Rate My Professor Jon Cogburn

Jon Cogburn is a Professor of Philosophy and serves as the Chair of the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies at Louisiana State University. His office is located in 116 Coates Hall. Cogburn obtained his B.A. in Philosophy from the University of Texas at Austin in 1993 and his Ph.D. in Philosophy from The Ohio State University in 1999. His research specializations and academic interests include philosophy of language, mind, and logic, formal logic, theories of concepts, Montague semantics, metaphysics, epistemology, object-oriented ontology, philosophy through video games, continental analytic philosophy, philosophy of art, and philosophy in literature.

Cogburn has an extensive publication record, including books such as Garcian Meditations: The Dialectics of Persistence in Form and Object (Edinburgh University Press, 2017), Philosophy Through Video Games co-authored with Mark Silcox (Routledge, 2009), Dungeons and Dragons and Philosophy: Raiding the Temple of Wisdom co-edited with Mark Silcox (Open Court, 2012), The Graham Harman Reader co-edited with Niki Young (Zero Books, 2023), and Kayfabe Nation: Professional Wrestling, Donald Trump, and the New Cynicism co-authored with Neil Hebert (Punctum Press, 2025). He has translated works by Tristan Garcia, including Form and Object: A Treatise on Things with Mark Ohm (Edinburgh University Press, 2014), Letting Be, Volume I: The Life Intense (Edinburgh University Press, 2018), and The Architecture of the Possible (Polity, 2022). Peer-reviewed articles by Cogburn appear in journals such as Open Philosophy ("Revisiting the Notion of Vicarious Cause: Allure, Metaphor, and Realism in Object-Oriented Ontology," 2024, with Niki Young), Erkenntnis ("Pritchard’s Epistemology and Necessary Truths," 2022, with J. Roland), Pacific Philosophical Quarterly ("Safety and the True-True Problem," 2013, with J. Roland), American Philosophical Quarterly ("The Emergence of Emergence: Computability and Ontology," 2011, with M. Silcox), and Synthese ("Manifest Invalidity: Neil Tennant’s New Argument for Intuitionism," 2003).

Cogburn teaches courses including PHIL 1000 Introduction to Philosophy, PHIL 2010 Symbolic Logic, PHIL 3410 Metaphysics, PHIL 3830 Philosophy of Mind, PHIL 4160/7160 Kant, PHIL 4190/7190 Object-Oriented Ontology, and PHIL 4351/7351 Philosophy Through Video Games. As department chair, he leads faculty and initiatives such as the AI & Religion Collaborative.