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Thomas Nagel (born 1937) is an American philosopher, currently University Professor and Professor of Philosophy and Law at New York University . His main areas of philosophical interest are Philosophy Of Mind , Political Philosophy , and Ethics . He is well-known for his critique of reductionist accounts of the mind in his essay "What Is it Like to Be a Bat?" (1974), and for his contributions to deontological and liberal moral and political theory in ''The Possibility of Altruism'' (1970). BIOGRAPHY Thomas Nagel was born July 4, 1937 in Belgrade , Yugoslavia (now Serbia ); his family was Jewish . He received a BA from Cornell University in 1958, a BPhil from Oxford University in 1960 , and a PhD from Harvard University in 1963 under the supervision of John Rawls . Before settling in New York, Nagel taught briefly at the University Of California, Berkeley (from 1963 to 1966) and at Princeton University (from 1966 to 1980). In 2006, he was made a member of the American Philosophical Society .Biographical information from Nagel's CV at NYU (PDF) . Nagel is a Fellow of the American Academy Of Arts And Sciences and a Fellow of the British Academy , and has held fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation , the National Science Foundation , and the National Endowment For The Humanities .From Nagel's faculty page at New York University . WORK Much of Nagel's work concerns the tension between objective and subjective perspectives: on reasons for action, on agency, on experience, the mind, and on reality as a whole. For many years, Nagel has conducted a Seminar noted for an array of guest speakers with his colleague Ronald Dworkin . Philosophy of mind Nagel is probably most widely known within the field of '' (edited by David J. Chalmers ). In "What is it Like to Be a Bat?", Nagel argues that Consciousness has essential to it a ''subjective character'', a ''what it is like'' aspect. He states that "an organism has conscious mental states if and only if there is something that it is to ''be'' that organism—something it is like ''for'' the organism."Nagel, "What is it Like to Be a Bat?" (1974), p. 436. Nagel also suggests that the subjective aspect of the mind may not ever be sufficiently accounted for by the Objective methods of Reductionistic Science . He claims that " {Link without Title} f we acknowledge that a physical theory of mind must account for the subjective character of experience, we must admit that no presently available conception gives us a clue how this could be done."Ibid., p. 445. Furthermore, he states that "it seems unlikely that any physical theory of mind can be contemplated until more thought has been given to the general problem of subjective and objective."Ibid., p. 450. While Nagel is sometimes categorized as a Dualist for these sorts of remarks, he is more precisely categorized as an anti-reductionist. Nagel (1998) writes: Ethics In ethics, Nagel is known for his contributions to deontological (non-consequentialist) ethics and liberal political theory. In ''The Possibility of Altruism'' (1970), Nagel defends Altruism . In a Neo-Kantian vein, he argues that people can have good reason to commit acts that benefit another without the expectation of benefit for oneself and without being motivated by factors such as sympathy. Along with Bernard Williams , he has also contributed much to the early development of the problem of Moral Luck , detailing its various aspects, and analyzing its impact on ethics and moral evaluation. SELECTED PUBLICATIONS Books
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