-
63A Dilemma Regarding Academic Freedom and Public Accountability in Higher EducationJournal of Philosophy of Education 44 (4): 529-549. 2010.The aim of this article is to establish that current thought about the point of a publicly funded university faces a dilemma. On the one hand, influential and attractive ‘macro’-level principles about how state resources ought to be accountably used entail that academic freedom should be utilised solely for the sake of social justice or some other concrete public good. Standard theories of public morality entail that an academic’s responsibility is entirely to be ‘responsive’ or ‘relevant’ to he…Read more
-
1761African Moral Theory and Public Governance: Nepotism, Preferential Hiring and Other PartialityIn Munyaradzi Felix Murove (ed.), African Ethics: An Anthology for Comparative and Applied Ethics, University of Kwazulu-natal Press. pp. 335-356. 2009.Suppose a person lives in a sub-Saharan country that has won its independence from colonial powers in the last 50 years or so. Suppose also that that person has become a high-ranking government official who makes decisions on how to allocate goods, such as civil service jobs and contracts with private firms. Should such a person refrain from considering any particulars about potential recipients or might it be appropriate to consider, for example, family membership, party affiliation, race or re…Read more
-
42Poderá o propósito de Deus ser a fonte do sentido da vida?In Desidério Murcho (ed.), Viver para Que? Ensaios Sobre o Sentido da Vida, Dinalivro. 2009.Portuguese translation by Desiderio Murcho of "Could God's Purpose Be the Source of Life's Meaning?" (Religious Studies 2000).
-
212Higher Education, Knowledge For Its Own Sake, and an African Moral TheoryStudies in Philosophy and Education 28 (6): 517-536. 2009.I seek to answer the question of whether publicly funded higher education ought to aim intrinsically to promote certain kinds of ‘‘blue-sky’’ knowledge, knowledge that is unlikely to result in ‘‘tangible’’ or ‘‘concrete’’ social benefits such as health, wealth and liberty. I approach this question in light of an African moral theory, which contrasts with dominant Western philosophies and has not yet been applied to pedagogical issues. According to this communitarian theory, grounded on salient s…Read more
-
202The final ends of higher education in light of an african moral theoryJournal of Philosophy of Education 43 (2): 179-201. 2009.From the perspective of an African ethic, analytically interpreted as a philosophical principle of right action, what are the proper final ends of a publicly funded university and how should they be ranked? To answer this question, I first provide a brief but inclusive review of the literature on Africanising higher education from the past 50 years, and contend that the prominent final ends suggested in it can be reduced to five major categories. Then, I spell out an intuitively attractive Afric…Read more
-
304African and western moral theories in a bioethical contextDeveloping World Bioethics 10 (1): 49-58. 2009.The field of bioethics is replete with applications of moral theories such as utilitarianism and Kantianism. For a given dilemma, even if it is not clear how one of these western philosophical principles of right (and wrong) action would resolve it, one can identify many of the considerations that each would conclude is relevant. The field is, in contrast, largely unaware of an African account of what all right (and wrong) actions have in common and of the sorts of factors that for it are german…Read more
-
41Love and emotional reactions to necessary evilsIn Pedro Alexis Tabensky (ed.), The positive function of evil, Palgrave-macmillan. pp. 28-44. 2009.This chapter supposes that certain bads are necessary for substantial goods, and poses the question of how one ought to react emotionally to such bads. In recent work, Robert Adams is naturally read as contending that one ought to exhibit positive emotions such as gladness towards certain ‘necessary evils’. A rationale he suggests for this view is that love for a person, which involves viewing the beloved as good, requires being glad about what is necessary for her to exist, even if it is someth…Read more
-
85Censure theory still best accounts for punishment of the guilty: Reply to MontaguePhilosophia 37 (1): 113-23. 2009.In an article previously published in this journal, Phillip Montague critically surveys and rejects a handful of contemporary attempts to explain why state punishment is morally justified. Among those targeted is one of my defences of the censure theory of punishment, according to which state punishment is justified because the political community has a duty to express disapproval of those guilty of injustice. My defence of censure theory supposes, per argumentum, that there is always some defea…Read more
-
1042Happiness 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
-
45Review of Polycarp Ikuenobe, Philosophical Perspectives on Communalism and Morality in African Traditions (review)Journal of Contemporary African Studies 26 (2): 236-238. 2008.
-
68Imperfection as sufficient for a meaningful life : How much is enough?In Yujin Nagasawa & Erik J. Wielenberg (eds.), New waves in philosophy of religion, Palgrave-macmillan. pp. 192-214. 2008.Supernaturalism about meaning in life appears plausible insofar it is reasonable to think that a meaningful life can come only from a world in which there is a perfect value of some kind. Call the view that meaningfulness depends on perfection the ‘perfection thesis’. My aim in this chapter is to develop the contrasting ‘imperfection thesis’, the claim that a life that is significant on balance does not require any perfect value. I argue that principles that naturalists have offered (or suggeste…Read more
-
652The Nature of Reactive Practices: Exploring Strawson’s ExpressivismSouth African Journal of Philosophy 27 (3): 49-63. 2008.I aim to answer the questions of whether reactive practices such as gratitude and punishment are inherently expressive, and, if so, in what respect. I distinguish seven ways in which one might plausibly characterize reactive practices as essentially expressive in nature, and organise them so that they progress in a dialectical order, from weakest to strongest. I then critically discuss objections that apply to the strongest conception, questioning whether it coheres with standard retributive und…Read more
-
187God, Morality and the Meaning of LifeIn Samantha Vice & Nafsika Athanassoulis (eds.), The Moral Life: Essays in Honour of John Cottingham, Palgrave-macmillan. pp. 201-227. 2008.In this chapter, I critically explore John Cottingham's most powerful argument for the thesis that the existence of God is necessary for meaning in life. This is the argument that life would be meaningless without an invariant morality, which could come only from God. After demonstrating that Cottingham's God-based ethic can avoid not only many traditional Euthyphro meta-ethical concerns, but also objections at the normative level, I consider whether it can entail the unique respect in which mor…Read more
-
534New developments in the meaning of lifePhilosophy Compass 2 (2). 2007.In this article I survey philosophical literature on the topic of what, if anything, makes a person’s life meaningful, focusing on systematic texts that are written in English and that have appeared in the last five years (2002-2007). My aims are to present overviews of the most important, fresh, Anglo-American positions on meaning in life and to raise critical questions about them worth answering in future work.
-
136God's purpose as irrelevant to life's meaning: Reply to affolterReligious Studies 43 (4): 457-464. 2007.Elsewhere I have contended that if a God-centred account of meaning in life were true, it would not be because meaning comes from fulfilling God’s purpose for us. Specifically, I have argued that this ‘purpose theory’ of life’s meaning cannot be the correct God-based view since God would have to be atemporal, immutable, and simple for meaning to logically depend on His existence, and since such a being lacking extension could not be purposive. Jacob Affolter has developed a fresh account of the …Read more
-
1770Toward an african moral theoryJournal of Political Philosophy 15 (3). 2007.In this article I articulate and defend an African moral theory, i.e., a basic and general principle grounding all particular duties that is informed by sub-Saharan values commonly associated with talk of "ubuntu" and cognate terms that signify personhood or humanness. The favoured interpretation of ubuntu (as of 2007) is the principle that an action is right insofar as it respects harmonious relationships, ones in which people identify with, and exhibit solidarity toward, one another. I maintai…Read more
-
2951Ubuntu 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
-
53Respect for persons permits prioritizing treatment for HIV/AIDSDeveloping World Bioethics 8 (2): 89-103. 2007.I defend a certain claim about rationing in the context of HIV/AIDS, namely, the 'priority thesis' that the state of a developing country with a high rate of HIV should provide highly active anti-retroviral treatment (HAART) to those who would die without it, even if doing so would require not treating most other life-threatening diseases. More specifically, I defend the priority thesis in a negative way, by refuting two influential and important arguments against it inspired by the Kantian prin…Read more
-
70How to Reconcile Liberal Politics with Retributive PunishmentOxford Journal of Legal Studies 27 (4): 683-705. 2007.There is a deep tension between liberalism and retributivism. On the face of it, one cannot coherently believe liberalism about the fundamental purpose of the state and retributivism about the basic end of legal punishment, given widely held and well-motivated or what I call ‘standard’ conceptions of these views. My aims in this article are to differentiate the types of conflict between liberalism and retributivism, to identify the strongest and most problematic type of conflict between th…Read more
-
1437The Motivation for “Toward an African Moral Theory”South African Journal of Philosophy 26 (26): 331-335. 2007.Here I introduce the symposium issue of the South African Journal of Philosophy that is devoted to critically analysing my article “Toward an AfricanMoral Theory.” In that article, I use the techniques of analytic moral philosophy to articulate and defend a moral theory that both is grounded on the values of peoples living in sub-Saharan Africa and differs from what is influential in contemporary Western ethics. Here, I not only present a précis of the article, but also provide a sketch of why I…Read more
-
294Judging Because Understanding: A Defence of Retributive CensureIn Pedro Tabensky (ed.), Judging and Understanding: Essays on Free Will, Narrative, Meaning and the Ethical Limits of Condemnation, Ashgate. pp. 221-40. 2006.Thaddeus Metz defends the retributive theory of punishment against challenges mounted by some of the contributors to this collection. People, he thinks, ought to be censured in a way that is proportional to what they have done and for which they are responsible. Understanding does not conflict with judging. On the contrary, according to him, the more we understand, the better we are able to censure appropriately. Metz’s argument is Kantian insofar as he argues that ‘respect for persons [victims,…Read more
-
159Review of Ethics & AIDS in Africa (review)South African Journal of Philosophy 25 (4): 369-71. 2006.
-
2Review of Ethics and AIDS in Africa (review)South African Journal of Philosophy 25 (4): 369-371. 2006.
-
51IntroductionPhilosophical Papers 34 (3): 311-329. 2005.This article introduces a special issue of Philosophical Papers devoted to the topic of meaning in life. In the paper, I engage with articles by Robert Audi, David Velleman, John Martin Fischer, Laurence Thomas, Berit Brogaard, Barry Smith and Larry James, laying out their central views, criticizing them, and suggesting ways they could be developed.
-
453Critical Notice:Baier and Cottingham on the Meaning of LifeDisputatio 1 (19): 215-228. 2005.I examine two recent books by analytic philosophers that address the underexplored topic of whether the meaning of life depends on the existence of a supernatural realm including God and a soul. John Cottingham’s On the Meaning of Life defends a supernaturalist conception of life’s meaning, whereas Kurt Baier’s Problems of Life and Death defends the opposite, naturalist perspective. I show that their respective arguments are worth serious consideration, indicate some potential weaknesses in them…Read more
-
65Review of David Benatar, Life, Death, and Meaning (review)Philosophical Papers 34 (3): 459-463. 2005.
-
738The Ethics of Routine HIV Testing: A Respect-Based AnalysisSouth African Journal on Human Rights 21 (3): 370-405. 2005.Routine testing is a practice whereby medical professionals ask all patients whether they would like an HIV test, regardless of whether there is anything unique to a given patient that suggests the presence of HIV. In three respects I aim to offer a fresh perspective on the debate about whether a developing country with a high rate of HIV infection morally ought to adopt routine testing. First, I present a neat framework that organises the moral issues at stake, bringing out the basic principles…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
-
30Open Perfectionism and Global JusticeTheoria 51 (104): 96-127. 2004.In his book Cosmopolitan Justice, Darrel Moellendorf argues that respect for persons has the following rough implications (among others): requires states to enact liberal legislation; permits them to interfere with religious or otherwise perfectionist regimes; forbids them from restricting immigration for perfectionist ends; and requires them to permit secession. In this article, I do not question Moellendorf's Kantian foundation; what I do here is question the inferences from this principle to …Read more
-
190Justice and the LawIn Christopher Roederer & Darrel Moellendorf (eds.), Jurisprudence, Juta. pp. 382-411. 2004.This chapter discusses major theories of domestic justice in the context of South African Constitutional, statutory and case law. It begins by considering when it is permissible for legislators to restrict civil liberty. South Africa's Parliament has criminalised prostitution, liquor sales on Sundays and marijuana use, actions that few liberals would say should be illegal. However, South African law permits abortion, gambling and homosexual relationships, which many conservatives would criminali…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 |