Hi! I'm Xin Hui.

I'm a PhD student in Philosophy at MIT; previously I was pursuing my PhD at the University of Pittsburgh. In the Summer of 2023 I was also enrolled in the Northeastern AIDE Summer Program. 

I work on both social philosophy and decision theory, and especially on their intersection. Each project may vary in the degrees to which they squarely belong in either subfield, but tend to revolve around one question: How can the ways we inquire (both formal and otherwise) bear on our social agency?

In other words, I work broadly on concepts of power, agency and positionality as they relate to decision-making as social beings. I am also interested in. Much of my work also centers around the question of what makes liberatory social movements succeed, and what tools we can develop to empower collective action towards remediating structural injustice.

Following my recent paper modelling information resistance and the sociopolitical relevance of such modelling efforts, I am working on extending the fragmentationist project to help agents conceptualize, diagnose and intervene on their own adaptive preferences. I am also working on consciousness-raising in liberatory social movements as a practice of co-creation, and on adapting normative tools like responsibility and privacy to serve emancipatory aims.

On more a more applied and yet more historical front, I am working on drawing out a model from French Revolutionary philosopher Sophie de Grouchy to illuminate how we could cultivate zetetic virtues to combat value capture in the technological realm.

I co-organized Wonder Philosophy Pittsburgh; here's an interview we did with the APA Blog.  I'm also an Affiliated Graduate Fellow of the Conceptual Foundations of Conflict Project at the University of Southern California under Mark Schroeder. 

I'm also the co-director of PIKSI-Boston, a program committed to elevating and broadening inclusion in philosophy by creating opportunities for those who may not otherwise have access to similar programming and mentorship, empowering them to pursue advanced studies in philosophy and continue on to the professoriate.

Before graduate school, I received a B.S. from NYU Stern in Business (with concentrations in Finance and Computing & Data Science) and Philosophy, and worked in Sales & Trading in Hong Kong for two years.

When I'm not glaring at code (Python, LaTeX, NetLogo or otherwise) or reading, I'm usually:

• Lifting (I used to be a competitive powerlifter but now dabble in Olympic weightlifting)

• Playing a board game (currently obsessed with Spirit Island and Wingspan, though Betrayal At House on the Hill remains one of my favourite games)

• Roleplaying a caricaturized version of myself in Dungeons & Dragons

usually not all at the same time.