About the 2005-2006 Lectures
The University of California, Berkeley will host the prestigious Tanner
Lectures on Human Values, a three-day event to be held from February
28 to March 2, 2006.
The lectures and the seminar are free and open to the public.
Lecture Schedule
Thinking How to Live Together
Lecture I: Insight, Consistency, and Plans for Living
Tuesday, February 28, 2006
4:10 p.m. – 6:30 p.m., Toll Room, Alumni House
With commentary by Michael E. Bratman
Lecture II: Living Together: Economic and Moral Argument
Wednesday, March 1, 2006
4:10 p.m. – 6:30 p.m., Toll Room, Alumni House
With commentary by John Broome and Frances Kamm
Seminar and Discussion with commentators
Thursday, March 2, 2006
4:10 p.m. – 6:30 p.m., Toll Room, Alumni House
With commentary by Michael E. Bratman, John Broome, and Frances Kamm
About Allan Gibbard
Allan Gibbard has made vital contributions to the field of ethical
theory, particularly to the study of meta-ethics. His efforts to characterize
the nature of moral judgment and define the meanings of moral statements
are praised for their originality and elegance. He also has done work
on the philosophy of language, metaphysics, and on the theories of conditionals,
social choice, and identity. Gibbard is currently studying claims that
the concept of meaning is normative, thereby extending his investigations
of the patterns of normative concepts involved in beliefs and decisions.
Gibbard's many publications on ethical theory include two books: Wise
Choices, Apt Feelings: A Theory of Normative Judgment (1990), which
develops a general theory of moral judgments and judgments of rationality,
and Thinking How to Live (2003), along with many articles. A
fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and of the Econometric
Society, and a member of the American Philosophical Society, Gibbard
has also held Guggenheim, Rockefeller, Nelson, and National Endowment
for the Humanities fellowships. He served as President of the Central
Division of the American Philosophical Association from 2001 to 2002.
Born in Providence, RI, in 1942 and growing up in West Virginia, Gibbard
received his B.A. in mathematics from Swarthmore College in 1963 with
minors in physics and philosophy. After teaching mathematics and physics
in Ghana with the Peace Corps (1963-1965), Gibbard studied philosophy
at Harvard University, earning his Ph.D. in 1971. He served as professor
of philosophy at the University of Chicago (1969-1974), and the University
of Pittsburgh (1974-1977), before joining the University of Michigan.
Gibbard chaired the University of Michigan's Philosophy Department
(1987-1988) and has held the title of Richard B. Brandt Distinguished
University Professor of Philosophy since 1994.
About the Commentators
Michael E. Bratman
Durfee Professor in the School of Humanities and Sciences and Professor
of Philosophy
Stanford University
Michael E. Bratman is an internationally respected philosopher of action.
His work is credited with furthering our understanding of moral responsibility,
temptation and self-control, and also shared intention and shared cooperative
activity. His research interests also include the nature of agency,
practical reason, and free will.
Bratman's publications include Intention, Plans, and Practical Reason
(1987), which is considered a foundational text on action theory,
and Faces of Intention: Selected Essays on Intention and Agency
(1999). A new collection of his writings, entitled Structures of
Agency: Essays is forthcoming from Oxford University Press.
Bratman earned a B.A. in Philosophy from Haverford College (1967) and
a Ph.D. in Philosophy from Rockefeller University (1974). He has taught
in the Stanford University Philosophy Department since 1974, and received
the Dean's Award for Distinguished Teaching in 1977. In 2000 he became
the U.G. and Abbie Birch Durfee Professor in the School of Humanities
and Sciences. A former chair of the Stanford Philosophy Department,
Bratman currently serves as its Director of Graduate Studies.
John Broome
White's Professor of Moral Philosophy
Corpus Christi College, University of Oxford
John Broome's scholarship combines both economic and philosophical expertise.
He has raised fundamental questions about economic equality, preserving
the environment, and the allocation of medical resources-revealing how
economic methods can contribute to moral philosophy. His current research
is on the structure of normativity, rationality, and processes of reasoning.
Broome has written prolifically in the fields of normativity, ethics,
and economics. His book-length studies are The Microeconomics of
Capitalism (1983), Weighing Goods: Equality, Uncertainty and
Time(1991), Counting the Cost of Global Warming (1992), Ethics
Out of Economics (1999), which addresses various questions about
the formal structure of good, the value of life, and the relation between
preference and value, and Weighing Lives(2004).
In 1968, Broome received a bachelor's degree in Mathematics and Economics
from the University of Cambridge. He went on to earn a Ph.D. in Economics
from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1972) as well as an
M.A. in Philosophy from the University of London (1973). He taught at
the University of St. Andrews before joining the faculty at the University
of Oxford in 2000, where he now serves as White's Professor of Moral
Philosophy.
Frances Kamm
Littauer Professor of Philosophy and Public Policy
John F. Kennedy School of Government
Department of Philosophy
Harvard University
Frances Kamm is a leading moral philosopher whose work has focused
on the nature of nonconsequentialist ethical theory and moral problems
related to life and death situations. Her pioneering and profound writings
are lauded for exploring important theoretical questions as well as
their applications to practical ethical problems.
Kamm has authored several important works in the field of philosophical
ethics, including Creation and Abortion (1992); Morality,
Mortality, Volume 1: Death and Whom to Save From It (1993); and
Morality, Mortality, Volume 2: Rights, Duties, and Status (1996),
all from Oxford University Press. Kamm has also published many articles
on the topics of normative ethical theory, bioethics, and the morality
of war.
A graduate of Barnard College, Columbia University (1969, with a major
in philosophy), Kamm has held residential Fellowships at the Program
in Ethics and the Professions at the Kennedy School, the Center for
Human Values at Princeton, and the Center for Advanced Study at Stanford,
and she has also been awarded National Endowment for the Humanities
and Guggenheim Fellowships, among others. She is a member of the editorial
boards of Philosophy & Public Affairs, Legal Theory, Bioethics,
and Utilitas, and also has served as a consultant on ethics to the World
Health Organization. Prior to joining the Kennedy School and the Department
of Philosophy at Harvard University in 2003, Kamm was Professor of Philosophy
at New York University, with appointments also in its Law School and
Medical School.
