Kimbrough Moore

Experience of reading: What do you experience when you read? Perhaps an inner voice or visual imagery? Sometimes or always, and do others have the same type of experience? Results: 

• There is substantial variability in reports about reading experience, both within and between participants. 

• Reported reading experience varies with passage type: passages with dialogue prompted increased reports of inner speech, while passages with vivid visual detail prompted increased reports of visual imagery. 

• Reports were at best weakly related to general cognitive abilities and memory of visual and auditory details.

Rock Climbing Grades: Difficulty ratings in rock climbing are marked by a surprising lack of consensus. This is unique among sports, after all, runners don’t typically argue over which time is the fastest. Two causes

• There are individual differences in difficulty due to body morphology, and as a result, multiple grades are often required in order to accurately measure difficulty. 

• Grades are based on unreliable introspective reports of an evaluatively loaded experience during a demanding athletic activity. 

• Variations in difficulty are often overlooked because ratings are determined by a morphologically homogenous group of (mostly male) climbers.

• List of datasets that I have created on gender in climbing.

Academic Publishing

• “Experimental Evidence for the Existence of an External World” in Weirdness of the World by Eric Schwitzgebel (2024)

• “The Experience of Reading” Consciousness and Cognition (2018)

• “Experimental Evidence for the Existence of an External World” in the Journal of the American Philosophical Association (2015)

• “Ethicists’ Courtesy at Philosophy Conferences” in Philosophical Psychology (2012)

Academic Presentations

• "Slash Grade: Disagreement and gender bias in rock climbing ratings" at University of Minnesota (2024)

• “Revolutionary Greetings” at University of Southern California (2013)

• “The Experience of Reading” at Universitat de Barcelona (2012)

• “How Well Do We Philosophers Know Our Own Conscious Experience” at Institute Jean Nicod (2012)

• “How Well Do We Philosophers Know Our Own Conscious Experience” at Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea/Universidad del Pais Vasco (2012)

• “The Experience of Reading” at New York University and City University of New York (2010)

Teaching

Instruct graduate and undergraduate courses in the Philosophy Department at San Francisco State University, a top ranked MA graduate program.

Teach courses on the ethics of computer science through the Computer Science Department at San Francisco State University, including the legal and moral analysis of AI, intellectual property, content moderation, and professional ethics.

List of courses taught: 

• Graduate Seminars: Moral Possibilities; Moral Psychology; Seminar in Philosophical Writing

• Undergraduate Courses: Being and Knowing; Business Ethics; Chinese Philosophy; Critical Thinking; Ethics, Communication, and Tools for Software Development; Evil; Introduction to Law and Society; Introduction to Philosophy; Philosophy of Animals; Philosophical Analysis; Philosophy and Personal Development; Philosophy of Law; Philosophy of Mind; Reason, Belief, and Truth; The Art(s) of Quantitative Reasoning

Grants

• Philosophy, Pedagogy, and Community. $39k (24/25 AY)

• Equity Gaps Project. $59k (23/24 AY)

• Equity 5 Project. $52k (22/23 AY)

• Affordable Learning Departmental Award. $10k (22/23 AY)

• Golden 3 Project. $132k (21/22AY)

Awards & Service

A lifetime of climbing is hard to summarize, but these are a few of the highlights.

• 300 ascents 5.13 and harder, up to 5.14c.

• Over 100 double digit boulder problems, up to V12.

• Hundreds of first ascents at Black Mountain in Southern California.

• First ascent of Sea of Tranquility (5.14a), which was the hardest climb in China.

• First all-natural ascent of Father's Day (5.14a), one of the hardest trad climbs in the world at the time.

• Finalist in numerous national and international competitions.

Rock Climbing Guidebooks

I have written, designed, and published a series of climbing guides with a collection of talented co-authors. Each has its own theme. 

• Tuolumne Bouldering (forthcoming)

• Golden State Bouldering, meaning of climbing, 400 pages (2022)

• Yosemite Bouldering, historical tradition, 464 pages (2020)

• Black Mountain Bouldering, climbing as play, 400 pages (2014)

You can also find Golden State Bouldering on the Kaya app.

Non-Academic Presentations

• Sandbagged: A conversation about why grades always feel wrong, Touchstone Climbing & Bay Area Climbers Coalition (2023)

• The Meaning Of Climbing: Confucian Rituals and Community, Arc’teryx Rise Up Festival (2022)

Media

• Manage an educational Instagram account on inclusivity and ethics in rock climbing with 10k followers and 5 million total views in the last 12 months (@kimbroughclimbs)

• I lay out my overall views about climbing grades in Not Your Typical Climber and The Dihedral podcasts.

• A subject matter expert on the ethics of rock climbing. Quoted in Climbing Magazine and Rock & Ice Magazine. 

• A subject matter expert on sexual assault within the rock climbing community. Quoted in Outside Magazine and Climbing Magazine. Interviewed on ABC News (TV) and Inside Edition (TV).

• Quoted in an LA Times article on free speech in national parks. 

• Featured in a series of YouTube videos about Joshua Tree by Giant Rock.

Technical Skills