparation) "Conservatism, Partiality, and Extending Lives Carl Tollef Solberg, Borgar Jølstad, and Peder Skjelbred (eds.), Between Life and Death: Essays on the Badness of Death and Population Ethics, Oxford University Press
6. (2025) "Longtermism and the Complaints of Future People", in Jacob Barrett, Hilary Greaves, and David Thorstad (eds.), Essays on Longtermism, Oxford University Press
Reports
7. (2024). "A Simple Tool for Disincentivising the Worst Pandemic Bioweapons", in Nathan A. Paxton (ed.), Disincentivising Bioweapons: Theory and Policy Approach, Nuclear Threat Initiative
Under Review
8. A paper on fairness and helping the future (draft).
9. A paper on the moral grounds of an aversion to dooming.
In Preparation
10. A paper on the wrong of deepfakes (with Kyle van Oosterum).
11. A paper on supererogation and conditional obligations.
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12. A problem for ex-ante anti-aggregative moral theories.
13. A paper on offsetting risks and the separateness of persons.