Mara van der Lugt

An intellectual history of the philosophers who grappled with the problem of evil, and the case for why pessimism still holds moral value for us today. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, philosophers engaged in heated debates on how God could have allowed evil and suffering in a creation that is supposedly good. Dark Matters traces how the competing philosophical...

Why 'hopeful pessimism' is not a contradiction in terms but a powerful source of moral and political commitment The climate debate is rife with calls for optimism. While temperatures rise and disasters intensify, we are asked to maintain optimism and hope, as if the real threat is pessimism and despair. In this erudite and engaging book, Mara van der Lugt...

An investigation of what it means to have children morally, philosophically and emotionally. ‘Do you want to have children?’ is a question we routinely ask each other. But what does it mean to create a child? Is this decision always justified? Does anyone really have the moral right to create another person? In Begetting, Mara van der Lugt attempts to...