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USING BIG WORDS TO EXPLAIN LITTLE WORDS

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 September 2011

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Extract

Sometimes, when I go to dinner parties organized by my partner, people ask me what I do, and I say that I'm a philosopher. But when I fumble at their questions about ‘my philosophy’, my partner will describe what I do by saying, ‘He uses big words to explain little words.’ Although this is meant tongue in cheek, it's basically right. My philosophical research is mainly in metaethics and the philosophy of language with a focus on the semantics of moral words. This means, for better or worse, that I use big words to explain little words.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 2011

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References

Note

1 For helpful feedback on earlier drafts of this paper, I'd like to thank Jean Beckley, Nicole Breazeale, Graham Hubbs, Tara Lloyd, and an audience at the University of Cape Town. Research for this article was supported by the Arts and Humanities Research Council.