Kyle van Oosterum

About

I am a Research Fellow at the University of Southampton working on the ERC 'Ethics of Doubt' Project (PI: Genia Schönbaumsfeld).

Previously, I held postdoctoral fellowships at King's College London and University College London. I did my PhD in philosophy at Oxford, and before that, I studied philosophy at Cambridge and St Andrews.

Here's my CV. Email: k.van-oosterum@soton.ac.uk

Research

I work mainly in ethics, political philosophy, and social epistemology. I wrote my dissertation on the political philosophy of echo chambers (abstract here).

Specifically, I work on paternalism, civility, and interdisciplinary questions about how to regulate social media in a liberal society.

Lately, I've been thinking about grace as an alternative response to blaming others for their epistemic and moral faults.

Beyond this, I am fascinated by AI and emerging technologies not because they throw up new problems but because they cast the old ones in a new light. Here, I'm currently thinking about the ethics of advisory AI as well as the harms of deepfake technologies.

When I'm not doing philosophy, I play music, watch basketball, and spend an inordinate amount of time searching for the best food in London.

Chapters in Edited Volumes

‘The Duty to Amplify: Social Media, Hate, and Counterspeech’ (under contract) (with Jeffrey Howard) in Oxford Volume on Hate Speech (Title TBD), edited by Robin Jeshion.
'Automated Technologies and Artificial Intelligence' (forthcoming), Vikram Bhargava, Michael Kates (Eds.), An Introduction to Business Ethics: Philosophy, Policy, and Management, Routledge.
‘Civility, Trust, and Trustworthiness’ (under contract), The Oxford Handbook on Civility. Oxford University Press. Edited by Matteo Bonotti, Nancy Snow and John Symons.

Works-in-Progress

On platform regulation and neutrality (under review)
On political influence online (under review)
On advisory AI (w/Jen Semler).
On the wrongness of deepfakes (w/Emma J. Curran)

Public Philosophy

I write philosophy and politics essays on Substack --> 'Unchambered'.

I also recently participated in an Oxford Union debate on the motion 'This House Would End the Private Ownership of Social Media Platforms'. My team opposed the motion and won 144-32. Video coming soon! :)

From 2022-2025, I co-hosted the Philosopher's Nest podcast (with Lewis Williams). Together, we interviewed philosophy PhD students and asked them about their research and experiences in the (weird) world of academic philosophy.

I've also appeared on UCL's Uncovering Politics Podcast talking about my paper on echo chambers and civility.