The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Faculty of law
Cardinal Cody Lecturer in Canon Law and Lecturer in Philosophy

Dr. David Enoch studied law and philosophy in Tel Aviv University, where he earned his B.A. and LL.B. in 1993. After completing his military service and clerking for Justice Dorit Beinisch at the Supreme Court, David turned to graduate studies in philosophy, first in Tel Aviv University, and then at the NYU Philosophy Department, where he earned his Ph.D. in May, 2003. Since the summer of 2003, David is a lecturer at the Hebrew University, on a joint appointment at the faculty of law and the philosophy department.

David works primarily in the areas of moral and political philosophy and the philosophy of law. His publications include "Once You Start Using Slippery Slope Arguments, You’re on a Very Slippery Slope", Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, 21(4) (2001), 629-647; "A Right to Violate One’s Duty", Law and Philosophy 21 (2002), 355-384; "How Noncognitivists Can Avoid Wishful Thinking", The Southern Journal of Philosophy 41 (4) (Winter, 2003), 527-545; "Some Arguments against Conscientious Objection and Civil Disobedience Refuted", 36 Israel Law Review (2002) (published in 2004), 227-253; "Meaning and Justification: The Case of Modus Ponens" (co-authored with Joshua Schechter), forthcoming in Noûs; "Why Idealize?", Ethics 115(4), 759-787; "Epistemicism and Nihilism about Vagueness: What's the Difference?", forthcoming in Philosophical Studies and "Agency, Shmagency: Why Normativity Won't Come from What Is Constitutive of Action", forthcoming in The Philosophical Review.

David’s doctoral thesis (entitled "An Argument for Robust Metanormative Realism") is a defense of the view according to which there are irreducibly normative truths that are perfectly objective and universal.

David’s current projects include the development of the doctoral thesis into a book (and several related papers), as well as some research regarding the neutrality of the state, the relations between metaethics and political philosophy, and epistemology.

In 2004-5 David teaches the course "Ethics, Political Philosophy and the Law" and the seminar "Political Philosophy and the Law" (with Professor Alon Harel) (in the Faculty of Law), and the course "Liberalism and the Neutrality of the State" and the seminar "Topics in Moral Philosophy" (in the philosophy department).

Email:denoch@mscc.huji.ac.il