My primary interest is in the classical Greek and medieval philosophical tradition, with an emphasis on philosophy of nature. My research is aimed at a re-evaluation of classical "essentialism," i.e. the theory that there are "essences" or "natures" that define the "whatness" of the things that exist, and which have a genuine metaphysical reality, unreducible to epiphenomena such as "organization" or "structure."

Last year I focused on Aristotle, and my "trabajo de investigación" (or interim dissertatin) was on how the Stagirite justified positing genuine "natures" as the explanations for why organisms exist as the kinds of beings they are, and have the characteristic activities they display, against the Greek materialists, in particular Empedocles, Anaxagoras and the Atomists. How did Aristotle argue for the reality of "natures" against the reductionists of his time? His response, heavily based in his metaphysics, has interesting repercussions for contemporary discussions on the reality of the mind. Read my Interim Disseration, linked below, for more information on this issue.

I'm now examining St. Thomas Aquinas's philosophy of nature, focusing on how Aquinas develops a philosophy of science as part of his more general philosophy of nature.  A part of this,  I am focusing on Aquinas's own scientific theories on light, sound and the structure of the heavens; the "epistemology of science" that governs our evaluation of scientific models; and the degree to which we can arrive at a true "knowledge of nature" via scientific investigation.