Paul S. Miklowitz

Professor

Contact Information

• Office: Bldg. 47, Rm. 34B
• Phone: 805-756-2868
• Email: pmiklowi@calpoly.edu
• Web Page: www.calpoly.edu/~pmiklowi/

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Education

• Ph.D., M.Phil., Yale University
• M.A., University of Chicago
• B.A., University of California

Research

A new book, God, the Soul, and the Limits of Knowledge:  Foundations of Metaphysics and Epistemology in Plato, Descartes and Kant, is now complete and looking for a publisher.  As the title suggests, it covers the material I teach on a regular basis in PHIL 230.  Besides this project, I have a couple of papers in progress on topics that range from the status of philosophy as a discipline straddling the domains of art and science to an extrapolation of Descartes’ dreaming hypothesis through an insight of Kant’s.

Awards & Honors

• Fulbright National Screening Committee for academic programs in Germany (2010, 2011, 2013)
• Sabbatical Leave, Cal Poly (Fall 2015)
• Sabbatical Leave, Cal Poly (Fall 2008 - Winter 2009)
• Finalist, Cal Poly Distinguished Teaching Award (AY 2005 2006)
• Visiting Fellow, Princeton University
• Faculty Recognition Award for Outstanding Teaching, College of Liberal Arts, Cal Poly
• Teacher of the Year, School of Liberal Arts, Cal Poly
• Andrew W. Mellon Postdoctoral Faculty Fellowship in the Humanities, Rice University
• Prize Teaching Fellowship, Yale University
• Mary Cady Tew Prize for Scholastic Excellence, Yale University
• Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD) Summer Stipend for study in Germany

Selected Publications

• “The State of Things,” in The Bottom Line weblog for the exhibitions “Lebbeus Woods, Architect” (SFMOMA, February 16 – June 2, 2013; The Drawing Center, New York City, Summer 2014), posted May 9, 2014.  Link:  http://thebottomline.drawingcenter.org/2014/05/09/the-state-of-things/
• Metaphysics to Metafictions: Hegel, Nietzsche, and the End of Philosophy (State University of New York Press)
• “Zarathustra's Secret: Releasing Nietzsche from Joachim Köhler's Closet” in New Nietzsche Studies
• “Unreading Nietzsche: Nazi Piracy, Pyrrhic Irony, and the Postmodern Turn” in New Nietzsche Studies
• “Same As It Ever Was: Plagiarism, Forgery, and the Meaning of Eternal Return” in Journal of Nietzsche Studies
• “Diskussion: Response to John T. Wilcox” in Nietzsche-Studien
• “The Ontological Status of Style in Hegel's Phenomenology” in Idealistic Studies

Selected Presentations

• “Bach and the Enlightenment” (with David Arrivée), Cal Poly Bach Week, 19 January 2017
• “Reflections on the Epistemology of Fanaticism,” Princeton University
• “After Values: A Nietzschean Eschatology,” Nietzsche and the Coming Millennium: On the Music of the Best Future (international conference at Villa le Balze, Fiesole, Italy)
• “Unreading Nietzsche,” Third Annual Conference of the Friedrich Nietzsche Society, University of London

Service

• Chair, Philosophy Department (1996-99)
• Chair, Academic Senate Library Committee
• Chair, CLA Professional Leave Committee

Courses Taught

• PHIL 429: Special Topics in the History of Philosophy - Kant's Critique of Pure Reason
• PHIL 429: Special Topics in the History of Philosophy - Schopenhauer
• PHIL 429: Special Topics in the History of Philosophy - Nietzsche
• PHIL 400: Special Problems
• PHIL 331: Ethics
• PHIL 316: Contemporary European Philosophy
• PHIL 315: German Philosophy: Kant to Nietzsche
• PHIL 231: Philosophical Classics - Ethics & Political Philosophy
• PHIL 230: Philosophical Classics - Knowledge & Reality
• HUM X335: Fanaticism
• HUM 361: Modernism - with Harry Helenbrand (former Dean of CLA) and Serim Denel/Bruno Giberti/Scott Schlimgen (Architecture)

Other

• Photography (image published as a journal cover and two juried awards in contests in New York, including first place black and white)
• Painting (oil and acrylic)
• Poetry and fiction writing (novel in progress)
• Winemaking