Daniel Jacobson is a contemporary analytic philosopher at the University of Michigan known for his work in metaethics, moral psychology, and aesthetics. He has contributed significantly to fitting-attitude theories of value and sentimentalist accounts of moral wrongness. His work explores how reactive attitudes like resentment and indignation ground moral concepts, and he has written influentially on the intersection of ethics and aesthetics.
Developed a fitting-attitude account of wrongness grounded in reactive emotions like resentment
Contributed to debates on moral sentimentalism and the role of emotions in ethical judgment
Written influential work on the relationship between ethics and aesthetics, including debates over moralism
Critiqued Kantian and rationalist ethics from a sentimentalist perspective
Engaged seriously with free speech, pornography, and expressive harm in political philosophy