Sayid R. Bnefsi

I am a law and philosophy scholar whose work explores moral and epistemological questions about Anglo-American criminal and civil law. I did my PhD (2023) and my JD (2024) at the University of California, Irvine.

Currently, I am a postdoctoral fellow with the Institute of Philosophy at the University of Neuchâtel in Switzerland, working on legal philosophy.

I am also a Research Associate at the African Centre for Epistemology and Philosophy of Science at the University of Johannesburg. In Spring 2023, I was an Ernst Mach predoctoral fellow with the Department of Philosophy at the University of Salzburg in Austria.

Compensatory Preliminary Damages: Access to Justice as Corrective Justice, in 27 CUNY Law Review 70 (2024)

Future Bias and Regret, in David Jakobsen, Peter Øhrstrøm & Per Hasle (eds.), Logic and Philosophy of Time 1-13 (2023) Aalborg: Aalborg University Press

Epistemic Isomorphism, in 53(4) Metaphilosophy 543-554 (2022)

Great Risks from Small Benefits Grow, in 49 Philosophia 603-610 (2021)

The Argument from Sideways Music, in 9(1) Thought: A Journal of Philosophy 64-69 (2020)

Future Bias and Presentism, in David Jakobsen, Per Hasle & Peter Øhrstrøm (eds.), The Metaphysics of Time 281-297 (2020) Aalborg: Aalborg University Press

B-Theory and Time Biases, in Patrick Blackburn, Per Hasle & Peter Øhrstrøm (eds.), Logic and Philosophy of Time 41-52 (Vol. 2) (2019) Aalborg: Aalborg University Press

My research explores philosophical and policy questions concerning various substantive and procedural issues in criminal and civil justice through a close study of legal doctrine and practice.

My doctoral dissertation, Ways to Reform the Law, was the first step in this research program. There, I offer three proposals that rework existing features and powers of the law to provide answers to some blended questions of philosophy and public policy—questions involving (1) the fair allocation of costs in litigation, (2) the possibility of holding individuals liable in tort for reckless conduct even if the risk does not materialize, and (3) the justification of the practice of differential punishment of criminal attempts.

My current work as a postdoctoral fellow is a continuation of my research program. This work involves analyzing defenses to legal offenses and other exceptions to legal culpability as a way to elucidate general principles of criminal and civil justice.