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Since 1985, I have, with great pleasure, been in the Chapel Hill Philosophy Department, where I am the Morehead-Cain Alumni Distinguished Professor and the Director of UNC's Program in Philosophy, Politics and Economics, and founding Director of the Philosophy, Politics, and Economics Society.

I was a Professorial Fellow in Philosophy at the University of Edinburgh from 2013-2016 and during the 2015-16 academic year I was a visitor in the Center for Human Values at Princeton University. I am also the Executive Director of the Marc Sanders Foundation, a non-profit foundation that promotes excellence in philosophy and public outreach. 

In 2020, I won the Philip Quinn Prize for “service to philosophy and philosophers” from the American Philosophical Association. In 2022, I received the University of North Carolina’s Board of Governor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching and the UNC Thomas Jefferson Award, which is awarded to “that member of the academic community who through personal influence and performance of duty in teaching, writing, and scholarship has best exemplified the ideals and objectives of Thomas Jefferson,”

Within philosophy, my interests include metaethics, moral theory, political philosophy, epistemology and metaphysics. 

Outside of philosophy, I spend a decent amount of time appreciating good coffee, indulging a taste for old cars and motorcycles, and for nine years, but sadly no longer, I spent time providing early morning child care at our kids' school, the Montessori Children's House of Durham, where my wife was, for eight years (all after my time there), the Head of School.

You'll find on the web two discussions I have had with Will Wilkinson on Bloggingheads.tv, one on Metaethics, and one on Evolution and Morality. Also on the web, you'll find a few of my talks, one on Evolution and Rational Agency, delivered at NYU/Abu Dhabi, one on The Nature of Normative Concepts, delivered at Virginia Tech, and one on  Adam Smith's Moral Theory, delivered at the Shalem Center in Israel, as well as a radio interview about moral dilemmas, conducted by  Alan Saunders, on the Philosophers Zone, which airs on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, and a short video introduction to The Prisoners' Dilemma on Wi-Phi along with a short discussion of Reasons to Vote, also on Wi-Phil. A list of my publications, many of which are available in e-form, is HERE.  My curriculum vita is HERE.

In December 2010 I had the honor of giving the mid-year Commencement Address at UNC/Chapel Hill.  You can find it on YouTube HERE. 

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My Mom, Dr. Joan McCord, passed away on February 24, 2004, after a brief but devastating bout with cancer. To learn about her and her work, you might go to her webpage, to her obituary in the New York Times or to a nice tribute to her on the web on the American Society of Criminology site.  As part of the American Society of Criminology's Oral History Project, John Laub interviewed her in 1996. You can find that interview HERE.  A collection of her papers, Crime and Family, is available on Amazon HERE. Freakanomics has an episode, "When Helping Hurts," discussing her work on the Cambridge-Somerville Youth Study.