About

I'm an associate professor of philosophy at Tufts University. Most of my research is in the philosophy of language and formal semantics, but I'm also interested in epistemology, the philosophy of mind, metaphysics, and philosophical logic. Along with Ariel Goldberg, I direct the Linguistics Minor at Tufts, and I teach a number of courses related to this, including Semantics, Philosophy of Language, and Modal Logic. I hold a BA from the University of Western Ontario, a BPhil from Oxford University, and a PhD from MIT. From 2019-2024, I was an Editor-in-Chief of Linguistics and Philosophy. During the 2020-2021 academic year, I was a fellow at the Paris Institute for Advanced Study.

Work

  1. A Relationist Theory of Intentional Identity
    Forthcoming in Mind.
    local file
  2. First-Person Propositions (with Michael Caie)
    Forthcoming in Philosophers' Imprint.
    philpapers preprint
  3. An Expressivist Theory of Taste Predicates
    Forthcoming in Philosophers' Imprint.
    local file
  4. Modality and the Future: Critical Notice of The Modal Future by Fabrizio Cariani
    2024. Analysis. (advance online version)
    local file | link
  5. Relativism and Two Kinds of Branching Time
    2023. Pacific Philosophical Quarterly. 104(2): 465-492.
    local file | link
  6. Dynamic Relationism about Belief
    2022. Proceedings of the 23rd Amsterdam Colloquium. 221-227
    local file
  7. Assertion, Evidence, and the Future
    2022. Philosophical Review. 131(4): 405-451.
    local file | DOI: 10.1215/00318108-10136817
  8. Williams on the Self and the Future
    2022. Analytic Philosophy. 63(3): 147-155.
    local file | DOI: 10.1111/phib.12229
  9. Knowing, Believing, and Acting as if You Know
    2021. Behavioral and Brain Sciences. 44(E164).
    local file | DOI: 10.1017/S0140525X20001545
  10. Naming and Epistemic Necessity
    2021. Noûs 55(2): 334-362.
    local file | DOI: 10.1111/nous.12314
  11. The Projection Problem for Predicates of Taste
    2020. Semantics and Linguistic Theory (SALT) 30, 753-778.
    local file | DOI: 10.3765/salt.v30i0.4809
  12. De Se Attitudes and Action
    2020. In S. Biggs and H. Geirsson (eds.), The Routledge Handbook of Linguistic Reference, Routledge.
    local file
  13. Quantification and Epistemic Modality
    2018. Philosophical Review 127(2): 433-485.
    Selected by the Philosopher's Annual as one of the ten best papers published in philosophy in 2018.
    local file | DOI: 10.1215/00318108-6973010
  14. Relational Semantics and Domain Semantics for Epistemic Modals
    2018. Journal of Philosophical Logic 47(1): 1-16.
    local file | DOI: 10.1007/s10992-016-9414-x
  15. Aboutness and Justification
    2017. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 95(3): 371-377.
    local file | DOI: 10.1111/phpr.12418
  16. Names in Fiction
    2017. Theoretical Linguistics 43(1-2): 61-70
    local file | DOI: 10.1515/tl-2017-0004
  17. Imagination and the Self
    2016. In A. Kind (ed.), The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Imagination, Routledge.
    local file | link
  18. What is the Problem of De Se Attitudes?
    2016. In M. Garcia-Carpintero and S. Torre (eds.),
    About Oneself: De Se Attitudes and Communication, Oxford University Press.
    local file | link
  19. Review of John MacFarlane, Assessment Sensitivity: Relative Truth and Its Applications.
    2016. Philosophical Review 125(3): 439-447.
    local file | DOI: 10.1215/00318108-3517041
  20. On Recanati's Mental Files
    2015. Inquiry 58(4): 368-377.
    local file | DOI: 10.1080/0020174X.2014.883751
  21. Taste Predicates and the Acquaintance Inference
    2014. Semantics and Linguistic Theory (SALT ) 24: 290-309.
    local file | link
  22. Self-Location and Other-Location
    2013. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 87(2):301-331.
    local file | DOI: 10.1111/phpr.12051
  23. Counterfactual Attitudes and Multi-Centered Worlds
    2012. Semantics and Pragmatics 5(5):1-57.
    DOI: 10.3765/sp.5.5
  24. Propositions, Semantic Values, and Rigidity
    2012. Philosophical Studies 158(3): 401-413.
    local file | DOI: 10.1007/s11098-010-9677-y
  25. Review of Robin Jeshion (ed.), New Essays on Singular Thought.
    2011. Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews.
    link
  26. Review of Stephen Yablo, Thoughts: Philosophical Papers, Vol. I.
    2011. Protosociology.
    link
  27. Semantics and the Objects of Assertion
    2010. Linguistics and Philosophy 33(5): 355-380.
    local file | DOI: 10.1007/s10988-011-9084-7
  28. De Se Attitudes: Ascription and Communication
    2010. Philosophy Compass 5(7): 551-567.
    link | DOI: 10.1111/j.1747-9991.2010.00290.x
  29. Persistence and the First-Person Perspective
    2009. Philosophical Review 118(4): 425-464.
    local file | DOI: 10.1215/00318108-2009-014
  30. Two Puzzles About Deontic Necessity
    2005. MIT Working Papers in Linguistics 51: 149-178.
    link

More work

  1. Comments on L.A. Paul, Transformative Experience.
    2015. Notes for talk at the Norwegian Institute in Athens.
    local file
  2. Imagination, Content, and the Self
    2008. PhD dissertation, MIT.
    local file | link
  3. Illusions of Influence in Newcomb's Problem
    2006. Unpublished manuscript.
    local file

Contact

111 Miner Hall, Tufts University
Medford, MA, 02155, USA
dilip.ninan [at] tufts.edu
+1 (857) 756-2324