Further Information:

I work as a DIAPHORA Early Stage Researcher in the LOGOS research group at the University of Barcelona. Before joining DIAPHORA, I completed a bachelor’s degree in mathematics at the University of Constance and a master’s degree in philosophy at the Humboldt University of Berlin. My main research focus concerns metaphysics and philosophical methodology, but I also have strong interests in the philosophy of language, philosophy of science and philosophy of mathematics.
My PhD project investigates the role that theories of grounding, fundamentality, essence and explanation play in the debate between Humean and anti-Humean positions on natural modality. Whereas Humeans maintain that, ultimately, everything is `separate and loose’ – and that natural laws are just certain kinds of generalization – anti-Humeans assume real connections in nature: primitive laws of nature or counterfactual facts, dispositional essences, or relations of nomic necessitation among the fundamental universals. My recent work has focused 1) on arguments for the conclusion that dispositional essentialism is in conflict with the mainstream view regarding the connection between grounding and essence, and 2) on the question of how we can make sense of the requirement that dispositional essences should govern the distribution of  fundamental properties.
My project is part of the research on philosophical methodology of the DIAPHORA work package 1. It explores the extent to which we can see background assumptions on grounding, essence and explanation as the underlying source of disagreement in the debate on natural modality, and it addresses dialectical questions about the interaction between the two debates. It thus also serves as a case study of the interactions between first-order and second-order theories in philosophy more generally.