An Ethics of the Second Person by Philip Strammer

This book reimagines the foundations of moral philosophy by centering on the ethical significance of second-personal experience—our direct, lived responsiveness to others. Philip Strammer challenges the dominance of both naturalist and transcendental traditions, arguing that neither adequately accounts for the moral depth of the I–You relation.

Drawing on Martin Buber’s dialogical philosophy and enriched by post-Wittgensteinian moral thought, the book explores conscience, remorse, and saintliness as second-personal phenomena. At its heart is the concept of lovingness—a wholehearted, unmediated openness to otherness—as the key to understanding moral meaning and the manifestation of goodness.

Through rigorous philosophical analysis and vivid phenomenological examples, Strammer offers a compelling alternative to moral theories moving within the subject-object dichotomy. This work will appeal to scholars and advanced students in ethics, phenomenology, moral psychology, and religious thought, offering a fresh and challenging perspective on what it means to live a morally responsive life with and among others.

Philip Strammer teaches at at the University of Pardubice, Czech Republic.