Philosopher Derek Parfit, a Senior Research Fellow at Oxford University and the Global Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at New York University, has a new book out - his second book after Reasons and Persons (1984), and a lifetime achievement. The new work comes in two volumes, or fourteen hundreds pages circa of lucid, hardcore philosophical analysis. Hailed by Peter Singer as "a major philosophical event" and by its publisher - Oxford University Press - as "already the most discussed work in moral philosophy", the book aims at providing new foundations for moral objectivism, against moral relativism.
Modern philosophy produced conflicting moral theories and this very fact itself stands as a major problem for moral objectivism. Parfit's main claim is that the conflict is apparent. He considers and reformulates three major views (the social-contract theory, utilitarianism, and Kant's) aiming to show that they all coincide with a certain version of consequentialism. Can this really be the case? The debate is open. The second volume starts off with four commentaries by leading moral philosophers, followed by Parfit's replies; no only: two years ago a book of commentaries had already come out, on the basis of the available manuscript materials.
As for the title, something appropriate to the audacious endeavor: On What Matters.
Photo courtesy of Google Images, LIFE photo archive
Comments