Stephen Finlay, previously professor of philosophy and director of the Dianoia Institute at Australian Catholic University, will be moving to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where he will be professor of philosophy.

Readers may recall that Finlay was among the philosophers brought to Australia by Australian Catholic University to take up permanent positions at its Dianoia Institute, only for the university a few years later to close the institute and terminate the contracts of its researchers. Though in 2023 the university administration assured Finlay he would keep his job, it went back on that commitment and let him go in 2024. Prior to his time at Dianoia he was at the University of Southern California.

Professor Finlay is known for his work in metaethics. He is the author of, among other things, the book Confusion of Tongues: A Theory of Normative Language. You can learn more about his writings here.

He takes up his new position in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Illinois, where he earned his PhD, in the fall of 2025.

Professor Finlay is the sixth hire the department has made over the past two years (the others are Luvell Anderson, Verena Erlenbusch-Anderson, Alison Duncan Kerr, Kevin Scharp, and John Schwenkler).