Rate My Professor Donald Smith

Donald Smith, Ph.D., serves as Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Philosophy at Virginia Commonwealth University, where he is located in Room 107, 915 W. Franklin Street. His academic journey began at Virginia Commonwealth University, where he earned a B.F.A. in Painting and Printmaking in 1993, followed by a B.A. in Philosophy and a B.S. in Mathematics, both in 1999. He completed his Ph.D. in Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame in 2004, with a dissertation titled 'Persistence, Persons, and Vagueness.' Smith's research interests encompass metaphysics, epistemology, and philosophy of religion, with areas of specialization in metaphysics and epistemology.

Smith has made significant contributions to philosophical literature through numerous peer-reviewed publications. Notable works include: '‘Wholly Present’ Defined,' co-authored with Thomas M. Crisp, published in Philosophy and Phenomenological Research (2005); 'Vague Singulars, Semantic Indecision, and the Metaphysics of Persons' in Philosophy and Phenomenological Research (2007); 'Kant on the Dependency of the Cosmological Argument on the Ontological Argument' in European Journal of Philosophy (2003); 'The Vagueness Argument for Mereological Universalism' in Pacific Philosophical Quarterly (2006); 'Mereology without Weak Supplementation' in Australasian Journal of Philosophy (2009); 'Chisholm's Phenomenal Argument Revisited: A Dilemma for Perdurantism' in American Philosophical Quarterly (2010); 'How to Endure an Alleged Paradox' in Journal of Philosophical Research (2008); and 'Knowledge and Lotteries' in Philosophical Books (2005). He has also contributed book chapters such as 'On Zimmerman's ‘The Providential Usefulness of Simple Foreknowledge’' in Reason, Metaphysics, and Mind: New Essays on the Philosophy of Alvin Plantinga (2012) and 'The Fall of the Mind Argument and Some Lessons about Freedom,' co-authored with E. J. Coffman, in Action, Ethics, and Responsibility (2010). These publications address key issues in metaphysics and epistemology.