Philip Stratton-Lake, professor of philosophy at the University of Reading, died last month following a period of serious illness. David Oderberg, Head of the Department of Philosophy at Reading, shared the following brief memorial notice: Philip was a much loved and respected colleague in the Department since he joined in 1998. He was an internationally reputed moral philosopher with expertise in a wide range of areas including meta-ethics, moral epistemology, Kantian ethics, contractualism, intuitionism, and Ross-style pluralism. He was one of the world’s leading figures in the revival and defence of ethical intuitionism, writing the article on the topic for the Stanford Encyclopedia and editing a seminal volume (Ethical Intuitionism: Re-evaluations). He also edited the now standard edition of W.D. Ross’ The Right and the Good. Other work includes an important monograph on Kant (Kant, Duty and Moral Worth) along with many articles and chapters in collections.
death
A friend of mine died last night, John was an old fellow who lived up Coro Ave. Eighty five years old he was. We became friends after he mentored Choppy and I down on the sand dunes. He was passionate about regenerating the foreshores of our local beach, he showed …
John Lee was a friend of mine who died of old age. I say old age but the hospital would tell you it was stroke. John would have told you it was because his body betrayed him.
After going for a run this morning I climbed down the 74 steps …
I just murdered the four red chooks. They had been guilty of eating all their own menstrual waste and tearing the feathers off each others breasts. I rung their necks. The first one was patchy, she had lost most of her feathers to the others. She had a skinny neck …
Max killed himself this week. I found out from a message on my phone. I was sitting in the cab of my ute after a day at work. I stared at my phone.
I thought I’d misunderstood the message. I read it again, the words became disjointed and I …
Last month my laptop became unstable. I had been trying to do something which I began to regret. Losing patience I reinstalled the operating system. Unfortunately on my previous installation I had negligently chosen to set up my hard-drives as a striped array. This meant despite days of recovery attempts …
Penelope Mackie, a philosopher at the University of Nottingham, has died. The following obituary was provided by Mark Jago (Nottingham). It is with great sadness that we announce the death of our friend and colleague, Penelope Mackie, following a period of illness. Penelope was born into an academic family. Her paternal grandfather Alexander was professor of education at the University of Sydney, and her father was the philosopher J.L. Mackie (whose philosophical papers she co-edited). She went to Somerville College, Oxford, in 1971, where she took the BPhil in Philosophy with a thesis, Identity and Continuity, in 1978, and later the DPhil in 1987, with a thesis, How Things Might Have Been: A Study in Essentialism. After her DPhil, Penelope moved to the US, first as a visiting lecturer at the University of Maryland (1986–1987) and then as Assistant Professor of philosophy at Virginia Commonwealth University (1987–1990). She then returned to Oxford, this time as a fellow of New College (1990–1994), before moving to Birmingham in 1994 and then to Nottingham in 2004, where she worked until her death.
Gary Iseminger, professor emeritus of philosophy at Carleton College, has died. Professor Iseminger was known for his work in philosophy of art. He authored The Aesthetic Function of Art (2004) and many articles, ranging on topics from the role of intention in art, to the nature of aesthetic judgments, to jazz improvisation. He also wrote on logic and authored a logic text for students. You can learn more about his writings here and here. Professor Iseminger taught at Carleton beginning in 1962, starting as an instructor and retiring in 2004 as the Stephen R. Lewis, Jr. Professor of Philosophy and Liberal Learning. Over the years, he held visiting appointments at various institutions, including the London School of Economics, University College London, University of Edinburgh, Lancaster University, Cambridge University, University of Minnesota, Lingnan University in Hong Kong, among others. In addition to his philosophical work, for a period he also coached varsity tennis at Carleton (including a team that won the conference title in 1967), and he played vibraphone, timpani, and sang in various performing groups, according to a memorial notice here.