On What Matters
On What Matters is a major work in moral philosophy. It is the long-awaited follow-up to Derek Parfit's 1984 book Reasons and Persons, one of the landmarks of twentieth-century philosophy. Parfit now presents a powerful new treatment of reasons, rationality, and normativity, and a critical examination of three systematic moral theories - Kant's ethics, contractualism, and conse...
On What Matters is a major work in moral philosophy. It is the long-awaited follow-up to Derek Parfit's 1984 book Reasons and Persons, one of the landmarks of twentieth-century philosophy. Parfit now presents a powerful new treatment of reasons, rationality, and normativity, and a critical examination of three systematic moral theories - Kant's ethics, contractualism, and consequentialism - leading to his own ground-breaking synthetic conclusion. Along the way he discusses a wide range of moral issues, such as the significance of consent, treating people as a means rather than an end, and free will and responsibility. On What Matters is already the most-discussed work in moral philosophy: its publication is likely to establish it as a modern classic which everyone working on moral philosophy will have to read, and which many others will turn to for stimulation and illumination.
Derek Parfit, (born December 11, 1942, Chengdu, China—died January 1, 2017, London, England), English philosopher whose work in normative ethics and metaethics, personal identity, and the theory of practical reason was widely influential in the English-speaking world from the 1980s. Many of his peers considered him the most important moral philosopher of the 20th and early 21st...
Derek Parfit, (born December 11, 1942, Chengdu, China—died January 1, 2017, London, England), English philosopher whose work in normative ethics and metaethics, personal identity, and the theory of practical reason was widely influential in the English-speaking world from the 1980s. Many of his peers considered him the most important moral philosopher of the 20th and early 21st centuries.