Petter Sandstad

Petter Sandstad is a Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellow at the Department of Philosophy, University of Reading, specializing in Aristotle's formal cause and its relevance to contemporary metaphysics and philosophy of science. His research develops a less ontologically committed account of formal causation consistent with modern scientific understanding.

His chief research interests include Aristotle, metaphysics, philosophy of science, formal causation, essence, and hylomorphism. Sandstad defends an interpretation of formal causation that minimizes ontological commitments while maintaining compatibility with current science, focusing on how form serves as causal explanation. His project "Formal Causation: Rivals and Extensions" systematically investigates Aristotle's original scope for formal causes, applications to processes and events, connections to mereology, relations to downward causation in mechanistic explanations, and formal causation as metaphysical explanation.

His publications reveal consistent engagement with Aristotelian metaphysics, particularly formal causation's role in scientific explanation and essence. The 2021 edited volume establishes Neo-Aristotelian frameworks, while his journal articles examine formal cause in the Posterior Analytics and decouple essentiality from necessity, demonstrating interdisciplinary connections between ancient philosophy and contemporary debates.

Scientific awards:

• Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship

Sandstad's research is exclusively funded by his prestigious Marie Curie Fellowship, which supports his comprehensive investigation into formal causation's theoretical extensions and applications. His work contributes significantly to re-evaluating Aristotle's four causes within modern philosophical and scientific contexts, particularly through bridging historical analysis with current metaphysical discourse.