Professor Cynthia Macdonald
Position
- Adjunct Professor of Philosophy
- Professor of Philosophy at Queen’s University, Belfast, Northern Ireland
Qualifications
- B.A. (Wayne State)
- B.Phil. (Oxford)
- D.Phil (Oxford)
Contact Details
cynthia.macdonald@canterbury.ac.nz
Background
Cynthia Macdonald was educated at Wayne State University, where she completed her Bachelor of Arts degree, and the University of Oxford, where she completed her B.Phil in Philosophy (Somerville College) and her D.Phil in Philosophy (Wolfson College). From 1975 to 1998 she taught at the University of Manchester, first as a lecturer, then as a Senior Lecturer and as a Reader in Philosophy. She was appointed Professor of Philosophy at the University of Canterbury in September 1998.
She has held the Belle van Zuylen Visiting Professorship at the University of Utrecht, and Visiting Professorships at the Queen's University, Belfast, Rutgers University and Columbia University. From 2003 to 2004 she was an External Residential Fellow at the Humanities Institute, University of Connecticut. Prior to her departure from Manchester, she was Honorary Secretary of the Mind Association; and she is currently Associate Editor of the Australasian Journal of Philosophy. She has participated in a number of international conferences and invited lecture tours.
Research Interests
Cynthia's research interests are in the areas of philosophy of mind, philosophy of psychology and cognitive science, and metaphysics. She is currently working on two research projects. One, funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, is on the topic of Authoritative Self-Knowledge. The other, with Graham Macdonald, funded by the Royal Society of New Zealand Marsden fund, is on the topic of Mental Causation and Explanation in the Human Sciences.
Cynthia is author of Mind-Body Identity Theories (Routledge's Problems of Philosophy Series), and Varieties of Things: Foundation sof Contemporary Metaphysics (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 2005). She is also co-editor (with Graham Macdonald) of Philosophy of Psychology: Debates on Psychological Explanation and Connectionism: Debates on Psychological Explanation, Knowing Our Own Minds (with Crispin Wright and Barry Smith), Readings in the Foundations of Contemporary Metaphysics (with Stephen Laurence), and McDowell and His critics (with Graham Macdonald, 2005). She has published widely in the areas of philosophy of mind, philosophy of psychology, and metaphysics, in The Journal of Philosophy, Mind, Nous, Synthese, Analysis, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, and edited collections.