Peter Albert Railton (born May 23, 1950) is an

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

philosopher A philosopher is a person who practices or investigates philosophy. The term ''philosopher'' comes from the grc, φιλόσοφος, , translit=philosophos, meaning 'lover of wisdom'. The coining of the term has been attributed to the Greek th ...

who is Gregory S. Kavka Distinguished University Professor and John Stephenson Perrin Professor of

Philosophy Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. ...

at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, where he has taught since 1979.

Education and career

He earned his Ph.D. from

Princeton Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the nin ...

in 1980, writing a dissertation under the supervision of David K. Lewis. He has a visiting professor at the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant un ...

and

Princeton University Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ...

. He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences in 2004 and the

Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters ( no, Det Norske Videnskaps-Akademi, DNVA) is a learned society based in Oslo, Norway. Its purpose is to support the advancement of science and scholarship in Norway. History The Royal Frederick Unive ...

in 2016. A public lecture he gave concerning his own struggles with depression attracted widespread notice and praise in the academic community.

Philosophical work

His dissertation concerned scientific explanation. His main research since centers on contemporary metaethics and

normative ethics Normative ethics is the study of ethical behaviour and is the branch of philosophical ethics that investigates the questions that arise regarding how one ought to act, in a moral sense. Normative ethics is distinct from meta-ethics in that th ...

(especially

consequentialism In ethical philosophy, consequentialism is a class of normative, teleological ethical theories that holds that the consequences of one's conduct are the ultimate basis for judgment about the rightness or wrongness of that conduct. Thus, fro ...

). He is the author of the book ''Facts, Norms, and Values'' (Cambridge University Press, 2003), a collection of his major papers in ethics, and a co-editor (with

Stephen Darwall Stephen Darwall (born 1946) is a contemporary moral philosopher, best known for his work developing Kantian and deontological themes. He is Andrew Downey Orrick Professor of Philosophy at Yale University. Education and career A 1968 gradua ...

and Allan Gibbard) of ''Moral Discourse and Practice: Some Philosophical Approaches'' (Oxford University Press, 1996). Railton has playfully described himself as a "stark, raving

moral realist Moral realism (also ethical realism) is the position that ethical sentences express propositions that refer to objective features of the world (that is, features independent of subjective opinion), some of which may be true to the extent that the ...

". "Moral Realism", ''The Philosophical Review'', Vol. 95, No. 2 (April 1986), p. 165 However, unlike some moral realists, he thinks moral facts that make moral statements true are natural facts.

Bibliography

* 1984, "Alienation, Consequentialism, and the Demands of Morality," ''Philosophy and Public Affairs'', Vol. 13, No. 2, pp. 134–171. * 1986, "Moral Realism," ''The Philosophical Review'', Vol. 95, No. 2, pp. 163–207. * 1991, "Moral Theory As A Moral Practice," ''Noûs'', Vol. 25, No. 2, pp. 185–190. * 1992, "Some Questions About the Justification of Morality," ''Philosophical Perspectives'', Vol. 6, pp. 27–53. * 1992, "Pluralism, Determinacy, and Dilemma," ''Ethics'', Vol. 102, No. 4, pp. 720–742. * 1993, "Noncognitivism about Rationality: Benefits, Costs, and an Alternative," ''Philosophical Issues'', Vol. 4, pp. 36–51. * 1994, "Truth, Reason, and the Regulation of Belief," ''Philosophical Issues'', Vol. 5, pp. 71–93. * 1996, "Moral Realism: Prospects and Problems," in Sinnott-Armstrong and Timmons (eds.), ''Moral Knowledge?'', Oxford University Press. * 1996, ''Moral Discourse and Practice'' (co-edited with Stephen Darwall and Allan Gibbard), Oxford University Press. * 2003, ''Facts, Values, and Norms'', Cambridge University Press.

References

Sources

4 U-M scholars named AAAS fellows

External links

Video interview/discussion with Railton
on Bloggingheads.tv
Peter Railton and the Moral Realism
(in Italian) {{DEFAULTSORT:Railton, Peter 1950 births 20th-century American non-fiction writers 20th-century American philosophers 20th-century essayists 21st-century American non-fiction writers 21st-century American philosophers 21st-century essayists American ethicists American male essayists American male non-fiction writers American philosophy academics Analytic philosophers Consequentialists Epistemologists Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Lecturers Living people Members of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters Metaphilosophers Metaphysicians Moral philosophers Moral realists Ontologists Philosophers of ethics and morality Philosophers of science Philosophers of social science Philosophy teachers Philosophy writers Rationality theorists University of Michigan faculty 20th-century American male writers 21st-century American male writers