Justin is interested primarily in ethics and metaethics. His MA thesis concerned the value of equality--specifically, equality in distribution of goods--where he argued against an intruiging view put forward by Raz and Frankfurt that distributive equality is important only derivatively. Justin's dissertation concerns the nature of normativity. A number of attractive ethical theories embody a rather exotic view of the nature of value, according to which a normative source (such as utility) can, somehow, transfer normativity to some rule or practice, such that the rule or practice on the receiving end is, in an important sense, non-derivatively normative.

phone: (919) 962-3329
email: jjeffrey@email.unc.edu
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