Michael Levin
Encyclopedia
Michael Levin is a philosophy professor at City University of New York
. He has published on metaphysics
, epistemology, race, homosexuality
, animal rights, the philosophy of archaeology, the philosophy of logic
, philosophy of language
, and the philosophy of science
.
Levin's central research interests are in epistemology (reliabilism
and Gettier problems) and in philosophy of race.
in epistemology and the theory of compatibilism
in free will.
in which he defends Scrooge as "an entrepreneur whose ideas and practices benefit his employees, society at large, and himself."
has criticized Levin's attempt to show that homosexuality
is abnormal, calling it absurd.
Feminist Susan Faludi
writes in Backlash that Levin's 1988 book Feminism and Freedom characterizes feminism as an "antidemocratic, if not totalitarian, ideology" without a single redeeming feature.
Timothy F. Murphy writes that while Levin "more or less accepts that there is a strong biological basis for homoerotic orientation" he nevertheless believes that antigay discrimination may be defensible on several grounds, including the possibility that there is a biologically based dislike of homosexuality.
and Richard Lynn
that white people score higher on IQ tests than black people due to genetic differences
—a view that has been criticized by scholars such as Leon Kamin
of Princeton University
.
City University of New York
The City University of New York is the public university system of New York City, with its administrative offices in Yorkville in Manhattan. It is the largest urban university in the United States, consisting of 23 institutions: 11 senior colleges, six community colleges, the William E...
. He has published on metaphysics
Metaphysics
Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being and the world, although the term is not easily defined. Traditionally, metaphysics attempts to answer two basic questions in the broadest possible terms:...
, epistemology, race, homosexuality
Homosexuality
Homosexuality is romantic or sexual attraction or behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality refers to "an enduring pattern of or disposition to experience sexual, affectional, or romantic attractions" primarily or exclusively to people of the same...
, animal rights, the philosophy of archaeology, the philosophy of logic
Philosophy of logic
Following the developments in Formal logic with symbolic logic in the late nineteenth century and mathematical logic in the twentieth, topics traditionally treated by logic not being part of formal logic have tended to be termed either philosophy of logic or philosophical logic if no longer simply...
, philosophy of language
Philosophy of language
Philosophy of language is the reasoned inquiry into the nature, origins, and usage of language. As a topic, the philosophy of language for analytic philosophers is concerned with four central problems: the nature of meaning, language use, language cognition, and the relationship between language...
, and the philosophy of science
Philosophy of science
The philosophy of science is concerned with the assumptions, foundations, methods and implications of science. It is also concerned with the use and merit of science and sometimes overlaps metaphysics and epistemology by exploring whether scientific results are actually a study of truth...
.
Levin's central research interests are in epistemology (reliabilism
Reliabilism
Reliabilism, a category of theories in the philosophical discipline of epistemology, has been advanced both as a theory of knowledge and of justified belief...
and Gettier problems) and in philosophy of race.
Philosophical views
Levin advocates reliabilismReliabilism
Reliabilism, a category of theories in the philosophical discipline of epistemology, has been advanced both as a theory of knowledge and of justified belief...
in epistemology and the theory of compatibilism
Compatibilism
Compatibilism is the belief that free will and determinism are compatible ideas, and that it is possible to believe both without being logically inconsistent. It may, however, be more accurate to say that compatibilists define 'free will' in a way that allows it to co-exist with determinism...
in free will.
Torture
In a 1982 essay "The Case for Torture" Levin argued that "there are situations where torture is not merely permissible but morally mandatory." Levin reiterated this view in 2009.Economics
For Christmas 2000, Levin published a libertarian critique of Dickens's popular novella A Christmas CarolA Christmas Carol
A Christmas Carol is a novella by English author Charles Dickens first published by Chapman & Hall on 17 December 1843. The story tells of sour and stingy Ebenezer Scrooge's ideological, ethical, and emotional transformation after the supernatural visits of Jacob Marley and the Ghosts of...
in which he defends Scrooge as "an entrepreneur whose ideas and practices benefit his employees, society at large, and himself."
Homosexuality and feminism
Levin argues that homosexual acts are abnormal because their participants are not using their sexual organs for what they are for, and that this abnormality must be a source of unhappiness, even though it may go unrecognized. Philosopher Roger ScrutonRoger Scruton
Roger Vernon Scruton is a conservative English philosopher and writer. He is the author of over 30 books, including Art and Imagination , Sexual Desire , The Aesthetics of Music , and A Political Philosophy: Arguments For Conservatism...
has criticized Levin's attempt to show that homosexuality
Homosexuality
Homosexuality is romantic or sexual attraction or behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality refers to "an enduring pattern of or disposition to experience sexual, affectional, or romantic attractions" primarily or exclusively to people of the same...
is abnormal, calling it absurd.
Feminist Susan Faludi
Susan Faludi
Susan C. Faludi is an American feminist, journalist and author. She won a Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Journalism in 1991, for a report on the leveraged buyout of Safeway Stores, Inc., a report that the Pulitzer Prize committee thought showed the "human costs of high finance".-Biographical...
writes in Backlash that Levin's 1988 book Feminism and Freedom characterizes feminism as an "antidemocratic, if not totalitarian, ideology" without a single redeeming feature.
Timothy F. Murphy writes that while Levin "more or less accepts that there is a strong biological basis for homoerotic orientation" he nevertheless believes that antigay discrimination may be defensible on several grounds, including the possibility that there is a biologically based dislike of homosexuality.
Race
Levin agrees with Arthur JensenArthur Jensen
Arthur Robert Jensen is a Professor Emeritus of educational psychology at the University of California, Berkeley. Jensen is known for his work in psychometrics and differential psychology, which is concerned with how and why individuals differ behaviorally from one another.He is a major proponent...
and Richard Lynn
Richard Lynn
Richard Lynn is a British Professor Emeritus of Psychology at the University of Ulster who is known for his views on racial and ethnic differences. Lynn argues that there are hereditary differences in intelligence based on race and sex....
that white people score higher on IQ tests than black people due to genetic differences
Race and intelligence
The connection between race and intelligence has been a subject of debate in both popular science and academic research since the inception of intelligence testing in the early 20th century...
—a view that has been criticized by scholars such as Leon Kamin
Leon Kamin
Leon J. Kamin is an American psychologist who chaired Princeton University's Department of Psychology in 1968....
of Princeton University
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
.
Books
- Metaphysics and the Mind-Body Problem, Oxford University Press, 1979. ISBN 0-19-824415-0.
- Feminism and Freedom, Transaction Publishers, 1987. ISBN 978-0887386701
- Why Race Matters: Race Differences and What They Mean, Praeger Publishers, 1997. ISBN 0-275-95789-6
Articles and essays
- Levin, M. E. 1968. Fine, Mathematics, and Theory Change. The Journal of Philosophy 65, no. 2: 52-56.
- Levin, M. E. 1971. Length Relativity. The Journal of Philosophy 68, no. 6: 164-174.
- Levin, M. E. 1973. On explanation in archaeology: a rebuttal to Fritz and Plog. American Antiquity 38, no. 4: 387-395.
- Levin, M. E. 1974. Kant’s Derivation of the Formula of Universal Law as an Ontological Argument. Kant-Studien 65, no. 1-4: 50-66.
- Levin, M. E. 1975. Kripke's argument against the identity thesis. The Journal of Philosophy 72, no. 6: 149-167.
- Levin, M. E. 1975. Relativity, Spatial and Ontological. Nous: 243-267.
- Levin, M. E. 1976. The extensionality of causation and causal-explanatory contexts. Philosophy of Science 43, no. 2: 266-277.
- Levin, M. E. 1976. On the ascription of functions to objects, with special reference to inference in archaeology. Philosophy of the Social Sciences 6, no. 3: 227.
- Levin, M. E. 1977. Animal rights evaluated. The Humanist 37, no. 4: 12-15.
- Levin, M. E., and M. R. Levin. 1977. Flagpoles, shadows and deductive explanation. Philosophical Studies 32, no. 3: 293-299.
- Levin, M. E., and M. R. Levin. 1978. The independence results of set theory: An informal exposition. Synthese 38, no. 1: 1-34.
- Levin, M. E., and M. R. Levin. 1978. Lavoisier's Slow Burn. Philosophy of Science 45, no. 4: 626-629.
- Levin, M. E. 1979. On theory-change and meaning-change. Philosophy of Science 46, no. 3: 407-424.
- Levin, M. E. 1979. Quine's View (s) of Logical Truth. Essays on the Philosophy ofW. V. Quine: 45-67.
- Levin, M. E. 1979. The universalizability of moral judgments revisited. Mind 88, no. 1: 115.
- Levin, M. E. 1979. Forcing and the Indeterminacy of Translation. Erkenntnis 14, no. 1: 25-32.
- Levin, M. E. 1979. Ahab as Socratic Philosopher: The Myth of the Cave Inverted. ATQ: The American Transcendental Quarterly 41: 61-73.
- Levin, M. E., and M. R. Levin. 1979. The modal confusion in Rawls' original position. Analysis 39, no. 2: 82.
- Levin, M. E. 1980. Reverse discrimination, shackled runners, and personal identity. Philosophical Studies 37, no. 2: 139-149.
- Levin, M. E. 1981. Equality of opportunity. The Philosophical Quarterly 31, no. 123: 110-125.
- Levin, M. E. 1981. Is racial discrimination special? The Journal of Value Inquiry 15, no. 3: 225-234.
- Levin, M. E. 1981. Phenomenal Properties. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 42, no. 1: 42-58.
- Levin, M. E. 1984. Why we believe in other minds. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 44, no. 3: 343-359.
- Levin, M. E. 2007. Bundling Hume with Kripkenstein. Synthese 155, no. 1: 35-64.
- Levin, M. E. 2007. Compatibilism and Special Relativity. The Journal of philosophy 104, no. 9: 433-463.
- Levin, M. E. nd. The Case for Torture
- Levin, M. E. nd. In Defense of Scrooge http://www.mises.org/article.aspx?Id=573, a libertarianLibertarianismLibertarianism, in the strictest sense, is the political philosophy that holds individual liberty as the basic moral principle of society. In the broadest sense, it is any political philosophy which approximates this view...
apology in favor of the popular protagonist of Dickens' A Christmas CarolA Christmas CarolA Christmas Carol is a novella by English author Charles Dickens first published by Chapman & Hall on 17 December 1843. The story tells of sour and stingy Ebenezer Scrooge's ideological, ethical, and emotional transformation after the supernatural visits of Jacob Marley and the Ghosts of...
See also
- American philosophyAmerican philosophyAmerican philosophy is the philosophical activity or output of Americans, both within the United States and abroad. The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy notes that while American philosophy lacks a "core of defining features, American Philosophy can nevertheless be seen as both reflecting and...
- Biology and sexual orientationBiology and sexual orientationBiology and sexual orientation is the subject of research into the role of biology in the development of human sexual orientation. No simple, single cause for sexual orientation has been conclusively demonstrated, but research suggests that it is by a combination of genetic, hormonal, and...
- List of American philosophers
External links
- Levin's academic page at CUNY