Rosalind Hursthouse

Rosalind Hursthouse (born 10 November 1943) is a British-born New Zealand moral philosopher noted for her work on virtue ethics. She is one of the leading exponents of contemporary virtue ethics, though she has also written extensively on philosophy of action, history of philosophy, moral psychology, and biomedical ethics. Hursthouse is Professor Emerita of Philosophy at the University of Auckland and Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand.

Hursthouse's book On Virtue Ethics (1999) has been a seminal contribution to the contemporary revival of virtue theory ("aretaic turn") and is often cited as the definitive exposition of neo-Aristotelian virtue ethics, which links morally right action, virtuous character, and human flourishing. Her book has been described by Roger Crisp as "the comprehensive statement modern virtue ethics has been awaiting for forty years." According to Simon Blackburn, "With this book virtue ethics finally comes of age... This volume will effortlessly take its place as the defining exposition of the view."

Early life and education Rosalind Hursthouse (née Mary Rosalind) was born in Bristol, England on 10 November 1943 to William (Bill) Weldon Oliver Hursthouse (10 July 1914 – 19 April 2017) and Jessie (Jay) Hursthouse (née Jessie E. Simmonds) (19 May 1914 – 26 October 1987), but she and her younger brother, William, grew up in Wellington, New Zealand. She is a member of the notable Atkinson–Hursthouse–Richmond family of New Zealand and a descendant of the Hursthouse family of England, which traces back to the first John Hursthouse who immigrated from Holland in the 1600s.

As a 17-year-old, Hursthouse was inspired to study philosophy by her aunt, Mary Fearon Hursthouse, after an argument at the dinner table. She enrolled the next year at Victoria University of Wellington and then transferred to the University of Auckland, where she earned her BA (1964) and MA (1965) in Philosophy and was subsequently appointed as Junior Lecturer in Philosophy.

In 1966, Hursthouse (as Rosalind Mary Hursthouse) went up to the University of Oxford to read for the BPhil (1968) on a postgraduate scholarship, While at Somerville, Hursthouse was mentored by Elizabeth Anscombe and Philippa Foot, both of whom would become for her lifelong friends and sources of philosophical inspiration.

Career After teaching at the University of Auckland and Corpus Christi College, Hursthouse joined the ranks of the founding faculty of the Open University to work with disadvantaged students and adult learners who had little to no background in philosophy.

While Hursthouse has applied virtue ethics to practical issues in Beginning Lives and Ethics, Humans, and Other Animals, her most important contribution to philosophy is On Virtue Ethics. In the first section, she shows how neo-Aristotelian virtue ethics provides action guidance and illuminates ethical dilemmas. In the second section, Hursthouse offers the first virtue-based account of acting "from a sense of duty," bringing out the significance of moral emotions. In the third and final section, she considers the question, "Which character traits are the virtues?" This is the most controversial and widely discussed part of her book. Hursthouse's answer is that the virtues are the character traits which tend to not only benefit their possessor but also, relatedly, make their possessor a good human being — based, in part, on quasi-scientific "ethical but non‐evaluative beliefs about human nature and how human life goes" ("Plato's Requirement on the Virtues").

Since writing On Virtue Ethics, Hursthouse has held visiting positions at the University of California, Los Angeles, the University of California, San Diego, the University of Auckland, the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Stanford University, and the University of California, Berkeley (Mills Distinguished Visiting professor in Moral and Intellectual Philosophy and Civil Polity). and retired from her academic career at the University of Auckland, where she is now Professor Emerita of Philosophy.