Overview

This volume collects thirteen of David Schmidtz's essays on the question of what it takes to live a good life, given that we live in a social and natural world. Part One defends a non-maximizing conception of rational choice, explains how even ultimate goals can be rationally chosen, defends the rationality of concern and regard for others (even to the point of being willing to die for a cause), and explains why decision theory is necessarily incomplete as a tool for addressing such issues.Part Two uses the tools of analytic philosophy to explain what we can do to be deserving ,what is wrong with the idea that we ought to do as much good as we can, why mutual aid is good, but why the welfare state does not work as a way of institutionalizing mutual aid, and why transferring wealth from those who need it less to those who need it more can be a bad idea even from a utilitarian perspective. Most ambitiously, Part Two offers an overarching, pluralistic moral theory that defines the nature and limits of our obligations to each other and to our individual selves.Part Three discusses the history and economic logic of alternative property institutions, both private and communal, and explains why economic logic is an indispensable tool in the field of environmental conflict resolution. In the final essay, Schmidtz brings the volume full circle by considering the nature and limits of our obligations to nonhuman species, and how the status of nonhuman species ought to enter into our deliberations about what sort of life is worth living.

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9780195365832

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Reviews

This really is philosophy for the real world, and the more impressive for that, since it takes a certain surefootedness to keep ones arguments philosophically rigorous while making so much of historical fact ... Schmidtz's distinctive prose is simple and informal, yet capable of conveying complex and subtle point ... Readers of Person, Polis, Planet will, as a result, discover Schmidtz's challenging, detailed arguments without having to perform excavations to get at them. Thomas Porter, Mind

<br> It is work of undoubted quality -- thoughtful, resilient and full of insight. At the same time, it addresses some of the most vexing questions that human agents face, yet in a thoroughly grounded fashion.... I found this an altogether satisfying, rewarding, and above all, challenging read. --Allan Holland, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews<p><br> This excellent collection brings together thirteen previously published pieces by the philosopher and economist David Schmidtz.... Perhaps more important, they are united by a distinctive and attractive methodological approach, one that combines the high degree of analytical clarity and rigor that one would expect from a first-rate philosopher with a kind of commonsense wisdom that is not always so common, an attention to empirical detail that goes well beyond the use of examples as mere illustrations, and a refreshingly humanistic concern with life as it is lived by people as they actually are.... Those who are already familiar with Schmi

<br> It is work of undoubted quality -- thoughtful, resilient and full of insight. At the same time, it addresses some of the most vexing questions that human agents face, yet in a thoroughly grounded fashion.... I found this an altogether satisfying, rewarding, and above all, challenging read. --Allan Holland, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews<br> This excellent collection brings together thirteen previously published pieces by the philosopher and economist David Schmidtz.... Perhaps more important, they are united by a distinctive and attractive methodological approach, one that combines the high degree of analytical clarity and rigor that one would expect from a first-rate philosopher with a kind of commonsense wisdom that is not always so common, an attention to empirical detail that goes well beyond the use of examples as mere illustrations, and a refreshingly humanistic concern with life as it is lived by people as they actually are.... Those who are already familiar with Schmidtz

Author Information

David Schmidtz is Kendrick Professor of Philosophy, joint Professor of Economics, and founding Director of the Center for Philosophy of Freedom at the University of Arizona. He is author of Rational Choice and Moral Agency, Elements of Justice, and co-author of Social Welfare and Individual Responsibility.

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