Connor Griffith
Virtue Ethics, Stoicism, Confucianism, & Anarchy
About Me
I am a fourth-year Ph.D. student at The Ohio State University department of philosophy. Prior to this, I received my master’s degree in philosophy at Ohio University, where I was advised by Yoichi Ishida. Before that, I studied both philosophy and history at Slippery Rock University of Pennsylvania, where my advisor was Andrew Colvin. My philosophical interests are mainly in value theory, specifically normative ethics, political philosophy, and historical ethical traditions.
For my master’s thesis, I drew upon Mengzi’s moral psychology to articulate a response to the amoralist, a theoretical character in contemporary metaethics who is capable of recognizing moral behavior and understands the obligatory nature of morality, but lacks the motivation to follow through with such obligations.
Ongoing Projects
I’m currently working on a more journal friendly version of my master’s thesis and learning a lot from my coursework and peers. I’ve also recently broken ground on my dissertation, where I’m looking at the political philosophy of the ancient Stoics and spelling out its theoretical and practical consequences.
Teaching
During my time at Ohio University, I was a teacher’s assistant for both Yoichi Ishida and Alfred Lent. During the first year, I shadowed both of them during their Intro to Logic lectures, lead a discussion group for a portion of their students, and graded their assessments. During the second year, I was given the opportunity to design the syllabus for and teach my own Intro to Logic class.
I’ve taught two courses at the University of Akron, Technology and Human Values for the Spring of 2023, and an Introduction to Ethics course in the Fall of 2022.
During my first year at OSU, I graded for both Alan Silverman’s “Death and the Meaning of Life” and Declan Smithies’ “Philosophy of Sport”. During my second year, I lead recitations for Steven Brown’s “Introduction to Philosophy” and graded for Alex Wolf-Root’s “Moral Philosophy”. During my third year, I graded for Colin Smith’s “History of Ancient Greek Philosophy” in the Fall and and graded for Meow Hui Goh’s “Chinese Literature in Translation” in collaboration with the Department of East Asian Languages and Literatures. I also served on the administrative team for OSU’s Philosophy and Critical Thinking (PACT) summer camp program run through the philosophy department for the Spring of 2026.
For my forth year, I’ll be teaching my own section of Asian Philosophies – focusing primarily on the history of philosophical exchanges in classical as well as medieval and early modern China, especially amongst the “three teachings” (sānjiào 三教): Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism. This also included an 8-week version of the course during Summer 2026.
