Employees of The Office and Philosophy

Robert Arp is currently a postdoc researcher through the University at Buffalo working in biomedical ontology. He is the editor of South Park and Philosophy (Blackwell, 2007) and has written a good deal more than you’re prepared to read about right now. Question: Can a person really tell if another person is gay just by looking at them, or must one buy a gaydar?

Michael Bray is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Southwestern University. He has published essays on Thomas Hobbes, C. B. Macpherson, Adam Smith, and Theodor Adorno and is at work on issues in film, technology, and society. Sadly, he currently purchases his paper at Staples but would be happy to discuss, over an Awesome Blossom, his options with a local supplier.

Keith Dromm is an Associate Professor of Philosophy in the Louisiana Scholars’ College at Northwestern State University in Natchitoches. FACT: He has written chapters for such books as The Philosophy of the X-Files (2007). FACT: He has published articles in journals such as the Journal of Applied Philosophy, History of Philosophy Quarterly, and the British Journal for the History of Philosophy. FACT: He knows more about bears than Dwight.

John Elia is the Therese Murray Goodwin ’49 Chair and Assistant Professor in Philosophy at Wilson College. He has special interests in ethics, political philosophy, and the philosophy of law. He uses office paper daily (and he’s really great with it); if the philosophy gig doesn’t work out, he may be moving to Scranton.

Jonathan Evans is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Indianapolis. He has published articles on modality and future contingents in medieval philosophy, on ethics, and sport. His current research is on human agency, modality, and time. On weekends, Evans works as a roadie for the under-publicized Grass Roots reunion tour which is slated to play in six large towns in Canada, western New York, and Pennsylvania; live recordings from the tour will be available for download on Creed’s blog-site.

Randall M. Jensen is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Northwestern College in Orange City, Iowa. His philosophical interests include ethics, ancient Greek philosophy, and philosophy of religion. He has also contributed to South Park and Philosophy, 24 and Philosophy, and Battlestar Galactica and Philosophy (all Blackwell, 2007). Bears, beets, Battlestar Galactica! There’s nothing on his horizon except everything.

David Kyle Johnson is currently an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at King’s College in Wilkes-Barre, PA. His philosophical specializations include philosophy of religion, logic, and metaphysics. He also wrote a chapter in Blackwell’s South Park and Philosophy, and has chapters on Family Guy, Quentin Tarantino, Johnny Cash, Battlestar Galactica, and Batman. He has taught many classes that focus on the relevance of philosophy to pop culture, including a course devoted to South Park. (A class incorporating The Office is in the works.) Kyle, for some reason, craves Altoids every time his computer reboots.

Rory E. Kraft, Jr. is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at York College of Pennsylvania, and co-editor of the journal Questions: Philosophy for Young People. His main areas of interest are ethical theory, applied ethics, and philosophy with pre-college students. Unfortunately, he suffers from spontaneous dental hydroplosion, and is concerned that he may be infected with a government-created Killer Nanobot Infection.

Meg Lonergan is a student at Hartwick College, finishing dual degrees in Sociology and Philosophy. She has many papers and books that are not yet written, largely because we are not worthy of her brilliance. A second reason, perhaps equally important, is that her love for Count Chocula keeps her very busy.

Morgan Luck is a Lecturer in Philosophy at Charles Sturt University and a fellow of the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics (CAPPE). His research areas include philosophy of religion, metaphysics, and epistemology. Morgan could give you a list of fifty things he could beat you at. He once threw a kettle over a pub. What have you ever done?

Russell Manning teaches high school philosophy at Yarra Valley Grammar in Melbourne, Australia. He is the author of “Jean Baudrillard and the Fatal Strategy of the City” (Cinema-scope Independent Film Journal Issue 8 May 2007), He is currently completing his Master’s thesis at Deakin University (Australia) and is developing a project with the Brentmeister to write “Dead Poets Society, the Musical.” He is attracted to entertainer/philosophers.

Sean McAleer is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy (not Assistant to a Professor of Philosophy) at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire. His work has appeared in Film and Philosophy, Studies in the History of Ethics, Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, and Inside Paper. A part-time motivational speaker for Cooper and Webb, in his spare time he plays guitar in the band Foregone Conclusion and enjoys listening to Hat FM.

Rick Mayock grew up in the Scranton area, and, although his memory is fuzzy, he thinks he may have actually worked at the Dunder-Mifflin Paper Company. Regardless, he is certain that his boss was Michael Scott. He is now employed as the Assistant to the Regional Manager of the Philosophy Department at West Los Angeles College, where he hopes to some day be promoted to Assistant Regional Manager. He has recently contributed to The Beatles and Philosophy and continues to visit the Scranton area on a regular basis.

Matthew P. Meyer is a Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire. He also teaches classes at the University of St. Thomas. He has published in the International Journal of Listening. He aspires to someday be a manager of Hotel Hell, where he will preside over guests such as Jim Halpert. He currently enjoys teaching and writing, though his attempts at publishing a book have been sabotaged by the inappropriate watermark on the pages of manuscripts he has sent to publishers.

Peter Murphy is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Indianapolis. He has published articles in Bioethics, Dialectica, and Synthese. He buys his beets wholesale from the Schrute farm.

Thomas Nys is a Lecturer in Philosophy at Utrecht University and postdoctoral researcher at the University of Amsterdam. He co-edited Autonomy and Paternalism: Reflection on the Theory and Practice of Health Care (2007) and published articles on various topics in moral and political philosophy. He also contributed to the excellent Metallica and Philosophy (Blackwell, 2007). It is with pride that Thomas reports that he courageously defended Gareth’s foxhole in the territorial army.

Stefanie Rocknak has published articles on David Hume, Edmund Husserl, W. V. O. Quine, Rudolph Carnap, death, art, and epistemo-logy. You can find her at Hartwick College (Oneonta, NY), where she is an Associate Professor of Philosophy. “But that’s just my day job,” she insists, “and a grueling one at that.” She dreams of the day that she can run away to a place as glamorous as Scranton. “Ideally, I’d become a receptionist, just like Pam. I could wile the day away playing Solitaire, and then do my art at night.” Rocknak is also an internationally recognized sculptor. Since 1999, her sculpture has been included in over 40 shows, including the Smithsonian and the South Street Seaport Museum (NY, NY). Her work has also been featured in five books and over thirty magazines and newspapers, and can be found in private and public collections throughout the United States.

Gregory J. Schneider is a PhD candidate in the Department of Rhetoric at the University of Minnesota. He studies the rhetoric of science and is writing a dissertation about science museum exhibitions and the way that they construct both science and the public. He has worked to reconcile his philosophic undergraduate experience with his sophisticated graduate training, and he thinks he has a handle on it now. Wait.

Nope, he just lost it again. He is the author of numerous unpublished diatribes and manifestos, and aspires to one day have his picture on the cover of Inside Paper. Late at night, you can often find him winning contests by throwing everyday objects over pubs.

Scranton (University of). This is an actual university that has the potential to provide the future workforce of Dunder-Mifflin.

Michael Friedman, Maria Johnson, Joe Kraus, and Stephen Whit-taker, PhDs all, are faculty at the University of Scranton, where they teach Shakespeare, Theology, Twentieth-Century American Literature, and Irish Studies, respectively. They have, additionally, clerked in a jewelry store in Kansas City, schlepped in a pharmaceutical factory in Parma, tended Christmas trees in central Ohio, and stocked shelves in Austin. Each is regularly mistaken for a cast member of The Office, and the confusion leads to many awkward and unscripted moments.

Andrew Terjesen is a Visiting Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Rhodes College. He has previously taught at Washington and Lee University, Austin College and Duke University. His interest in the ways in which pop culture intersects with philosophy have resulted in the essay in this volume as well as essays in Family Guy and Philosophy (Blackwell, 2007) and Battlestar Galactica and Philosophy (Blackwell, 2007). It is his hope that everyone become a HERO.

Eva E. Tsahuridu was set for David’s chair but couldn’t keep her head down. So she went back to university to become Principal Lecturer in Organizational Behaviour at the University of Greenwich Business School, where she has her own chair.

Wim Vandekerckhove is an Assistant Professor of Practical Ethics at Ghent University, Center for Ethics & Value Inquiry. His research and publications cover business ethics, global ethics, whistleblowing, forced labour, social responsible investment and workplace stapler incidents.

Jamie Watson is getting his PhD in philosophy at Florida State University. He shares an office with people who are smarter than he is, so he spends most of his time nodding and repeating, “Absolutely.” Of course, brains aren’t everything. And yes . . . that’s what she said.

Mark D. White is Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science, Economics, and Philosophy at the College of Staten Island in New York City, where he teaches courses combining economics, philosophy, and law. He co-edited the book Economics and the Mind (2007), and has written many articles and book chapters on economics and philosophy. But his proudest accomplishment is having written the liner notes for Scrantonicity’s upcoming live album, Scranton Comes Alive.

J. Jeremy Wisnewski is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Hartwick College. He is the author of Wittgenstein and Ethical Inquiry: A Defense of Ethics as Clarification (2007) and The Politics of Agency (2008), and the editor of Family Guy and Philosophy (Blackwell, 2007). He is watching you right now, and wants you to buy his books. Wisnewski has also published a number of articles in such journals as American Philosophical Quarterly, Philosophy of the Social Sciences, Continental Philosophy Review, and Public Affairs Quarterly. His next project is to play Michael Scarn in a new production of Threat Level: Midnight.