Fred Feldman

His books include Doing the Best We Can (Kluwer, 1986), Confrontations with the Reaper (Oxford, 1992), Pleasure and the Good Life (Oxford, 2004), and What is This Thing Called Happiness? (Oxford, 2010). He has written a number of journal articles on metaphysics, deontic logic, theory of intrinsic value, theory of personal welfare, hedonist philosophy, morally right action, and death. He received a National Endowment for the Humanities fellowship for spring 2008 to work on a new book on happiness.

Fred Feldman (born Newark, New Jersey, 1941) is an American philosopher who specializes in ethical theory. He is professor emeritus of philosophy at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where he taught from 1969 until his retirement in 2013. His research primarily focuses on normative ethics, metaethics, the nature of happiness, and justice. He has long been fascinated by philosophical problems about the nature and value of death. He received a NEH research fellowship for the academic year of 2008/09; he received a Conti Faculty research fellowship for the academic year of 2013/14.

Feldman was born in 1941 and grew up in Maplewood, New Jersey, where he graduated in 1959 from Columbia High School. After graduating from Bard College in 1963, he received a master's degree from Harpur College, SUNY (now SUNY Binghamton) in 1965. Feldman received his PhD degree in philosophy from Brown University, where he studied under Roderick Chisholm. His doctoral dissertation concerned the metaphysics of identity. He is emeritus professor of philosophy at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where he spent almost his entire academic career.