Aaron Smuts
Academic Background
University of Wisconsin, Madison (2002-2006)
2006 Ph.D., Department of Philosophy
Ph.D. minor, Department of Communication, program in film.
Dissertation: Laughing at Art: Humor, Art, and Morality (Chair: Noël Carroll)
University of Texas at Austin
1997-8 Ph.D. student, Department of Philosophy
University of Houston, TX
1997 BA Philosophy, Summa cum Laude
1997 BA History, Summa cum Laude
Courses Taught
Free Will and Moral Responsibility (Fall 2010; Fall 2011)
Political Philosophy (Fall 2010)
Bioethics (Fall 2010; Fall 2011)
Philosophy of Religion (Spring 2011; Spring 2012; Summer I 2012)
Environmental Ethics (Spring 2011)
The Good Life (Spring 2011; Fall 2012)
Meta-ethics (Fall 2011)
Philosophy of Emotion (Spring 2012)
Philosophy Internship (Spring 2012)
Moral Responsibility (Fall 2012)
Philosophy of Death (Fall 2012)
Philosophy of Love (Spring 2013)
Philosophy of Film (Spring 2013)
Areas of Interest
Aaron Smuts earned his PhD in philosophy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Aaron's interests range across a wide variety of topics in ethics, the philosophy of art, metaphysics, and general value theory. Currently he is working on two projects. The first is on the nature and value of well-being. The other project concerns the normative assessment of emotions. Aaron has published over three dozen articles in a variety of books and academic journals.
Publications
- A Life Worth Living.
- Five Theses About Caring.
- How Much Should We Be Moved by the Fate of Anna Karenina?
- In Defense of the No-Reasons View of Love.
- Pleasurably Regarding the Pain of Fictional Others.
- Love and Free Will.
- Welfare, Meaning, and Worth.
- Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Love. Oxford University Press. forthcoming. Co-edited by Christopher Grau & Aaron Smuts.
- Cognitive and Philosophical Approaches to Horror. In Harry Benshoff (ed.), Blackwell Companion to the Horror Film. Blackwell forthcoming.
- L'Humor. In Julien Deonna Emma Tieffenbach (ed.), Petite Dictionnaire des Valeurs. forthcoming.
- Love and Death: The Problem of Resilience. In Michael Cholbi (ed.), Immortality and the Philosophy of Death. Rowman and Littlefield forthcoming.
- Philosophy of Film: A Contemporary Introduction. Routledge. forthcoming.
- Philosophy of Film: An Introduction. Routledge. forthcoming.
- The Ethics of Imagination and Fantasy. In Amy Kind (ed.), Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Imagination. forthcoming.
- How Not to Defend Response Moralism. Journal of Aesthetic Education 49 (4):19-38. 2015.
- Is It Better to Love Better Things? In Tony Milligan, Christian Maurer & Kamila Pacovská (eds.), Love and Its Objects. 2015.
- Cinematic. Nordic Journal of Aesthetics 23 (46):78-95. 2014.
- Normative Reasons for Love, Part I. Philosophy Compass 9 (8):507-517. 2014.
- Normative Reasons for Love, Part II. Philosophy Compass 9 (8):518-526. 2014.
- The Ethics of Singing Along: The Case of 'Mind of a Lunatic'. Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 71 (1):121-129. 2013.
- Five Tests for What Makes a Life Worth Living. Journal of Value Inquiry 47 (4):1-21. 2013.
- Painful Art and the Limits of Well-Being. In Jerrold Levinson (ed.), Suffering Art Gladly. Palgrave/ Macmillan 2013.
- Reply to Elliott: In Defense of the Good Cause Account. Film and Philosophy 17:47-57. 2013.
- To Be or Never to Have Been: Anti-Natalism and a Life Worth Living. Ethical Theory and Moral Practice (4):1-19. 2013.
- The Good Cause Account of the Meaning of Life. Southern Journal of Philosophy 51 (4):536-562. 2013.
- The Salacious and the Satirical: In Defense of Symmetric Comic Moralism. Journal of Aesthetic Education 47 (4):45-62. 2013.
- It's a Wonderful Life: Pottersville and the Meaning of Life. Film and Philosophy 16 (1):15-33. 2012.
- Less Good but Not Bad: In Defense of Epicureanism About Death. Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 93 (2):197-227. 2012.
- Popular Art. In The Continuum Companion to Aesthetics. Continuum 2012.
- The Power to Make Others Worship. Religious Studies 48 (2):221 - 237. 2012.
- Grounding Moralism: Moral Flaws and Aesthetic Properties. Journal of Aesthetic Education 45 (4):34-53. 2011.
- Immortality and Significance. Philosophy and Literature 35 (1):134-149. 2011.
- Rubber Ring: Why Do We Listen to Sad Songs? In John Gibson & Noel Carroll (eds.), Narrative, Emotion, and Insight. Penn State UP 131. 2011.
- The Feels Good Theory of Pleasure. Philosophical Studies 155 (2):241-265. 2011.
- 'Pickman's Model': Horror and the Objective Purport of Photographs. Revue Internationale de Philosophie 4:487-509. 2010.
- The Ethics of Humor: Can Your Sense of Humor Be Wrong? Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 13 (3):333-47. 2010.
- The Ethics of Humor: Can Your Sense of Humor Be Wrong? Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 13 (3):333-347. 2010.
- The Ghost is the Thing: Can Fiction Reveal Audience Belief? Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1):219-239. 2010.
- Art and Negative Affect. Philosophy Compass 4 (1):39-55. 2009.
- Do Moral Flaws Enhance Amusement? American Philosophical Quarterly 46 (2):151-163. 2009.
- Film as Philosophy: In Defense of a Bold Thesis. Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 67 (3):409-420. 2009.
- Story Identity and Story Type. Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 67 (1):5-14. 2009.
- The Paradox of Suspense. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy 2009 (6.1):1-15. 2009.
- What is Interactivity? Journal of Aesthetic Education 43 (4):pp. 53-73. 2009.
- Horror. In Paisley Livingston & Carl Plantinga (eds.), Routledge Companion to Philosophy and Film. 2008.
- The Desire-Frustration Theory of Suspense. Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 66 (3):281-291. 2008.
- 'The Little People': Power and the Worshipable. In Lester Hunt & Noel Carroll (eds.), The Twilight Zone and Philosophy. Blackwell 2008.
- Wings of Desire: Reflections on the Tedium of Immortality. Film and Philosophy 13 (1):137-151. 2008.
- Review: Hitchcock as Philosopher by Yanal, Robert J. Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 65 (3):339–341. 2007.
- The Joke is the Thing: 'In the Company of Men' and the Ethics of Humor. Film and Philosophy 11 (1):49-66. 2007.
- The Paradox of Painful Art. Journal of Aesthetic Education 41 (3):59-77. 2007.
- Humor. Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 2006.
- V. F. Perkins' Functional Credibility and the Problem of Imaginative Resistance. Film and Philosophy 10 (1):85-99. 2006.
- V. F. Perkins' Functional Credibility. Film and Philosophy 10. 2006.
- Anesthetic Experience. Philosophy and Literature 29 (1):97-113. 2005.
- Are Video Games Art? Contemporary Aesthetics 2. 2005.
- Video Games and the Philosophy of Art. American Society for Aesthetics Newsletter. 2005.
- Helpless Spectators: Suspense in Videogames and Film. Text Technology 1 (1):13-34. 2004. Co-authored by Aaron Smuts & Jonathan Frome.
- Film Theory Meets Video Games: An Analysis of the Issues and Methodologies in 'ScreenPlay'. Film-Philosophy 7 (54). 2003.
- Haunting the House From Within: Disbelief, Mitigation, and Spatial Experience. In Steven Jay Schneider & Daniel Shaw (eds.), Film-Philosophy. Scarecrow Press 158--173. 2003.
- Multiple Inheritance and Film Identity: A Reply to Dilworth. Contemporary Aesthetics 1:1-3. 2003.
- Review of Simon Critchley, On Humour. Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 61 (4):414-416. 2003.
- Sympathetic Spectators: Roman Polanski's Le Locataire (The Tenant, 1976). Kinoeye 2 (3). 2002.
- The Metaphorics of Hume's Gendered Skepticism. In Anne Jaap Jacobson (ed.), Feminist Interpretations of David Hume. Penn State UP 2000.
- Devil Simulation: Why We Couldn'T, Shouldn'T, and Wouldn'T.