Remy Debes is Professor of Philosophy and Catherine and Charles Freeburg Professor in the Humanties (for 2026-29), and Editor of The Southern Journal of Philosophy. He specializes in contemporary ethics and the history of moral and political philosophy, especially the Enlightenment figures David Hume and Adam Smith. Across both areas of interest, his research centers around questions of human dignity, respect, empathy, emotions, and moral psychology.
His recent book, The Possibility of Respect: Human Dignity and the Ethics of Difference, was published with Oxford University Press in late 2025 (more ). He is currently at work co-editing a volume on Adam Smith in the Routledge Philosophical Minds series, titled, The Smithian Mind (expected 2027).
You can learn more about his work through his personal website .
Links to his work can also be found on his Academia webpage .
BIO
After earning a B.A. at Boston University, Prof. Debes completed his PhD in Philosophy at the University of Michigan, where he won awards for his teaching and dissertation work, including a Charlotte Newcombe Fellowship in 2005-06. He joined the faculty at 蜜桃导航 in 2006. He served as Director of Undergraduate Studies from 2008-2011, receiving the Dean's Award for Excellence in Advising in 2011. He held this position again from 2013-2016.
In 2015 Prof Debes was invited to join the President's Research Vision Committee to help steer the University of 蜜桃导航 towards its eventually successful goal of becoming an R1 institution. And from 2019-2020, he served on the university's inaugural Research Council. In 2019-20 he served as the Co-Chair (together with Kate Schaffzin, then Dean of Law) of a Presidential Steering Committee to create a new project-based learning middle school at the University of 蜜桃导航. 鈥淯niversity Middle鈥� opened in the Fall of 2019 and has since garnered multiple awards for its innovation and success.
In 2019 Prof. Debes was appointed Chair of Philosophy, stepping down in 2024. Since 2017 Prof. Debes has served as Editor of The Southern Journal of Philosophy (excepting his sabbatical year 2023-204). In 2025-26 he served as Chair of the Provost鈥檚 AI & Pedagogy one-year task force, and in the fall of 2026 he was appointed as Chair of the university鈥檚 new standing AI Steering Committee.
From 2008-2014 Prof. Debes was Secretary and Treasurer to the International Adam Smith Society and he currently sits on the Editorial Board for the Journal of Scottish Philosophy. He has directed or co-directed more than dozen conferences including 鈥淓arly Modern Social Justice,鈥� 鈥淧erfecting Liberty: Utopia and Dystopia in Philosophy and Fiction鈥� (with Charles Griswold), 鈥淭he Scottish Tradition: Explaining its Rise, Understanding its Legacy鈥� (with James Harris), and 鈥淓mpathy and Ethics.鈥�
In 2014 Prof. Debes was the recipient of a 72K grant from the Templeton Foundation for his project, 鈥淯nderstanding as a Form of Respect,鈥� which supported a year long sabbatical. In 2019, he was on teaching leave as a Freeburg Fellow at the Marcus Orr Center for the Humanities. He spent 2024-2025 on a research sabbatical finishing The Possibility of Respect. In the Fall of 2026 he was named the Catherine and Charles Freeburg Professor of Humanities (for the term 2026-29)
His work was featured on the Blog of the American Philosophical Association, which you can read , and has been the focus of a few recent podcasts, which you can learn more about . He has also written the public essays, for Aeon; and for Adam Smith Works.
At the undergraduate level, Prof. Debes teaches Introduction to Philosophy, Ethical Theory, Contemporary Moral Problems, and the Philosophy of Law. He has run graduate seminars on Respect, Human Dignity, Agency and Emotions, Empathy, 17th Century Ethics, Elightenment Sentimentalism, Hume, Smith, and, together with Michael Monahan, 鈥淪mith, Hegel, Marx.鈥�
In 2009 he was named an Alumni Distinguished Teacher, one of four faculty members university-wide to receive this recognition. He was recognized with this award again in 2019. He was recognized in 2010 with the College of Arts and Sciences Excellence in Teaching Award. And in 2024 he was recognized with a GSA award for excellence in graduate advising (more here).
Selected Publications
鈥凄颈驳苍颈迟测.鈥�&苍产蝉辫;.
鈥淎dam Smith, Political Stability, and the Pull of Sympathy.鈥� In The Empathetic Emotions in the History of Philosophy, Eds. Keith Ansell-Pearson and David James. (Oxford University Press, 2025).
鈥淎 Place for Animals? Rethinking the History of Human Dignity.鈥� In Animal Dignity: Philosophical Reflections on Non-Human Existence, Ed. Melanie Challenger. (London: Bloomsbury Press, 2023).
"Hume on Personal Merit: Virtue, Talent, and the Import of Appendix 4." In Reading Hume on the Principles of Morals. Ed. by Jacqueline Taylor. (Oxford University Press, 2020).
Editor, Dignity: A History, part of the Oxford Philosophical Concept series (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017).
"Understanding Persons and the Problem of Power." In Making Sense of the World: New Essays in the Philosophy of Understanding, Ed. Stephen Grimm (New York: Oxford University Press, forthcoming, October 2017).
"Empathy and mirror neurons." In, Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Empathy, Ed. Heidi Maibom. (Routledge, 2017) 54-63.
"From Einf眉hlung to Empathy: Sympathy in Early Phenomenology and Psychology." In Sympathy: A History, Ed. Eric Schliesser. Part of the new Oxford Philosophical Concepts series. (Oxford University Press, 2015).
"Adam Smith on Dignity and Equality," British Journal for the History of Philosophy, 20:1 (2012): 109-140.
Recent & Upcoming Events
鈥淭he Possibility of Respect: Author Meets Critics,鈥� St. Andrews, Scotland, March 2026
鈥淒ignity Needs No Apology,鈥� Utah Valley, November 2026
鈥淎dam Smith鈥檚 Commerical Man,鈥� Stevenson Forum in Political Philosophy, University of Glascow, Janurary 2027
鈥淭he Possibility of Respect: Author Meets Critics,鈥� APA Central Division Meeting, Denver, Feburary 2027