Faculty Research Interests

Jason Aleksander, Ph.D., (Vanderbilt University, 2007).
Professor Aleksander’s current research interests are in the history of philosophy from the late Middle Ages to the eighteenth century. At Vanderbilt, his dissertation, The Disavowal of Renaissance Philosophical Crises and the Geneses of Modern Philosophy and Science, focused on the significance of the mutual, interrelated origins of modern science and secular political theory in the crises of Renaissance philosophy. His immediate research concerns the philosophical background responsible for the eventual assimilation of the Copernican Revolution. In the long-term, he intends to develop his dissertation for publication. His article, “Modern Paradoxes of Aristotle’s Logic,” appeared in Epoché, vol. 9, no. 1 (Fall 2004): 79-99.

Brian Klug, Ph. D. (Committee on Social Thought, University of Chicago, 1992)
Dr. Klug was, until 2005, Associate Professor of Philosophy and is currently Fellow of the College of Arts and Sciences at Saint Xavier University. He is currently Senior Research Fellow & Tutor in Philosophy at St. Benet's Hall, Oxford (UK); member of the Faculty of Philosophy of the University of Oxford (UK); member of the Faculty of the Centre for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, Oxford (UK); and Honorary Fellow of the Parkes Institute for the Study of Jewish/non-Jewish Relations at the University of Southampton (UK). He is Associate Editor of the journal Patterns of Prejudice (Routledge). Dr. Klug is co-editor (with Dr. Francis Dunlop) of Ethics, Value and Reality: Selected Papers of Aurel Kolnai (Hackett) and (with Dr. Kathleen Alaimo) Children as Equals: Exploring the Rights of the Child (University Press of America). He has published on educational philosophy, Thoreau, animal rights and race. His current research interests are in the areas of antisemitism, Jewish identity and Zionism. His writing on these subjects has appeared in books and periodicals (academic and popular) in the US, UK, Israel, Germany, Italy and Switzerland.

Nan-Nan Lee, Ph.D., (Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, 1994).
Professor Lee joined the Philosophy faculty at Saint Xavier in August 1988. In addition to her Ph.D. in Philosophy she has a MSW from Loyola University at Chicago, and is a LCSW in the state of Illinois. Her research interests include Critical Theory of T. W. Adorno, psychoanalytic theories, and contemporary social/political philosophy.

A. Leland Morton, Ph.D., (University of Cincinnati, 2006).
Professor Morton’s dissertation entitled, Making it Intelligible: An Historical Approach to Understanding Intelligibility in the Assessment of Scientific Theories, addressed the role that concerns with a theory’s “intelligibility” played in the development of scientific thought. His primary research interests are in Early Modern Philosophy, contemporary Philosophy of Science, Epistemology, and the History and Philosophy of Science with a particular focus on the intellectual development of Chemistry after Boyle. His recent publications include, “Re-examining Logical Positivism: ‘Testability and Meaning’ in Contemporary Neuroscience,” with John Bickle, Ph.D., Journal of Contemporary Philosophy, Vol. XXV No. 1 & 2, 2004, pp. 3-11; and, “Leibniz’s ‘Attractive’ Tri-lemma: Newton and the Challenge of Intelligibility,” Southwest Philosophy Review—Summer, 2004.

Brian Satterfield, ABD, (Committee on Social Thought and Classics at the University of Chicago, Ph.D. Pending).
Professor Satterfield is currently a doctoral candidate in the Committee on Social Thought and Classics at the University of Chicago, writing on Homer. His research interests include Greek philosophy and poetry.

Thomas Thorp, Ph.D., (SUNY-Stony Brook, 1993).
Professor Thorp’s current research interests are in several areas of Political Theory, specifically, the history of corporate expansion on the American frontier in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and the Archaic origins of Athenian democracy. A manuscript on the latter topic, co-authored with Brian Seitz, is under review at Penn State Press. Recent publications include: "Odysseus Lies" in Etiquette, edited by Ron Scapp, SUNY Press, 2006; “Little Stones: Sovereignty in Plato’s Politeia,” Studies in Practical Philosophy, vol. 5 no. 1; “The Tenure of Wisdom upon the West,” Studies in Practical Philosophy vol.4 no.1 Spring ’04.