Event Description
In an article in the Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, “Unconditional Love, Some Implications for the Law,” I argued, provocatively, that the concept of “unconditional love” is useful for explaining why the law has certain modal features: viz., obligations to care for adult disabled children, to not abort pregnancy, to visit incarcerated kin, and to not testify in court against one's spouse. In this talk, I explore whether two recent papers related to love, one about “objectionable obligations” (Sophia Moreau, Philosophical Review, 2026) and the other about “general love” (P Quinn White, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 2025), bear on my arguments. Core philosophical perspectives in these papers are not only consonant with my claims, but further illuminate grounds for caution against baking love-based obligations into the law.
Event details: This event is open to the general public and does not require registration (but please note that our seating is limited). The event will be followed by a reception in the Piano Lounge, Graham House.
Speaker
Dr Anita L Allen is the Henry R Silverman professor of law and professor of philosophy, emerita. A graduate of Harvard Law with a PhD from the University of Michigan in Philosophy, Dr Allen is internationally renowned as an expert on philosophical and social justice dimensions of privacy and data protection law; ethics; bioethics; legal philosophy; women’s reproductive rights; and faculty advancement. She was Penn’s vice provost for faculty from 2013-20 and chaired the Provost’s Arts Advisory Council.
Dr Allen is an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine, the American Law Institute, the American Philosophical Society, and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 2018-19 she served as president of the Eastern Division of the American Philosophical Association. From 2010-17, Dr Allen served on President Obama’s Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues. She has served on the faculty of the School of Criticism and Theory at Cornell, for which she is an advisor, and served a two-year term as an associate of the Johns Hopkins Humanities Center, 2016-18.
Dr Allen’s books include Unpopular Privacy: What Must We Hide (Oxford, 2011); Privacy Law and Society (Thomson/West, 2017); The New Ethics: A Guided Tour of the 21st Century Moral Landscape (Miramax/Hyperion, 2004); Why Privacy Isn’t Everything: Feminist Reflections on Personal Accountability (Rowman & Littlefield, 2003), and Uneasy Access: Privacy of Women in a Free Society (Rowman & Littlefield, 1988).
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