-
507Assessing Lives, Giving Supernaturalism Its Due, and Capturing Naturalism: Reply to 13 Critics of Meaning in Life (repr.)In Masahiro Morioka (ed.), Reconsidering Meaning in Life: A Philosophical Dialogue with Thaddeus Metz, Waseda University. pp. 228-278. 2015.A lengthy reply to 13 critical discussions of _Meaning in Life: An Analytic Study_ collected in an e-book and reprinted from the _Journal of Philosophy of Life_. The contributors are from a variety of philosophical traditions, including the Anglo-American, Continental and East Asian (especially Buddhist and Japanese) ones.
-
17African Ethics, Revised EditionIn Hugh LaFollette (ed.), The International Encyclopedia of Ethics, Blackwell. 2013.An updated version of this 4000 word overview of the meta-, normative and applied ethical dimensions of contemporary sub-Saharan moral philosophy.
-
262How the West Was One: The Western as Individualist, the African as CommunitarianEducational Philosophy and Theory 47 (11): 1175-1184. 2015.There is a kernel of truth in the claim that Western, and especially Anglo-American-Australasian, normative philosophy, including that relating to the philosophy of education, is individualistic; it tends to prize properties that are internal to a human being such as her autonomy, rationality, pleasure, desires, self-esteem, self-realization and virtues relating to, say, her intellect. One notable exception is the idea that students ought to be educated in order to be citizens, participants in a…Read more
-
72Review of Leonhard Praeg, A Report on Ubuntu, and of Leonhard Praeg and Siphokazi Magadla (eds), Ubuntu: Curating the Archive (review)Philosophical Papers 43 (3): 447-453. 2014.
-
535Meaning as a Distinct and Fundamental Value: Reply to KershnarScience, Religion and Culture 1 (2): 101-106. 2014.In this article, I reply to a critical notice of my book, Meaning in Life: An Analytic Study, that Stephen Kershnar has published elsewhere in this issue of Science, Religion & Culture. Beyond expounding the central conclusions of the book, Kershnar advances two major criticisms of it, namely, first, that I did not provide enough evidence that meaning in life is a genuine value-theoretic category as something distinct from and competing with, say, objective well-being, and, second, that, even if…Read more
-
12The Concept of a Meaningful Life (repr.)In Joshua Seachris (ed.), Exploring the Meaning of Life: An Anthology and Guide, Wiley. pp. 79-94. 2012.Reprint of an article that initially appeared in the American Philosophical Quarterly (2001).
-
794Auf dem Weg zu einer afrikanischen MoraltheorieIn Franziska Dübgen & Stefan Skupien (eds.), Afrikanische politische Philosophie - Postkoloniale Positionen, Suhrkamp. pp. 295-329. 2015.German translation by Andreas Rauhut of a mildly revised version of 'Toward an African Moral Theory' (Journal of Political Philosophy 2007).
-
181Jurisprudence in an African ContextOxford University Press. 2017.A textbook written mainly for final year law students taking Jurisprudence at an African university, but that would also be of use to those in a political philosophy course. It includes primary sources from both the Western and African philosophical traditions, and addresses these central questions: what is the nature of law?; how should judges interpret the law?; is it possible for judges to be objective when they adjudicate?; how could the law justly allocate liberty and property?; who is owed…Read more
-
281De zachte plek (The Sweet Spot)In Leo Bormans (ed.), The World Book of Happiness 2.0, Marshall Cavendish International (asia) Pte. pp. 335-338. 2011.An 850 word statement, translated into Dutch and composed for a lay audience, of respects in which happiness and meaningfulness can come apart, but highlighting the aim of engaging in projects in which they are co-present.
-
19Précis of Meaning in Life: An Analytic Study (repr.)European Journal for Philosophy of Religion 8 (2): 1--4. 2016.A brief summary of the main claims advanced in Meaning in Life: An Analytic Study, largely cribbed from the Journal of Philosophy of Life (2015).
-
767In Search of Ubuntu: A Political Philosopher’s View of Democratic South AfricaIn Busani Ngcaweni (ed.), Liberation Diaries: Reflections on 20 Years of Democracy, Jacana. pp. 205-214. 2014.In this essay I recount how I have been hoping to see more ubuntu in South Africa’s institutions than had been present in the two dominant socio-politico-economic models across the world in the 20th century. I haven’t been expecting utopia from the past 20 years of democracy; I’ve just wanted something new to come out of Africa. I here relate my experience of learning that it is not always forthcoming, at least not as quickly as I would have liked. However, I conclude by indicating that the prom…Read more
-
6Recent Work in African Ethics (repr.)In Sharlene Swarz & Monica Taylor (eds.), Moral Education in Sub-Saharan Africa, Routledge. pp. 115-126. 2011.Reprint of an article that initially appeared in the Journal of Moral Education (2010).
-
547Ubuntu: The Good LifeIn Alex Michalos (ed.), Encyclopedia of Quality of Life and Well-being Research, Springer. pp. 6761-65. 2014.An overview of a characteristically African approach to the human good.
-
208Distributive Justice as a Matter of Love: A Relational Approach to Liberty and PropertyIn Ingolf Dalferth (ed.), Love and Justice (Claremont Studies in Philosophy of Religion), . pp. 339-352. 2019.Usually a relational approach, such as one appealing to care or love, is contrasted with an account of justice. In this chapter, however, I argue that distributive justice is well conceived as itself a matter of honouring people in virtue of their capacity to love and to be loved. After spelling out a familiar conception of love, I explain how treating people with respect in light of this capacity provides a plausible basis for human rights, one that rivals influential individualist foundations …Read more
-
1046Happiness and Meaningfulness: Some Key DifferencesIn Lisa Bortolotti (ed.), Philosophy and Happiness, Palgrave-macmillan. pp. 3-20. 2009.In this chapter, I highlight the differences between the two goods of happiness and meaningfulness. Specifically, I contrast happiness and meaning with respect to six value-theoretic factors, among them: what the bearers of these values are, how luck can play a role in their realization, which attitudes are appropriate in response to them, and when they are to be preferred in a life. I aim not only to show that there are several respects in which happiness and meaning differ as categories of val…Read more
-
797The Concept of a Meaningful LifeAmerican Philosophical Quarterly 38 (2): 137-153. 2001.This paper aims to clarify what we are asking when posing the question of what (if anything) makes a life meaningful. People associate many different ideas with talk of "meaning in life," so that one must search for an account of the question that is primary in some way. Therefore, after briefly sketching the major conceptions of life's meaning in 20th century philosophical literature, the remainder of the paper systematically seeks a satisfactory analysis the concept of a meaningful life that t…Read more
-
174آيا هدف خداوند مى تواند سرچشمه معناى زندگى باشد؟* (Persian: Could God's Purpose Be the Source of Life's Meaning?)Naqd Va Nazar: Quarterly Journal of Philosophy and Theology 8 (29-30): 149-183. 2003.Persian translation by Mohammad Saeedi of 'Could God's Purpose Be the Source of Life's Meaning?' (first published in Religious Studies 2000).
-
2956Ubuntu as a Moral Theory: Reply to Four CriticsSouth African Journal of Philosophy 26 (4): 369-87. 2007.In this article, I respond to questions about, and criticisms of, my article “Towardan African Moral Theory” that have been put forth by Allen Wood, Mogobe Ramose, Douglas Farland and Jason van Niekerk. The major topicsI address include: what bearing the objectivity of moral value should have on cross-cultural moral differences between Africans and Westerners; whether a harmonious relationship is a good candidate for having final moral value; whether consequentialism exhausts the proper way to r…Read more
-
19The Politics of Doing Philosophy in Africa: A Conversation (repr.)In Mogobe B. Ramose (ed.), Contrasts and Contests About Philosophy, Routledge. pp. 148-160. 2016.Reprint of an article first appearing in the South African Journal of Philosophy (2015).
-
21Climate Change in Africa and the Middle East in Light of Health and Salient Regional ValuesIn Cheryl Macpherson (ed.), Climate Change and Health: Bioethical Insights into Values and Policy, Springer. pp. 115-125. 2016.A discussion of respects in which climate change is likely to affect health in Africa and the Middle East with some reference to moral values, such as ubuntu and Islam, salient in the respective regions.
-
5711Ethics in Aristotle and in Africa: Some Points of ContrastPhronimon 13 (2): 99-117. 2012.In this article I compare and, especially, contrast Aristotle’s conception of virtue with one typical of sub-Saharan philosophers. I point out that the latter is strictly other-regarding, and specifically communitarian, and contend that the former, while including such elements, also includes some self-regarding or individualist virtues, such as temperance and knowledge. I also argue that Aristotle’s conception of human excellence is more attractive than the sub-Saharan view as a complete accoun…Read more
-
42The Desirability of a Property Clause: Michelman's Defence of LiberalismStellenbosch Law Review 24 (2): 312-28. 2013.I address Frank Michelman’s recent attempts to dispel the notion that there are deep tensions between a liberal approach to constitution making and a resolute commitment to fighting poverty, i.e., to holding what he calls ‘social liberalism’. He focuses on the prima facie tension between anti-poverty struggle on the part of government and the existence of a property clause in a constitution, a tension that several commentators in South Africa have contended requires removing that clause from its…Read more
-
59The Justice of Crime PreventionTheoria 51 (105): 104-128. 2004.In this essay, I critically evaluate the new South African state's approach to crime prevention in light of the Kantian principle of respect of persons. I show that the five most common explanations of why the state must fight crime are unconvincing; provide a novel, respect-based account of why justice requires the state to prevent crime; and specify which crime fighting techniques the state must adopt in order to meet this requirement. Reviewing the South African state's criminal justice polic…Read more
APA Central Division
Pretoria, Gauteng, South Africa
Areas of Specialization
2 more
The Meaning of Life |
Normative Ethics |
Social and Political Philosophy |
African Philosophy |
Philosophy of Law |
Applied Ethics |
Value Theory |