Trinity’s Prof Peter Simons, from the Department of Philosophy, has been named as one of the 50 most influential philosophers alive today, according to a new list published by higher education and rankings website The Best Schools.
In their list, which includes the likes of Noam Chomsky and Peter Singer, the website praises the “influential” work of Simons in the area of metaphysics and ontology, a branch of philosophy that deals with the nature of existence.
Simons is the current Chair of Moral Philosophy, having previously served as Head of the School of Social Sciences and Philosophy. Before coming to Trinity, Simons was the Professor of Philosophy at the University of Leeds, which maintains the largest philosophy department in the UK after Oxford.
In a press statement, Simons emphasised the value of philosophy in everyday life. Simons, whose own philosophy has provided insight to a range of industries, including engineering and software design, said “the kind of abstract thought in which philosophy engages is of value to industry”.
“If you do it well you will gain skills that are widely transferable that can be applied right across the board. The cognitive and logical skills you acquire will prove very useful to any employer”, he added.
Elected a fellow of the British Academy in 2004, the UK’s national body for the humanities and social science, Simons is already well-celebrated thinker. In 2013, he was also elected to the membership of the Royal Irish Academy.
Simons’s research interests include metaphysics, which addresses such abstract concepts as knowledge, identity, time, and space. “Philosophical concepts get to the heart of the dispute about what it’s truly like to live life”, he said
Joining him on the list are noted feminist and queer theorist Judith Butler, best known for her 1990 book, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity . Martha Nussbaum, another feminist scholar, also appears on the list, alongside Cornel West, the first African-American to earn a PhD in philosophy from the University of Princeton.
