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EvansD

Professor J. David G. Evans

Professor of Logic and Metaphysics
(PhD Cambridge)

Contact Details
email: jdg.evans@qub.ac.uk
Curriculum Vitae / List of publications

Teaching Areas

My teaching was in ancient philosophy (Plato and Aristotle), history of modern philosophy (especially Descartes, Locke and Kant), and extensive material in the introductory philosophy courses. In earlier periods I taught moral philosophy, logic, Frege and Brentano.

Research Interests

My main research areas and publications have been on Plato, Aristotle, Kant, moral philosophy, and teaching philosophy. I would characterise myself as an analytic historian of philosophy; I bring the apparatus of full scholarly rigour to material in the history of philosophy and also assess the contribution which such material can make to contemporary philosophical debate. In recent years I have been an expert consultant for UNESCO on teaching introductory philosophy in Africa and on philosophy for children.

Recent/Selected Publications

  • ‘Reason and Violence: arguments from force’, Philosophy 80 (2005), 267-77.
  • ‘Value Pluralism: the contribution of Aristotle EN 5’, in W.L.McBride (ed.), The Idea of Values (Bowling Green: Philosophy Documentation Centre, 2003), pp.39-46.
  • ‘Aristotle on techne’, in G.Hottois & P.Chabot (edd.), Les philosophes et la technique (Paris: Vrin, 2003), pp.37-47.
  • ‘“Beyond Reality”: Plato’s Good revisited’, in A.O’Hear (ed.), Philosophy: the good, the true and the beautiful (Cambridge University Press, 2000), pp.105-18.
  • ‘Kant’s analysis of the Paralogism of Rational Psychology in Critique of Pure Reason Edition B’, Kantian Review 3 (1999), 99-105.

Education and Career

  • 1955-60           St Edwards School, Oxford.
  • 1959                Open Scholarship in Classics, Queens' College, Cambridge.
  • 1960-3             Cambridge University, Classical Tripos Parts 1 and 2, Class 1.
  • 1963-64           Cambridge University, Craven Student.
  • 1964-65           Research Fellow, Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge.
  • 1965-78           Official Fellow and Lecturer, Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge.
  • 1972-73           Visiting Professor, Philosophy Department, Duke University, USA.
  • 1978-present    Professor of Logic and Metaphysics, Queen's University, Belfast.
  • 1978-92           Head of Philosophy Department, Queen's University, Belfast.
  • 1986-89           Dean of the Faculty of Arts, Queen's University, Belfast.
  • 1987-1995       Director of the School of Philosophical and Anthropological Studies
  • 1993-2003       Chair, Postgraduate Research Committee
  • 2004-present    Chair, University Research Ethics Committee

Professional Committees

  • Steering Committee, International Federation of Philosophical Societies (FISP): elected  1988  for 10 years;  reelected  1998 for 5 years; coopted 2003 for further 5 years.
  • UK Funding Councils for Higher Eduation - Research Assessment Exercise: Philosophy panel member  1995/6;  Philosophy panel chairman  1999/2001
  • UK National Committee for Philosophy: member  1992-2003;  chairman  1994-8.
  • British Philosophical Association  executive committee: member 2003-5
  • National Committee for Philosophy, Royal Irish Academy:  member  1979-present; chairman  1984-88;  acting chairman  1982/3, 1992/3.
  • Royal Institute of Philosophy  member of the Council and Executive Committee  1990-present   chairman of the Belfast Branch  1989-present
  • Aristotelian Society member of the Executive Committee  1998-2001
  • Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education: Philosophy benchmarking group member 1999/2000
  • Association Internationale des Professeurs de Philosophie Member of bureau centrale  2000-present
  • Arts Council of Northern Ireland member of the Board  1991-4.
  • Northern Ireland Schools Examination Council member  1987-90.
  • Strand Primary School, Belfast governor 2002-present

Invited lectures

  • 1973  University of Oklahoma (Norman); University of California (Berkeley); International Society for the Philosophy of Religion (Charleston, South Carolina); University ofAlabama (Birmingham); Universiy of Louisiana (New Orleans); University of Georgia (Athens).
  • 1976  Durham University; Liverpool University.
  • 1979  New University of Ulster (Coleraine); Ulster Polytechnic (Jordanstown); Irish Philosophical Club (Ballymscanlon).
  • 1981  University College, Cork; Royal Irish Academy Classics Conference (Dublin).
  • 1983  Trinity College, Dublin; Hibernian Hellenists (Ballymascanlon).
  • 1985  Royal Irish Academy Philosophy Conference (Dublin).
  • 1988  University of Kiel; University of Bologna; World Congress of Philosophy (Brighton).
  • 1989  Universities of Padova, Trieste; Hacettepe University (Ankara); Universities of Tel Aviv, Haifa, Hebrew University (Jerusalem), Bar Ilan University; Irish Philosophical Society (Limerick).
  • 1990  Universities of South Carolina (Columbia), Florida (Gainesville), Maryland (College Park), Toledo (Ohio), Notre Dame (Indiana); Universities of Calgary, Lethbridge (Alberta); Universities of Hebei (Baoding), Wuhan, Fudan (Shanghai), Guizhou (Guiyang); Universities of Bonn, Greifswald, Berlin (Humboldt); Beijing Academy of Social Sciences; Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences; Czechoslovak Academy Of Sciences (Prague).
  • 1991  Hungarian Academy of Sciences (Budapest); Eötvös Loránd University (Budapest); Müszaki University (Budapest); Kossuth Lajos University (Debrecen); Janos Pannonius University (Pécs); Royal Irish Academy Philosophy Conference (Dublin); World Conference of Philosophy (Nairobi).
  • 1992  Société Sénégalaise de Philosophie (Cheikh Anta Diop University, Dakar); University College, Galway; Hacettepe University (Ankara), Middle East Technical University (Ankara), Bogazici University (Istanbul), Uludag University (Bursa), Çukurova University (Adana); Seoul National University (Korea); Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (Belgium).
  • 1993  Eötvös Loránd University (Budapest), Miskolc University (Hungary); World Congress of Philosophy (Moscow); Società Filosofica Italiana, Treviso (Italy).
  • 1994  Kossuth Lajos University (Debrecen); Institut Internationale de Philosophie, Kyoto (Japan).
  • 1995  Royal Institute of Philosophy Conference (Coleraine); University of Crete (Rethymno); University College, Dublin.
  • 1996  University of Kent, Canterbury; Islamic University of Gaza (Palestine); Scuola Normale Superiore (Pisa), Universities of Pisa, Venezia, Padova (Italy); Joint Session of Mind Association and Aristotelian Society, Dublin; Istituto Banfi, Reggio Emilia (Italy); UNESCO conference, Sofia (Bulgaria).
  • 1997  Silesian University, Katowice; Jagellonian University, Kraków; Catholic University of Lublin; University of Wroclaw; University of Torun; Insitute of Philosophy, Polish Academy of Sciences; University of Wales Cardiff; International World Congress for Non-Violence (ASEVICO), Dublin; Philosophical Society of Turkey, Göreme; N.U.I., Maynooth.
  • 1998  Paris, UNESCO meeting of experts; Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (Belgium); World Congress of Philosophy (Boston); London, Royal Institute of Philosophy.
  • 1999 Yamoussukro (Côte d’Ivoire), UNESCO meeting of experts; South Africa, Universities of Pretoria and Cape Town; Athens (Greece), 3rd International Conference on Aristotle; Naples (Italy), Istituto Internazionale per gli Studi Filosofici; Edinburgh University.
  • 2000 University of Bradford; International Philosophy Olympiads (Münster, Germany); Joint Session of Mind Association and Aristotelian Society, Sheffield; AIPPh, 15th International Congress (Bad Godesberg, Germany)
  • 2001 Paris, UNESCO meeting of experts; Université de Fribourg, Switzerland; Université de Lyon, France; Athens (Greece), 3rd International Conference on Aristotle.
  • 2002 Kossuth Lajos University (Debrecen); Université Libre, Bruxelles; Institute of Philosophy, Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing; Danish Pedagogical University (Copenhagen).
  • 2003 31st Conference on Value Inquiry (Grand Forks, North Dakota); Venezia University, Italy; Debrecen University, Hungary; Joint Session of the Aristotelian Society & the Mind Association, Belfast; 21st World Congress of Philosophy, Istanbul; AIPPh International Conference (Bonn-Bad Godesberg); Wittgenstein Symposium (Dublin); Bolton Institute of Higher Education.
  • 2004 Danish Pedagogical University (Copenhagen); Katholieke Universiteit, Leuven.
  • 2005 University of Helsinki.
  • 2006 Cheikh Anta Diop University (Dakar, Sénégal); ); Vietnamese Academy of Social Sciences (Hanoi); Immanuel Kant State University of Russia (Kaliningrad); Université de Fribourg, Switzerland.
  • 2007 AIPPh, meeting of experts (Minden, Germany)