ANTHONY SKELTON

My research interests lie in the areas of the history of ethics and normative ethics. In the history of ethics, my research focus has been the utilitarian tradition of ethical thinking. I have a particular interest in the nineteenth-century philosopher Henry Sidgwick, who is the greatest of the classical utilitarians. I am currently working on two books on Sidgwick, a long one entitled Henry Sidgwick and the Conflicts of Ethics and a short one entitled Sidgwick’s Ethics (under contract with Cambridge University Press). My main interest is in exploring how Sidgwick explicates and manages the most important problems in moral thinking. I have also written papers on G. E. Moore, Hastings Rashdall, and W. D. Ross. I am currently writing a paper comparing and contrasting the practical ethics of Immanuel Kant and Sidgwick. My long-term goal is to write a history of utilitarianism from Richard Cumberland to the present called Utility’s Ambition.

In normative ethics, my research focus has been the nature of well-being, especially the nature of children’s well-being, and (more recently) the ethics of adolescent refusals of life-prolonging medical treatment and of so-called (biomedical) “enhancement”. I am currently working on a paper on the ways in which pain and pleasure differ axiologically and on a paper on well-being methodology. My long-term ambition is to work out a view about the relationship between the philosophy and the science of well-being. I am the editor of the most up to date Canadian-focussed text book in bioethics, which is entitled Bioethics in Canada (second edition).

MA Thesis:

Three Accounts of Cognitivist Internalism Undermined.

Doctoral Thesis:

Reasoning Towards Utilitarianism: Learning from Sidgwick

Books:

Bioethics in Canada, eds., Charles Weijer, Anthony Skelton and Samantha Brennan (Oxford: University Press, 2013)

Scholarly Articles:

“Children’s Well-being: A Philosophical Analysis”, Routledge Handbook of the Philosophy of Well-Being, ed., Guy Fletcher, (New York: Routledge, forthcoming).

“Two Conceptions of Children’s Welfare”, Journal of Practical Ethics (forthcoming).

“On Henry Sidgwick’s ‘My Station and its Duties’”, Ethics (forthcoming).

“Utilitarianism, Welfare, Children”, The Well-being of Children in Theory and Practice, eds., Alexander Bagattini and Colin McLeod (Springer, 2014).

“Sidgwick’s Argument for Utilitarianism and his Moral Epistemology: A Reply to David Phillips,” Revue d’études benthanmiennes 12 (2013).

“Utilitarian Practical Ethics: Sidgwick and Singer”, Henry Sidgwick: Ethics, Psychics, Politics, eds., P. Bucolo, R. Crisp and B. Schultz (Catania: University of Catania Press, 2011), 592-633.

“Ideal Utilitarianism: Rashdall and Moore”, Underivative Duty: British Moral Philosophers from Sidgwick to Ewing, ed., Thomas Hurka (Oxford: University Press, 2011), 45-65.

“Henry Sidgwick’s Moral Epistemology”, Journal of the History of Philosophy  48 (2010), 491-519.

“W. D. Ross”, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed., Edward N. Zalta (2010; revised 2012)

“On Sidgwick’s Demise: A Reply to Professor Deigh”, Utilitas 22 (2010), 70-77.

“Sidgwick’s Philosophical Intuitions”, Etica & Politica / Ethics & Politics 10 (2008), 185-209.

Critical Notice of Robert Audi, The Good in the Right: A Theory of Intuition and Intrinsic Value. Canadian Journal of Philosophy 37 (2007), 305-325.

“Schultz’s Sidgwick”, Utilitas 19 (2007), 91-103.

“Henry Sidgwick’s Practical Ethics: A Defense”, Utilitas 18 (2006), 199-217.

Encyclopedia Entries:

“Singer, Peter (1946-)”, Encyclopedia of Political Thought, ed., Michael Gibbons (Wiley-Blackwell, 2014)

“Griffin, James (1933-)”, Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of Utilitarianism, ed., James Crimmins (Bristol: Thoemmes/Continuum, 2013), 186-188.

“Intuitionism”, Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of Utilitarianism, ed., James Crimmins (Bristol: Thoemmes/Continuum, 2013), 280-286.

“Ideal Utilitarianism”, Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of Utilitarianism, ed., James Crimmins (Bristol: Thoemmes/Continuum, 2013), 261-265.

“Rashdall, Hastings (1858-1924)”, Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of Utilitarianism, ed., James Crimmins (Bristol: Thoemmes/Continuum, 2013), 463-465.

“Ross, W. D. (1877-1971)”, Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of Utilitarianism, ed., James Crimmins (Bristol: Thoemmes/Continuum, 2013), 488-490.

“Rashdall, Hastings”, International Encyclopedia of Ethics, ed., Hugh LaFollette (Wiley-Blackwell, 2013), 4325-4329.

“Sidgwick, Henry (1838-1900)”, Biographical Encyclopedia of British Idealism, ed., William Sweet (Bristol: Thoemmes/Continuum, 2010), 617-624.

“Abortion” & “Human Race (Death of the)” (In French), Dictionnarie de la Mort, ed., Philippe Di Folco (Paris:Larousse, Collection “In Extenso”, 2010), 119-122, 409-411.

“Griffin, James (1933-)”, The Dictionary of Twentieth-Century British Philosophers, ed., Stuart Brown (Bristol: Thoemmes Press, 2005), 348-352.

“Sidgwick, Henry (1838-1900)”, The Dictionary of Nineteenth-Century British Philosophers, eds., J. Mander and A. P. F. Sell (Bristol: Thoemmes Press, 2002), 1018-1028.

“Sidgwick, Eleanor Mildred (née Balfour: 1845-1936)”, The Dictionary of Nineteenth-Century British Philosophers, eds., J. Mander and A. P. F. Sell (Bristol: Thoemmes Press, 2002), 1016-1018.

“Birks, Thomas Rawson (1810-1883)”, The Dictionary of Nineteenth-Century British Philosophers, eds., J. Mander and A. P. F. Sell (Bristol: Thoemmes Press, 2002), 98-100.

Scholarly Reviews (Selected):

Of Terence Irwin, The Development of Ethics: A Historical and Critical Study. Volume III: From Kant to Rawls, Philosophical Review (forthcoming).

Of David Phillips, Sidgwickian Ethics, Journal of Moral Philosophy (forthcoming).

Of Fred Feldman, What is this Thing Called Happiness?, Philosophical Quarterly 63 (2013), 395-398.

Of Andrew Irvine and John Russell (eds.), In the Agora: The Public Face of Canadian Philosophy, University of Toronto Quarterly 80 (2011), 244-245.

Of Peter Singer, The Life You Can Save: Acting Now to End World Poverty, The Globe and Mail (Saturday, March 14, 2009), F11.

Of Kwame Anthony Appiah, Experiments in Ethics, The Globe and Mail (Saturday, March 1, 2008), D3.

Of Bart Schultz and Georgios Varouxakis (eds.), Utilitarianism and Empire, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews, http://ndpr.nd.edu/, July 12, 2006.

Invited Talks:

“What Makes a Child’s Life Go Well?”, What is Welfare? Can We Measure it?: An Interdisciplinary Workshop, Institute of Applied Ethics, University of Hull, Hull, UK, November 28-29, 2013.

“On the Ethical Barrier to In vitro Eugenics”, Ethox Centre, Oxford University, Oxford, UK, June 25, 2013.

“What Makes a Child’s Life Go Well?”, Carnegie-Uehiro-Oxford Conference in Practical Ethics: Happiness and Wellbeing, Oxford University, Oxford, UK, June 20-21, 2013.

“Children’s Well-being: A Philosophical Discussion”, St. Anne’s College, Oxford University, Oxford, UK, May 28, 2013.

“Sidgwick’s Hedonism: A Reply to Kasia de-Lazari-Radek and Peter Singer”, Faculty of Philosophy, Oxford University, Oxford, UK, May 6, 2013.

“Utilitarianism, Welfare, Children”, Ethox Centre, Oxford University, Oxford, UK, February 4, 2013, Centre of Medical Law and Ethics, University of King’s College, London, UK, March 27, 2013.

“Two Conceptions of Children’s Welfare”, St. Cross Seminar in Ethics, Oxford University, Oxford, UK, January 31, 2013.

“Remarks on David Phillips’s Sidgwickian Ethics”, Twelfth Annual Conference of the International Society for Utilitarian Studies 2012, New York University, New York City, USA, August 8-11, 2012.

“Fairing Well as a Child,” McMaster University, March 25, 2011, University of Montreal, March 28, 2011, Eleventh Conference of the International Society for Utilitarian Studies, Lucca, Italy, June 23-25, 2011, and Iowa State University, October 28, 2011.

Winter 2009, Sidgwick’s Ethics (graduate seminar)

Winter, 2010, Introduction to Ethics and Value Theory

Winter, 2010, Normative Ethics

Autumn, 2010, Introduction to Ethics and Value Theory

Autumn, 2010, Moore’s Ethics (graduate seminar)

Autumn, 2011, Promises, Promises: Sidgwick, Ross, Scanlon (graduate seminar)

Autumn, 2011, Advanced Introduction to Philosophy

Winter, 2012, History of Ethics: Mill’s Moral and Political Philosophy

Winter, 2012, Introduction to Ethics and Value Theory

Autumn, 2013, Ethics and Society

Winter, 2013, Ethics and Society

Winter, 2013, Utility, Liberty, Equality: The Case of John Stuart Mill

Autumn, 2014, Ethics and Society

Autumn 2014, Meta-ethics

Winter, 2015, Ethics and Society