I was born in northern Ontario but spent my childhood moving across Canada and the USA. I was home-schooled, completed my BBA at the Schulich School of Business (2014), and pursued a brief career in finance. Methodological concerns led me to reject my religious worldview at the time and turn to philosophy for better answers about what morality requires of us.
I completed my MA in philosophy at York University (2016) and my PhD in philosophy at the University of Arizona (2023). I initially specialised in metaethics but methodological concerns again led me to change course and pursue a doctoral minor in neuroscience. I was surprised to find that normative kinds like functionality, rationality, success, and error play central roles in neuroscientific explanation, task design, and data analysis. I also noticed that the pervasive assumption that these normative kinds must be naturalised (defined in non-normative terms) was stifling their ability to play these roles. Inspired by metaethics, my research now aims to show that taking these norms to be objectively and irreducibly normative would have a liberating effect across the complexity sciences.
Outside of academic life, I like to meet people, host friends, cook a lot of Desi food, bake a lot of vegan desserts, do road trips, hike, and go to EDM festivals. I’ve lived in Canada, USA, Singapore, and now Germany, and I visit Pakistan or India about every year or two.