Practical Philosophy
Our research is having significant impact in healthcare and healthcare ethics as well as in broader areas of public policy.
We regularly meet as a group and invite colleagues from across the University who have related interests in practical philosophy to join the conversation and collaborate.
Our research interests also venture into the history of practical philosophy. Our work in this area came to fruition when we were host to the recent Arts and Humanities Research Council-funded research network Reason, Right and Revolution: Practical Philosophy between Kant and Hegel.
Our practical philosophy research is organised into two research clusters covering ethics as well as legal and political philosophy:
People
- Professor Tom Baldwin (emeritus) Bioethics, moral psychology and moral theory.
- Dr Chris Belshaw (Honorary Fellow) Applied ethics, including questions of the value of death and the nature of a person.
- Dr Jamie Buckland Practical reasoning and value theory.
- Dr Hannah Carnegy-Arbuthnott Social & political philosophy, moral philosophy, feminist philosophy.
- Dr James Clarke Post-Kantian practical philosophy, especially that of Erhard, Fichte and Hegel. Rousseau’s moral psychology and political philosophy and philosophy of law.
- Dr Johan Gustafsson Consequentialism, population ethics, free will, personal identity, value theory, moral uncertainty, social contract theory, liberalism and the value of freedom.
- Dr Stephen Holland Applied ethics, especially bioethics and public health ethics.
- Dr Christopher Jay Metaethics, normative ethics, the demandingness of morality and Kantian ethics.
- Professor Mary Leng Metaethics, particularly analogies between debates in philosophy of mathematics and metaethics.
- Dr Daniel Morgan Moral psychology.
- Dr Martin O'Neill Social justice, equality and inequality, freedom, autonomy and responsibility and political economy.
- Professor Christian Piller Normative ethics, value theory, normativity, decision theory and social choice, population ethics, value of knowledge.
- Professor Alan Thomas Moral psychology, moral particularism, metaethics, political philosophy and political economy.
- Professor Wlodek Rabinowicz (Lund University) Value theory (especially formal axiology), moral philosophy (consequentialism, population ethics) and decision theory (especially dynamic decision making).
- Rebecca Davis (rebecca.davis@york.ac.uk)
- Thick concepts and reasons for action (supervisors: Professor Mary Leng and Dr Stephen Everson)
- Daniel Hind (dceh500@york.ac.uk)
The Limits of Liberal Constitutionalism (supervisors: Dr Martin O'Neill and Professor Alan Thomas) - Isobel Standen (isobel.standen@york.ac.uk)
Defeasible Reasoning for Resilient Autonomous Systems (supervisors: Professor Alan Thomas and Professor Radu Calinescu)