Robert Nozick

Key ideas

In Anarchy, State, and Utopia, Nozick argued that individuals have strong rights that limit what the state may do. Only a minimal state, protecting against force, theft and fraud, is justified. His Wilt Chamberlain example argued that free exchanges will always upset any fixed pattern of distribution, a direct challenge to John Rawls.

In the same book he asked whether you would plug into an the experience machine that gave you any experiences you wanted. If you would not, then something matters to us besides how our lives feel from the inside, a powerful objection to hedonism.

In 1969 he published the first philosophical paper on Newcomb's problem, which became a central case for decision theory. Later books ranged across personal identity, knowledge and the meaning of life, with a willingness to change his mind that he defended as a virtue.

Life, briefly

Nozick was born in Brooklyn to a family of Russian Jewish immigrants. He taught at Harvard from 1969 until his death, and was known for teaching a different course almost every year. He died of cancer at sixty-three.

Major works

• Newcomb's Problem and Two Principles of Choice (1969)
• Anarchy, State, and Utopia (1974)
• Philosophical Explanations (1981)
• The Examined Life (1989)

Further reading

• WikipediaRobert Nozick