Dr. Mark Alfano is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the Delft University of Technology and the Australian Catholic University. Dr. Alfano uses tools and methods from philosophy and the sciences to explore topics in moral psychology, epistemology, and digital humanities. He studies how people become and remain virtuous, how values become integrated into people's lives, and how these virtues and values are (or fail to be) manifested in their perception, thoughts, feelings, deliberations, and behavior. One of the guiding themes of his work is that moral philosophy without psychological content is empty, but psychological investigation without philosophical insight is blind. He’s the author of books like Character as Moral Fiction, and Nietzsche's Moral Psychology.

In this episode, we focus mostly of Dr. Alfano’s work on virtue ethics and moral character. We first get into issues regarding modern accounts of virtue ethics, the objectivity (or lack thereof) of morality, and what moral character is. We also refer to moral psychology, and the replication crisis in Psychology, with particular emphasis on the literature from social psychology. We talk about thick concepts of virtue ethics, and the is-ought dichotomy. Finally, we address the situationist critique of virtue ethics, what we know about the effects of labelling, and how personality might play a role in different people being differentially susceptible to change.

Follow Dr. Alfano’s work:

Faculty page (Delft University): http://bit.ly/2ZhrLHO

Faculty page (Australian Catholic University): http://bit.ly/2liH7Nw

Personal website: http://bit.ly/2Y97OWr

PhilPeople profile: http://bit.ly/2ml7mD5

ResearchGate profile: http://bit.ly/2kH8zUK

Amazon profile: https://amzn.to/2kJorGk

A HUGE THANK YOU TO MY PATRONS/SUPPORTERS: KARIN LIETZCKE, ANN BLANCHETTE, SCIMED, PER HELGE HAAKSTD LARSEN, LAU GUERREIRO, RUI BELEZA, ANTÓNIO CUNHA, CHANTEL GELINAS, JERRY MULLER, FRANCIS FORDE, HANS FREDRIK SUNDE, BRIAN RIVERA, ADRIANO ANDRADE, YEVHEN BODRENKO, SERGIU CODREANU, ADAM BJERRE, ŁUKASZ STAFINIAK, AIRES ALMEIDA, BERNARDO SEIXAS, HERBERT GINTIS, RUTGER VOS, RICARDO VLADIMIRO, BO WINEGARD, JOHN CONNORS, ADAM KESSEL, VEGA GIDEY, CRAIG HEALY, OLAF ALEX, PHILIP KURIAN, JONATHAN VISSER, AND DAVID DIAS!

A SPECIAL THANKS TO MY PRODUCERS, YZAR WEHBE, ROSEY, AND JIM FRANK!

Home Top podcasts Popular guests Top books