John Passmore

John Arthur Passmore AC FAHA (9 September 1914 – 25 July 2004) was an Australian philosopher and historian of ideas. Born in Manly, Sydney, he was educated at Sydney Boys High School and the University of Sydney, where he graduated with first-class honours in English literature and philosophy. He initially trained to be a secondary-school teacher but was drawn to philosophy. He taught at the University of Sydney from 1934 to 1949 before studying at the University of London. From 1950 to 1955, he was the first professor of philosophy at the University of Otago in New Zealand. He spent a year at the University of Oxford in 1955 before returning to Australia to join the Australian National University in 1958, where he was professor of philosophy until 1979. He was a Foundation Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities in 1969. Passmore also held visiting professorships and lectured internationally. He served as a director and governor of the Australian Elizabethan Theatre Trust. In 1994, he was appointed a Companion of the Order of Australia. Passmore died on 25 July 2004, survived by his wife and two daughters. His scholarship paid careful attention to the historical context of philosophical problems. In his influential book *Man's Responsibility for Nature* (1974), he argued for a changed attitude towards the environment and against unconstrained exploitation of the biosphere. However, he rejected deep ecologists' views, finding them misguided mysticism or irrationalism, and was skeptical of attributing intrinsic value to nature, preferring an anthropocentric view that valued nature for its contribution to sentient creatures' flourishing. He described himself as a "pessimistic humanist," believing neither humans nor societies were perfectible.