Graduate Students

I graduated with distinction from the University of British Columbia in 2024 with a BA in Cognitive Systems. My primary philosophical interests are in the philosophy of science and metaethics. What are the causes of the replication crisis in the social sciences? How should we understand the logic of scientific explanation and confirmation? What does it imply for one to be normatively obligated? Outside of academics, I am interested in coral, social deduction games, soccer, and living the good life. Feel free to reach out to me at: gabriel.cameron_bazo@tufts.edu.

I graduated from the University of Wyoming in 2018 with a BA in History and a minor in Philosophy. Following graduation, I began serving as an Armor Officerwith the United States Army. While serving in the Army, I enjoyed the opportunity to continue my studies in history and completed my MA at Norwich University in August 2023. I am primarily interested in philosophy of mind, especially regarding issues of consciousness and its application to artificial intelligence. I also have interests in epistemology and metaethics. In my free time, I enjoy spending time with my family and being outdoors hiking, camping, and skiing, as well as traveling and reading. Feel free to contact me at zbrown06@tufts.edu.

I graduated from Koç University in 2025 with a BA in Business Administration (thankfully, this has become quite irrelevant now) and Philosophy. My philosophical interests are mainly in metaethics. I am especially interested in asking how evolutionary theory should inform the way we think about moral phenomena. Other than that, two historical figures that I am in awe of are Aristoteles and Kant.

I graduated from Harvard College in 2025 with a BA in Philosophy. As an undergraduate, I became interested in the philosophy of mind, aesthetics, epistemology, and Later Wittgenstein; I’m now obsessed with how they inform each other. Outside of class, I’m usually watching movies, painting theater sets, or reading novels.

I studied Cognitive Science, Neuroscience, and Psychology at the University of Toronto. After I graduated, I worked as a researcher in industry and academia. My philosophical interests include philosophy of science, philosophy of social science, epistemology, and feminist philosophy. Outside of philosophy, I like to read fiction and stay active. If you are a prospective student, please feel free to email me at oceana.ding@tufts.edu.

I graduated in 2024 from St. John’s College with a BA in Liberal Arts. My philosophical interests include Ancient Philosophy, Metaphysics, and Political Philosophy. I also harbor some investment in the works of Soren Kierkegaard. Outside of class, I enjoy playing tennis, hosting a study group, and an occasional Guiness. You can reach me at ogonza03@tufts.edu.

I graduated with a BS in Computer Science from UTD in 2009 before spending a decade in Silicon Valley working in software development on teams tackling everything from online payment fraud prevention to employee hiring and retention to machine learning data optimization for self-driving cars. My primary interests are in philosophy of language and epistemology, with a particular focus in their relationship to ethics in AI. Secondarily, I am also interested in research in ancient philosophy, especially Aristotle. You can reach me at andrew.hubbs@tufts.edu

I graduated summa cum laude with a BA in Philosophy from the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs in 2023. I have broad philosophical interests spanning various areas of philosophy, including metaphysics, epistemology, and logic, as well as game theory, Buddhist philosophy, and comparative philosophy. However, the questions that I am primarily interested in asking concern the philosophy of mind and cognitive science: What is the nature of mental causation? What is the nature of non-human animal mentality, and what can it tell us about the evolution of human mentality? What is the nature of self-knowledge, and is this kind of knowledge fallible? Can we (or how might we) explain the nature of consciousness in a manner that is consistent with physicalism while still respecting the unique properties of consciousness as a natural phenomenon? Outside of philosophy, I am an avid reader of both fiction and non-fiction (I especially love Ray Bradbury’s fiction), and among other activities, I enjoy writing short stories, eating good vegetarian food, exploring the natural world (especially through hiking and bike-riding), and listening to the Grateful Dead. Feel free to email me at tjungb01@tufts.edu. 

I graduated from BU in 2025 with a BA in Philosophy. My philosophical interests include Aristotelian metaphysics, philosophy of mind, and the relationship between philosophy and literature (I especially love Russian lit!). Outside of academics, I’m a competitive powerlifter and love to stay active!

I graduated from the United States Military Academy at West Point with a BS in Philosophy in 2017 and started serving as an Air Defense Artillery Officer in the United States Army. During the last seven years, I have lived abroad in South Korea and Japan, supporting missile defense operations throughout the region. I enjoy exploring the ethical implications of emerging and digital technologies, such as artificial intelligence, internet access, robotics, etc. as well as the philosophy of law, with special emphasis on theories of crime, punishment, and justice in society. In my free time, I enjoy road tripping with my wife and dog, cooking, and photography. I'm also a self described 'tattoo nerd' with ink from ten countries and counting. Feel free to contact me at robert.laval_leyva@tufts.edu.

I graduated from Wake Forest University with a BA in Philosophy and a double minor in psychology and neuroscience. My interests in philosophy include the philosophy of neuroscience, philosophy of mind, and comparative philosophy between Chinese and Western philosophy. I am currently working on the scientific explanations for the problem of consciousness and the generalizability of consciousness. I am also interested in the Chinese Heart-Mind philosophy system. My email is lliu24@tufts.edu.

Lucie (Yiran) Lu is a first-year MA student, and her philosophical interests are epistemology and metaphysics. Before coming to Tufts, she received her BA in philosophy and comparative literature from NYU.

Brandon De Lucia (he/him) is currently in his ‘plus one year’ of the 4+1 BA/MA program of the Tufts Philosophy Department, set to graduate in Spring 2026. His main interests lie in Social Philosophy. He prefers politics & civics (including republicanism, democracy, and gender/sexuality), law (constitutionalism, analytic jurisprudence, criminal punishment), and language & action (social conventions, contextualism, discourse ethics, rule-following, plans). One topic of interest is whether judicial rulings are/can be objectively correct or incorrect. Writers of interest include Cicero, Machiavelli, Pettit, Beauvoir, Marion Young, Hart, Habermas, Wittgenstein, Lewis, and Bratman. He’s excited to TA Western Political Thought 1 in the fall. In his free time, he enjoys playing Mariokart with friends & family, baking, and thinking about the Roman Republic. Accordingly, his favorite fact is that our earliest record of the cannoli comes from Cicero. Brandon is happy to answer any questions – or discuss anything philosophy – at brandon.delucia@tufts.edu.

I graduated from Tufts with a BA in Philosophy and Romance Studies in 2025 and I am continuing my studies in Philosophy through the Fifth-Year Master’s program. My main philosophical interests are in theories of justice, philosophy of law, and exploring different models of structural justice in responses to wrongdoing. I’ve been especially interested in the concept of moral outrage in the aftermath of mass harm, and how it might inform appropriate responses to such harm. Outside of philosophy I like learning new languages, binging TV shows, drawing, and playing card games. Feel free to reach out to me at juan.morris@tufts.edu.

Before coming to Tufts, I competed in policy debate and studied philosophy at Gonzaga University. My primary interests are in philosophy of mind, philosophy of perception, and aesthetics and I tend to approach these areas from a 4E (embodied/embedded/enactive/extended) cognition perspective. Often you can find me asking questions about the ways that external objects—especially digital technologies and art objects—influence and facilitate cognitive processes. I am also interested in how the way we answer these questions implicates moral and social philosophy. Outside of philosophy, I like to go on walks, enjoy the company of my friends, drink tea, and listen to music.

I graduated from Le Moyne College in 2023 with a BA in History. Prior to attending Le Moyne, I was also an undergraduate student at Tufts, where I studied philosophy. I was driven to return to both Tufts and to the study of philosophy by a desire to explore questions at the foundations of the humanities. My goal is to better understand statements about human minds, human experiences, groups of people, and other objects of study that are currently resistant to purely scientific description. This involves a variety of philosophical disciplines, including metaethics, epistemology, and philosophy of language. I am also very interested in the philosophy of logic and the questions it raises about rational thought more generally. Outside of philosophy, I enjoy walks with my friends, reading genre fiction, and creative writing. Feel free to contact me at: paul.schneible@tufts.edu.

I graduated from Fordham University in 2020 with a BA in Economics. Afterwards, I spent some time as an accountant before obtaining a post-baccalaureate diploma in philosophy from Simon Fraser University. My primary philosophical interests are in metaethics and philosophy of mind. I also enjoy learning about ancient philosophy as well as Kant/ post-Kantian continental philosophy. Some things I like are the New York Jets, the Grateful Dead, and long-form hiking. Please feel free to reach me at theodore.schoneman@tufts.edu.

Before going to Tufts I studied philosophy at the University of Oslo. When it comes to philosophy, I am interested in metaphysics, philosophy of mind and philosophy of action, especially where it does intersect with technology. Additionally, I am also intrigued by political philosophy and the occasional ethical dilemma. 

Outside of my academic pursuits, you can often find me at the dance floor - where I particularly enjoy salsa and west coast swing dancing. I also like martial arts and cheap novels. 

My e-mail is line_horgen.thorstad@tufts.edu - please feel free to reach out!

In 2024 I graduated from the University of Toronto with BA in Philosophy. During my studies, I developed an interest in meta-ethics, applied ethics, social theory, free will, and conceptual engineering, but I am excited to expand my philosophical interests. My hobbies include reading fiction, watching baseball, and music (listening to it, creating it, writing about it, playing it – really anything to do with it). I can be reached at alexander.trachsell@tufts.edu.

I graduated from Koc University in 2025 with a double major in Philosophy and Psychology. My primary philosophical interests are in the philosophy of action (especially Anscombe) and the philosophy of mind, with a particular focus on consciousness and the mind-body problem. I'm also intrigued by various topics in epistemology, such as skepticism and certainty, and in metaphysics, including free will, fatalism, and future contingency. I enjoy reading phenomenologists like Sartre and Merleau-Ponty, as well as ancient philosophers, mostly Plato. Outside of philosophy, I enjoy music and literature, and I'm a fan of Galatasaray. Feel free to reach out to me at svarol01@tufts.edu.

I recently graduated from UPenn with a BA in Philosophy and minors in both mathematics and logic, information & computation (LGIC). In the interim, I also spent a year studying philosophy as a visiting student at Pembroke College, Oxford. I'm mostly interested in questions that cross-cut through the philosophy of mathematics, logic, epistemology, and the philosophy of language. Outside of philosophy, I enjoy writing poetry. Feel free to reach out at avllah01@tufts.edu.

I graduated from UCLA with a BS in Mathematics and a BA in Philosophy in 2022. I am broadly interested in the philosophy of mathematics, formal epistemology, and decision theory, but especially where each intersects with the infinite. Beyond my philosophical interests, I enjoy cooking, baking, hiking, tennis, video games, and unsuccessfully trying to learn new crafts.

I graduated from Cornell University in the Fall of 2023 with a BS in Development Sociology and Environmental Governance (summa cum laude, distinction in research). During my time in undergraduate, I pursued a minor in philosophy and completed independent research in moral psychology on private wealth and ideology. Broadly, I am interested in moral philosophy, philosophy of law, and social ontology. I have a particular interest in studying how wealth, class, and information are implicated in the reproduction of inequality-enforcing institutions, along with how characteristics of institutional design fit in (or not) with individual psychology. Apart from philosophy, I enjoy triathlon, cooking, and spending time outside. If you have any questions or would like to connect, please feel free to reach out to me at eric.west@tufts.edu.

I came to Tufts in 2024 after earning my BA degree from Vassar College in 2023 and spending a year in the Post-Bacc Classics program at Penn. I am primarily interested in ancient philosophy, especially Plato and Aristotle's metaphysics and natural philosophy, but am also curious about a range of topics in contemporary philosophy, especially epistemology and ethics, and eager to explore new philosophical interests. Outside of philosophy, I enjoy playing piano, walking, and visiting museums. You can reach out to me at zhixian.xu@tufts.edu.

I graduated from NYU Shanghai with a BA in Social Sciences on the track of Political Science in 2025. My primary philosophical interests are social and political philosophy and feminist philosophy, especially the theorization of capitalism. Recently, I have become interested in questions in social epistemology: What is the foundation of understanding and public will in the political context? How do people derive understanding and knowledge from information, especially false information? Is reason the basis for the public will or not? Aside from philosophy, I enjoy watching tennis and Formula 1. You can reach me at Jiawei.Ye@tufts.edu.