1. Harry Gordon Frankfurt was an American philosopher.
21 Facts About Harry Frankfurt
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Harry Frankfurt was a professor emeritus of philosophy at Princeton University, where he taught from 1990 until 2002.
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Harry Frankfurt made significant contributions to such fields as ethics and philosophy of mind.
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Harry Frankfurt was born David Bernard Stern at a home for unwed mothers in Langhorne, Pennsylvania, on May 29,1929, and did not know his biological parents.
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Harry Frankfurt attended Johns Hopkins University, where he obtained his Bachelor of Arts in 1949 and Doctor of Philosophy in 1954, both in philosophy.
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Harry Frankfurt previously taught at Ohio State University, SUNY Binghamton, Rockefeller University, Yale University, and then Princeton University.
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Harry Frankfurt was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1995.
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Harry Frankfurt was a Visiting Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford University; he served as president, Eastern Division, American Philosophical Association; and he received grants and fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Andrew Mellon Foundation and the National Endowment for the Humanities.
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Harry Frankfurt argues that there is another branch of inquiry that has received less attention, namely the question of what has importance or what we should care about.
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Harry Frankfurt defends a different perspective on this issue by arguing that caring about something makes this thing important.
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Harry Frankfurt explains this in terms of needs: the caring attitude brings with it a need.
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Harry Frankfurt rejects it based on the claim that at least some cases of the caring attitude are misguided.
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Harry Frankfurt holds that persons are beings that have second-order volitions.
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Harry Frankfurt sees this as the mark of personhood because entities with second-order volitions do not just have desires but care about which desires they have.
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Harry Frankfurt holds that personhood is an important feature of humans but not of other animals.
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Harry Frankfurt has rejected the principle of alternative possibilities based on a series of counterexamples, the so-called "Harry Frankfurt cases".
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Harry Frankfurt argues that, in this case, Allison is morally responsible for walking her dog even though she lacked the ability to do otherwise.
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Harry Frankfurt cases have provoked a significant discussion of the principle of alternative possibilities.
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Harry Frankfurt started taking piano lessons from an early age, initially from his mother who hoped that he might pursue a career as a concert pianist.
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Harry Frankfurt continued to play piano and receive lessons throughout his life, alongside his philosophical career.
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Harry Frankfurt died of congestive heart failure in Santa Monica, California, on July 16,2023, at age 94.