Jan Westerhoff

Jan Christoph Westerhoff is a philosopher and orientalist with specific interests in metaphysics and the philosophy of language.

Early life and education

Westerhoff was was educated at the Annette-von-Droste-Hülshoff Gymnasium, a Gymnasium in Düsseldorf, Germany. He studied at Trinity College, Cambridge and the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London (SOAS).

Academic career

He was previously a Research Fellow in Philosophy at the City University of New York, a Seminar Associate at Columbia University, a Junior Research Fellow at Linacre College and a Junior Lecturer in the Philosophy of Mathematics at the University of Oxford. At present he is a University Lecturer in Religious Ethics at the University of Oxford, a Fellow of Lady Margaret Hall and a Research Associate at SOAS.

Research

He is a specialist in metaphysics and Indo-Tibetan philosophy. His research interests also include the history of ideas in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

Selected works

Books

• Reality. A Very Short Introduction. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011, ISBN 0199594414)
• Twelve Examples of Illusion. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010)
• The Dispeller of Disputes. Nagarjuna's Vigrahavyavartani. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010)
• Nagarjuna's Madhyamaka (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009)
• Ontological Categories. Their Nature and Significance (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005)
• (co-authored with The Cowherds) Moonshadows. Conventional Truth in Buddhist Philosophy, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010, ISBN 0199751439)

Journal papers (selection)

• "Nagarjuna's arguments on motion revisited", Journal of Indian Philosophy, 2008, 36:4, 455-480.
• "The Madhyamaka Concept of svabhava: Ontological and Cognitive Aspects",Asian Philosophy, 2007, 17:1, 17-45.
• "Nagarjuna's catuskoti", Journal of Indian Philosophy, 2006, 34, 367-395.
• "Logical Relations between Pictures", Journal of Philosophy, 2005, 102: 12, 603-623.
• "The Construction of Ontological Categories", Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 2004 82:4, 595-620.
• "The Underdetermination of Typings", Erkenntnis, 2003, 58:3, 379-414.
• "Ars Characteristica Kantiana. Ludwig Benedict Trede's Forgotten Necessary Grammar", Kant-Studien, 2003, 94, 3, 333-351.
• "The Definition of 'Ontological Category'", Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 2002, 102, 3, 287-293.
• "A World of Signs. Baroque Pansemioticism, the Polyhistor and the Early Modern Wunderkammer.", Journal of the History of Ideas, 62, 4, 2001, 633-650.
• "Harsdörffer, Leibniz and the Universal Characteristic", Journal of the History of Ideas, 60, 3, 1999, 449-467.

Talks

• Talk on naturalizing Buddhism, 2011
• Talk at the Madhyamaka and Methodology Symposium, 2010

External links

• Westerhoff's homepage