peter009@umn.edu

721 Heller
612-625-6058

Professor Peterson's homepage

My current research projects are on Plato and Socrates. I am interested especially in Plato's metaphysics and philosophy of language. I teach a graduate-level course on selected works of Plato or Aristotle every year. For example, a recent course on Aristotle was on the Nicomachean Ethics. A recent course on Plato was on the Parmenides. I also have a long-standing interest in Wittgenstein and recently taught a course on the Philosophical Investigations.

I lead (with Elizabeth Belfiore of Classical and Near Eastern Studies and Norman Dahl) a study group that each semester reads closely and discusses works of Aristotle's. The group is currently working on the Politics.

I have supervised Ph.D. dissertations on topics on Plato's metaphysics, Plato's philosophy of language, Aristotle's metaphysics, metaphysical realism, and Frege's philosophy of language.

Selected Publications

"An Authentically Socratic Conclusion in Plato's Phaedo: Socrates' Debt to Asclepius" in Naomi Reshotko, ed. Desire, Identity, and Existence, 2003.

"New Rounds of the Exercise of Plato's Parmenides," Modern Schoolman 80,2003 (pp. 245-278).

"Socrates Talks to Himself in Plato's Hippias Major" Ancient Philosophy 20, 2000 (pp265-387). Appears under the pseudonym 'Halsten Olson.'

"The Language Game in Plato's Parmenides" Ancient Philosophy 20, 2000 (pp. 19-51).

"Plato's Parmenides: A Principle of Interpretation and Seven Arguments." Journal of the History of Philosophy 34 (1996).

"Apparent Circularity in Aristotle's Account of Right Action in the Nicomachean Ethics." Apeiron 25 (1992).

"Remarks on Three Formulations of Ethical Relativism." Ethics 95 (1985).

"Substitution in Aristotelian Technical Contexts." Philosophical Studies 47 (1985).

"Zeno's Second Argument Against Plurality." Journal of the History of Philosophy 16 (1978).

"A Reasonable Self-Predication Premise for the Third Man Argument." Philosophical Review 82 (1973).