David Liggins

In 2005, I completed my Ph.D. at the University of Sheffield, where my supervisors were Rosanna Keefe and Chris Hookway. Supported by an award from the Analysis Trust, I spent the 2005-6 academic year at the Faculty of Philosophy at Cambridge, continuing my research. I became a Lecturer at Manchester in 2006, and a Senior Lecturer in 2010.

I spent the 2009-10 academic year on research leave, thanks to an AHRC Research Leave award.

From 2011 to 2014, Chris Daly and I directed a research project entitled The Foundations of Ontology, funded by the AHRC.

In 2016 I became an Editor of Analysis. I stepped down in 2024. I was previously an Associate Editor of the Australasian Journal of Philosophy.

I am an ontologist: I try to work out what exists. I have a particular interest in debates over the existence of mathematical objects, possible worlds, composite objects, and propositions. My Cambridge "Element" Abstract Objects is a short, opinionated introduction to the debate over the existence of abstract objects.

Because I share Quine's "taste for desert landscapes", I have tended to explore theories which posit less rather than more, which has led me to think about paraphrase, pretence, fictionalism, and error theory. My book Truth Without Truths brings some of these ideas into discussions of truth and paradox.

I am currently working on the significance of higher-order logic for metaphysics.

Publications

Links to published versions (PhilPapers)

Penultimate drafts of many of my papers are available on PhilPapers. If you have trouble getting hold of any of my papers, just email me.

I would be delighted to work with graduate students who share any of my research interests. Just drop me an email to discuss. Possible topics include: the indispensability argument, nominalism, fictionalism, pretence theories, truth, propositions, philosophical method, metaontology. For funding opportunities available to students wishing to do a PhD in any of these areas, please seehttp://www.socialsciences.manchester.ac.uk/subjects/philosophy/postgraduate-research/phd-funding/.