Is Religion Special? Toleration, Conscience, and Exemptions from the Law
Brian Leiter, J.D., Ph.D.
University of Chicago
What is the basis for permitting exceptions to law and policy based on religious belief and practice? If there is a good reason to impose a general standard on people, why should religious believers be exempt from that standard but not others who may oppose the standard on non-religious grounds? Professor Leiter will examine various exceptions given to religious believers and ask how they are justified or not.
Brian Leiter is the Karl N. Llewellyn Professor of Jurisprudence and Director of the Center for Law, Philosophy, and Human Values at the University of Chicago Law School. He is the author of Why Tolerate Religion? (Princeton, 2012), Naturalizing Jurisprudence: Essays on American Legal Realism and Naturalism in Legal Philosophy (Oxford, 2007), and the Routledge Guide to Nietzsche on Morality (2002), He also keeps the widely regarded “Leiter Reports: A Philosophy Blog.”
4 pm, Wed. January 15, 2014
College of Medicine Research Bldg Room 8175
909 S. Wolcott St.
Professor Leiter’s talk is supported by the Traub-Byfield gift to the College of Medicine to support ethics education. For further information or to request an accommodation, please contact Professor Timothy F. Murphy at tmurphy@uic.edu or 312.996.3595.
