Shelly Kagan is the Clark Professor of Philosophy at Yale University

Yale University

Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...

 and the former Henry R. Luce

Henry Luce

Henry Robinson Luce was an influential American publisher. He launched and closely supervised a stable of magazines that transformed journalism and the reading habits of upscale Americans...

 Professor of Social Thought and Ethics. Originally a native of Skokie

Skokie, Illinois

Skokie is a village in Cook County, Illinois, United States. Its name comes from a Native American word for "fire". A Chicago suburb, for many years Skokie promoted itself as "The World's Largest Village". Its population, per the 2000 census, was 63,348...

, Illinois

Illinois

Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...

, he received his B.A. from Wesleyan University

Wesleyan University

Wesleyan University is a private liberal arts college founded in 1831 and located in Middletown, Connecticut. According to the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, Wesleyan is the only Baccalaureate College in the nation that emphasizes undergraduate instruction in the arts and...

 and his Ph.D. from Princeton University

Princeton University

Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....

 under the supervision of Thomas Nagel

Thomas Nagel

Thomas Nagel is an American philosopher, currently University Professor of Philosophy and Law at New York University, where he has taught since 1980. His main areas of philosophical interest are philosophy of mind, political philosophy and ethics...

 in 1982. He taught at the University of Pittsburgh

University of Pittsburgh

The University of Pittsburgh, commonly referred to as Pitt, is a state-related research university located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded as Pittsburgh Academy in 1787 on what was then the American frontier, Pitt is one of the oldest continuously chartered institutions of...

 and at the University of Illinois at Chicago

University of Illinois at Chicago

The University of Illinois at Chicago, or UIC, is a state-funded public research university located in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its campus is in the Near West Side community area, near the Chicago Loop...

 before arriving at Yale.

Philosophy

According to his Yale web page, his main research interests "lie in moral philosophy, in particular normative ethics

Normative ethics

Normative ethics is the study of ethical action. It is the branch of philosophical ethics that investigates the set of questions that arise when considering how one ought to act, morally speaking...

. Indeed, his second book is a systematic survey of the field of normative ethics, considered analytically (rather than historically, as is more typical of textbooks in ethics). More particularly still, much of his work centers on the debate between consequentialist

Consequentialism

Consequentialism is the class of normative ethical theories holding that the consequences of one's conduct are the ultimate basis for any judgment about the rightness of that conduct...

 and deontological moral theories."

An article in the Yale Bulletin and Calendar says that his book The Limits of Morality "critiques so-called ordinary morality

Morality

Morality is the differentiation among intentions, decisions, and actions between those that are good and bad . A moral code is a system of morality and a moral is any one practice or teaching within a moral code...

; the view that there are limits to what morality can impose on humans; and defends the doctrine of classical utilitarianism

Utilitarianism

Utilitarianism is an ethical theory holding that the proper course of action is the one that maximizes the overall "happiness", by whatever means necessary. It is thus a form of consequentialism, meaning that the moral worth of an action is determined only by its resulting outcome, and that one can...

, which holds that people are morally obliged, without limit, to do as much good as they can." His Normative Ethics "examines how to judge the rightness or wrongness of actions, exploring such factors as consequences, harm and consent

Consent

Consent refers to the provision of approval or agreement, particularly and especially after thoughtful consideration.- Types of consent :*Implied consent is a controversial form of consent which is not expressly granted by a person, but rather inferred from a person's actions and the facts and...

."

Kagan is currently exploring the concept of desert

Desert (philosophy)

Desert in philosophy is the condition of being deserving of something, whether good or bad.-Nomenclature:The word is related to justice, revenge, blame, punishment and many topics central to moral philosophy...

, which is a philosophical concept of what individuals do or do not deserve. He is working on a book called The Geometry of Desert to be published in the future. Kagan is also a member of the editorial board of the journal Ethics.

External links

• Kagan's course "Death" at Open Yale Courses
  Open Yale Courses
  Open Yale Courses is a project of Yale University to share full video and course materials from its undergraduate courses.Open Yale Courses provides free access to a selection of introductory courses....
  
  . Includes audio and video files of course lectures.