Chair of Theoretical Philosophy

How do inferential roles, positions and transitions constitute objects of thought? I pursue the question historically, with Kant, Sellars and Hegel; formally, in nodal logic; and in the reconstruction of philosophical corpora.

Areas of specialisation: reference and intentionality; Sellars and post-Kantian philosophy; nodal logic and the formal reconstruction of inferential relations; functional classification and philosophical corpora.

Areas of competence: epistemology; metaphysics and metaontology; the theory of categories; philosophy of mind; philosophy of information; logic and argument theory; digital methods in philosophy.

Work in progress: a habilitation thesis, From a Nodal Point of View. Point, Line, Field, Space, and Monad; two edited volumes, Wilfrid Sellars: Fraught with Ought (with Mahdi Ranaee, under contract with Oxford University Press) and Frigg and His Critics: Models, Theories, and Scientific Representation (with Leon Isenmann, under contract with Routledge); and a bilateral project, Reference and Functional Classification in Sellars's Philosophy, with Daniel Kalpokas (Córdoba), under review with CONICET and the DAAD.

I founded the International Sellars Colloquium at the Faculty of Philosophy in Cambridge in 2015 and have convened it since. It meets monthly, with members across Europe, the Americas, the Middle East and East Asia.

I also convene the Hegel Kreis Berlin, founded at Humboldt-Universität in 2019: a monthly colloquium on Kant, Hegel and classical German philosophy, which in 2026 held a symposium in honour of Rolf-Peter Horstmann.

Personal website: seiberth.de · ORCID: 0000-0002-5606-0964

• In progress: Habilitation, University of Potsdam (From a Nodal Point of View. Point, Line, Field, Space, and Monad)
• Since 2023: Assistant Professor of Theoretical Philosophy (Logic and Argument Theory), University of Potsdam
• 2023: Visiting Researcher, University of Padua (Articulating Categories)
• 2022–23: Junior Fellow, Walter Benjamin Kolleg, University of Bern
• 2021–23: Lecturer in Theoretical Philosophy, University of Potsdam
• 2018: Dr. phil., summa cum laude, University of Potsdam, with Johannes Haag, Pirmin Stekeler-Weithofer and Huw Price
• 2014–15: Visiting Scholar, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Cambridge, hosted by Huw Price at Trinity College (DAAD)
• 2013: Magister Artium, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

Monograph

(1) Intentionality in Sellars. A Transcendental Account of Finite Knowledge. New York: Routledge, 2022 (Routledge Studies in American Philosophy). Subject of a book symposium in the International Journal of Philosophical Studies 30 (2022), no. 5, with commentaries by Anke Breunig, Michael R. Hicks and Griffin Klemick.

Edited volumes

(2) Wilfrid Sellars: Fraught with Ought. Writings on Mind, Meaning, and Metaphysics, ed. with Mahdi Ranaee. Oxford University Press, under contract.

(3) Frigg and His Critics: Models, Theories, and Scientific Representation, ed. with Leon Isenmann. Routledge Studies in the Philosophy of Science, under contract. Contributors include Catherine Z. Elgin, Michela Massimi, Dana Scott, Claus Beisbart, Axel Gelfert and Ioannis Votsis.

(4) Reading Kant with Sellars. Reconceiving Kantian Themes, ed. with Mahdi Ranaee. New York: Routledge, 2025 (Routledge Studies in American Philosophy).

Articles and chapters

(5) ‘Hypergraphing the Space of Reason’, in László Kocsis and Krisztián Pete (eds), Wilfrid Sellars's Metaphilosophy. Two Images and the Philosophy in Between. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2026, 211–232 (invited).

(6) ‘A Clue to Sellars' System: Transcendental Linguistics and the Scheme of Things’, in Carl B. Sachs (ed.), Interpreting Sellars. Critical Essays. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2026, 192–210 (invited).

(7) ‘Wider die Illusion finaler Bestimmbarkeit. Der Hypergraph als Forschungsumgebung und als digitale Edition’ (with Melcher Abramowski), in Julian Polberg and Melanie Sehgal (eds), Philosophische Arbeitsweisen. Forschungsobjekte und Editionsfaktoren. Basel: Schwabe, 2025 (Theorien – Methoden – Praxisformen 2), 57–76 (invited).

(8) ‘Sellars' Metaontology’, in Mahdi Ranaee and Luz Christopher Seiberth (eds), Reading Kant with Sellars. Reconceiving Kantian Themes. New York: Routledge, 2025, 251–277.

(9) ‘Introduction: Kantian Themes in a Transcendental Linguistic Turn’ (with Mahdi Ranaee), in Reading Kant with Sellars. New York: Routledge, 2025, 1–13.

(10) ‘A Précis of Intentionality in Sellars: A Transcendental Account of Finite Knowledge’, International Journal of Philosophical Studies 30 (2022), no. 5, 519–524 (invited).

(11) ‘Response to Critics: Phenomenalism, Fallibilism and Finitude’, International Journal of Philosophical Studies 30 (2022), no. 5, 559–572 (invited).

(12) ‘The Role of Languagings in Sellars' Theory of Experience’, Rivista Italiana di Filosofia del Linguaggio 15 (2021), no. 2, 19–48.

Forthcoming

(13) ‘Functionalism’, in Jeremy Koons (ed.), The Sellarsian Mind. Routledge (Routledge Philosophical Minds) (invited).

Research software and data

(14) TextRefs: An Open Registry for Canonical Text References (with Moritz Mähr). Zenodo, 2026. textrefs.org

TextRefs gives every classical citation, such as ‘Plato, Republic 514a’ or a Bekker line of Aristotle, one permanent web address, and links the passage to the editions, translations and library records that contain it. An open standard, run by a non-profit association in Zürich under the Principles of Open Scholarly Infrastructure; the data are in the public domain (CC0).

Nodality Lab

• Founded and directed by me since 2025, at the Institute of Philosophy, University of Potsdam; it grew out of the Argument Mapping Project (AMP). Nine members from seven institutions: Birmingham, St Andrews, Leuven, Paris, Karlsruhe, Bern and Potsdam. Lines of research: nodal logic, nodal epistemology, nodal affordance, clinical reasoning, and lineages of justification. Taught in the seminar Applied Nodal Logic, 2026/27.

Corpora Sellarsianae Online (CSO)

• The digital bibliography of the writings of Wilfrid Sellars, in collaboration with Robert Brandom and the Archives & Special Collections of the University of Pittsburgh Library

Funding

• 2026: Digital Humanities Microgrant, University of Potsdam (applicant)
• 2025: Fritz Thyssen Foundation, workshop grant for Rules, Functions and Categories, EUR 15,000, with Sebastian Luft (Paderborn)
• 2026, under review: CONICET–DAAD, Reference and Functional Classification in Sellars's Philosophy, German principal investigator, with Daniel Kalpokas (Córdoba)

Conferences, workshops and series convened (a selection from twenty since 2020)

• 19–20 November 2026: Inference Tickets for Trains of Thought. New Directions in Inferentialism, a workshop for early-career researchers, University of Potsdam (with Riccardo Tarantino, Matías von dem Bussche and Leone Zellini)
• 24 June 2026: Inference and Object, Nodality Lab workshop with Ulf Hlobil, University of Potsdam (with Melcher Abramowski)
• 12 May 2026: Husserl, Sellars, Intentionality, Husserl Archives, KU Leuven (with Agnė Valatkaitė and Gregor Bös)
• 24 April 2026: Permanence in Hegelian Thought and Spirit, workshop with Sally Sedgwick (Boston), Dina Emundts and Rolf-Peter Horstmann, Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin
• 31 October 2025: Cosmopolitan Legal Theory in an Anti-Cosmopolitan Age, Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin (with Joshua Nichols, McGill)
• 10–11 October 2025: Rules, Functions and Categories: A Workshop on Wilfrid Sellars, University of Paderborn (with Sebastian Luft)
• 2025/26: Notiz nehmen, lecture series, University of Potsdam
• 3–4 May 2025: Models and Theories, book symposium on Roman Frigg, University of Potsdam (with Leon Isenmann)
• 11 April 2025: What is Given is What is Taken: Reading Sellars reading C. I. Lewis, University of Potsdam, with Cheryl Misak, James R. O'Shea and Johannes Haag
• 13 December 2024: Hypergraph Literacy, workshop and panel, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (with Monika Raič)
• 2022/23: The Sensory Element in Experience, monthly reading group with Yale, Tel Aviv, Padua, Humboldt-Universität and Potsdam
• August 2020: A-Deduction, Objectivity and Intentionality, workshop with James R. O'Shea and Johannes Haag, University of Potsdam

• Introduction to Logic and Argument Theory, an annual lecture course since 2023/24; introductory lectures in philosophy, theoretical philosophy and epistemology
• 2026/27: Applied Nodal Logic, a seminar in which the work of the Nodality Lab is taught
• Seminars on the philosophy of information, metaphysics, argument mapping and digital methods; reading classes on Sellars, Kant, Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit, Wittgenstein's Tractatus, Bourdieu's Logic of Practice, Dirk Hartmann's epistemology and Charlotte Witt's metaphysics of gender
• Coordinator of the reading classes (Lektürekurse) at the Institute of Philosophy
• 2026: convenor of a working group at the summer academy of the Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes, on the ecological crisis and liberal society (with Jan-Philipp Kruse)
• Erasmus+ teaching at the University of Bologna (2025), with guest lectures in Modena and Reggio Emilia and at Tor Vergata, Rome; earlier teaching at Leipzig and at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

Supervision and examining

• BA and MA dissertations in theoretical philosophy, logic and metametaphysics (since 2023)
• 2025: external examiner of a doctoral thesis, University of Auckland

A selection from thirty-four.

• 2026: ‘Komplexitätsbewältigung durch Nodalisierung’, Villa Vigoni, German-Italian Centre for European Dialogue, Loveno di Menaggio
• 2026: ‘Why to be is to make a difference: Actuality in Nodality, Process Ontology, and Morphisms’, Research Centre for Greek Philosophy, Academy of Athens
• 2026: ‘A Logic for Nodality, a Notation for Implication Space’, Workshop on the Philosophy of Wilfrid Sellars, Charles University, Prague
• 2026: ‘Accepting First Principles’, Husserl, Sellars, Intentionality, Husserl Archives, KU Leuven
• 2026: ‘Arguments as Vehicles for the Space of Intelligence: A Model for Explanatory Power’, London School of Economics (chair: Roman Frigg)
• 2025: ‘Nodal Logic: Ein Modell für den Raum der Gründe’, research seminar of Dirk Hartmann, University of Duisburg-Essen
• 2025: ‘Proposition as Position: Axioms of Nodal Logic’, From Text to Thought, Husserl Archives, KU Leuven
• 2025: ‘Urteilsumgebung’, Center for Adaptive Rationality (Ralph Hertwig), Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Berlin
• 2024: ‘Hypergraphing the Space of Reason’, Wittgenstein Archives, University of Bergen
• 2016: ‘Sellars on Intentionality’, Huw Price's research group, Trinity College, Cambridge

• Referee for Synthese, the Journal of Transcendental Philosophy, the British Journal for the History of Philosophy, The Southern Journal of Philosophy, the International Journal of Philosophical Studies and Philosophy; reader for Routledge and Springer
• Member of the German Society for Philosophy (working group on the philosophy of digitality), the German Society for Analytic Philosophy, and the Society for German Idealism and Romanticism