Thomistic Seminar
August 18 – 22, 2008

Led by Professor John Haldane
(University of St Andrews, Scotland)

Last updated: 2/4/08

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Faculty Biographies

Elizabeth Anscombe: Ethics, Value, and Practice


G. E. M. Anscombe
Elizabeth Anscombe (1919-2001) is widely regarded as one of the most powerful philosophical minds of the twentieth century and has been described as the greatest woman philosopher of whom we have any record. Her work was marked by its range and directness of approach. Avoiding so far as possible discussions of contemporary philosophical writings, she launched into an enquiry first identifying a question and then thinking through to a satisfactory answer. Her work in moral philosophy, broadly understood, argued against mechanism and determinism so far as concerns human action, and in favor of the objectivity of value, virtue and justice. She also emphasized the importance of personal responsibility and the dangers of moral corruption particularly in relation to the creation and destruction of human life. 2008 marks the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of her essay “Modern Moral Philosophy” which is generally credited with having changed the character and direction of ethical theory in the decades following its appearance.

Anscombe’s relation to the philosophy of Thomas Aquinas, and to Thomism, is complex. She first read Aquinas while a student at Oxford, finding herself looking to his arguments about a first cause, and also at what he says about the natural law. Later it was again to his writings on causality, action and ethics that she returned. Yet while one can often discern the influence of Aquinas on her thinking, it is rarely made explicit and only very occasionally did she ever write directly about Aquinas. More broadly, her outlook on human nature also owes something to Augustine and it would be misleading to describe her as a Thomist (though she sometimes been grouped along with her husband Peter Geach and her student Anthony Kenny as an “analytical thomist”).

Elizabeth Anscombe was a formidable and independently minded thinker whose work needs to be better understood if it is to have the influence within and beyond academic philosophy that it deserves, and which could be hoped to enhance the understanding of fundamental issues about human life and conduct. The seminar will explore aspects of Anscombe’s work in the areas of value theory, ethics, and norm-governed practice. It will relate these to the work of some of her contemporaries and to the thought of Aquinas. The topics to be focused on are: