Toby Friend

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Toby received his PhD from UCL in 2018 for a thesis expounding a novel perspective on the relationship between type- and token-level causal relations and laws of nature. He has also been a Teaching Fellow at UCL's Science & Technology Studies and Philosophy departments lecturing courses on Philosophy of Science, Metaphysics and Metaphysics of Science. More recently Toby has been assistant both to the editors of Philosophy and the European Journal for Philosophy of Science. Before his doctorate Toby studied philosophy at Birkbeck and UCL and before that, design-engineering at the University of Glasgow and Glasgow School of Art.

Toby's research predominantly centres on the intersection of metaphysical issues concerning laws of nature and causation. A motivating thought is that causal relations are metaphysically basic but also amenable to analysis, such as subsumption under laws. The causal and constitutive individuation of events, and the role of laws in their individuation, will play a significant role in forthcoming research. Toby has also developed work on the topic of persistence and time.

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