John Martin Fischer

John Martin Fischer
Born	(1952-12-26) 26 December 1952 (age 72)
Era	Contemporary philosophy
Region	Western philosophy
School	Analytic
Main interests	Philosophy of action, free will, moral philosophy

John Martin Fischer (born December 26, 1952) is an American philosopher. He is Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at the University of California, Riverside and a leading contributor to the philosophy of free will and moral responsibility.[1]

Education and career

Fischer received his undergraduate degree from Stanford University and his Ph.D. from Cornell in 1982. He began his teaching career at Yale University, where he taught for almost a decade before joining the faculty at the University of California, Riverside. In 2017 he was appointed by the Regents of the University of California as one of 22 University Professors, the first and only philosopher since the inception of this program.

In June 2011, Fischer was elected vice-president of the Pacific Division of the American Philosophical Association and became president of the Pacific Division in 2013.[1] In 2024, he was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.[2]

Philosophical work

While Fischer's work centers primarily on free will and moral responsibility, where he is particularly noted as a proponent of semi-compatibilism[3] (the idea that regardless of whether free will and determinism are compatible, moral responsibility and determinism are),[4] he also has worked on the metaphysics of death and philosophy of religion and led a multi-year, multi-pronged research project on "immortality," funded in 2012 by the John Templeton Foundation.[5]

Books

• Moral Responsibility (editor) (Cornell University Press, 1986)
• God, Foreknowledge and Freedom (editor) (Stanford University Press, 1989)
• Perspectives on Moral Responsibility (co-editor with Ravizza) (Cornell University Press, 1993)
• The Metaphysics of Death (editor) (Stanford University Press, 1993)
• The Metaphysics of Free Will: An Essay on Control (Blackwell, 1994)
• Responsibility and Control: A Theory of Moral Responsibility (co-authored with Ravizza) (Cambridge University Press, 1998)
• My Way: Essays on Moral Responsibility (Oxford University Press, 2006)
• Our Stories: Essays on Life, Death, and Free Will (Oxford University Press, 2009)
• Near-Death Experiences: Understanding Visions of the Afterlife (co-authored with Benjamin Mitchell-Yellin) (Oxford University Press, 2016)
• "Death, Immortality, and Meaning in Life' (Oxford University Press, 2019)
• 'Should You Choose to Live Forever?' (co-authored with Stephen Cave). (Routledge, 2023)

Media appearances and interviews

• Shermer, Michael (17 December 2019). "John Martin Fischer — Death, Immortality and Meaning in Life". Science Salon (Podcast). Skeptic Magazine.
• Friction (Philosophy) (15 July 2021). "John Martin Fischer - Free will, God, Meaning, and More" (Interview). Archived from the original on 2021-12-21.

See also

• American philosophy
• List of American philosophers

References

1. "John M. Fischer". philosophy.ucr.edu. Archived from the original on 2019-04-04. Retrieved 2018-12-18.
2. "2024 New Member List | American Academy of Arts and Sciences".
3. "Semicompatibilism". www.informationphilosopher.com.
4. Kane, R. (2005) A Contemporary Introduction to Free Will, New York: Oxford UP. ISBN 978-0-19-514970-8
5. Radio, Southern California Public (20 June 2014). "Researchers ponder life after death in 'Immortality Project'". Southern California Public Radio.

External links

• Information Philosopher on John Martin Fischer
• List of papers by John Martin Fischer
• The Moscow Center for Consciousness Studies video interview with John Fischer