The Howard Z. Fitzgerald Essay Contest is an annual undergraduate philosophy essay competition. It is open to IUP students who have written papers for philosophy courses. The contest, named after a philosophy professor Howard Z. Fitzgerald, recognizes strong written analysis and philosophical expression among undergraduate students.
Prizes
First prize: $150
Second prize: $100
Third prize: $50
Rules
- Competition restricted to papers written for IUP philosophy courses.
- Papers must be typed, at least six double-spaced pages in length, and written in a standard font with standard margins.
- Paper must be prepared for blind review by removing all identifying marks (including author’s name) and by providing a detachable cover sheet with author’s name, email address, and the paper’s title.
- All submissions must include a bibliography.
- Papers submitted during a previous competition cannot be submitted again.
2026 Winners
First Prize: Sarah Miller, “Plato’s Aristocracy and the Best Form of Government”
Second Prize: Braden Hanes, “Compatibilism, Identity, and the Dictator’s Regret”
Third Prize: Heath Flick, “Why We Should Be Content With a Brute Fact Cosmology”
2025 Winners
First Prize: Jordan Thomas, “Ethics of Ambiguous Imaginings: Expanding on Zheng and Stear”
Second Prize: Andrew Stuart, “Fascism, Totalitarianism, and Authoritarianism”
Third Prize: Emily Hess, “A Developmental Approach to AI: How Spelke’s Core Knowledge Theory Could Advance Machine Learning”
2024 Winners
First Prize: Jordan Thomas, “Population Ethics: The Total View and Its Implications”
Second Prize: Koan Weinstein, “Moral Animals: De Waal and Korsgaard”
Third Prize: Jacob Custer, “A Comparative Analysis of the Death of God and the Last God”
2023 Winners
First Prize: Dylan Roberts McDonald, “An Analysis of Jason Brennan’s Epistocratic System”
Second Prize: Jordan Thomas, “Compatibilism and an Objection to Susan Wolf’s Sane Deep-Self View”
Third Prize: Carly Ryan, “Examining the Value of Competency in an Electorate: A Rebuttal to Brennan’s Argument”
2022 Winners
First Prize: Alexander Giffen, “Material Constitution and Everyday Beliefs”
Second Prize: Audrey Ritko, “Leibniz’s and Hume’s Accounts of Causation and Necessary Connection”
Third Prize: Sasha Shulman, “Difference in Idealism”
2020 Winners
First Prize: Collin Hoffman, “Scheffler’s Hybrid Theory: A Solution to Consequentialism and Deontology”
Second Prize: Kathryn Misiak, “A Defense of Hilary Putnam’s Sociolinguistic Hypothesis”
Third Prize: Raven Roland, “A Philosophical Account of Affirmative Action”
2019 Winners
First Prize: Daniel Wethli, “The Common Escape into Kierkegaard’s Aesthetic Sphere of Existence”
Second Prize: Brianna Karenbauer, “Differences Between Constructive Empiricism and Traditional Scientific Anti-Realism”
Third Prize: Wade Larison, “The Emergence of Ecstases: Heidegger’s Concepts of Care and Temporality”
2018 Winners
First Prize: Daniel Wethli, “A Defense of Gigerenzer’s Optimistic View of Human Rationality”
Second Prize: Lindsey Gibson, “A Critique of Aristotelian Essentialism”
Third Prize: Joseph Gregory, “The Justness of Plato’s Aristocracy”
2017 Winners
First Prize: Shawn Horvath, “The Death Penalty: Can It Be Justified Without Free Will?”
Second Prize: Joseph Gregory, “The Practical Validity of Radical Responsibility”
Third Prize: Abby Jo Panek, “Universalism and the Meaning of Equality”
2016 Winners
First Prize: Olivia Wolfe, “Entitlement and Political Legitimacy: The Implications of Socially Cooperative Production”
Second Prize: Afton Herring, “On Nature, Nurture, and Universal Grammar”
Third Prize: Robert Wilt, “The Altruistic Ego”
2015 Winners
First Prize: Peter Crivellaro, “Consciousness as an Extended Capacity”
Second Prize: Aubrey Keperling, “How to Make Our Lives Seem Longer: Manipulating Our Engagement with the World from ‘Ready-to-hand’ to ‘Present-at-hand’”
Third Prize: Joel DeMary, “Is There a Moral Obligation to Follow the Law?” and Katie Gunning, “The Role of Women in Plato’s Republic”
2014 Winners
First prize: Ross Newcome, “Constructive Empiricism: A Model of Reality”
Second prize: Rachel Lager, “An Analogy Fit for a Philosopher King”
Third prize: Kristen Shafer, “Realistic Realism: The Scientific Aims to Explaining Reality”
2013 Winners
First prize: Luke Piper, “Plato’s Views on Akrasia: A Case for Consistency”
Second prize: Leah Keller, “To Be Sisyphus or to Escape Leveling”
Third prize: Kelly Muthler, “Distributive Justice and the Environment”
2012 Winners
First prize: Christian Minich, “Ceteris Paribus: The War Over the Constants of Immortality”
Second prize: Sophia Hosterman, “Between a Diamond and a Hard Place: Interpreting the Tractatus”
Third prize: Leah Keller, “Closed Due to Cognition: Colin McGinn’s Theory of Cognitive Closure”
2011 Winners
First prize: Christian Minich, “Navigating Charybdis and Scylla: Mulligan and Heil’s Account of Relations”
Second prize: Chaz McCown, “Nietzsche’s Metaphysiological Aesthetics in The Birth of Tragedy”
Third prize: Sophia Hosterman, “Establishing the Untenability of Scientific Realism”
2010 Winners
First prize: Ronald Radzai, “Interpretive Method and Hume’s Appendix Retraction in the Treatise”
Second prize: Christian Minich, “Deficiency of Forms: Superiority of the Exact Property View in the Phaedo”
Third prize: Charles McCown, “Relations All In Your Head?”
2009 Winners
First prize: Tommy Hanauer, “Contra Scientific Realism”
Second prize: Carole Walker, “The Akratic Shoe-Shopper: Can We Knowingly Choose What is Bad for Us?”
Third prize: Jason Patton, “Free Will”