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Axel Mueller

Professor of Instruction

Ph.D. University of Frankfurt
Curriculum Vitae

Ph.D. University of Frankfurt, specializes in philosophy of language, general philosophy of natural science and American pragmatism. He also published on Kant and has interests in the history of analytic philosophy. He wrote the book Referenz und Fallibilismus (DeGruyter, 2001), on the interactions between conceptual content, fallible (theoretical and background) assumptions and empirical knowledge of particulars (mainly in the work of Hilary Putnam). He has published articles on the normative structure of inductive concepts and on the relations of scientific practice and realism. Currently he is working on a series of articles that aim at an extended analysis of the semantic basis of mental content externalism in Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, and on several publications on themes in pragmatism. The overarching purpose of these is to see whether and how actual contextual and background, i.e. pragmatic elements in determining reference and scientific results can be used to disarm skeptically-minded arguments from underdetermination. More recently, he also has been publishing on topics in political philosophy, like Jane Addams' pragmatist arguments regarding the foundations of cosmopolitan peace and on the possibility of democratic legitimacy for supranational political institutions. Mueller has been invited and occupied visiting positions, e.g., in Madrid, Mexico, Santiago de Chile. Most recently (2012-13), Mueller was DAAD Visiting Professor for philosophy at the Center for European Studies at the University of Flensburg/University of South Denmark (Flensburg, Germany).

Books

Articles

Work in Process

  • "Kant's Semantic Externalism". This is a chunk on Kant and Semantic Externalism, which has far outgrown all its ancestors and will, eventually and hopefully, result in a couple of smaller pieces. Comments welcome; please ask me before citing or quoting.