August 14, 2003

John Rawls

Posted by Brian

Does anyone know who was John Rawls’s PhD dissertation advisor? This question came up in discussion around here (a propos of nothing much at all) and no one knew, but I imagine at least one reader, if not a fellow Timberite, will know.

Posted on August 14, 2003 06:19 PM UTC
Comments

And to think that anyome might wonder if this is an academic blog!

Posted by David Sucher · August 14, 2003 06:29 PM

I dunno. I do know that he spent the summer after he got his PhD doing the index for Walter Kaufmann’s Nietzsche, so maybe it was Kaufmann. If you care to look it up somewhere, the title was “A Study In The Grounds of Ethical Knowledge: Considered With Reference to Judgments on the Moral Worth of Character” which is notable for having been transformed into a journal article that contains zero footnotes or other citations.

Posted by Matthew Yglesias · August 14, 2003 06:49 PM

Here’s something:

“A Study in the Grounds of Ethical Knowledge: Considered with Reference to Judgments on the Moral Worth of Character.” Ph.D. Dissertation, Princeton University, 1950. Abstract in Disserta tion Abstracts (1955), 15(4):608-609.

http://sun3.lib.uci.edu/~scctr/philosophy/rawls.html

Posted by David · August 14, 2003 06:51 PM

Proquest digital dissertations only sells it in hardcopy. If all else fails you can ask J.B. Schneewind:

“J.B. Schneewind, philosopher and historian, tells of arriving at Princeton as a student and observing Rawls defend his doctoral dissertation. Such an ordeal can be a friendly ceremony, a rite of passage, or a blood bath exacted by barbarous professors. The young Rawls turned it into an erudite lesson by citing to the professors passages from Kant—in German!”

Posted by Shai · August 14, 2003 07:00 PM

Rawls’s dissertation supervisor was Walter Stace. At least, that’s what Thomas Pogge says in an essay called “A Brief Sketch of Rawls’s Life,” reprinted in Richardson and Weithman, The Philosophy of Rawls: Development and Main Outlines of Rawls’s Theory of Justice (Garland, 1999). Apparently, Rawls also worked with Norman Malcolm and Max Black (author of that wonderful book, The Prevelance of Humbug and other essays).

Posted by micah · August 14, 2003 07:04 PM

I sent an e-mail inquiry to Ann Getson, a contact person at the Phil. Dept.

Maybe she’ll send a reply. I’ll let you know.

Posted by David · August 14, 2003 07:05 PM

Much thanks for all the quick feedback!

Posted by Brian Weatherson · August 14, 2003 07:08 PM

Is it just me or is that a really bad title? He must have gotten some big time assistance before coming up with A Theory of Justice.

Posted by Matthew Yglesias · August 14, 2003 08:19 PM

Eh, even A Theory of Justice is pretty blah. Rawls has nothing on Hobbes and Nietzsche.

Posted by Walter · August 14, 2003 10:05 PM

:-) I always think of A Theory of Justice being the Old Testament (Political Liberalism the New), so I don’t expect it to have a snappy, clever title.

Posted by PG · August 15, 2003 03:52 PM

Stace, best known for a book on mysticism. Kaufmann, stuck with trying to convince everyone that Nietzsche and Hegel weren’t Nazis or Commies. Surtprising, really.

Posted by zizka · August 17, 2003 12:40 AM
Followups

→ Publish Or Perish?.
Excerpt: This Brian Weatherson post got me looking at the introduction to my copy of John Rawls' Collected Papers and for the first time I noticed the chronology of his publications. They're rather ... sparse, especially at the beginning of his...Read more at Matthew Yglesias

This discussion has been closed. Thanks to everyone who contributed.