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17Divine Command Ethics: Jewish and Christian Perspectives. By Michael J. HarrisHeythrop Journal 49 (3): 516-517. 2008.
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14Civics, Policy, and DemoralizationCriminal Justice Ethics 36 (1): 25-44. 2017.Civics can be distinguished from policy. Civics concerns basic principles and institutions of political and legal order. Policy concerns specific ways in which particular ends are pursued by the st...
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25Choosing Character: Responsibility for Virtue and ViceCornell University Press. 2001.Are there key respects in which character and character defects are voluntary? Can agents with serious vices be rational agents? Jonathan Jacobs answers in the affirmative. Moral character is shaped through voluntary habits, including the ways we habituate ourselves, Jacobs believes. Just as individuals can voluntarily lead unhappy lives without making unhappiness an end, so can they degrade their ethical characters through voluntary action that does not have establishment of vice as its end. Ch…Read more
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1757Acquiring Universal Values through a Particular Tradition: A Perspective on Judaism and Modern PluralismEuropean Journal for Philosophy of Religion 5 (2): 1--22. 2013.Religious traditions can be sources of values and attitudes supporting the liberal polity in ways that political theorizing and conceptions of public reason often fail to recognize. moreover, religious traditions can give support through the ways reason is crucial to their self-understanding. one understanding of Judaism is examined as an example. Also, the particularism of traditions can encourage commitment to universally valid values and ideals. reason’s role in Judaism and other religious tr…Read more
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Censure, sanction and the moral psychology of resentment and punitivenessIn Antje du Bois-Pedain & Anthony E. Bottoms (eds.), Penal censure: engagements within and beyond desert theory, Hart Publishing. 2019.
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16This book offers an introduction to the philosophical issues of criminal justice ethics in a way suitable for students of criminology and criminal justice. It links philosophical concepts with empirical research in criminology and introduces criminal justice ethics, in the context of political and legal order.
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6Jonathan Jacobs examines the injustice of incarceration in the U.S. and U.K., both during incarceration and upon release into civil society. Situated at the intersection of criminology and political philosophy, Jacobs's focus is on moral reasoning, and he argues that the current state of incarceration is antithetical to the project of liberal democracy, as it strips incarcerated people of their agency. He advocates for reforms through a renewed commitment to the values and principles of liberal …Read more
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31How Is Criminal Justice Related to the Rest of Justice?Criminal Justice Ethics 39 (2): 111-136. 2020.Are principles of criminal justice derived from a broader conception of justice, or does criminal justice involve some of its own distinctive principles such that it is not—for example—an aspect of...
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5The Nature of Value: Axiological Investigations (review)Review of Metaphysics 50 (2): 410-410. 1996.This book is a systematic defense of a nonnaturalist, intuitionist moral realism. It supplies an account of moral facts according to which moral value is supervenient, undefinable, and nonreducible. The author also argues that "we must accept without proof some claim to the effect that a given thing is intrinsically good or bad if we are to prove that anything at all is so". The project is explicitly in the tradition of philosophers such as Brentano, Moore, and Ross. The author focuses on develo…Read more
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28Desmond King-Hele, A Tapestry of Orbits. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992. Pp. x + 244. ISBN 0-521-39323-X. £35.00 (review)British Journal for the History of Science 26 (3): 377-378. 1993.
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8Being True to the World: Moral Realism and Practical WisdomPeter Lang Incorporated, International Academic Publishers. 1990.This book begins with a critique of moral relativism and proceeds to develop a realist account of practical wisdom. The central claims are that there are objective moral facts and that knowledge of these facts can be action-guiding. The justification for these claims involves explaining the role of imagination in moral judgment and action and also showing how a realist approach to morality enables us to better account for immorality, revealing it to involve ignorance, error or falsification. The…Read more
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Teleology and Essence: An Account of the Nature of Organisms and PersonsDissertation, University of Pennsylvania. 1983.The main claim is that there is a fundamental and ineliminable relationship between teleology and essence in those things which have life-histories, whether organic or personal. The dissertation is divided into two Parts. In the first Part necessary and sufficient conditions for something's being an organism are formulated. In the second Part this is done for persons. ;What it is to be an organism is explained in terms of the entity being so constituted as to undergo a multi-stage, internally-re…Read more
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30Friendship, Self-Love and KnowledgeAmerican Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 66 (1): 21-37. 1992.
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2The Unity of the VicesThe Thomist 54 (4): 641-653. 1990.In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:THE UNITY OF THE VICES JONATHAN JACOBS Oolgate University, Hamilton, New York JOHN ZEIS Oanisius Ooilege, Buffalo, New York W:E SOMETIMES describe someone 1rus "just plain,, ' ' • • 0 " ' ' • • mean, or Just plam d1shonesit, orr JUSt pJam unw." Or we say" thaJt wrus ·a just plain ·stupid thing rto do.," G~a:liizing from tlhese and lik!e descriiptions, we can ask, are there any "just plain" vices? By this I mean, are :amy vices pure, …Read more
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25Deliberation, Self-Conceptions, and Self-EnjoymentIdealistic Studies 19 (1): 1-15. 1989.It is only for persons that the question, “How shall I live?” arises, and it arises inevitably, even if in an inarticulate and unreflective manner. Persons must deliberate, decide, plan, and schedule their actions. Openness with respect to ends confronts them, and they must structure and direct their lives by determining what sort of career to trace out, even if it proves to be a career of routine or unambitious undertakings. Circumstances can constrain and compel, and the openness persons confr…Read more
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49Law, reason, and morality in medieval Jewish philosophy: [Saadia Gaon, Bahya ibn Pakuda, and Moses Maimonides]Oxford University Press. 2010.Jon Jacobs emphasises their distinctive contributions, emphasises the shared rational emphasis of their approach to Torah, and draws out resonances with ...
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53Choosing character: responsibility for virtue and viceCornell University Press. 2001.Jacobs' interpretation is developed in contrast to the overlooked work of Maimonides, who also used Aristotelian resources but argued for the possibility of ...
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7Practical realism and moral psychologyGeorgetown University Press. 1995.In this original study, Jonathan Jacobs provides a new account of ethical realism that combines both abstract meta-ethical issues defining the debate on realism and concrete topics in moral psychology. Jacobs argues that practical reasoners can both understand the ethical significance of facts and be motivated to act by that understanding. In that sense, objective considerations are prescriptive. In his discussion of the theory of practical realism, he extends themes and claims originating in Ar…Read more
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54Plasticity and perfection: Maimonides and Aristotle on characterReligious Studies 33 (4): 443-454. 1997.Many of the basic elements of Maimonides' moral psychology are Aristotelian, but there are some important respects in which Maimonides departs from Aristotle. One of those respect concerns the possibility of changing one's character. There is, according to Maimonides, redemptive possibility that Aristotle does not recognize. There is, according to Maimonides, a redemptive possibility that Aristotle does not recognize. This is based on the fact of revealed law. That is, if there is revealed law, …Read more
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16Dimensions of Moral Theory: An Introduction to Metaethics and Moral PsychologyWiley-Blackwell. 2002.A study of fundamental issues in metaethics and in moral psychology, surveying important approaches with an emphasis on the disputed status of moral value and the roles of cognition and sensibility. Coverage of the issues includes discussion of significant thinkers from antiquity to the present.
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25Lemos, Ramon M. The Nature of Value: Axiological Investigations (review)Review of Metaphysics 50 (2): 410-411. 1996.
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25Reason, Religion, and Natural Law: From Plato to Spinoza (edited book)Oxford University Press. 2012.A collection of new papers by ten philosophers exploring relations between conceptions of natural law and theism, ranging from Plato to the early modern period. Rather than defending a a specific view of natural law, the papers explicate the complex texture of the relations between the diverse conceptions of natural law and diverse conceptions of theism and its significance for moral and political thought.
Areas of Specialization
Meta-Ethics |
Philosophy of Law |
Medieval and Renaissance Philosophy |
Areas of Interest
Meta-Ethics |
Philosophy of Law |
Medieval and Renaissance Philosophy |