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The College of Humanities and Social Sciences is proud to honor Tannaz Haddadi, BA Philosophy '99, MS Conflict Analysis and Resolution '05, with the Distinguished Alumni Award in philosophy. Haddadi is a deputy associate director at the Federal Reserve Board and a senior executive with more than two decades of leadership across government, private, and nonprofit sectors.

The College of Humanities and Social Sciences is proud to honor Steve Bodmer, BA Philosophy '03, with the 2024 Distinguished Alumni award in philosophy. Bodmer is a distinguished legal professional with a rich background in federal Indian law and dedication to Native communities. He is an enrolled member of the Edisto Natchez-Kusso Tribe of South Carolina and a veteran of the U.S. Navy.

Dasha Pruss is an assistant professor of philosophy and computer science at George Mason University. Previously, she was a 2023-2024 fellow at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society and a postdoctoral fellow in the Embedded Ethics program at Harvard University. She received her PhD in history & philosophy of science from the University of Pittsburgh in 2023 and holds a BS in computer science from the University of Utah. Her work has been funded by the National Science Foundation and the Horowitz Foundation for Social Policy.

In Memoriam: Mark Sagoff (1941-2023) Mark Sagoff was a leading and foundational figure in environmental philosophy and ethics and one of the first members of the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy, founded in 1978. Originally a scholar of Kant and aesthetics, Sagoff published widely in journals of philosophy, law, economics, and the environment. His books The Economy of the Earth (1988), and Price, Principle, and the Environment (2004) are considered landmarks in the field.

Christopher D. Merwin is a Postdoctoral Fellow in George Mason’s Philosophy Department. He earned his B.A. in Philosophy and Religious Studies, with a minor in Classics, at Boston University; completed an M.A. in Philosophy at the New School for Social Research; and earned his Ph.D. in Philosophy at Emory University, with a dissertation entitled “The Metaphysics of Temporality: Heidegger’s Later Concept of Time”. Dr. Merwin was awarded a Fulbright Award to conduct research at the Martin Heidegger Archives from 2018 to 2019. His research interests include phenomenology (especially the work of Edmund Husserl, Martin Heidegger, and Maurice Merleau-Ponty), the metaphysics of time in the history of philosophy, environmental philosophy and the philosophy of nature, the philosophy of science and technology, and ancient philosophy.

George Mason University philosophy professor Andrew Peterson co-authors paper setting the first ethical framework for practitioners offering psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy.

Director Penny Lane’s decision to become a “Good Samaritan” by giving one of her kidneys to a stranger launches her on an unexpectedly funny, intimate, and provocative quest to understand why everyone seems to think she’s crazy.

The residential research fellows for fall 2024 and spring 2025 are drawn from across a variety of departments and programs in the College of Humanities of Social Sciences as well as the Schar School of Policy and Government. Their diverse projects explore the CHR's 2024-25 theme of "humanity and its others."