I grew up in the rust belt of western Pennsylvania, about seventy miles north of Pittsburgh. I attended Thiel College, located in my home town of Greenville, graduating in 1984 with a double major in Philosophy and Political Science. I then moved to Charlottesville, Virginia, where I enrolled in the graduate program in Philosophy at the University of Virginia, completing my PhD in 1993. After a year of living dangerously, I secured a tenure-track position in the Department of Philosophy and Religion at Ithaca College beginning in the fall of 1994. There I earned tenure and was promoted to Associate Professor in 2001. I served from 2001-2004 as Chair of the department. In 2006, I took an appointment in the Philosophy Department at Florida State University, and I was promoted to full Professor in 2008. In 2010 I came to the University of Arizona to join both the Philosophy Department and the Center for the Philosophy of Freedom. In 2018, I stepped away from the Freedom Center, but in 2023 I returned.
I now reside in the foothills of Tucson, AZ with my wife Danielle Steffey, our son Coen, born in May of 2011, and our four dogs, Dude, Coco, Ella, and Billie. Danielle is a social scientist specializing in issues related to criminal justice. My son has begun riding his bike with me and soon, I fear, will be able to drop me like yesterday’s news. He’s passionate about music and has taken up both the piano and the violin. He’s been enrolled in a Young Composers class run by the Tucson Symphony Orchestra, and has been writing his own classical music compositions. Last May of 2025, a string quintet from the TSO performed his first composition, “In Light of Bad Decisions,.” This was during a spring concert celebrating young composers. Coen has by now become an expert skier, and he’s conquered the most challenging double-diamond diamond runs at Wolf Creek Ski Resort, located in the San Juan Mountains of Colorado. My boy can rip.
As for my non-philosophical interests, my two great athletic passions are skiing and cycling, pretty much in that order. While there is no snow here in Tucson, the cycling is spectacular. So when I am not cooking for my family or hard at work living the life of the mind, I am getting in a good ride. When my schedule permits, I scoot off into the high mountains in southern Colorado or Utah to see how close I can come to killing myself on a pair of skis.
Oh, and I’ve also been known to enjoy a cocktail from time to time.