GRADUATE STUDENTS IN ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY
London is a thriving community for ancient philosophy. Below are students who are currently studying on graduate programmes in ancient philosophy.
LUCA DONDONI
PhD Student, Department of Philosophy
Before joining UCL, Luca Dondoni (luca.dondoni.21@ucl.ac.uk) completed an MPhil. Stud. in Philosophy at King’s College London, studied at Collegio Ghislieri (Pavia, IT), where he received a B.A. and M.A. from the University of Pavia, and an M.A. from IUSS, and visited the Departments of Philosophy at the Central European University (HU) and at Durham University (UK). His main research interests lie at the crossroads between ancient Greek philosophy (especially later Plato and the Presocratics) and contemporary metaphysics of mind (especially consciousness), with a specific focus on the distribution of mind within the physical reality. As a Keeling-funded PhD candidate, his research is supervised by Dr Fiona Leigh (UCL) and Prof. Raphael Woolf (KCL), and aims at investigating to what extent the Timaean metaphysics may be helpful to solve some pressing concerns in contemporary (analytic) philosophy of mind (e.g., the Hard Problem of Consciousness) — on the way to a form of Platonic Panpsychism.
YAQUB ENEBORG
MPhil Stud Student, Department of Philosophy
Yaqub Eneborg read for an MA in Philosophy at Koç University, Istanbul, with a thesis entitled ‘Bodily Desire, Perception, and Belief in the Phaedo’, under the supervision of Dr Damien Storey. Before this, he studied Arabic and Middle Eastern Studies (Stockholm), Classical Arabic (Amman), and Islamic Studies (Cambridge), focusing particularly on philosophy and philosophical theology in the Islamic world. Yaqub joined UCL in 2023 and is currently enrolled in the MPhil.Stud. Philosophical Studies programme as a Keeling scholar. His main interests lie in epistemology, psychology, language, and logic, in both the Ancient Greek and Arabic philosophical traditions.
LAWRENCE EVANS
Keeling Research Assistant, PhD Student, Department of Philosophy
Lawrence Evans received his MPhil. Stud. from UCL at the end of 2019, with a thesis on Aristotle’s function argument in the Nicomachean Ethics. He started his PhD at UCL in 2020, with a thesis centred on Aristotle’s conception of eudaimonia and its relation to human nature, primarily supervised by Dr Fiona Leigh, with addition supervision by Dr Elena Cagnoli Fiecconi and Dr Simona Aimar. Besides Aristotle’s ethics, he has research interests in Plato and in ancient philosophy more generally. He has taught a number of modules on ancient philosophy as a PGTA in the Philosophy Department at UCL. He also taught the ‘Introduction to Ancient Philosophy’ module in the UCL Summer School in Ancient Philosophy 2023. In May 2023, he was appointed as the Keeling Research Assistant in the Keeling Centre for Ancient Philosophy at UCL.
INDIA GRIFFITHS
PhD Student, Department of Philosophy
India Griffiths received her BA in Philosophy from University College London (2021), with a thesis on Sartre’s philosophical use of fictional prose. She advanced directly onto the UCL MPhil programme and is currently enrolled as a second–year MPhil student, writing her thesis under the supervision of Fiona Leigh on moral degeneration in Plato’s Republic, specifically focusing on Plato’s tyrannical character. Her research interests include ancient moral psychology, the role of vice in Plato and Aristotle, mythology in ancient philosophy, and alsobroader interests in German Idealism and Existentialism.
ANTONIO LAI
PhD Student, Department of Philosophy
Antonio Lai received his B.A. in Philosophy from National Taiwan University. He then joined the MPhil. Stud. programme in Philosophy at UCL (his thesis was entitled: ‘How can the Concept of Immortality be Understood in Plato’s Symposium?’), working under the supervision of Dr Fiona Leigh. His main research interests are in Plato’s ethics and moral psychology. He started a PhD at UCL in September 2021 and his thesis is focused on Plato’s doctrine of ‘Homoiōsis Theōi’ under the supervision of Dr Fiona Leigh (temporarily on a remote basis).
JELENA MILOSAVLJEVIC
PhD Student, Department of Philosophy
Jelena Milosavljevic received her B.A. in Philosophy (2020) from King’s College London with a thesis on Aristotle’s account of akrasia. She joined UCL in September 2020 and is currently enrolled in the MPhil. Stud. Philosophical Studies programme, funded by the department’s Keeling Scholarship. Her research interests include ancient moral psychology and philosophy of action, particularly accounts found in Aristotle’s ethical works and those of ancient Greek scepticism.
ALBA MIRIELLO
PhD Student, Department of Philosophy
Alba Miriello received both her B.A. in Philosophy (first class) in 2014 and her M.A (summa cum laude) in 2015 from the University of Pisa. Her M.A. dissertation, entitled ‘The Socratic Daemonin Plotinus’ Enneades: Ennead III 4 15, Translation and Commentary’, has been published. In 2018, she received an M.A. in Philosophy from Birkbeck College, University of London, with a thesis entitled ‘An account of kinesis in Plotinus’ Nous’ under the supervision of Dr Sophia Connell. In 2019, she joined the Department of Philosophy at UCL, awarded the Keeling Scholarship for research in ancient philosophy. She is currently writing her MPhil. Stud. dissertation on the Form of the Good in Plato’s Republic under the supervision of Dr Fiona Leigh. Her main interests are Plato’s metaphysics and Neoplatonism. In 2012, she spent one year on the Erasmusprogramme in Regensburg (Germany), as part of her B.A.
JOSEPH SIBLEY
MPhil Stud Student, Department of Philosophy
Joseph Sibley read for a BA in PPE at the University of Oxford. He also obtained the MSt in Ancient Philosophy there with a thesis entitled ‘Aristotle on Emotion and Moral Development’. He joined UCL in 2022 and is currently enrolled in the MPhil Stud. Philosophical Studies programme as a Keeling scholar. He is broadly interested in ancient ethical thought, and more particularly in the moral psychology found in the works of Plato and Aristotle.