Matt Farr BA Philosophy

Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Centre for Time and Department of Philosophy, University of Sydney

Hi, I'm Matt Farr and I studied BA Philosophy within Philosophy at the University of Southampton.

I strongly recommend studying philosophy at Southampton. The department has a good student/staff ratio and as such makes for a friendly environment, and the relatively small class size for many of the optional units allows for students to interact with lecturers.

After studying for a BA in Philosophy in Southampton I continued on to postgraduate study, achieving a PhD in Philosophy at the University of Bristol with a thesis on the philosophy and physics of time direction. At present I am a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Centre for Time and the Department of Philosophy at the University of Sydney, Australia.

I decided to study for a BA in philosophy after enjoying the subject at A-level; the fundamentality of the questions with which philosophy is concerned, and the diversity of their application, made the subject stand out as the most appealing option for further study. Southampton was a great choice due to the wide range of philosophy units, and in particular the expertise on Russell and Wittgenstein. I was exposed to many different areas of philosophy during my degree and ultimately became interested in the philosophy of space and time and epistemological issues in physics, where I continue to research. The teaching and support I received in Southampton was hugely important in my decision to pursue a career in academia; in particular I was strongly encouraged to apply to study for an MA in philosophy of science by my dissertation supervisor.

In my current position at the University of Sydney I conduct research on philosophical problems about time, as part of an interdisciplinary project spread between philosophy, history of science, psychology and physics. My research is centred on the role played by time in fundamental physics and in what sense it challenges commonly-held beliefs such as that the past and future are less real than the present, that we cannot affect the past, and that the future (but not the past) is as-yet unsettled.

I strongly recommend studying philosophy at Southampton. The department has a good student/staff ratio and as such makes for a friendly environment, and the relatively small class size for many of the optional units allows for students to interact with lecturers. The relaxed atmosphere of the department is enhanced by its location, a few minutes from the (much busier) main campus, and beside Southampton Common, making it an ideal place to study philosophy.

http://www.mattfarr.co.uk/