Biography
Nicholas Makins works on the Philosophy & Medicine Project, a joint venture between King’s Philosophy and the Peter Sowerby Foundation. He completed a PhD in Philosophy at the London School of Economics and Political Science, with a thesis entitled Moral Doubt, Meta-ethics, and Choice.
Prior to this, Nick obtained an MBBS in Medicine from UCL Medical School, before working as a policy advisor in the Government Office for Science. He also completed a BSc in Biomedical Science with Psychology at UCL, and an MSc in Philosophy of Science at LSE.
Research interests and PhD supervision
- Practical rationality and decision theory
- Meta-ethics
- Philosophy of medicine
I have research interests in a range of philosophical topics, including: uncertainty and the role(s) of values in medical decision making; decisions under normative uncertainty and practical conflict, or ambivalence; the relation between preferences and reasons for action; the role of normative principles in guiding action; and the relation between norms of morality and those of rationality.
Selected publications
- Nicholas Makins (2021) “Attitudinal Ambivalence: Moral Uncertainty for Non-cognitivists”, Australasian Journal of Philosophy.
Teaching
- Philosophy of Medicine
- Moral and Political Philosophy
- Philosophy of Science
Expertise and public engagement
I was recently interviewed on the Philosophy Exchange podcast about some of my recent research: https://t.co/iC0ZanoJG9?amp=1