I am a policy strategist for open access to scientific and scholarly research literature. Most of my work consists of research, writing, consulting, and advocacy. Most visibly, I am the Open Access Project Director at Public Knowledge, the author of the SPARC Open Access Newsletter, and the editor of the Open Access News blog.

If you support open access to peer-reviewed research articles and their preprints, then read my blog and newsletter. See what's been done and what you can do to help the cause. If you're not sure what open access is, then see my overview.

Until May 2003 I was a full-time professor of philosophy at Earlham College, where I had taught since 1982. I also taught computer science and law. Although I have left full-time teaching, I am still a research professor at Earlham and still work full-time in the academic universe. My philosophical interests (formerly, my teaching interests) lie chiefly in the history of modern European philosophy, science, and literature, roughly from Montaigne to Nietzsche; Kant, Hegel, and the German romantic generation of philosophers and writers; the history of western skepticism from Sextus Empiricus to the 20th century; epistemological and ethical issues related to skepticism, such as fictionalism, ideology, self-deception, and the ethics of belief; the logical, epistemological, ethical, and legal problems of self-reference; the metatheory of first-order logic; the ethics of liberty, paternalism, consent, and coercion; criminal law and tort law; the law and ethics of responsibility and excuse; and the philosophy of law. For more information, see my vita and publications.

My last book is The Case of the Speluncean Explorers:  Nine New Opinions (Routledge, 1998, reprinted with corrections 2002). See the Preface and Introduction, my page of information, or the Amazon pages on it (paperback or hardback).

Some of the looting in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina was done by starving people to obtain food. (Some wasn't, but here let's focus on the first kind.) Was that looting justified by necessity? If the looters are prosecuted and plead necessity, should they be acquitted? Are you looking for a book that explores the basis and boundaries of the necessity defense? What is judicial activism? How do judges with different moral and political beliefs interpret written law, how do they use precedents, how do they conceive the proper role of judges, how do they conceive the relationship between law and morality, and how do they defend their judicial practices against criticism? Are you looking for an even-handed book that illustrates the contending positions and lets you decide for yourself? Ahem. Try The Case of the Speluncean Explorers: Nine New Opinions.

Academic pages

• Academic publications and writings on open access
• Writings for the net
• Open Access News blog
• SPARC Open Access Newsletter
• Courses at Earlham College
• Nomic
• Curriculum vitae

Professional positions (most recent first)

• Member of the Publishing Working Group for Science Commons.
• Member of the Steering Committee of the Scientific Information Working Group of the U.N. World Summit on the Information Society.
• Member of the Advisory Board of American Library Association Information Commons.
• Director of the Open Access Project at Public Knowledge.
• Senior Researcher at the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC).
• Author of the SPARC Open Access Newsletter.
• Editor of the Open Access News blog.
• Moderator of the SPARC Open Access Forum, discussion list for my blog and newsletter.
• Member of the Board of Directors of the Bagaduce Watershed Association.
• Moderator of the BOAI Forum, discussion list for the Budapest Open Access Initiative.
• Consulting Editor of Episteme.
• Member of the Executive Committee of the International Association for Computing and Philosophy and co-editor of its Virtual Library of Philosophy.
• Senior Researcher at Noetic Laboratories.
• Member of the New Knot Claims Assessment Committee of the International Guild of Knot Tyers.
• Member of the Board of Governors of the International Consortium For The Advancement of Academic Publication.
• Co-Editor, Noesis:  Philosophical Research On-Line.
• General Editor, Hippias, The Limited-Area Search Engine for Philosophy.
• Senior Research Professor of Philosophy at Earlham College.

Guides and indices I maintain

• Course-related lists of links
• Guide to the Open Access Movement. (I'm phasing this out.)
• Guide to Philosophy on the Internet. Now also available in a multi-file edition.
• Guides to Disciplinary Guides. (I'm phasing this out.)
• Knots on the Web

Sites I formerly maintained

• The Earlham College Convocation Series on 20th century intellectual history (now completed).
• The Earlham College Daycare facilities. I created and maintained these pages until September 1998, when I turned them over to others.
• The Earlham College Philosophy Department. I created this site and maintained it until June 2001, when I turned it over to Ferit Güven.
• East Penobscot Bay Nature Education Resource Directory. I created the electronic version of this directory and in August 2000 turned over the maintenance to Helen Weinland.
• Law, Government, and Politics in Indiana. Now offline. I created this page for Infocom, a local ISP, and maintained it until December 1998.
• ReportCard. The professional grade managing software. Neither the software nor the web site is supported.
• Search engines. An attempt at a useful selection. Very much out of date.
• Undergraduate Philosophy Journals, Conferences, and Essay Contests. I created this page and maintained it until February 21, 2003, when I turned it over to Ferit Güven.

To have no time for philosophy is to be a true philosopher. Pascal, Pensées. Trans. A.J. Krailsheimer, Penguin, 1966, §513

Contacting me

• Email:  peters@earlham.edu. This is the best way to reach me. I read my email many times a day. If I'm too busy to reply quickly, I'll reply as soon as I can. Please don't send an attachment if you can put the message into the body of your email. If you must send an attachment, then at least explain what it is in the body of your email. For security reasons, I delete attachments not accompanied by explanations.
• Snail mail:  Please don't send snail mail if you can send email instead. If you don't know where I live, send me an email and I'll send you my address. I no longer live or work in Indiana, so please do not send me snail mail at any address in Indiana.
• Phone:  Please don't phone if you can send email instead. If you don't know my number, send me an email and I'll send you my phone number.
• Fax:  Please don't send a fax if you can send email instead. If you must send a fax, email or phone first to get the number and set up a time for delivery.