b. 1966
Mark C. Murphy is a contemporary American philosopher specializing in natural law theory, philosophy of religion, and the metaphysics of divine nature. He is a professor at Georgetown University and has written extensively on theistic ethics, divine agency, and the relationship between God's nature and moral norms. His work challenges classical perfect being theology by arguing that divine goodness may require God to be genuinely affected by creaturely suffering.
Developed a revisionary account of perfect being theology that takes divine passibility seriously
Authored 'God's Own Ethics' (2017), arguing that God's nature constrains divine moral agency in non-trivial ways
Advanced natural law theory through 'Natural Law and Practical Rationality' (2001)
Argued that classical divine impassibility is incompatible with genuine moral goodness in God
Contributed to debates on divine authority and the foundations of theistic metaethics