Marion Hourdequin
Assistant Professor of Philosophy
office: Armstrong 125
phone: 719/227-8331
email: marion.hourdequin at coloradocollege.edu
Research and Teaching Interests
My primary interests are in environmental ethics, comparative (Chinese and Western) philosophy, metaethics, and the philosophy of biology. I teach courses in all of these areas, as well as in philosophy of science and epistemology.
My dissertation research focused on the relationship between evolution and ethics: more specifically, I defended a naturalistic metaethics that makes a place for justified moral belief. This work drew on recent developments in evolutionary theory, including multilevel selection and cultural evolutionary theory.
Current projects include work on the relationship between collective action problems such as climate change and the individualistic assumptions of rational choice theory, philosophical naturalism in environmental ethics, the relationship between moral learning and moral motivation, and the ethics of ecological restoration.
Education
A.B., Princeton University, 1995
M.S., University of Montana, 1999
M.A., University of Montana, 2001
Ph.D., Duke University, 2005
Courses
PH 140 Ethics
PH 227 Epistemology
PH 228 Philosophy of Science
PH 246 Environmental Ethics
PH 286 Chinese Philosophy
PH 303 Relativism, Pluralism, & Social Reform
Representative Publications
"Doing, Allowing, and Precaution," Environmental Ethics 29 (2007): 339-358.
Review of The Evolution of Morality by Richard Joyce, Metascience 16 (2007): 315-319 .
Review of Not by Genes Alone: How Culture Transformed Human Evolution by Peter Richerson and Robert Boyd, Philosophy of Science 73/1 (2006): 127-131.
"Practical Wisdom in Environmental Education," with David Havlick, Ethics, Place, and Environment 8/3 (2005): 385-392.
"Theories as Tools: A Pluralistic Approach to Ecological Modeling," Studies in History and Philosophy of Science C 36 (2005): 594-601.
"A Relational Approach to Environmental Ethics," with David Wong, Journal of Chinese Philosophy 32 (2005): 19-33.
"Tradition and Morality in the Analects: A Reply to Hansen," Journal of Chinese Philosophy 31 (2004): 517-533.