Eric Servatius
- Graduate Student // Philosophy
Office and Contact
Email: eservati@purdue.edu
Eric’s research interests are in interdisciplinary social philosophy, broadly construed. Principal among these are the philosophy of psychology (esp. the psychology of norms, social cognition, and moral psychology), political philosophy, social and political epistemology, applied ethics, and the philosophy of mind and cognitive science (esp. distributed, extended, and scaffolded cognition).
While wide-ranging, his research is unified by two overarching themes. First, he studies how our cognitive processes and social institutions and environments reciprocally shape one another. Second, he examines whether—and if so, how—these empirical facts should inform our theories of epistemic and moral normativity and guide the design of sociopolitical structures. Throughout, he aims to better understand the contours of our robustly social existence.
Before joining the Philosophy Department at Purdue University, Eric earned dual bachelor’s degrees in political science and journalism from the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities (2021) and a master’s degree in philosophy from the University of Mississippi (2025), where his thesis examined the moral psychology of contempt and the role of third-person contempt expressions in social signaling and norm enforcement.
Outside of philosophy, Eric enjoys reading literary fiction, listening to jazz and hip-hop, cooking, exercising, and spending time with his wonderful girlfriend, Christian.
While wide-ranging, his research is unified by two overarching themes. First, he studies how our cognitive processes and social institutions and environments reciprocally shape one another. Second, he examines whether—and if so, how—these empirical facts should inform our theories of epistemic and moral normativity and guide the design of sociopolitical structures. Throughout, he aims to better understand the contours of our robustly social existence.
Before joining the Philosophy Department at Purdue University, Eric earned dual bachelor’s degrees in political science and journalism from the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities (2021) and a master’s degree in philosophy from the University of Mississippi (2025), where his thesis examined the moral psychology of contempt and the role of third-person contempt expressions in social signaling and norm enforcement.
Outside of philosophy, Eric enjoys reading literary fiction, listening to jazz and hip-hop, cooking, exercising, and spending time with his wonderful girlfriend, Christian.