Thad Botham

Dr. Thad Botham is published in epistemology and in metaphysics. Thad was a visiting assistant professor at Valparaiso University in 2006. He has taught at ASU since the fall of 2006. He has taught for Barrett, the Honors College at ASU, and is currently the faculty honors advisor for philosophy. Thad is a founding faculty member of the ASU's Master of Liberal Studies Program.

Thad has a penchant for high quality teaching that, pacé Socrates’s Meno, produces results. Fostering an environment where students feel safe, yet challenged, Thad equips students to master both evaluation and delivery of sound arguments for controversial claims. He nurtures the sense of community many consistently experience in his classroom. Thad enjoys refereeing manuscripts for top-tier philosophy journals such as Synthese, Analysis, Ergo, and Erkenntnis.

Thad's 2008 book, "Agent-Causation Revisited: Origination and Contemporary Theories of Free Will," reveals that experts in the secular free will literature neglect to take seriously the deeply seated intuition that acting freely requires being an ultimate originator of change in the world.  From his findings, Thad argues that a theory called agent-causation best fits both our intuitive commitments about free will as well as our scientific understanding about how the world works.

Thad's current research includes several works on progress. One engages a debate in the philosophy of religion between three theories that attempt to reconcile a creator with maximal control over creation, on the one hand, and creaturely free will, on the other hand. The three theories are Thomism, Molinism, and Open Theism. While studying at Notre Dame under several of the most authoritative minds on the issue, Thad has developed a conjecture that the last 30 years of debate, which includes thousands of professional contributions, rests on a big mistake. Thad’s research unearths early contributions that have apparently gone unnoticed and unappreciated for three decades. He aims to unpack his BIG IDEA that the three theories are not mutually exclusive candidates for addressing the reconciliation-problem.  If plausible, Thad's BIG IDEA would launch an entirely new research program in the philosophy of religion.

Thad enjoys doing so many different things with his gorgeous wife, Peggy Bell:  traveling, camping, canoeing, hiking, shooting photography, exploring, and a hundred other wonderful things.  His three children amaze him in how much they thrive and leave the world better than they found it.  Thad roasts his own coffee beans because, well, the coffee is better that way.  For fun, Thad builds large boomerangs from a 1912 Australian design, and they really do return.