Today, I finished the first draft of chapters seven and eight of my dissertation. Originally, these two chapters were supposed to be just one chapter on resultant moral luck. However, after writing 55 good pages (!), I realized that the best course would be to divide the chapter into two. So chapter seven develops my general theory of responsibility for outcomes, and then chapter eight uses that theory to solve the problem of resultant moral luck.

Hooray me!

I’m really happy with how these two chapters turned out, as I think I’ve done some very robust, innovative, and useful work. Not only have I dispensed with the most difficult kind of moral luck, but my general theory of responsibility for outcomes provides tort law with a much-needed and wholly new account of the nature and limits of responsibility for harms done. (Yeah, wow.) The theory definitely requires some further development to address the kinds of problems routine in the law. (For now, my focus is only on solving the problem of moral luck.) However, I believe that I have the essentials well-drawn, thanks to the rational foundation provided by Aristotle.

So I’m pleased — but now I have to frantically prepare to teach my section of “Introduction to Philosophy” starting on Monday. Yikes!