Dr Nigel Pleasants (he / him / his)

Office Hours: Tuesdays 14.00 – 15.00 & Fridays 14.00 – 15.00 via Zoom (link is on ELE module pages, or email me for it)

My main areas of interest and work are in social and moral philosophy. Since my degree days I have been strongly influenced by the philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein, especially his very latest writings in On Certainty. I am a member of the British Wittgenstein Society and sit on its Honorary Committee. In recent years I have been attempting to work out ways in which Wittgenstein’s philosophy might help illuminate areas of moral philosophy, introducing and developing the idea of moral certainty. My other main interests are in reflecting philosophically on our historical and social scientific understanding of slavery and abolition, genocide, and the Holocaust. I also have an interest in the ethics and politics of contemporary animal exploitation. My primary orientation is philosophical, but I draw and reflect on findings, theories, explanations and ideas from history and the social sciences, and philosophy of social science. I have interests in moral psychology (moral agency, moral responsibility, moral certainty, moral perception, moral and morally relevant factual ignorance) and in the badness of death and the wrongness of killing. ​​

Selected Publications​

2023: Philosophical Perspectives on Moral Certainty, edited by Cecilie Eriksen, Julia Hermann, Neil O’Hara, and Nigel Pleasants (Routledge)​​

2022: ‘If You’re an Egalitarian…So What?’, Social Philosophy & Policy 39 (2), 13-33​​

2022: ‘Did Marx really think that capitalism is unjust?’ Philosophical Papers 51 (1), 147 - 77​​

2021: ‘Excuse and justification: What’s explanation and understanding got to do with it?’  European Journal of Social Theory 24 (3), 338–355

2021: Review of Gavin Kitching, 'Capitalism and democracy in the twenty-first century: a global future beyond nationalism', in Contemporary Political Theory 20, 115–18

2019: ‘Free will, determinism and the “problem” of structure and agency in the social sciences’, Philosophy of the social sciences 49 (1), 3–30

2018: ‘Would Aristotle have seen the wrongness of slavery if he had undergone a course of moral enhancement?’  Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement 83, 87-107.​​

2018: 'The structure of Moral Revolutions’,  Social Theory and Practice 44 (4), 567-92

2018: ‘Ordinary Men: Genocide, Determinism, Agency and Moral Culpability’, Philosophy of the social sciences 49 (1), 3–30

2016: ‘The question of the Holocaust’s uniqueness: Was it something more than or different from genocide?’  Journal of Applied Philosophy 33 (3), 297–310.

2015: ‘If killing isn’t wrong, then nothing is: A naturalistic defence of basic moral certainty’ Ethical Perspectives 22 (1), 197 – 215.​​

2010: 'Moral argument is not enough: The persistence of slavery and the emergence of abolition', Philosophical Topics 38 (1), 159-180.​​

2009: ‘Structure, agency, and ontology for Political Scientists?’, Political Studies 57 (4), 885-891.​​

2009: 'Wittgenstein and Basic Moral Certainty', Philosophia 37 (4), 669-679 (Special issue: The Third Wittgenstein Conference, edited by D. Moyal-Sharrock).​​

2008: ‘Wittgenstein, ethics and basic moral certainty’, Inquiry 51 (3), 241- 67.​​

2008: ‘Institutional wrongdoing and moral perception’, Journal of Social Philosophy 39 (1), 96–115.​​

2008: ‘Structure and moral agency in the antislavery and animal liberation movements’, in D. Grumett and R. Muers (eds.) Eating and believing: interdisciplinary perspectives on vegetarianism and theology. London: T&T Clark, pp. 198-216.​​

2008: Review of P. Tabensky (ed.) Judging and understanding: essays on free will, narrative, meaning and the ethical limits of condemnation, Philosophical Papers 37 (1), 177-84.​​

2006: ‘Nonsense on stilts? Wittgenstein, ethics, and the lives of animals’, Inquiry 49 (4), 314-36​​

2004: ‘The concept of learning from the study of the Holocaust’, History of the Human Sciences 17 (2/3), 187-210​​

2003: ‘Social criticism for “critical critics”?’ History of the Human Sciences 16 (4), 95-100.​​

2003: ‘A philosophy for the social sciences: realism, pragmatism, or neither?’ Foundations of Science 8 (1), 69-87.​​

2002: ‘Towards a critical use of Marx and Wittgenstein’, in G. Kitching & N. Pleasants (eds.), Marx and Wittgenstein: knowledge, morality and politics. London: Routledge, pp.160-81.​​

2002: ‘Rich egalitarianism, ordinary politics, and the demands of justice’, Inquiry 45 (1), 97-118.​​

2000: ‘Winch and Wittgenstein on understanding ourselves critically: descriptive not metaphysical’, Inquiry 43 (3), 289-318.​​

2000: ‘Winch, Wittgenstein, and the idea of a critical social theory’, History of the Human Sciences 13 (1), 78-91.​​

1999: Wittgenstein and the idea of a critical social theory. London: Routledge.​​

Work in Progress​ 

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'Empathy with evildoers​​'

'Wittgenstein and deep moral disagreement​​'

'Marxian theory of moral progress​​​'

Biography

I left school at 16 - as one did at the Secondary Modern school I attended (having been classified as unsuited for academic pursuits by the selection test of the tripartite education system that used to operate in the British State sector before comprehensivisation). I did various jobs for the next eight years: mink farm, road haulage company, meat-processing factory. In the last two of those years I took evening classes in 'O' level maths and 'A' level sociology (my education had supposedly given me practical life-skills, and prepared me for the world of semi-skilled work, but hadn't given me much formal qualification apart from a few CSEs). Having liked the taste of academic education, I resigned from my job in a well-known Suffolk turkey processing factory (a very sweet act) to embark on a programme of full-time 'A' level study at my local Further Education College (in Lowestoft, Suffolk). I went on to do a degree in Philosophy and Sociology at the University of Bristol, and then to the University of Cambridge for an M.Phil in Social and Political Theory, followed by a Ph.D.I came to Exeter in 1997, to what was then the Department of Sociology. I was centrally involved in reinstating philosophy at Exeter via the Department of Sociology. The department continued to grow and broaden with the addition of anthropology and criminology. Throughout this time I have served for many years as Director of Undergraduate Studies and Director of Education.