Allegory with a portrait of a Venetian senator (Allegory of the morality of earthly things), attributed to Tintoretto, 1585

(This post summarizes and comments on the posts of the last two weeks.)

Ellin’s suggestion that the moral life provides meaning is fruitful, as is Thomson’s suggestion that we add intellectual and aesthetic value for fully meaningful lives. Continue reading Objective Meaning of Life →

Thaddeus Metz is a Research Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Pretoria in South Africa. He grew up in Iowa and received his Ph.D. from Cornell University in 1997. Continue reading Thaddeus Metz: “The good, the true, and the beautiful: toward a unified account of great meaning in life” →

Susan R. Wolf elaborated on her ideas about meaning in life that we previously discussed in two lectures delivered at Princeton in 2007. In those lectures she argued that meaning is not reducible to either happiness or morality. Continue reading Susan R. Wolf: The Importance of Objective Values →

Steven Cahn is Professor of Philosophy at CUNY Graduate Center and the author or editor of many philosophical textbooks. Cahn rejects Wolf’s distinction between meaningful and meaningless lives, Continue reading Steven Cahn’s “Meaningless Lives?”: A Reply to Wolf →

Susan R. Wolf (1952 – ) is a moral philosopher who has written extensively on meaning in human life. She is currently the Edna J. Koury Professor of Philosophy at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She addresses the topic of the meaning of life, among other places, in her essay: “Happiness and Meaning: Two Aspects of the Good Life.” Continue reading Summary of Susan Wolf’s, “Happiness and Meaning: Two Aspects of the Good Life” →