Geoffrey Sayre-McCord is a philosopher who works in moral theory, meta-ethics

Meta-ethics

In philosophy, meta-ethics is the branch of ethics that seeks to understand the nature of ethical properties, statements, attitudes, and judgments. Meta-ethics is one of the three branches of ethics generally recognized by philosophers, the others being normative ethics and applied ethics. Ethical...

, the history of ethics, and epistemology and has written extensively in these areas. He is known especially for his work on moral realism

Moral realism

Moral realism is the meta-ethical view which claims that:# Ethical sentences express propositions.# Some such propositions are true.# Those propositions are made true by objective features of the world, independent of subjective opinion....

 and on David Hume

David Hume

David Hume was a Scottish philosopher, historian, economist, and essayist, known especially for his philosophical empiricism and skepticism. He was one of the most important figures in the history of Western philosophy and the Scottish Enlightenment...

's moral theory. He has also written on contractualism

Contractualism

Contractualism can refer to two different positions. First, it can to refer to moral theories based on social contract theory, also known as contractarianism, which argue that what people ought to do is determined by contracts or agreements reached between those people. Second, the term was used by...

. His Essays on Moral Realism is widely used in undergraduate and graduate courses on meta-ethics and he was, for five years, a co-editor of the highly regarded journal Noûs

Noûs

Noûs is a philosophy journal published four times per year by Blackwell Publishing. It was founded by Hector-Neri Castañeda and is currently edited by Ernest Sosa...

.
Sayre-McCord received his BA from Oberlin College

Oberlin College

Oberlin College is a private liberal arts college in Oberlin, Ohio, noteworthy for having been the first American institution of higher learning to regularly admit female and black students. Connected to the college is the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, the oldest continuously operating...

 and his PhD (under the direction of David Gauthier

David Gauthier

David Gauthier is a Canadian-American philosopher best known for his neo-Hobbesian social contract theory of morality, as laid out in his book Morals by Agreement.-Biography:...

) from 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...

. The recipient of several university-wide teaching awards, Sayre-McCord is the Morehead Alumni Distinguished Professor of Philosophy and Chair of the Philosophy Department at the University of North Carolina

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is a public research university located in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States...

, where he has taught since 1985.

Some Articles

• "Coherence and Models for Moral Theorizing," Pacific Philosophical Quarterly (1985)
• "Deontic Logic and the Priority of Moral Theory," Noûs (1986)
• "The Many Moral Realisms," Southern Journal of Philosophy, Spindel Conference Supplement, (1986)
• "Moral Theory and Explanatory Impotence," Midwest Studies (1988)
• "Deception and Reasons to be Moral," American Philosophical Quarterly, (1989)
• "Functional Explanations and Reasons as Causes," Philosophical Perspectives (1990)
• "Being a Realist about Relativism," Philosophical Studies (1991)
• "Normative Explanations," Philosophical Perspectives (1992)
• "On Why Hume's General Point of View Isn't Ideal -- and Shouldn't Be," Social Philosophy and Policy (1994)
• "Coherentist Epistemology and Moral Theory," in Moral Knowledge?, ed. by Sinnott-Armstrong and Timmons (1996)
• "Hume and the Bauhaus Theory of Ethics," Midwest Studies (1996)
• "Hume's Representation Argument Against Rationalism," Manuscrito (1997)
• "The Meta-Ethical Problem," Ethics (1997)
• "'Good' on Twin Earth," Philosophical Issues (1997)
• "Contractarianism," Blackwell Guide to Ethical Theory (1999)
• "Criminal Justice and Legal Reparations," Philosophical Issues (2001)
• "Mill's 'Proof': A More than Half-Hearted Defense," Social Philosophy and Policy (2001)
• "On the Relevance of Ignorance to the Demands of Morality," Rationality, Rules, and Ideals, ed. by Sinnott-Armstrong (2002)
• "Moral Realism," Oxford Handbook of Moral Theory, ed. by Copp (2006)
• "Moral Semantics and Empirical Enquiry," Moral Psychology, ed. by Sinnott-Armstrong (2008)
• "Hume on Practical Morality and Inert Reason," Oxford Studies in Metaethics, ed. by Shafer-Landau (2008)

Edited Volumes

• Essays on Moral Realism (Cornell University Press, 1988)
• Hume: Moral Philosophy (Hackett Publishing, 2006)

External links

• Geoffrey Sayre-McCord's webpage at UNC-Chapel Hill
• Geoffrey Sayre-McCord's curriculum vita
• Geoffrey Sayre-McCord's personal webpage
• Papers available on-line
• Video conversations/interviews with Will Wilkinson
  Will Wilkinson
  Will Wilkinson is a Canadian American libertarian writer. Until August 2010, he was a research fellow at the Cato Institute where he worked on a variety of issues including Social Security reform and, most notably, the policy implications of happiness research. He is currently working on a paper...
  
   on Bloggingheads.tv
  Bloggingheads.tv
  Bloggingheads.tv is a political, world events, philosophy, and science video blog discussion site in which the participants take part in an active back and forth conversation via webcam which is then broadcast online to viewers...
  
  
• Stanford Encyclopedia entry on Meta-Ethics, on-line
• Stanford Encyclopedia entry on Moral Realism, on-line
• Sayre-McCord on Bloggingheads.tv discussing meta-ethics
• Sayre-McCord on Bloggingheads.tv discussing ethics and evolution