Markus Schrenk studied philosophy, logic and physics (Magister) in Bonn. With a scholarship, he moved to Oxford University, where he received his DPhil in 2006. There, he also worked as a lecturer for several years. After further appointments in Germany and abroad (Nottingham, Luxembourg, Cologne), Markus accepted a professorship at Heinrich Heine University in Düsseldorf in 2014. His teaching and research interests lie in metaphysics, specifically the metaphysics of the (natural) sciences (laws of nature, dispositions, causality, modality), philosophy of science, and philosophy of language. His most recent project, however, deals with a topic in the philosophy of art: what is proprioceptive art? As a team with denXte, he won the 2022 Communicator Award of the German Research Foundation (DFG) and the Stifterverband.

What I'll do at the KFG
Humans have many abilities. But there are also things they can’t do. Their constitution and the laws of nature constrain their possibilities. My contribution to the KFG will be twofold: I’ll focus on (1) the limits laws put on human abilities and ask (2) whether the experience of (nomological) resistance against our intentional actions can count as experience of (nomic) necessity.