Jonathan Beere received the B.A. in History and Philosophy of Natural Sciences at the University of Chicago in 1995 and two years later the B.A. Literae Humaniores at Oxford University.

In 2003 he achieved his PhD at Princeton University; the subject of his thesis was "The Priority of Active Being: An Interpretation of Aristotle's Metaphysics IX".

2004-2007 Jonathan Beere taught as Asisstant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Chicago.

2007-2008 he was Assistant at the chair of Ancient and Contemporary Philosophy (Christof Rapp) and is Assistant Professor of Ancient Philosophy at Humboldt-Universität Berlin since April 2009.

Jonathan Beere is Co-Director at the Graduate School of Ancient Philosophy with Christoph Helmig since fall 2009.




• Ancient Philosophy
• Metaphysics
• Moral Psychology
• Philosophy of Action
• Philosophy of Mathematics
• Kant, Wittgenstein

In addition to his regular teaching and administrative duties in the Department of Philosophy, Jonathan Beere, together with Christoph Helmig, currently runs the Junior Research Group "Place, Space and Motion" at the Excellence Cluster Topoi. He recently organized a "Summer School" on Plato's Sophist at the Humboldt-Universität. He has served as a referee for "Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy" and "Classical Philology".

Counting the Unmoved Movers: Astronomy and Explanation in Aristotle’s Metaphysics XII.8, in: Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie 2003. [pdf]

Potentiality and the Matter of Composite Substance, in: Phronesis 2006. [pdf]

The Priority in Being of Energeia, in: Dynamis. Autour de la puissance chez Aristote (ed. by M. Crubellier, A. Jaulin, D. Lefebvre, P.-M. Morel) 2008. [pdf]

Doing & Being: An Interpretation of Aristotle’s Metaphysics IX (to be published).

Faking Wisdom: Plato on Sophistry as an Expertise, in an edited volume on Wisdom in Antiquity (ed. by K. Vogt, W. Mann - to be published 2010).

Entry "Metaphysics", in: The Encyclopedia of Greece and Rome, ed. by M. Gagarin, Oxford University Press [to be published March 2010].

Entries "Form und Materie" und "Akt und Potenz", in: Aristoteles-Handbuch, ed. by C. Rapp / K. Corcilius, Metzler Verlag [to be published April 2010].