My main interests are the philosophy of language and metaphysics. In my thesis, I looked at the problem of negative existentials, which is the problem of how utterances of sentences like 'Santa Claus does not exist' could be true or meaningful, since they appear to involve the use of names that do not refer to anything.

Contact details

• Email: karen dot riley at anu dot edu dot au
• Fax: +612 6125 3294
• Office: D Block, room 1

• My cv
• Thesis abstract
• Online papers:
  • A version of Chapter 1 of my thesis, containing a discussion of the problem of negative existentials; Direct Reference; and fictionalism.
  • A version of Chapter 2 of my thesis, in which I discuss a variety of proposals for solving the problem of negative existentials.
  • 'The Phenomenology of Identity Statements', draft of 9 August 2006.
  • 'Kroon on Identity Statements', draft of 9 August 2006.

• Philosophy Program, RSSS
• Centre for Law and Philosophy, RSSS
• Law Program, RSSS
• The Australian Society for Legal Philosophy
• Graduate Studies in Philosophy

• David Chalmers' website
• 
• 
•