Research

My interests run broad. Here are some projects, questions, and themes that I’m currently working on or have been interested in:

The Reality of the Ideal: A Study of Kant’s Highest Good

(Oxford University Press, 2025)

What is the good of the highest good in everyday life? I propose a new interpretation that sees its importance as fulfilling a contemplative need to construct a worldview. Part of it rests on my view of how an ideal in a Kantian sense might be practical without guiding our action (here is a sample of my view).

This is my first book. It began from research that I started in my dissertation (thank you to the Institute for Citizens and Scholars who funded me with the Charlotte W. Newcombe Dissertation Fellowship) and which I’ve continued to develop during my time at Princeton.

Available for order at Amazon, Oxford University Press, and Barnes & Noble.

Gödel’s Theological Worldview

Beyond proving the existence of God, what else did Kurt Gödel believe was possible to discern about theological topics via reason? Through a discovery that his views on immortality are quite similar to Kant’s (see below), I began digging around the IAS archives and discovered a rabbit hole that I’m continuing to tumble down. It is also giving me the opportunity to learn the out-of-date German form of stenography known as Gabelsberger, which he used to write almost all of his notes.

My plan: reconstruct Gödel’s views on God, religion, and immortality through a close analysis of his correspondence, philosophical notebooks, and personal library at IAS.

For a sample of my work, see my essay in Aeon: https://aeon.co/essays/kurt-godel-his-mother-and-the-argument-for-life-after-death

I was also recently featured on NPR’s The Academic Minute: https://academicminute.org/2024/02/alexander-englert-institute-for-advanced-study-why-godel-believed-in-an-afterlife/

This has also gotten some nice reactions and media mentions on:

Leiter Reports: https://leiterreports.typepad.com/blog/2024/01/g%C3%B6dels-arguments-for-belief-in-an-afterlife.html

New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/05/opinion/the-crown.html?searchResultPosition=3

The Atlantic: https://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/archive/2024/01/the-debate-that-claudine-gay-is-evading/677032/

Real Clear Science: https://www.realclearscience.com/2024/01/03/why_logician_kurt_godel_believed_in_the_afterlife_1002418.html

Hegel’s Pure Idea of Life

Hegel claims that life is a category that arises out of his Science of Logic. How, though, does he do this precisely? And if he can pull it off, what does this teach us about organic life and non-organic forms that mimic it (e.g., A.I.)?

I have a paper on the first question in Hegel-Studien (here). I’m working on the second question currently in papers in progress and talks.

Fichte’s Worldview vis-à-vis the Buddhist Yogachara Tradition

When reading Fichte’s Guide to a Blessed Life, I was struck by passages that reminded me of my loose grasp of Buddhist philosophy. I asked the study group: “Is Fichte close to Buddhism here?” No one knew. At Princeton, I found Jonathan Gold (Department of Religion), who has a deep knowledge on such things! And the developing answer to my question is: “More than one would initially think.” We have since published an essay on what we found in The Immanent Frame, which is a reflection on the nature of comparative philosophy.

Jonathan and I co-organized this workshop to dig into connections and disconnects. We’re still working it out. Many papers are currently percolating on kicking away the ladder arguments, freedom-vs.-liberation, and the status of the concept through a comparative lens. I also want to look more into Fichte’s view of worldview as a technical term, which I have already begun to study (here).

The Moral Imagination

For a while, I have been working on Kant’s notion of imagination and how it might relate to morality. This connects to questions that I have about the trolley problem and how Kant would answer it. I’m working on a paper that seeks to get Kant out of the hot seat of having to treat individuals as means.

Connectedly, I’m curious about whether we can radically revolutionize our characters at will. Kant suggests that we must; but how we can is unclear. I’ve given a talk recently exploring this connecting Kant to the late Wittgenstein and William James’ work on conversion.

Are we immortal?

Kant says we must believe we so. I’m working on some of his stranger arguments that have not been studied as much, namely: one based on teleology (for my paper on it, click here), and one in which Kant references the devil.

Kant’s Last Work: the Opus postumum

Kant’s last posthumous work is a labyrinth with many fascinating twists and turns. Kant suddenly is interested in what he terms, “self-positing.” And he presents novel arguments about how we form a view of the world. I’m interested in how he develops his practical and religious thought here.